5 ms·

Science currently looks like somebody going to fish, with the purpose of caught the best fish in the sea. So first they put the bait inside a plastic box, to w

Science currently looks like somebody going to fish, with the purpose of caught the best fish in the sea. So first they put the bait inside a plastic box, to weed out all the dumb fishes. Then they put the box inside another sealed wooden box, with a combination lockpad. Because only a really smart fish with skilled fin-paws should be able to figure out how to open also that box. For better measure, they finally put the wooden crate out of the water, to select for olympic fishes able to keep its breath for a longer time. And then put an electronic device in the bottom with an encrypted map to the treasure. When some fish will appear will be the most stupendous fish in the sea, with the most brilliant scales; And everybody will be happy to eat it And then science waits... and waits some more,... a little more... And after one year, science starts wondering where all the fishes go, and why all of the candidates that appeared are rats. If you put too much requisites and ask for only ideal flawless careers, made in some unicornia university; in the short time the candidates interested in your job position will start lying. After a while all that remain at your door are cheaters So, well... enjoy the fruits of your brilliant strategy.

j_maffe 3y ago
I think you're talking about Academia, not science. The scientific method is not at fault here.
- nickff 3y ago
  I don't want to be pedantic or argumentative, but I think you've created a straw-man of the comment you're replying to. scientific institutions != scientific method Academia is the most prestigious scientific institution.
  - xqcgrek2 3y ago
    >Academia is the most prestigious scientific institution. For some. For others its national labs, like Los Alamos or NASA centers. In those, the culture is very different.
  - dingnuts 3y ago
    >Academia is the most prestigious scientific institution. That's an opinion. Industry does a lot more worthwhile science than academia, and does it without tax money, in my opinion. Was the transistor invented by academia? You can argue that's engineering, rather than science. In my opinion the difference is semantics.
    - nickff 3y ago
      I agree that industry does a lot of worthwhile science, and maybe more than academia, but I was talking about 'prestige', not 'productivity'.
    - cycomanic 3y ago
      Apart from the fact that you seriously overestimate the amount of science being done in industry, you seem to also underestimate the amount of government assistance industry receives for doing this research (and more development), either through tax breaks or direct grants.
- readthenotes1 3y ago
  Any method that ignores the limitations of the instruments of production is indeed very flawed
- dilap 3y ago
  sure, but in practice when people use the word science (as in "trust the science"), they mostly mean research happening in academia
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - LBTables 3y ago
    ...which is unfortunate, and worth pointing out that academia is not the only conductor of scientific research.
    - dilap 3y ago
      I think the takeaway is that the scientific method is great, but since science is necessarily conducted by humans, the economic incentives within context of "doing science" also need to be correct for good science to get done. (Currently, it seems like, this is very often not the case. Hence, your trust in current-science-as-conducted should be correspondingly lower. Lots of variation by field, probably, too.) (Though then again maybe you shouldn't even believe anything until you see it having actual real effects in your day to day life?)
- thereddaikon 3y ago
  Show me someone that questions the scientific method. You would be hard-pressed to find a reasonable person who does. When people criticize "science" they are almost always criticizing academia. Getting pedantic isn't very helpful.
  - j_maffe 3y ago
    I don't know I think pointing out that OP is talking about academia can help with finding actual root causes. It wasn't a way to criticize the notion in any way. Using two things like science and academia interchangeably is not a minute detail IMO
  - boomchinolo78 3y ago
    Feyerabend, for one, but that's getting quite above you...
    - olddustytrail 3y ago
      That would have been a better comment without the dig. I suspect the person you're replying to would find "Against Method" interesting (assuming they haven't already read it).
andrewflnr 3y ago
Tl;dr: not allowing data fabrication is some kind of lofty, unreasonable standard that doesn't allow science to be published. Please.
- gilmore606 3y ago
  That's not what he means, he's saying the pressure to constantly publish original research (the more original the better!) creates these incentives to become a rat, that is, to cheat.
  - adamc 3y ago
    Right, and as another poster pointed out, that's academia, not science.
  - andrewflnr 3y ago
    That's bullshit, though. Pressure is not an excuse to fabricate data, and no one will defend that claim out loud. But what else does a rambly comment about how hard it is for researchers mean under a story about data fabrication? Ed: to be clear, the one making the argument about publishing pressure in a sensible way is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36881029 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36881029
    - wyago 3y ago
      The original comment calls the people fabricating data "rats" and "cheaters", I'm not sure how you would construe that to be excusing them. The comment is describing that if a system is made to be so difficult you have to cheat to get past it, only cheaters will get past it.
    - rcxdude 3y ago
      The point is it's not an excuse, but it's not surprising that given that pressure those who fabricate data have an edge in the system compared to those who don't. (i.e. if you create an environment where the only way to succeed is to be fraudulent then of course it's going to be populated by frauds)
malkia 3y ago
This reminds of a completely different joke about fishes, and getting caught: Police officer stops someone for driving over the limit. The driver: - But I wasn't the fastest going on the road. What about the others? - So when you go fishing, do you always catch the biggest fish? anyway...
pmoriarty 3y ago
"If you put too much requisites and ask for only ideal flawless careers, made in some unicornia university; in the short time the candidates interested in your job position will start lying. After a while all that remain at your door are cheaters" Are you saying doing science is so hard the only way to succeed is to cheat? This is a slap in the face to scientists doing honest work.
- rcxdude 3y ago
  How is it a slap in the face? The point is the metrics by which academia judges science have been divorced from what actually produces good science for a while (and you'll find very few scientists who disagree with that), but it does reward cheaters quite well.
  - shortlongterm 3y ago
    Short term or long term? Sure in the short term dishonesty might work for a scientist but long term? Legacy after death? I'm not so sure on that. Surely the conditions for being a professional academic are much more favorable than times in the past. (By virtue only that University is more accessible to more people today than any other time) Just because we see flaws today doesn't mean that those flaws can not be 'fixed'. (Nor that we won't discover new flaws and new fixes: engineering is an interative process).
    - rcxdude 3y ago
      Well, cheaters are generally more interested in the short term than the long term, and non-cheaters have to content with it too, before they can get to the long term. > Surely the conditions for being a professional academic are much more favorable than times in the past. (By virtue only that University is more accessible to more people today than any other time) If anything this has made things worse in the current system, because it has grown so much more competitive. Competition is good only so far as success in the competition is based on contributing to the overall goal, and academia lacks a good alignment between that and rewards, so the competition has some fairly significant negative effects. I agree there are likely ways to fix the current system, but it will require a concerted effort from many directions, as the current incentive structure rewards many in the current system for perpetuating it.

