"Kim Stanley Robinson - Forty Signs of Rain" - читать интересную книгу автора (Robinson Kim Stanley)

Anna nodded. Editing a journal was a privilege and an honor, even though usually unpaid—indeed, one
often had to continue to subscribe to a journal just to get copies of what one had edited. It was another
of science’s many noncompensated activities, part of its extensive economy of social credit.

“Okay,” Anna said. “I just wanted to see if we could tempt you. That’s how we do it, you know. When
visitors come through who are particularly good, we try to hold on to them.”

“Yes, of course.” Frank nodded uncomfortably. Touched despite himself; he valued her opinion. He
rolled his chair toward his screen as if to get to work, and she turned and left.

He clicked to the jacket Anna had forwarded. Immediately he recognized one of the investigators’
names.

“Hey Anna?” he called out.

“Yes?” She reappeared in the doorway.

“I know one of the guys on this jacket. The P.I. is a guy from Caltech, but the real work is by one of his
students.”
“Yes?” This was a typical situation, a younger scientist using the prestige of his or her advisor to advance
a project.

“Well, I know the student. I was the outside member on his dissertation committee, a few years ago.”

“That wouldn’t be enough to be a conflict.”

Frank nodded as he read on. “But he’s also been working on a temporary contract at Torrey Pines
Generique, which is a company in San Diego that I helped start.”

“Ah. Do you still have any financial stake in it?”

“No. Well, my stocks are in a blind trust for the year I’m here, so I can’t be positive, but I don’t think
so.”

“But you’re not on the board, or a consultant?”

“No no. And it looks like his contract there was due to be over about now anyway.”

“That’s fine, then. Go for it.”

No part of the scientific community could afford to betoo picky about conflicts of interest. If they were,
they’d never find anyone free to peer-review anything; hyperspecialization made every field so small that
within them, everyone seemed to know everyone. Because of that, so long as there were no current
financial or institutional ties with a person, it was considered okay to proceed to evaluate their work in
the various peer-review systems.

But Frank had wanted to make sure. Yann Pierzinski had been a very sharp young
biomathematician—he was one of those doctoral students whom one watched with the near certainty that
one would hear from them again later in their career. Now here he was, with something Frank was
particularly interested in.