Science in a Hurry

Thursday, 03.13.08

Photo by Flickr user SF Treasure Hunt under a Creative Commons license

The risks of risk studies

November 1987

Ellen Ruppel Shell analyzes the fear-mongering faults of epidemiology.

An element of doubt

December 1995

Ellen Ruppel Shell finds that much of the hysteria around lead-paint poisoning was based on shaky science.

Phony science wars

November 1999

Richard Rorty surveys the debate between philosophers of science.

On February 29, a leading South Korean research university announced it had suspended the author of two headline-generating papers for fabricating his data.

Tae Kook Kim's research, which appeared in Nature Chemical Biology and Science in 2005 and 2006, offered alluring possibilities for breakthroughs in fighting cancer and slowing (or even reversing) aging. His suspension for dishonesty follows several embarrassing retractions in other hyped research areas -- the most notable involving another South Korean scientist, Woo Suk Hwang, who falsely claimed to have created human stem-cells via cloning. (Ironically, newspapers reporting on Kim's ostensible accomplishments quoted Kim as saying he aspired to be "another Hwang Woo Suk.")

The fault lies in ourselves as well as in our scientists. Science is plodding and nuanced, and most scientists are disinclined to overstate the implications of their findings. The public hungers for stunning leaps forward, and the press feeds our appetite by reporting on new developments as if they're going to change our world overnight. When government funding and international prestige are added to the picture, our collective hopes create incentives to publish fast.

Some scientists have complained recently that top journals are rewarding novel results over rigorous research. Perhaps journals should hold higher standards for replication of data before it is accepted for publication. And we should be more mindful of the difference between optimistically embracing a new finding and rushing to accept it before the result has been tested and repeated -- in effect, fully subjected to the scientific method, slow as it may be. — Justine Isola

Fraud abroad

Lack of institutional safeguards overseas has caused a boom in bad science, writes the New York Times.

Partisans in labcoats

Richard C. Lewontin argues that political pressure undermines and corrupts the credibility of research.

Retrial and error

Charles Platt looks back on the cold fusion fraud, and reports on scientists who think it may not be impossible after all.

Everyone is wrong

Joao Medeiros summarizes recent reports that find the majority of published research is eventually proved false.

A fraud epidemic?

This NIH study analyzes the social, academic, and financial pressures that lead to fraud. This landmark report by John Ioannidis ignited the whole debate.

Filed Under: Korea, medicine, science

(1)

In a world where adults are paid obscene fortunes to kick, swat, or toss balls around for our amusement, and research scientists are forced to scrabble and beg for funding it both understandable and unfortunate that some succumb to fraud for survival.

Posted by Daryl Petrarca | March 14, 2008 6:15 PM

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