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What makes you think they abandon peer review? Some of those people do publish peer reviewed papers. Unfortunately, peer review is pretty worthless. I've read

What makes you think they abandon peer review? Some of those people do publish peer reviewed papers. Unfortunately, peer review is pretty worthless. I've read a lot of papers that passed through peer review yet had basic errors in the first page, in one case, one was saying something false about public statistics in the very first sentence! If you don't trust particular fields then peer review isn't a very convincing upgrade because it's bad scientists reviewing other bad scientists. I'm not sure who you mean by "one such loner scientist" - do you mean Wakefield? He was peer reviewed and it took years for his paper to be retracted! That's the sort of problem I mean. For COVID stuff, for better or worse the arguments are mostly about data and everyone is working off the same datasets. So you don't need fancy equipment. A computer is sufficient. I find the pseudonymous person to in some ways have more to lose. One thing that you realize very quickly reading bad COVID papers is that the people who write them never suffer any consequences. It doesn't matter if the predictions are wrong, or if the scientific method is violated, or even if they just flatly lie in the text itself. It seems universities will let their academics get away with almost anything. Look at Ferguson for a good example of that. The man has made an entire career out of being always wrong and nobody in Imperial College London seems to care. The non-affiliated researchers on the other hand are trying to build an audience, some are selling their analysis to readers. They know they can lose that income stream if they screw up. Plus the open comments sections works wonders - they are effectively being peer reviewed in real time by far larger numbers of people than there are in the academic process. I've seen mistakes caught that way a few times now and it usually leads to a quick admission and apology, something I never saw coming from academics even in the rare cases their paper was retracted.

