Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Fraud, so much fraud

science.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

811–820 of 868 posts

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#811

Post by staunton »

mlsu wrote: post #497
mike_hearn wrote: post #378

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Replication is over-emphasised. Attempts to organise mass replications have struggled with basic problems like papers making numerous claims (which one do you replicate?), the question of whether you try to replicate the original methodology exactly or whether you try to answer the same question as the original paper (matters in cases where the methodology was bad), many papers making obvious low value findings (e.g.…

So then, how on earth does this stuff even get published? What exactly is it that we're all doing here? If a finding either cannot be communicated enough for someone else to replicate it, or cannot be replicated because the method is shoddy, can we even call that science? At some level I know that what I'm proposing isn't realistic because the majority of science is sloppy. P-hacking, lack of detail, bad writing, bad…

> can we even call that science?

The amazing thing is that it all works out in the end and science is still making (quite a lot of) progress.

That's also the reason why we shouldn't spend all of our time and money checking and replicating things just to make sure noone publishes fraudulent/shoddy results. (We should probably spend a little more time and money on that, but not as much more as some people here seem to suggest).

Most research is in retrospect useless nonsense. It's just impossible to tell in advance. There is no point in checking and replicating all of it. Results that are useful or important will be checked and replicated eventually. If they turn out to be wrong (which is still quite rare), a lot of effort is wasted. However, again, that's rare.

If the fraud/quality issues get worse (different from "featuring more frequently and prominently in the news"), eventually additional checks start to make sense and be worth it overall. I think quite a lot of progress is happening here already, with open data, code, pre-registration of studies, better statistical methods, etc, becoming more common.

I think a major issue is the idea that "papers are the incontestable scientific truth". Some people seem to think that's the goal, or that it used to be the case and fraud is changing that now, however, this was never the case and it's not at all the point of publishing research. I think a major gain would be to separate in the public perception the concepts, understanding and reputations of science vs. scientific publishing.

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#812

Post by bmsan »

rdtsc wrote: post #610
lanstin wrote: post #555

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Barry Apppelman, for a long time the boss of all the Unix engineers, said malice was preferable to incompetence because malice would take breaks.

However malice is directed. When it doesn’t take breaks it does a lot more damage usually. One can argue malice can be controlled with incentives at some level, though.

So can "stupidity". If something is possible for a human to do, it's something that's possible for any sufficiently-enabled/supported human to do. I've heard it put that the inability to understand or do something is a matter of not having acquired the necessary prerequisites. So, the incentives to control stupidity are the incentives to acquire and apply the prerequisite skills or knowledge.

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#813

Post by bmsan »

Maken wrote: post #739
Aerroon wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that's really going to work. People won't list all their incentives, because some of them are implicit and others are embarrassing or "creepy". Others will absolutely judge you for what incentivizes your actions, therefore hiding them is the status quo. If you say that your incentive for working out is to look good and be popular with the ladies then people will judge you for it, even if it's exactly th…

You got it backwards. It's not about being transparent about what you want to achieve, it's about being transparent about what others expect you to achieve on your current position.

To check my understanding: say your current position is "unemployed." You would think that the expectation for you is to "get a job", but to get a job is extremely difficult. You have to navigate an almost adversarial job market and recruiting process, often for months. It's essentially a massive negative incentive, considering all of the effort and grief involved. So, the incentives aren't aligned with the desired outcome; the skittishness of each individual hiring company to make sure that they don't get screwed by a bad hire has warped the entire dynamic. Is this a good example?

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#814

Post by carapace »

nathan_compton wrote: post #777
carapace wrote: post #583

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(I keep mentioning this but no one seems to be picking up on it.) There is an algorithm that was developed in the late 80's in the context of therapy that could be used to align incentives and collectively agree on outcomes. The algorithm is a simple recursive procedure where the guide or therapist evokes the client's motivation or incentive for an initial behaviour and then for each motivation in turn until a (so-ca…

NLP and related stuff is not taken all that seriously among main stream scientists, you should probably say.

In re: this "NLP is pseudoscience" business, I've lost patience with it. First, I'm living proof of NLP's efficacy. Second, I don't go around suggesting homeopathy or astrology or pyramid power, okay? Like Ron Swanson "my recommendation is essentially a guarantee."

In terms of a Venn diagram the region representing people who have experience with NLP and the region representing people who think NLP is pseudoscience are disjoint, they do not overlap. As in I have never found anyone who claims that NLP is pseudoscience who has also admitted to having any experience with it. That is not science, eh? To the extent that mainstream scientists don't take NLP seriously they make themselves ridiculous. So yeah, in this one instance, ignore the scientists and look at the strange thing anyway, please? Humor me?

Now NLP is not scientific (yet) and it doesn't pretend to be (although many promoters do talk that way, and that's wrong and they shouldn't do that) and in fact there's a video online (I'll link to if I find it) where the co-founder addresses this point and says "it's not scientific".

