Fraud, so much fraud
science.org
Fraud, so much fraud
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Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#2> It seems like a strange thing to take someone with a long and respected career and subject them to what would essentially be a Western blot and photomicrograph audit before offering them a big position.
This is absolutely something that we should routinely be doing, though.
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#3[flagged]
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#4There are unfortunately very rarely consequences for academic fraud. It's not just that we only catch a small fraction — mostly the most brazen image manipulation — but these cases of blatant fraud happen again and again, to resounding silence.
Ever so rarely, there may be an opaque, internal investigation. Mostly, it seems that academia has a desire to not make any waves, keep up appearances, and let the problem quiet down on its own.
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#5> It seems like a strange thing to take someone with a long and respected career and subject them to what would essentially be a Western blot and photomicrograph audit before offering them a big position. This is absolutely something that we should routinely be doing, though.
It's pretty similar to the level of distrust in the software engineering job interview process.
Pick your poison, to some extent. Better would be to not have to do it after-the-fact, but to vet better at every intermediate step, but it's hard. Just a very difficult people problem.
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#6The amazing part about this to me is that the only reason the authors were caught is image manipulation. The fraud in numbers and text? Not so easy to uncover.
Prediction: papers stop using pictures entirely
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#7[flagged]
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#8> But if the NIH had done that in 2016, they wouldn't be in the position they're in now, would they? How many people do we need to check? How many figures do we have to scrutinize?
All of them
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#9[flagged]
Re: Fraud, so much fraud
#10The Retraction Watch website does a good job of reporting on various cases of retractions and scientific misconduct [1].
Like many others, I hope that a greater focus on reproducibility in academic journals and conferences will help reduce the spread of scientific misconduct and inaccuracy.