1) Because the skills required to be a good distiller are very similar to the skills required to be a good researcher, most people who'd become good distillers become good researchers instead for status/impact/etc reasons. However, a good-not-great distillation could still be produced by someone who's new to the field, and hence is directly valuable (with the caveat that a senior researcher should still probably have to look at the piece to check if there aren't any errors, but that's a substantially lower time commitment than writing the piece oneself).
2) Distillation is a great way to build and demonstrate skill for newcomers to a field.
Idea: have internships such as Nonlinear's or run CERI/SERI/CHERI-style fellowships focusing fully or in part on producing distillations.
I discovered Stefan Mancuso through the list of thinkers, who among other things claims that plants have rights.
1) Because the skills required to be a good distiller are very similar to the skills required to be a good researcher, most people who'd become good distillers become good researchers instead for status/impact/etc reasons. However, a good-not-great distillation could still be produced by someone who's new to the field, and hence is directly valuable (with the caveat that a senior researcher should still probably have to look at the piece to check if there aren't any errors, but that's a substantially lower time commitment than writing the piece oneself).
2) Distillation is a great way to build and demonstrate skill for newcomers to a field.
Idea: have internships such as Nonlinear's or run CERI/SERI/CHERI-style fellowships focusing fully or in part on producing distillations.