Anton Howe writes a VERY long and detailed critique of the failed process of peer review in tech history. The specific paper in question deals with an obscure aspect of iron work. The writers were clearly aiming for a standard elite political goal, and the journal, following modern practice, amplified the political goal instead of accounting for the criticisms from equally qualified reviewers.
Ockham. Step back to the bigger question.
(1) Facts are irrelevant. Only skills matter. Facts are tools for creating controversy and tyranny. If an ironworker was attempting to spread a method of rolling iron that couldn’t work, the method WOULDN’T SPREAD AT ALL regardless of peer review or political connections. Other ironworkers would try it and see that nothing happens.
A shared method that DOES work will be believed because the people who can use it will try it and find it works. A good example is Yasuko’s technique for eliminating lower back pain. The problem is widespread, and the web is full of One Weird Tricks for helping. None of them work. Yasuko’s method worked instantly and decisively for me.
(2) This little controversy misses the larger purpose of polemical history, even within its own context. The sides are arguing whether a British ironmaker stole a sugarcane processing method accidentally discovered by black slaves in Jamaica. By focusing only on the blackness of the slaves, the bigger polemical argument slips by unscathed. Industrialists STEAL EVERYTHING from EVERY INVENTOR, whether black or white or male or female. The modern argument focuses on race and gender to distract us from the real questions of CLASS and WEALTH.
History should lead to lessons. The lesson here is simple. If you want to be PAID for creating, work in the development department of a business or government. Don’t expect to be paid for your independent invention, whether patented or not.
(3) Incidentally, vertical sugarcane rollers are still in use, which implies that horizontal sugarcane rollers were never practical enough to be stolen.
(4) Meta: Peer review is a method that doesn’t work at all for its alleged and pretended goal. It doesn’t relieve fact pain. Yet it continues to spread. Conclusion: It works beautifully to accomplish its REAL purpose, enforcing orthodoxy and defeating heretics.
Polistra's Mill 