Data point: I have emailed the top ~10 researchers of 3 different fields in which I was completely naive at the time (social psychology, computational social simulation, neuroscience of morality) - giving a ~ 30 total -, and they all tend to engage my questions, with a subsequent e-mail conversation of 5 to 30 emails.
I had no idea how easy it was to make a top researcher engage in a conversation with a naive person. Knowing this made me much more prone to apply the prescription of this post—one I am in agreement.
(I understand that what this post prescribes is far more complex than actually engaging in a conversation with the top researchers of an area.)
Data point: I have emailed the top ~10 researchers of 3 different fields in which I was completely naive at the time (social psychology, computational social simulation, neuroscience of morality) - giving a ~ 30 total -, and they all tend to engage my questions, with a subsequent e-mail conversation of 5 to 30 emails. I had no idea how easy it was to make a top researcher engage in a conversation with a naive person. Knowing this made me much more prone to apply the prescription of this post—one I am in agreement. (I understand that what this post prescribes is far more complex than actually engaging in a conversation with the top researchers of an area.)