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How we started

As a scientist - or while reading this, likely as a dissident scientist - there is an eventual realisation that mainstream science, research, or even publications do not provide the avenues to conduct research off the fringes of mainstream science. This is understandable because high standards must be maintained. However, to look beyond the horizon, one cannot expect to find help in the usual places.

How we got here

While platforms such as Academia and ResearchGate and (etc.) ... genuinely foster collaboration, what sometimes happens is that they become advertising boards for people trying to promote their own scientific ideas - especially in the case where ideas are off the beaten track. Even there, it seems those with the loudest voices and largest budgets get the biggest following. Good ideas get lost in the noise. The aethercollaboration.org was formed to create a group that can focus on one task, and shut out other noises while doing so.

WHY?

Anyone and everyone who have tried to show off their findings in aether research are most frequently met by a phrase that goes something like this:


"That's nice, but have you looked at my ideas?"


Which means there was likely only a cursory glance of one's work, which then turns out to be too complicated or too radical or too different for the other person's liking, and the 'glance' remains a cursory one. Even if a deeper reading is done, the first contradiction or error encountered  becomes the 'aha, this is wrong' moment where the paper gets tossed into a corner. In reality some works are complex or lengthy and cannot just be evaluated in a public online discussion.


We're trying to change that, because maybe nobody has a fully working aether model that everyone can understand and use, but some of us have something to add which we thought important enough to write a paper about. We need to dig down, find all those nuggets, and put them together into a cohesive aether model. If there is no formal review to be found out there for aether research, we shall create our own right here.


It's not going to be anybody's model ... it's going to be everybody's model.

Our Mission and Our Method

AETHER EXISTS.

That is our fundamental statement.


Then follows the work:

(this list is dynamic and changes every time we think about the task at hand, but it gives an idea what the plan is)


Define the aether and search for proof.

  • Collect, score and journal aether related papers.
  • Foster a collaboration between authors.
  • Work toward the ultimate functional aether model.
  • Create standards for aether-related terms.
  • Propose experiments and set out to find proof.


    • Phase 1: Foundation Building

    • Set up aethercollaboration.org with its core mission, goals, and a public website.
    • Form a collection of 20+ aether-related papers from existing public sources across the internet.


    Phase 2: Rubric Validation & Review

    • Perform an initial scoring of the papers using AI. AI will score paper structure and content from separate rubrics.
    • Include an initial human review of content to compare the AI's scores to the subset of papers.
    • Based on human feedback, continuously refine the AI and human score rubrics to ensure it accurately scores based on paper quality and content for a range of papers.
    • Subscribe to an advanced AI with science capabilities. Rescore all papers with AI using the validated rubric. 






    Phase 3: Public Engagement & Collaboration

    • Actively seek volunteers for administration while continuing to search for authors to submit and peer review other newly added papers.
    • Post the 20+ collection of reviewed papers and their final scores on the website, sorted by score.
    • Post the rubrics on the site for existing and future authors to test their papers against. Create a forum on the website (or e.g.Github) for discussions of reviews.
    • Notify all authors of their posted papers and scores, and formally invite them to comment on the system and scoring. This may be for authors to improve on their papers, new authors wanting to be listed, or even authors suggesting improvements to the standard rubric. Allow authors to have their papers withdrawn.
    • Keep adding more papers from public sources on the web.
    • Invite authors to submit new papers or revised versions for continuing rounds of AI-assisted and human scoring. Formally introduce the condition that submitting authors must add reviews to 2-3 existing papers. Points are awarded for reviews and ‘x’ points needed to submit a new paper.


    Phase 4: Advanced Collaboration

    • Facilitate the creation of a set of "master" collaborative aether papers, possibly using a tool like GitHub, by bringing together authors from the collaboration. By now there should be a committee of moderators in place to manage this.
    • Set up working groups with focused aether projects.
    • Formalize the group's theoretical model(s).


    Phase 5: Future Vision

    • Register as a formal journal with ISSN.
    • Consider adding author presentations (video) to the collections.
    • Develop experimental proposals and pursue viable experiments. 
    • Search for funding if required for projects or experiments.

    Notice

    • We are looking for evidence of aether beyond the fringes of accepted science. The answer is unlikely to be displayed on a billboard, but we might find it under a strange-looking rock. Right now we are not even asking the right questions. There will be good papers and bad papers. We publish all of them and review all of them!
    • We accept published or unreviewed papers and review it here. Reviews and scores are offered as constructive criticism so we can work toward a common goal.
    •  Publication and review of a paper on this site does not constitute an endorsement of author, concept or content, nor is it ever intended to degrade or ridicule any author, concept or content. 
    • In case of a bad score or review, we would recommend to rather submit a revised paper, but any author may request for their papers to be removed if they feel it is not getting a fair exposure or review. 
    • All work is done by volunteers and we are about 100 papers behind on listing and review. Still, send us your unlisted work or a link to view it and we shall add it to our list.

    Our collaborators

    Administration, author or reviewer. Your services are required.

    Admin

    Website, membership, AI and human rubrics require frequent attention. With growing membership, discussion platforms need to be set up and collaborations need to be managed.

    Scoring

    Refining the rubrics and consistently applying it to score aether related papers.  Scores are set by AI and human peer review.

    Authors

    New authors are required to use the standard rubric to review and score existing papers before they may submit their own. This complements and provides a check against the initial AI scores.