The Indian matter is important, not because of race, but because of
culture. Taleyarkhan's Indian background played into what happened because
he was caught by surprise by what happened and how things quickly spiraled
out of control. He was not accustomed to dealing with media in the way most
of them dealt with him.
On March 1, 2006 at two in the afternoon, Seth Putterman of UCLA insinuated
fraud during an in-person DARPA review at Purdue regarding Taleyarkhan's
work. About two hours later, Eugenie Samuel Reich contacted Taleyarkhan to
ask him about Putterman's insinuations.
From what I know of Taleyarkhan, his experience with media in India did
not give him any reason to expect the assault that was on the way. When
Reich made the contact with Taleyarkhan, had he been more familiar with the
culture of American and British journalism, it is my opinion that alarm
bells would have started ringing in his head and he would have raised
bloody hell; to DARPA, to UCLA, to the Nature editors and to the Purdue
Administrators. But Taleyarkhan is of Indian descent, that was not in his
nature.
Steve
