Email from a Nobel Laureate - Randy Schekman @eLife

#eLife #nobelprize #publishing #science #Facebook

Yesterday I got a (second) email from Randy Schekman, who will be awarded with the Nobel today. Please find below his mail and my reply:

Hello Philipp –

When I accept the Nobel Prize tomorrow with Jim Rothman and Tom Südhof it will be a proud moment to mark three decades of work in cellular transport, and the contributions of the numerous colleagues who we have been fortunate enough to work with over those years. It will also be an opportunity to highlight the work we’re all doing to improve and advance the conduct of science itself.

Access to public higher education and the published outputs of science are two issues that I care very deeply about so, while I have this unique opportunity, I'd like to invite you to share your views on these and other key topics in science. Do you agree that the cost of education has become an impediment in the U.S.? Do you agree that traditional publishing processes need to change? How and why?

Join me in an online conversation throughout the week, and help me ask as many brilliant minds as possible to participate.

http://www.elifesciences.org/crm/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=817&qid=422177

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And, be sure to follow eLife on Facebook and Twitter for updates from tomorrow’s ceremony.

Randy

Randy Schekman

HHMI Investigator

Editor-in-Chief, eLife

Dept. of Mol. and Cell Biology

Li Ka Shing Center

UC Berkeley

Berkeley, CA 94720-3370

Hello Randy,

many thanks for your email. I would think that saying what you wrote in your article published in the Guardian is just about right. That hits the point. Still, I’d also say that prizes like the Nobel are a big part of the problem - at least for life sciences. This is not saying anything about your great research, I am sure you deserve the prize (of one can deserve a prize actually, but I am lacking the right word just now), but there are a whole lot of e.g. Biologists who will never be able to get any award/prize just by the fact that their research is not “sexy” enough (or has no direct merit to human health or something). Also in quite a few cases prizes are given to the lab head, when it is a team of many many people that should be awarded (and in this context see the discussion around who should be merited for the “Higgs” - and I am surely not the one to judge this, but I like what Peter says in his interviews). In this way any of these huge publicly announced awards (another one would e.g. be the German Leibnitz Preis) are part of the problem.

One remark though at the end: Sharing on Facebook‽‽‽ Randy, come on, that is about the same as Cell, Nature and Science.

All the best and have fun today!

Philipp