• Home
  • Development of Heparin and HS Glycotherapeutics
  • Lab
  • People

Ferniglab Blog

The personal blog of Dave Fernig, thoughts on science and unrelated matters

Feeds:
Posts
Comments
« The burden of proof
Counting the cost of misconduct »

Policing the police

August 16, 2014 by ferniglab


The end of this week has seen two very insightful postings on science and governance by Stephen Curry and Neuroskeptic.

Stephen Curry’s post “Who governs science” has what is for me a pithy summary of how science works: “No-one is in charge … …. That structure, or rather, lack of structure has not been arrived at by design but reflects the organic emergence of the scientific enterprise over the past several hundred years… …It poses challenges for good governance but is at the same time a source of great strength.”

This akin in some ways to a world-wide anarcho-syndicalist commune.

How can such “disorganisation” be productive? I would argue that it is precisely the lack of structure that is essential for creativity to flourish, because creativity in any field of culture can only occur through critical thinking. Question everything, but always first yourself, then others. Again. And again. And again. Ad infinitum. One cannot do this in formal structures with strong lines of control. The evidence is particularly strong: human creativity and so science flourishes at times of “freedom” and disappears at times of repression.

With careers and status to be gained, there is clearly temptation for some to cheat in such a system. The question posed by Stephen in his post and in a post by Neuroskeptic entitled “Who should catch fraud” is how might the system be policed.

Stephen argues that one way to enforce “standards”, and so prevent cheating is Open Access. I would concur. Open Access allied to Open Data allows the entire community to peruse research findings and then questions to be raised. Such peer review by the entire community is, as Stephen argues, at the heart of the “disorganisation” of science and so of creativity and critical thinking.

Neuroskeptic’s post “Who should catch fraud” looks at the process whereby fraud is unmasked and then the lines of responsibilities to journals, institutions and grant awarders. This ends with a statement, which is unfortunately true: “While all of these organizations have policies for investigating and punishing fraud when it comes to light, they rarely (if ever) actually catch it, leaving this hazardous and stressful job to individuals.“

I would add that these policies are usually hardly enforced. That is journals, institutions and grant awarders prefer to look intensely the other way, unless there is such a strong reaction from the community and interest from the wider public that they really do have to turn their heads.

The comments thread on this post at Retraction Watch highlights two instances of institutions apparently failing to apply even the most simple principles of due diligence in terms of hiring and promotion.

So there is a gap between Stephen’s call for open access and action: how to translate community discussion into action, while allowing for the (very) substantial difference of opinion that must go hand in hand with the necessary “disorganisation” of science?

In a nutshell, how can the police possibly police the police, a problem compounded by the complete absence of formal structure and organisation across science. Neuroskeptic hit the button here, pointing out that fraud is detected and pursued “1) By readers of published papers who notice oddities in the data, or 2) by internal whistleblowers, almost always junior lab members“

The weakness of this system are obvious, as there is a positive feedback loop that strengthens the hand of the fraudster: the richer and more powerful you are, the greater your immunity to pursuit, allowing an accumulation of greater riches and power.

The problem is that individuals take on huge risks when they blow the whistle. I believe that the solution is under development and seems in its early stages to be delivering. Not perfectly, but sufficiently to make people stand up and think. The tools we have available for communicating are changing rapidly and the commenting site PubPeer is having an effect, slowly but surely. Why slowly? Because only a fraction of the community uses PubPeer. Usage is growing (stats on views and number of comments and would be most interesting). As Paul Brookes points out in his article in PeerJ (here), when potential misconduct is made public, there is a far greater chance of action being taken. Couple widespread use of PubPeer as a centralised filter and outlet of our reading and reviewing of papers and grants to open access and open data and we avoid vigilantism, witch hunts, ensure science remains “disorganised” and, most crucially self-righting (posts on the latter here
and here).

Advertisement

Share this:

  • Twitter
  • Facebook
  • LinkedIn

Like this:

Like Loading...