scotty79 5y ago
> What makes you think they abandon peer review? Maybe that's because I have much trouble picturing who exactly do you have in mind. I don't know about any major thing solved by unaffiliated scientist. Sure, there are some of the not well regarded discovered some pretty important thing. But they still were operating in the same environment, and once they proven their case sufficiently were embraced by that environment. > Some of those people do publish peer reviewed papers. Some? And that's supposed to make them more trustworthy for me than scientists that other scientists trust? > Unfortunately, peer review is pretty worthless. As all tools by themselves are. That's why we have the scientific community and that's why you can make a career of mastering all the tools of science. Reputation among colleges has some value as a tool too. > do you mean Wakefield? I mean exactly him. > He was peer reviewed and it took years for his paper to be retracted! Yes. It takes time. It took even more years of solid journalistic investigation to show how much of a fraud he was. Meanwhile no other better source stepped forward to provide us with better insight on that case. And many "citizen scientists" did their own "research" and found much confirmation for Wakefield claims which they happily pronounced to vulnerable people. > For COVID stuff, for better or worse the arguments are mostly about data and everyone is working off the same datasets. So you don't need fancy equipment. A computer is sufficient. Not quite, because data is just the base level, from data you need to extract information, from that knowledge and from that insight. At the level between data and knowledge you need to have a pretty solid understanding of context of given field, like virology or epidemiology or immunology, because without it, from that data, you'll be able to create only mistakes and confusion. > The man has made an entire career out of being always wrong and nobody in Imperial College London seems to care. Sure, scientists usually don't spend their careers debunking others that are clearly wrong. They are usually more focused on developing the ideas of the ones who are right, because that's better use of their time. There are ton of garbage science around. That makes me even less confident about things that are not even science. > The non-affiliated researchers on the other hand are trying to build an audience, some are selling their analysis to readers. That's a horrible argument. Truth doesn't sell. Lies sell best. Also lies are somewhat resilient and still sell very well in the presence of information debunking them. > I've seen mistakes caught that way a few times now and it usually leads to a quick admission and apology I've seen way more doubling down on the lie or mistake than apologies. Apologies usually come from real scientists that have internet thing on the side while having usual fulfilling scientific careers. > something I never saw coming from academics even in the rare cases their paper was retracted. That's because retracted papers usually don't come from people who made honest mistake. They come from over liars, who wouldn't apologize or even admit if someone caught their hand while they are stealing. While random person (or non-afiliated scientist) on the internet is more often just misguided and/or incompetent.
- native_samples 5y ago
  "There are ton of garbage science around. That makes me even less confident about things that are not even science." Your argument, or world view, is that you can determine what's true by looking at who scientists trust and the peer reviews of these scientists. I've just named a man who is by universal academic consensus a scientist, but who - as you're aware - produces garbage science without any pushback. In fact, as far as epidemiology is concerned, ICL are the bees knees. One of their worst most obviously garbage papers has over 1300 citations! And so your answer is that scientists don't spend time rebutting it (and never have) because it's so obviously bad they don't need to? Why do they keep citing it then? Where are the initial takedowns that established so strongly this guy was a fraud that scientists don't feel a need to write any more, and why do no governments seem to be aware of this? Put another way, how can you determine which scientists are doing good work vs bad if all the available evidence, like citation counts, suggests they don't care and confuse bad work for good all the time? Remember that scientists are always "selling", which is why they complain about the grant application process so much. They are selling interesting claims to governments, not exactly known for being discerning buyers. "It took even more years of solid journalistic investigation to show how much of a fraud he was." Yes, it was hard work. Do you think current mainstream journalism is solid? I don't. The average science journalist would apparently rather die than argue with a scientist about anything, let alone allege fraud. They see their job as amplifying 'expert' voices, not investigating them. But such journalism does exist and can be found outside of the large media institutions. You just have to look for it. Here's a small selection: https://dailysceptic.org/ https://dailysceptic.org/ - news and analysis from the UK, they often do reviews of scientific papers and find flaws in them. For example this review of a paper by Ferguson's group: https://dailysceptic.org/2021/08/24/examining-the-latest-paper-from-imperial-college-london/ https://dailysceptic.org/2021/08/24/examining-the-latest-pap... All the content on this site is free and there are no ads. Mostly donation driven with lots of user submitted articles. Many readers and guest article writers have an academic, scientific, engineering or data analysis background. https://eugyppius.substack.com/ https://eugyppius.substack.com/ - a mix of data analysis, fact checks and political analysis. Some paywalled content but not much. https://bartram.substack.com/ https://bartram.substack.com/ - very deep analysis of the UK data (which is the best quality in the world) by a pseudonymous "former academic and senior UK government scientist". https://alexberenson.substack.com/ https://alexberenson.substack.com/ - a former NYT investigative reporter who did a science beat in the past. He has a more US-centric approach, and mixes data analysis with links to other news stories and various journalistic hot takes. He's a regular writer rather than someone with a data background, but he still does a decent enough job and the comments section usually picks up pretty fast when there's a risk of statistical mis-analysis. https://boriquagato.substack.com/ https://boriquagato.substack.com/ - a weird one but has some good articles: lots of data analysis mixed with populist "rise up" style political exhortions and amusing cat pictures. Very different to anything you'll find in a newspaper but there's still lots of thought provoking data here. https://greenwald.substack.com/ https://greenwald.substack.com/ - this is mostly analysis of media coverage rather than scientific papers e.g. https://outsidevoices.substack.com/p/the-nyts-partisan-tale-about-covid https://outsidevoices.substack.com/p/the-nyts-partisan-tale-... but it can be useful for fact checking. This is one where some content is paywalled. So now you'll go through and find reasons why you don't like these sources, or don't find them credible enough. Fine, but I don't find outlets like the BBC or NYT or Nature credible because there were too many times they published things that were clearly untrue and agenda-driven, then ignored all feedback about it.

scotty79 5y ago

> What makes you think they abandon peer review? Maybe that's because I have much trouble picturing who exactly do you have in mind. I don't know about any major thing solved by unaffiliated scientist. Sure, there are some of the not well regarded discovered some pretty important thing. But they still were operating in the same environment, and once they proven their case sufficiently were embraced by that environment. > Some of those people do publish peer reviewed papers. Some? And that's supposed to make them more trustworthy for me than scientists that other scientists trust? > Unfortunately, peer review is pretty worthless. As all tools by themselves are. That's why we have the scientific community and that's why you can make a career of mastering all the tools of science. Reputation among colleges has some value as a tool too. > do you mean Wakefield? I mean exactly him. > He was peer reviewed and it took years for his paper to be retracted! Yes. It takes time. It took even more years of solid journalistic investigation to show how much of a fraud he was. Meanwhile no other better source stepped forward to provide us with better insight on that case. And many "citizen scientists" did their own "research" and found much confirmation for Wakefield claims which they happily pronounced to vulnerable people. > For COVID stuff, for better or worse the arguments are mostly about data and everyone is working off the same datasets. So you don't need fancy equipment. A computer is sufficient. Not quite, because data is just the base level, from data you need to extract information, from that knowledge and from that insight. At the level between data and knowledge you need to have a pretty solid understanding of context of given field, like virology or epidemiology or immunology, because without it, from that data, you'll be able to create only mistakes and confusion. > The man has made an entire career out of being always wrong and nobody in Imperial College London seems to care. Sure, scientists usually don't spend their careers debunking others that are clearly wrong. They are usually more focused on developing the ideas of the ones who are right, because that's better use of their time. There are ton of garbage science around. That makes me even less confident about things that are not even science. > The non-affiliated researchers on the other hand are trying to build an audience, some are selling their analysis to readers. That's a horrible argument. Truth doesn't sell. Lies sell best. Also lies are somewhat resilient and still sell very well in the presence of information debunking them. > I've seen mistakes caught that way a few times now and it usually leads to a quick admission and apology I've seen way more doubling down on the lie or mistake than apologies. Apologies usually come from real scientists that have internet thing on the side while having usual fulfilling scientific careers. > something I never saw coming from academics even in the rare cases their paper was retracted. That's because retracted papers usually don't come from people who made honest mistake. They come from over liars, who wouldn't apologize or even admit if someone caught their hand while they are stealing. While random person (or non-afiliated scientist) on the internet is more often just misguided and/or incompetent.

