A popularly held notion mistakes publication for science; in other words – it is science in alchemy mode. 'I am a scientist and I synthesized A from B. I don't need to describe how, in detail. If you can see that A could have synthesized B without needing explanations, that would prove you are a scientist. If you are not a scientist, why would you need to see my methods anyway?'
It is easy to see why such parochialism and close-mindedness was jettisoned. Good science does not waste time describing every known step or in pedantry. Poor science tries to hide its flaws in stunted description, masquerading as the terseness of scholarly parlance. Curiously, it is often the more spectacular results that are accompanied by this technique. As a result, rationalizations to not provide data or method take on the same form – 'my descriptions may be sketchy but you cannot replicate my experiment, because, you are just notgood enough to understand the science, or follow the same trail'.
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