> If a study doesn't replicate because society has changed, and so the results, then that study cannot be used to infer things about current society. Not neces

> If a study doesn't replicate because society has changed, and so the results, then that study cannot be used to infer things about current society. Not necessarily, again it depends what you mean by replication. For example in the case of the bystander apathy experiment where they used smoke, do you have to replicate the study exactly as it was done, i.e.: is smoke essential, or would some other sign of threat also do? This is why I chose that example, if right after 9/11 you tried to replicate that particular study in the US and used smoke, it probably wouldn't replicate, because people would have been recently and strongly primed to react to smoke as a threat. I think people are over-interpreting the replication failures sometimes.