However it does work. So it seems imperative to do science to it!?

At the time it was developed there were dozens of schools of psychology on the one hand[1] and academic psychologists on the other and the two groups did not talk to each other. NLP ran afoul of the academic psychologists in the mid 1980's and they closed ranks against it and haven't bothered themselves with it since. Again, I think it would be fantastic if we would do science to it and figure out what these algorithms are actually doing.

In any event the important thing is that the tools and techniques that have been developed are rigorous and repeatable. E.g. this "Core Transformation Process" works. That's primary data on which the science of psychology should operate not ignore.

[1] E.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esalen_Institute | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_Potential_Movement | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanistic_psychology

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#815

Post by pvaldes »

yard2010 wrote: post #648
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It becomes a survival bias: if people can cheat at a competitive game (or research field) and get away with it, then at the end you'll wind up with only cheaters left (everyone else stops playing).

This is why cheaters should never ever ever be allowed to play again with fair players, only with cheaters

Cheaters playing with cheaters is what we have yet. The problem is not in the cheaters, is in the game that deliberately select for cheaters.

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#816

Post by pmarreck »

ksenzee wrote: post #136
pmarreck wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My sole rational argument for Christianity is that it has made the societies that it is, or was, infused with, more honest than the ones that were not.

I’m not sure there are any rational arguments for Christianity. I say that as a practicing Christian. Either it meets a spiritual need in you, or it’s not very valuable. I imagine that belief in a God who punishes evildoers has kept some people honest throughout history, but the value of that is surely outweighed by the evil done in the name of that God. I also don’t believe Christian societies are more honest than o…

I unfortunately cannot track down the prior research that I did on this in the time I have available as a new father but I am as skeptical as they come and I seemed to have found some solid data suggesting that nations with Christian values are simply broadly more honest and trustworthy. This includes countries such as Iceland because even though it is technically atheist, there's inertia there still from the influence of Christianity on its culture.

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#817

Post by pmarreck »

projektfu wrote: post #162
pmarreck wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My sole rational argument for Christianity is that it has made the societies that it is, or was, infused with, more honest than the ones that were not.

That sounds like it is loaded with a lot of "no true Scotsman" caveats including, perhaps, Scotland, which has crime like any other country.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41684157

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#818

Post by pmarreck »

inglor_cz wrote: post #244
pmarreck wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My sole rational argument for Christianity is that it has made the societies that it is, or was, infused with, more honest than the ones that were not.

If I read pagan Roman observations about life and people, they strike me as way, way more honest (sometimes brutally honest) than anything that we are used to for the last 1000 years, perhaps with exceptions like Machiavelli and some verbal jokes of the "unprintable" character. In Christian theory, everyone is a sinner, but in a real Christian society, people try to cover up their particular sins all the time, at lea…

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41684157

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#819

Post by lanstin »

ungreased0675 wrote: post #659
lanstin wrote: post #590

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference between public health and basic research. To stop an epidemic in flight one has to go with ones best guess and that saves lives so they do it.

I’d just like to add that the epidemic wasn’t stopped at all. Everyone still caught COVID. Were outcomes worse than they otherwise would have been? That’s an impossible question to answer. Are there serious studies on the impact of public health interventions?

I saw one study of relative death rates that concluded if all US has followed California standards, about 800,000 fewer people would have died. And remember "flatten the curve"? The goal isn't to stop everyone getting the virus but to slow it down enough that the health care capacity is sufficient. A quick google finds this study and a few more recommended: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-31709-2 even the way the virus isn't killing as many vulnerable people as we get it the Nth time after M vaccinations is a success if the lower the curve strategy.

Re: Fraud, so much fraud

#820

Post by lanstin »

moduspol wrote: post #614
lanstin wrote: post #590

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The difference between public health and basic research. To stop an epidemic in flight one has to go with ones best guess and that saves lives so they do it.

We weren't told it was the best guess to save lives. We were told it was the science, and this science was very fast to adapt to alarmist narratives while being incredibly slow (sometimes taking years) to adapt to reality. And that's before you take into account things like BLM rallies being encouraged during COVID while less politically correct gatherings were banned or decried as "super spreader events." [1] [1] ht…

Public health also studies the most effective communication strategies for sharing public health info even in the face of uncertainty. I bet they will be more explicit about uncertainty next time based on the last time, but that is why they didn't say it. The field started out with a person breaking the handle to an invented ell, not even using communications but taking physical actions to stop the spread.

As far as the speed of revisions, my memory is the initial advice to wash your hands so much faded within months, as well as the wash your groceries advice. It took the US some time to notice how effective masks were in Japan, and push for masking. And now good air filtration for public spaces is gaining momentum, even as the deaths from COVID declined.

And you aren't a bit alarmed anytime a novel virus hits an immunologically naïf population, well you should be.

Post reply on HN