Consider this an open letter to Hank, not as an act of aggression but because, hey, I'm due a blog post for today anyway.

We need a "Computational Science" section.  It's okay for stuff that relates to a science subfield to go there-- computational biology in Biology, galaxy crashing in Space, genome breaking in Medicine.  But there are some comp sci things that really belong in their own area.  Just sticking it in Culture->Technology doesn't work, because it's not about culture or stuff, but bonafide science.

This might break your Rule of Six, since each of the 6 toplevels has 6 subsections.  But already many of the pieces in Physics have comp sci leanings-- making Physics into Physics&Applied Physics would neatly separate things out and leave room for a Comp Sci category in Physical Sciences, where it belongs.

For what it's worth, I talked with an editor at Nature who noted that it's rare to have a genuine comp sci science article, rather than "a comp sci method applied to a domain".  But they exist... my earlier  "Petabyte Problem" article was in astronomy but really tackled the broader domain of handling massive data in any field.

And my latest, Autism in Computer Science, was a mix of Culture but also pure Comp Sci, in that it discussed brain topology in terms of serial vs parallel programming.  I would have split it into two articles if there were a Comp Sci section, but lacking that, I figured stick it in Culture. No point in writing on a specific area if there isn't a place to put it.

So make a Comp Sci section, and we'll write for it.


Alex, the Daytime Astronomer


Tues and Fri here, via RSS feed, and twitter @skyday
Read about my own private space venture in The Satellite Diaries