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Researchers taking on fraudulent science

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Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#11

Post by georgeecollins »

Frost1x wrote: post #8
coolhand2120 wrote: post #4

I really hope these people gain wider support. They seem so anti-establishment, which implies that the establishment is pro fraud. And that sounds about right to me. This is a huge problem. When fraud is rewarded over legitimate research we lose so many times. Once when we reward the fraud, again when the fraudulent research is propagated into the corpus, again when we recognize that this has squelched legitimate sci…

>This is a huge problem. When fraud is rewarded over legitimate research we lose so many times. I’d generalize this further and say we have an underlying economy and society that rewards fraud over what should be happening widespread. It’s happening everywhere and lying seems to be one of the best strategies to success. With competitive pressures increasing, it’s often even worth the risk. This may have always been t…

>> There’s few if any establishments I trust anymore.

Sorry, but that's tin foil hat territory. Everyday I trust my bank to handle my money fairly, the gas station to give the right amount of gas, the labels on food and medicine to be accurate, the weather report, etc. etc. I am sure there are problems with virtually every institution that need to be addressed. But I am surrounded by reliable information and trusted actors.

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#12

Post by elashri »

There are two things that you should put into perspective when seeing these numbers.

1- The article give pure numbers and does not report ratios. So when they report

> Last year, more than 10,000 research papers were retracted, marking an all-time high

The source is nature publication and while it gives rate of retraction per year it doesn't show the ratios. So if this is 10,000 out of 5M or 10,000 out of 10M is huge different. Yes in both cases it will be a problem but also there are no information about re-traction cause. There is no statistics on cause of re-traction. Not every retraction is necessarily because of fraud.

Actually in the nature paper they reported the retraction rate (without any other information) to be 0.2% in 2022 but again without more information.

2- calling it epidemic is clickbait title. Depending on retraction as a measurement of fraud problem in science is subjective. There are problems with citations, paper mills and many other things. But you can't put all of these things into one basket. Retraction is a standard process that even legitimate researchers are using sometimes to fix problems with the paper ranging from discovering malfunction device after publication to method not working. Associating retraction with fraudulent activity only would mean that a researcher wouldn't use it if the perception that if you do it yourself then you are trying to cover something or you have ethical problems.

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#13

Post by etrautmann »

JohnKemeny wrote: post #10

All scientists should sign on top of their papers that what they write is truthful. See also https://datacolada.org/98

That’s so fundamentally core to the idea of authoring a paper that it would be fundamentally useless. Anyone knowingly publishing fraudulent data will not be deterred by a signature. It’s already career ending if discovered.

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#14

Post by derbOac »

I love these people's work.

At the same time I don't think any of this really addresses the root causes of the problems, which are career, university administrative, and field (i.e., recognition and attention) incentives. The whole paradigm we use, and the way we treat scientists and fund research, is broken. It feels a little bit like bailing water out of your boat with teacup on one side while ignoring the gaping hole letting rushing water in on the other side.

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#15

Post by dustingetz »

Frost1x wrote: post #8
coolhand2120 wrote: post #4

I really hope these people gain wider support. They seem so anti-establishment, which implies that the establishment is pro fraud. And that sounds about right to me. This is a huge problem. When fraud is rewarded over legitimate research we lose so many times. Once when we reward the fraud, again when the fraudulent research is propagated into the corpus, again when we recognize that this has squelched legitimate sci…

>This is a huge problem. When fraud is rewarded over legitimate research we lose so many times. I’d generalize this further and say we have an underlying economy and society that rewards fraud over what should be happening widespread. It’s happening everywhere and lying seems to be one of the best strategies to success. With competitive pressures increasing, it’s often even worth the risk. This may have always been t…

tragedy of the commons

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#17

Post by anonymouskimmer »

coolhand2120 wrote: post #4

I really hope these people gain wider support. They seem so anti-establishment, which implies that the establishment is pro fraud. And that sounds about right to me. This is a huge problem. When fraud is rewarded over legitimate research we lose so many times. Once when we reward the fraud, again when the fraudulent research is propagated into the corpus, again when we recognize that this has squelched legitimate sci…

> They seem so anti-establishment, which implies that the establishment is pro fraud.

What I'm getting from the article so far is that "the establishment" is actually a bunch of establishments (plural). And thus there are many systems to game, and many incentives to game them.

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#18

Post by pvaldes »

JohnKemeny wrote: post #10

All scientists should sign on top of their papers that what they write is truthful. See also https://datacolada.org/98

That would for sure deter the serial liars.

It was assumed by default that scientists don't lie (and researchers are signing their articles since thousands of years). Innocent until proven guilty is a better system, but... lets add even more bureaucracy to publish, is not insulting enough yet.

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#19

Post by anonymouskimmer »

derbOac wrote: post #14

I love these people's work. At the same time I don't think any of this really addresses the root causes of the problems, which are career, university administrative, and field (i.e., recognition and attention) incentives. The whole paradigm we use, and the way we treat scientists and fund research, is broken. It feels a little bit like bailing water out of your boat with teacup on one side while ignoring the gaping h…

The root cause it too many people for the funding available. If a single scientist can spend $250k per year it's obvious that even rich economies can only support so many of them.

Whenever you have this situation you inevitably lead to selection criteria which can, and will, be gamed.

Re: Researchers taking on fraudulent science

#20

Post by kiba »

coolhand2120 wrote: post #4

I really hope these people gain wider support. They seem so anti-establishment, which implies that the establishment is pro fraud. And that sounds about right to me. This is a huge problem. When fraud is rewarded over legitimate research we lose so many times. Once when we reward the fraud, again when the fraudulent research is propagated into the corpus, again when we recognize that this has squelched legitimate sci…

While the problem of fraud is real, exaggerating the extent of the problem is not a good idea either.

Otherwise the fraud would be so pervasive that anybody with a PhD attached after name should be distrusted unless proven otherwise.

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