native_samples 5y ago
"There are ton of garbage science around. That makes me even less confident about things that are not even science." Your argument, or world view, is that you can determine what's true by looking at who scientists trust and the peer reviews of these scientists. I've just named a man who is by universal academic consensus a scientist, but who - as you're aware - produces garbage science without any pushback. In fact, as far as epidemiology is concerned, ICL are the bees knees. One of their worst most obviously garbage papers has over 1300 citations! And so your answer is that scientists don't spend time rebutting it (and never have) because it's so obviously bad they don't need to? Why do they keep citing it then? Where are the initial takedowns that established so strongly this guy was a fraud that scientists don't feel a need to write any more, and why do no governments seem to be aware of this? Put another way, how can you determine which scientists are doing good work vs bad if all the available evidence, like citation counts, suggests they don't care and confuse bad work for good all the time? Remember that scientists are always "selling", which is why they complain about the grant application process so much. They are selling interesting claims to governments, not exactly known for being discerning buyers. "It took even more years of solid journalistic investigation to show how much of a fraud he was." Yes, it was hard work. Do you think current mainstream journalism is solid? I don't. The average science journalist would apparently rather die than argue with a scientist about anything, let alone allege fraud. They see their job as amplifying 'expert' voices, not investigating them. But such journalism does exist and can be found outside of the large media institutions. You just have to look for it. Here's a small selection: https://dailysceptic.org/ https://dailysceptic.org/ - news and analysis from the UK, they often do reviews of scientific papers and find flaws in them. For example this review of a paper by Ferguson's group: https://dailysceptic.org/2021/08/24/examining-the-latest-paper-from-imperial-college-london/ https://dailysceptic.org/2021/08/24/examining-the-latest-pap... All the content on this site is free and there are no ads. Mostly donation driven with lots of user submitted articles. Many readers and guest article writers have an academic, scientific, engineering or data analysis background. https://eugyppius.substack.com/ https://eugyppius.substack.com/ - a mix of data analysis, fact checks and political analysis. Some paywalled content but not much. https://bartram.substack.com/ https://bartram.substack.com/ - very deep analysis of the UK data (which is the best quality in the world) by a pseudonymous "former academic and senior UK government scientist". https://alexberenson.substack.com/ https://alexberenson.substack.com/ - a former NYT investigative reporter who did a science beat in the past. He has a more US-centric approach, and mixes data analysis with links to other news stories and various journalistic hot takes. He's a regular writer rather than someone with a data background, but he still does a decent enough job and the comments section usually picks up pretty fast when there's a risk of statistical mis-analysis. https://boriquagato.substack.com/ https://boriquagato.substack.com/ - a weird one but has some good articles: lots of data analysis mixed with populist "rise up" style political exhortions and amusing cat pictures. Very different to anything you'll find in a newspaper but there's still lots of thought provoking data here. https://greenwald.substack.com/ https://greenwald.substack.com/ - this is mostly analysis of media coverage rather than scientific papers e.g. https://outsidevoices.substack.com/p/the-nyts-partisan-tale-about-covid https://outsidevoices.substack.com/p/the-nyts-partisan-tale-... but it can be useful for fact checking. This is one where some content is paywalled. So now you'll go through and find reasons why you don't like these sources, or don't find them credible enough. Fine, but I don't find outlets like the BBC or NYT or Nature credible because there were too many times they published things that were clearly untrue and agenda-driven, then ignored all feedback about it.