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Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

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Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#121

Post by eduction »

wpietri wrote: post #95
renewiltord wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This guy is featured in the So You've Been Publicly Shamed book, and it definitely seemed like he was pilloried pretty hard. It is interesting, though, which journalists get tarred and feathered and which ones are celebrated. Certainly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Miller and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Novak have massive journalistic ethical errors: the former fabricating news for the US Government a…

Is Miller still a celebrated journalist? I had her down mentally as "noted fraud". Looking at Wikipedia, it looks like she's never done real news again, and has spent her time on what I think of as the "wingnut welfare circuit". And the reactions to her memoir suggest that she's never been welcomed back into the profession: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judith_Miller#Memoir

She is neither celebrated nor an outright fraud.

She was disgraced because she reported inaccurate claims (on WMDs in Iraq) from government intelligence sources. Specifically she reported them without sufficient skepticism — without checking the sourcing of the claims (I.e. asking questions like “how did the CIA acquire this intelligence”) or giving sufficient credence and attention to counter claims.

Although this is considered bad practice, it is not considered fraudulent. She was indeed takling to highly placed government sources and had reason to believe they were credible.

My opinion: Although what she did was rightly viewed, eventually, as journalistic malpractice, she was clearly pleasing her editors who routinely moved her stories to the front page. These editors also failed to demand skepticism and wider investigation, and while at least one was pushed out, the institution of the NY Times remained credulous about government claims. I routinely see stories where they uncritically repeat government claims — especially where classified intelligence is involved and especially relating to military operations. Therefore I believe Miller is also something of a scapegoat.

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#122

Post by rqtwteye »

jack_riminton wrote: post #69
rqtwteye wrote: post #43

There is this pattern where things are always the opposite of their message: - Dishonesty expert is dishonest - Politicians who constantly talk about freedom want to restrict anything that doesn't fit their world view - Militant anti-gay preachers hire call boys - Diversity teams are the least diverse

Corporate entities with “innovation” in their titles are most definitely not innovative e.g. Innovation Managers have most likely never done an innovative thing in their life

And "excellence" initiatives are usually led by people who have never accomplished anything :-)

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#123

Post by rqtwteye »

telotortium wrote: post #48
rqtwteye wrote: post #43

There is this pattern where things are always the opposite of their message: - Dishonesty expert is dishonest - Politicians who constantly talk about freedom want to restrict anything that doesn't fit their world view - Militant anti-gay preachers hire call boys - Diversity teams are the least diverse

> - Diversity teams are the least diverse IME DEI is usually a function rolled into HR (although they often contract with diversity training firms), rather than a separate team, except at large companies. Where there are separate DEI teams, they tend to be the most diverse, at least among the white-collar workforce - the requirements for these jobs tend to be quite nonspecific, because they don't really need to do mu…

"Where there are separate DEI teams, they tend to be the most diverse,"

That's not my observation at all.

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#124

Post by dredmorbius »

necovek wrote: post #2

[flagged]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36424373>

In Comments ... Don't be snarky. ... Please don't sneer ... Avoid generic tangents. Omit internet tropes.... Please don't post shallow dismissals, especially of other people's work.... Please don't complain about tangential annoyances—e.g. article or website formats, name collisions, or back-button breakage. They're too common to be interesting.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html>

And finally, that would be her expertise.

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#125

Post by kneebonian »

eru wrote: post #92
IggleSniggle wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For similar reasons, I left academia. I joined academia for the pursuit of truth, and forth the glory of Knowing. But it turned out that academia doesn’t really do this anymore, it just sells itself as doing these things. Academia is entirely a “reputation” system, as it turns out, from paper publishing to student-evaluations to “public rankings.” As it turns out, the capitalist marketplace must also contend with the…

> But it turned out that academia doesn’t really do this anymore, it just sells itself as doing these things. What do you mean by 'anymore'. Was there some golden age of bygone glory?

I'd argue there was to some extent. I mean psych has always had issues, but it seems from the late 1800's to the mid 1970's would characterize the golden age. During this time science that produced results and was verifiable and reproducible experienced a huge boom. In part because during this time period almost every nation on earth got involved at some point in a life or death struggle which turns to do a pretty good job at cutting through science that doesn't hold water when it's the difference between your country winning and your countrymen being slaughtered.

As proof of this most of the open question in fundamental physics are the same ones that were open at the time of Einstein's death.

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#126

Post by Kamq »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #21

Adding to the irony: She is the best-selling author, most recently, of “Rebel Talent: Why it Pays to Break the Rules in Work and Life.”

That doesn't seem ironic.

Someone writing a book arguing for breaking the rules is exactly who I would expect to break the rules.

Or is the irony here that someone actually took an idea seriously and followed through on it?

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#127

Post by dchftcs »

mmmmpancakes wrote: post #111
lumost wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think around year 4 a manager made the mistake of believing the research and pushing hard on it. This in turn became a tracked goal with a multi-year timeline. The individual left before things could fall on them too heavily.

how do you work 4 years on a project before having a tracked goal. absurd. sounds like management's fault.

The goals before the 4 years were probably based on results claimed, not making a product. Research management is difficult and efficiently running a lab requires some degree of trust that researchers don't lie.

I think the bigger part of management's fault here is that they should have spent some time on verifying the research before dedicating more resources.

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#128

Post by uw_rob »

> (4) The evidence of fraud detailed in our report almost certainly represents a mere subset of the evidence that the Harvard investigators were able to uncover about these four articles. For example, we have heard from some HBS faculty that Harvard’s internal report was ~1,200 pages long, which is 1,182 pages longer than the one we sent to HBS.

Great example that highlights the balance of presumption of innocence with the asymmetrical bullshit principal. This person should be referred to criminal prosecution for fraud as a deterrent to others. 1,200 page reports to provide proof beyond a reasonable doubt is not scalable.

Re: Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty

#129

Post by lumost »

dchftcs wrote: post #127
mmmmpancakes wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how do you work 4 years on a project before having a tracked goal. absurd. sounds like management's fault.

The goals before the 4 years were probably based on results claimed, not making a product. Research management is difficult and efficiently running a lab requires some degree of trust that researchers don't lie. I think the bigger part of management's fault here is that they should have spent some time on verifying the research before dedicating more resources.

Also setting up mechanisms to verify results and share results. Even a basic mechanism of “check in your code” would have served the purpose of identifying fake work. A code review mechanism can help stop irresponsible work.
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