Considering all the endless meetings, conferences and discussions scientists have to attend and find room to do research in between, I doubt that the issue is a lack of means for them to discuss...
I also highly disagree that publishing does very little to advance science, it puts a relatively self-contained result into the record. Replacing publishing with forums would be the euivalent of replacing documentation with a chat.
Lol yeah, cannot imagine equating published papers and forum posts. I knock the peer review process all the time but it is a significant hurdle that acts as a filter for all sorts of trash.
I also highly disagree that publishing does very little to advance science, it puts a relatively self-contained result into the record. Replacing publishing with forums would be the euivalent of replacing documentation with a chat.