Denis G. Rancourt
Professor of Physics
University of Ottawa
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
26 November 2001
Marc Brodsky
(via e-mail)
CEO and
Executive Director
American
Institute of Physics
One Physics
Ellipse
College
Park, Maryland 20740
Hello Mr.
Brodsky,
Thank you
for this reply to my web request and comment.
Now I am
more concerned than initially. It seems
that AIP has interpreted a sentence from a non-AIP sponsored book in the
narrowest possible sense and that AIP does not have independent evidence of the
accusation against Jeff Schmidt. Is
there a documented history of inadequate or sub-standard performance at
work? If the employee was actually
doing this and the AIP did not notice or act to correct it, is there not a
serious problem with the AIP management?
After all, producing such a book is no small task.
Have you,
Mr. Brodsky, read the book? I have and
it seems clear to me that that sentence from the introduction should not be
taken literally. In the context of the
book as a whole, it should be interpreted in the broad sense that the employee
(author) has not put all of his creative energy into his work as our society
often demands but that he has, instead, tried to find space in his life for
independent creative activity. I
believe that most readers have and will interpret this tongue in cheek statement
of the introduction for what it is clearly intended to be: a clever and
humorous attention grabber.
Your note
has convinced me more than anything that the AIP is wrong in this affair. I am going to make a professional point of
staying away from AIP and its publications until clear evidence of correction
of this wrong by the AIP is put forth.
I am really
stunned! The AIP's position flies in
the face of common sense.
Sincerely,
Denis G.
Rancourt