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We’re incentivizing bad science + Science, scorn, & cynicism

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We’re incentivizing bad science
https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/obs...d-science/

EXCERPT (James Zimring): . . . So, let’s imagine what might happen if the rules of professional science evolved such that scientists were incentivized to publish as many papers as they could and if those who published many papers of poor scientific rigor were rewarded over those who published fewer papers of higher rigor? What would happen if scientists weren’t rewarded for the long-term reproducibility and rigor of their findings, but rather became a factory that produced and published highly exciting and innovative new discoveries, and then other scientists and companies spent resources on the follow up studies and took all the risk?

Just as banks in 2008 made money from selling the loans, not holding the loans, the quality of the loan ceased to be meaningful to them. Likewise, once published, the innovators of novel science often move onto the next new innovation, and because of publication bias and the “file drawer effect,” we never hear about it if their findings fail in the hands of others. Of course, reputations for good work affect scientists as much as anyone else, but one or two “real” advances by a researcher will erase any downside to even a litany of other findings that disappeared into the trash pile of time since no one else can reproduce them. Indeed, in a now famous report from Bayer Pharmaceuticals, 65 percent of published scientific findings were not reproducible by Bayer scientists when they tried to use them for drug development.

This is not an issue of scientific fraud or misconduct where scientists invent data or purposefully lie; the data are real and were really observed. However, the fiercely competitive environment leads to a haste to publish and a larger number of less rigorous papers results. [...] Of course, scientific publication is subjected to a high degree of quality control through the peer-review process ... However, this is changing. The very laudable goal of “open access journals” is to make sure that the public has free access to the scientific data that its tax dollars are used to generate.

However, open access journals charge the authors of articles a substantial fee to publish, in order to make up for the dollars lost from not requiring subscriptions. So, instead of making more money the more copies of the journal they sell, open access journals make more money as a function of how many articles they accept. Authors are willing to pay more to get their articles published in more prestigious journals. So, the more exciting the findings a journal publishes, the more references, the higher the impact the journal, the more submissions they get, the more money they make.

[...] much like the bankers of the early 21st century, we risk allowing new incentives to erode our self-regulation and skew our perceptions and behavior; similar to the risky loans underlying mortgage-backed securities, faulty scientific observations can form a bubble and an unstable edifice. As science is ultimately self-correcting, faulty conclusions are remedied with ongoing study, but this takes a great deal of time... (MORE - details)



Science, Scorn, and Cynicism
https://www.thecrimson.com/column/table-...nce-scorn/

EXCERPT (William A. McConnell): . . . Yet, as (somebody other than, it turns out) Mark Twain famously put it, “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” And thus, amidst this science-oriented backdrop, the doctrine of scientism — “the promotion of science as the best or only objective means by which society should determine normative and epistemological values” — has emerged. [...] Scientism ... inherently devalues the individual. It denies the capabilities of an individual mind, and the meaning of an individual existence, thus cultivating repressed cynicism about the world.

We see this cynicism manifested in individuals’ pessimism in their ability to take a position on an issue. For as powerful a tool as science is, it is also selectively wielded, by academia, by large corporations, by the government. The individual is excluded from the truth-finding process. Thus the phrase “I don’t know enough to have an opinion” rolls freely and quickly off tongues, preempting the important processes of individual reasoning and reflection. Conversations start and end with a Google search that either revealed the answer science gave us or didn’t. The skeptical position becomes the thoughtful one, even as it entails almost no thought.

By devaluing the ways in which individuals derive meaning, scientism also contributes to a dangerous moral cynicism, not so much on the hot-button topics but on the more quotidian acts concerning morality — white lies, stereotyping, keeping promises, working hard, authenticity and the like. At its worst, scientism denies any form of meaningful justification — the religious, the cultural, the philosophical — for these norms and casts them as wholly arbitrary cultural artifacts. Where is the science to say that we should conform to these norms, it prompts. At best, it allows for a coarsely utilitarian view of them, the sort of easy “greater good” thinking that on the ground level almost always loses out to human selfishness.

In either case, scientism undermines the force of these moral norms. We may play along, depending on the strength of other behavior-shaping factors. But societies tend to slowly phase out the things they have stopped respecting.

Science is not going anywhere, nor should it. It is the greatest tool for understanding the world we humans have developed, and the innovation and improvements in our lives that it has brought should be duly respected. But we would all do well to not let this respect evolve into scientism. Because ultimately — a powerful hammer though science may be — the world is much more than just nails. (MORE - details)
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