Comment from David Weiss

[200.432, 200.454, 200.461, 200.206, 200.450] To Whom it May Concern: I am a professor of physics at a large research university. I am writing in my personal capacity to oppose the proposed revisions to sections 200.432, 200.454, 200.461, 200.206, and 200.450 that would restrict typical professional expenses, curtail the communication of scientific results, and place excessive scrutiny on the activities of scientists. My professional membership in the American Physical Society has been very important in my career. It has allowed me to remain abreast of developements in my field and to publicize the work that has been done in my research group. There is one scientific conference, the DAMOP meeting, that I attend every year to retain a broad overview of the research in atomic physics. But each year I also attend from 3 to 6 other conferences to which I am invited to speak. It is difficult to know the identity of these conferences at the time of funding applications. Conferences and workshops keep researchers in a given field up-to-date about on-going work. Since the whole scientific venture is fundamentally collaborative, this is critical to progress. Sometimes conferences are designed to cross-fertilize ideas from different fields and sub-fields, and they do that. In my experience, many of the best ideas for research directions, as well as knowledge about others ideas that I can apply in my labs, come from the interactions that occur at scientific conferences. Access to the scientific literature is crucial for making efficient progress. Good ideas arise all over the world, and the scientific literature lets all scientists reap the benefits of all ideas. Advances would be exponentially slower without the sharing of ideas in the literature. There have been many times in my career where my original work has been taken up by others and extended. Some of my very best work involved extending these extensions. I publish only a few papers each year, each of which represents substantial work by me and the members of my research group. That work would have been essentially wasted were it not brought the attention of the wide scientific audience through peer-review publication. Unfettered publications are essential to the progress and health of the scientific enterprise. This rule would hamstring scientific publications from the US, dramatically decreasing the impact and effectiveness of science in the US.