Since the previous post was apparently unclear (I've reviewed and don't see how) I'll expand and clarify. I'm not interested in finding you or tracking you to get you in trouble, or in any way finding out who you are. For my purposes in understanding the role of the
anonymous internet in shaping public opinion who you are is irrelevant unless you bring it into the discussion; and even then *only* what you bring into the discussion is of interest.
Why you do what you do and make the choices you make, however, is of great interest to me.
In light of your stated goals of bringing accuracy to the discussion, for you, validating the authority you are claiming would seem to make sense unless there is a specific reason to not do that. That leads me to this:
If you are, in fact, on staff at a National Lab as you claim;
and since you make that claim as an appeal to authority;
And since you assert that you are proud of what you post because it is accurate;
why would you not participate with your actual name and affiliation in the public realm?I would if that were my circumstance.
For example, in my case I joined DU to discuss the Iraq War, and moved to EE to do research on the public discussion around energy and where I have been following a specific research protocol that requires me to adhere to the prevailing norms of this community (ie 99.99999% are anonymous). Since my credentials would assist in establishing the legitimacy of my views regarding energy , and since I do not misrepresent data nor make false claims;
I find anonymity to be a decided limitation to establishing the validity of my positions. If my primary goal were to win arguments instead of to observe debate among a community of equals, then I would probably have long ago used professional authority to support the opinions I put forth.
I have to presume that you have no such research protocol requiring you to keep your identity secret.
That leads to several possible conclusions:
1) you are not who/what you say
2) you are who you say and you are unaware of the role of ethics in your implied profession and/or the distinction between legal and social sanctions for violating those ethics.
3) you are who you say and are aware that your actions here (what you post and how you relate) require a firewall between this realm and your professional realm because it would result in trouble for you if the posts were linked to your professional identity.
My questions to you in the deleted post were aimed to identify whether it was one, two or three.
Frankly #2 is an almost inconceivable option, leaving either one or three.
Whatever it is, you can rest assured your personal life is not of interest to me.
What you do and say here, however, is. And your actions are not those a reputable scientist would want associated with their name.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=284964&mesg_id=285370http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=282854&mesg_id=284289http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=280296&mesg_id=280296