D.r Hovanec was a hobbyist who was so interested in the hobby that he got graduate degrees in related fields. Nobody on any forum where he posts nor at any function at which he speaks doesn't know his credentials. Anybody on this forum who has similar credentials and research experience is certainly permitted to say so. I know that Chris Cow another early proponent of fishless cycling has Ph.D. in chemistry. I know that Stephan Tanner who sells the Poret foam among other things is a Ph.D, microbiologist. There are other hobbyists who have pretty impressive credentials and are not ashamed to say so on forums where they participate. Credentialed experts who actually post on forums do not hide the fact that they have their degrees and experience.
The thing you hit on the head is the part about the science standing alone. Go read the research papers and then decide if they stand alone. You will see the methods, the equipment, the results and the analysis of them spread out in plain site. And then you will see the conclusions of the research and a list of cited references. Where is all that from the forum members posting something works or does not, where are their methods, controls and multi-million dollar pieces of equipment? Laboratory research is conducted in a very controlled and precise way which is why mere hobbyists do not make these sort of scientific discoveries. For one to able to say a product does not work, they must be able to prove this is the case every time it is used. Further, nobody else should be able to have it work for them either.
Martin Moe Jr. is a credentialed scientist whose entire life was dedicated to the field of marine biology. It is his profession, not his hobby. If he comes here and posts on those topics, I sure as heck would listen, and if a user disagreed with him, do I have to tell you who I would believe? Julian Sprung is in a similar vein, he has the undergraduate credentials and hands on experience. And he makes his living from his training and experience. It is his profession not his hobby. Eric Borneman also has the sw credential having been on his way to his Ph.D. But then he got arrested. I never saw how that ended up. He seems to have dropped out of sight? But until then he made decent money from his formal education and experience in sw. It was his profession not his hobby. Amano is a photographer, aquatic gardener and a designe. But if he comes here and wants to talk about microbiology and nitrification or fish biology, his credentials are mostly worthless in that respect. But he is also a professional in the aquarium trade, he is not simply a hobbyist.
While you are correct that hobbyists may have some extensive knowledge based on experience, to be a trained Ph.D. in chemistry or microbiology is not something one can do in their basement. Most of the people you called hobbyists above are actually trained professionals in fields directly related to various areas of the hobby. There is a great deal of difference between being a hobbyist and being a trained experienced professional.
If anybody on this site has a graduate degree in chemistry or is a microbiologist and they havein depth first hand experience with these things, they would be posting a lot differently than most of us can or do. None of the people you mention above did anything serious while they were only hobbyists, they did them after much schooling and years of hands on experience. Saying they are mere aquarists is basically a canard. So I will stick by what I said. Those people I choose not to believe on this (or any other) site are those saying things they do not back up with references. They simply state them as fact and offer no proof. I will only accept this from somebody with the credentials to make such statements legitimately. And credentials mean both degrees earned plus the hands on experience over time.
I'm not interested so much in the fact that major public aquaria are using a product but why they are using it?
One thing should be obvious. The people who chose to use it must have believed it would work. These people are well trained and highly experienced in their field. All the other factors you try to bring in are not relevant. I do not think that you are suggesting that such extraneous factors would cause these people to spend one penny on anything they felt did not work. Nobody says the product that works costs too much, so instead we will save money and buy something much cheaper that does not work. We can't import the stuff that works, so we will buy the local product that doesn't. That would be beyond silly.
What we do know is what they actually did choose and that it did work. We know this because it is not hard to find out if that huge display tank went haywire and there were issues with cycling that harmed the dolphins or other tank inhabitants. The press would have been all over that as would a variety of animal activists etc. And then lets not forget that its not just one public aquarium that used the product, its is multiple facilities in more than one country. That doesn't make much sense if the stuff did not work. Sooner or later the word gets out among the industry insiders and nobody would be using it.
I can find references to people using Dr Hovanec's bacteria, I can find references to people using Avecom's ABIL, I can find references to folks using a few other things. But I can not find anything similar for Stability, for API Quick Start for example. I can research commercial starters for aquaculture and find even more bacterial products that folks in this hobby have never run across such as Novozymes PondProtect®.
And who claimed that just because a given product works it means that all others do not? Please reread what I have said and you will see that my beef with Stability, for example, is based on the fact that I believe the research which says that what handles ammonia and nitrite oxidation in tanks are autotrophic bacteria. Since I believe this, I can not then think that a product which states it contains none of these can be efficacious.
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