Related

Posted in Peer review, Post publication peer review, Research integrity, Science process, Science publishing, Scientific progress | Tagged research, Research integrity, science, Science fraud, Science progress |

  • Places of interest

    The one and only PhD comics, the guide to being a graduate and to mentoring.

    Improbable Research and the Ig Nobels

    Retraction Watch provides updates on retractions of articles.

    Office for Research Integrity, their video should be compulsory for all.

    Centre for Alternative Technology

    Lateral Science, has some quite stunning information - well worth a browse.

    Fascinating places that have been closed by lawyers

    Science Fraud, shut down due to legal threats on Jan 3 2013. and Abnormal Science

  • Blogroll

    • WordPress.com
    • WordPress.org
  • Funding agencies

    • Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council
    • Cancer and Polio Research Fund
    • Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
    • Liverpool Pancreas NIHR Biomedical Research Unit
    • Medical Research Council
    • North West Cancer Research
  • Seminars

    • Cancer Research UK Centre
  • August 2014
    M T W T F S S
     123
    45678910
    11121314151617
    18192021222324
    25262728293031
    « Jul   Sep »
  • Archives

    • November 2022
    • July 2022
    • April 2022
    • March 2022
    • May 2021
    • March 2021
    • August 2020
    • June 2020
    • April 2020
    • March 2020
    • December 2019
    • October 2019
    • July 2019
    • May 2019
    • April 2019
    • January 2019
    • September 2018
    • August 2018
    • May 2018
    • April 2018
    • February 2018
    • January 2018
    • December 2017
    • November 2017
    • July 2017
    • June 2017
    • April 2017
    • March 2017
    • January 2017
    • October 2016
    • June 2016
    • May 2016
    • March 2016
    • January 2016
    • December 2015
    • July 2015
    • June 2015
    • May 2015
    • March 2015
    • February 2015
    • January 2015
    • December 2014
    • November 2014
    • October 2014
    • September 2014
    • August 2014
    • July 2014
    • June 2014
    • February 2014
    • January 2014
    • December 2013
    • October 2013
    • September 2013
    • August 2013
    • July 2013
    • June 2013
    • May 2013
    • April 2013
    • March 2013
    • February 2013
    • January 2013
    • December 2012
    • November 2012
    • October 2012
    • September 2012
    • August 2012
    • July 2012
    • June 2012
    • May 2012
    • April 2012
    • March 2012
    • February 2012
    • January 2012
    • November 2011
    • October 2011
    • September 2011
    • August 2011
    • July 2011
    • June 2011
    • May 2011
    • April 2011
    • March 2011
    • February 2011
    • January 2011
    • December 2010
    • November 2010
    • October 2010
    • September 2010
    • August 2010
  • Follow me on Twitter

    My Tweets
  • Cloud

    American Civil War antithrombin III banana Biological imaging biotechnology Brexit Choanoflagellates chocolate chondroitin sulfate coagulation Confederate States covid19 DN Lee Education EU EU referendum Europe extracellular matrix FGF Fibroblast growth factor Food FRET sensors Gish Gallop glycosaminoglycans GMO government Graduate students heparan sulfate heparin history of science imaging Irvine Stephens Bulloch James Bulloch James Dunwoody Bulloch Liverpool microbiology Nanoparticle Nanoparticles Nanotechnology neuroscience nmr Open Access Open Data orange Parliament Peer Review PhD polysaccharide port sunlight Post publication peer review protein chemistry REF research Research Excellence Framework Research integrity Roast SARS-CoV-2 science Science and Technology Committee Science fraud Science Funding Science progress Scientific American Seminars sorbet speaking strawberry sulfation Sulfotransferase synthetic biology Teaching technology transfer Tourism Travel Universities

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.

WPThemes.


Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here: Cookie Policy
  • Follow Following
    • Ferniglab Blog
    • Join 73 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Ferniglab Blog
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Copy shortlink
    • Report this content
    • View post in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
%d bloggers like this: