Robin Neill wrote: > Peer review, judgement only by one's peers, ensures that the >person under review receives judgement from those who are setting >precedent for or against criteria that they themselves will have to >meet. Needless to say they want those criteria to be favourable to >themselves. Peer review institutionalizes a segment of the >population that controls is own court of judgement. It can generate >a lower standard (for members of the segment) or a biased >standard (favouring members of the segment). It seems to me that >both such outcomes are the consequence of peer review, generally >taken; and both are bad. The journals are powerful institutions, and any profession needs such institutions if thought is to advance. However, institutions can also protect their members from critique by narrowing the acceptable range of criticism. But since knowledge only advances by critical judgment, institutions can end up retarding knowledge; they become ossified and merely powerful mechanisms to defend an entrenched priesthood. In my opinion, institutions ought to be regarded with equal measures of deep respect and profound suspicion. Ranking the journals fall, I believe, on the profound suspicion side of the equation. John C. M?daille