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Comment by wyxuan | Hacker News Reader

Nitpick, I have a great deal for respect for Derek but he isn't a journalist (and nor does he claim to be).

It's just a column.

But that's not to say the reactions from journalists weren't critical. Adam from Stat had some choice words about the decision.

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My personal opinion: I respect the opinion of a medicinal chemist working in the field of drug discovery more than I do a journalist. The insider who works in the field understands the issues and problems of getting drugs to market more than an outsider.

In other words, it's a column by a guy who spent his career in drug discovery. Not merely a journalist.

Derek always had a well informed take, but asking scientist about a regulatory decision is like asking a engineer about a legal decision. Informed, but not an expert.

Yeah, Derek Lowe is a professional drug researcher who "moonlights" as a popular science writer.

If the other drug researchers are sticking necks out to say this is bullshit, it's pretty like that ... this is bullshit. The situation he describes that all the other companies had already failed to their useless drugs approved. Now that one useless drug slips through, all the others are going try and do that.

I'm not sure that's a useful distinction, it's not a chartered profession. Someone who writes a weekly column for money is a journalist in the way that someone who writes software for money is a programmer.

There’s a pretty big distinction in the journalism world. It’s more like saying anyone who uses a computer for work is a programmer.

Yeah, but nobody listens to the guy that calls JavaScript coders "not real programmers" because JavaScript is a 'scripting language'.

The point is, it doesn't seem like a useful distinction.

what qualifications is a journalism supposed to have? Humanities? when you write about Science having some actual experience doing science is helpful.

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