Repost: Summary statement tea leaves

SciMonkbling Evil Monkey has a post up at Neurotopia (Version 2.0) in which he rails against idiot reviewer comments found in the summary statements. These latter are the written critiques provided by the three (typically) reviewers assigned to a NIH grant application. Applicant complaints about such comments are rampant and YHN as ranted about many such comments in his day. Nevertheless, writing and reading many such summary statements while serving on a study section has provided me with a great deal of additional context that was not obvious to me from my previous experience as only an applicant.
First, go read Evil Monkey’s post and chime in with your favorite idiot reviewer comments. Then come back over here and read the following thought I posted over at the old blog a year ago.

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Now that we’re past the new-R01 deadline and heading for the revised-R01 deadline it is time to talk summary statements. Out they come and we start perusing them for clues as to how to revise so as to improve our score. Frequently, one starts tearing one’s hair when it seems that the reviews cannot have been done by anyone 1) with a brain, 2) familiar with the science or 3) who actually read the grant.

Surgeon Commits Battery On Patients

Apparently, a surgeon has been committing battery on his patients by applying temporary tattoos to their bodies while they are unconscious during surgery. Given the way physicians are trained to believe they are gods who function on a practical and ethical plane that is above mere mortals, this kind of shit doesn’t surprise me one bit.
From a legal standpoint, this is clearly battery, as these patients gave informed consent to a particular operation, and not to having temporary tattoos placed on their bodies while unconscious. It is battery in exactly the same way it would be battery if you put a temporary tattoo on the body of a stranger asleep at the beach.
For more discussion, see my and Lauren’s posts at Feministe.