Article View: ca.environment
Article #7651Re: Cadillac Desert
From: Leon Taylor
Date: Tue, 06 Sep 1994 23:41
Date: Tue, 06 Sep 1994 23:41
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Gregory Brian Pasternack (gpast@uclink.berkeley.edu) wrote: : I am wondering if there are any *scholarly* critiques of the book : _Cadillac Desert_ by Marc Reisner. While I believe that most of his : "facts" are indeed *facts*, he takes the typical unscientific, : journalistic practice of presenting numbers with no citations.... I don't understand why a citation would render Reisner's book science. Reisner might, for instance, write that "every acre-foot mined from the Arizona aquifers cost $5.35 in foregone farm income [Smedley Whiplash, 1989]." You then must decide whether to believe the estimate because Whiplash said it -- and that isn't very satisfactory -- or to look up the Whiplash study yourself. If you look up the study, you still must decide whether you accept the way in which Whiplash arrived at his estimate. I would prefer that a writer -- journalist or scientist -- simply tell me how the estimate was derived and relegate those disruptive citations to the bibliography. Give me something that I can read; tell me what you think and why. I will decide what to believe. Regards, Leon Taylor, Economics Dept., Tulane U., New Orleans, La. 70118-5698 taylor@mailhost.tcs.tulane.edu
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X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 10607c,3b81fd602233c771 X-Google-Attributes: gid10607c,public X-Google-Thread: 10df74,3b81fd602233c771 X-Google-Attributes: gid10df74,public X-Google-Thread: fb58e,3b81fd602233c771 X-Google-Attributes: gidfb58e,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 1994-09-07 10:58:12 PST Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!nntp.gmd.de!newsserver.jvnc.net!rutgers!usc!howland.reston.ans.net!wupost!tulane!rs6.tcs.tulane.edu!taylor From: taylor@rs6.tcs.tulane.edu (Leon Taylor) Newsgroups: ca.environment,talk.environment,sci.environment Subject: Re: Cadillac Desert Followup-To: ca.environment,talk.environment,sci.environment Date: 6 Sep 1994 23:41:50 GMT Organization: Computer Science Dept., Tulane Univ., New Orleans, LA Lines: 23 Message-ID: <34iunu$94s@news.cs.tulane.edu> References: <34gr6d$cqs@agate.berkeley.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: rs6.tcs.tulane.edu X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2]