From: Oliver Sparrow 
Date: Fri, 18 Oct 1996 09:13:10 +0100
Organization: Royal Institute of International Affairs


The evidence is that there is no 'publication barrier', just a set of
ever-higher barriers that one has to jump in order to publish in, 
say, Science. This would matter if science (small s) consisted of a
set of logical set pieces, a sort of chess game made up of publications.
What is observed to happen is, however, that ideas grow, expand, 
slither across disciplines; and take their reinforcement from a myriad of
half truths, personal opinions, peer group consensus and falsification.
Its a social algorithm, run on a mass of parallel processors with serious
race track problems. But it works. 

In other words, I suspect that the original poster's proposal, to consider
emotional states and evolution, is an interesting one. I personally would
be concrned by the 'how' word, but if he can do it, he should. If it's useful,
it will spread; like pimples in a gymnasium.

_________________________________________________

  Oliver Sparrow
  ohgs@chatham.demon.co.uk