j_maffe 3y ago

I think you're talking about Academia, not science. The scientific method is not at fault here.

nickff 3y ago
I don't want to be pedantic or argumentative, but I think you've created a straw-man of the comment you're replying to. scientific institutions != scientific method Academia is the most prestigious scientific institution.
- xqcgrek2 3y ago
  >Academia is the most prestigious scientific institution. For some. For others its national labs, like Los Alamos or NASA centers. In those, the culture is very different.
- dingnuts 3y ago
  >Academia is the most prestigious scientific institution. That's an opinion. Industry does a lot more worthwhile science than academia, and does it without tax money, in my opinion. Was the transistor invented by academia? You can argue that's engineering, rather than science. In my opinion the difference is semantics.
  - nickff 3y ago
    I agree that industry does a lot of worthwhile science, and maybe more than academia, but I was talking about 'prestige', not 'productivity'.
  - cycomanic 3y ago
    Apart from the fact that you seriously overestimate the amount of science being done in industry, you seem to also underestimate the amount of government assistance industry receives for doing this research (and more development), either through tax breaks or direct grants.
readthenotes1 3y ago
Any method that ignores the limitations of the instruments of production is indeed very flawed
dilap 3y ago
sure, but in practice when people use the word science (as in "trust the science"), they mostly mean research happening in academia
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- LBTables 3y ago
  ...which is unfortunate, and worth pointing out that academia is not the only conductor of scientific research.
  - dilap 3y ago
    I think the takeaway is that the scientific method is great, but since science is necessarily conducted by humans, the economic incentives within context of "doing science" also need to be correct for good science to get done. (Currently, it seems like, this is very often not the case. Hence, your trust in current-science-as-conducted should be correspondingly lower. Lots of variation by field, probably, too.) (Though then again maybe you shouldn't even believe anything until you see it having actual real effects in your day to day life?)
thereddaikon 3y ago
Show me someone that questions the scientific method. You would be hard-pressed to find a reasonable person who does. When people criticize "science" they are almost always criticizing academia. Getting pedantic isn't very helpful.
- j_maffe 3y ago
  I don't know I think pointing out that OP is talking about academia can help with finding actual root causes. It wasn't a way to criticize the notion in any way. Using two things like science and academia interchangeably is not a minute detail IMO
- boomchinolo78 3y ago
  Feyerabend, for one, but that's getting quite above you...
  - olddustytrail 3y ago
    That would have been a better comment without the dig. I suspect the person you're replying to would find "Against Method" interesting (assuming they haven't already read it).

andrewflnr 3y ago

Tl;dr: not allowing data fabrication is some kind of lofty, unreasonable standard that doesn't allow science to be published. Please.

gilmore606 3y ago
That's not what he means, he's saying the pressure to constantly publish original research (the more original the better!) creates these incentives to become a rat, that is, to cheat.
- adamc 3y ago
  Right, and as another poster pointed out, that's academia, not science.
- andrewflnr 3y ago
  That's bullshit, though. Pressure is not an excuse to fabricate data, and no one will defend that claim out loud. But what else does a rambly comment about how hard it is for researchers mean under a story about data fabrication? Ed: to be clear, the one making the argument about publishing pressure in a sensible way is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36881029 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36881029
  - wyago 3y ago
    The original comment calls the people fabricating data "rats" and "cheaters", I'm not sure how you would construe that to be excusing them. The comment is describing that if a system is made to be so difficult you have to cheat to get past it, only cheaters will get past it.
  - rcxdude 3y ago
    The point is it's not an excuse, but it's not surprising that given that pressure those who fabricate data have an edge in the system compared to those who don't. (i.e. if you create an environment where the only way to succeed is to be fraudulent then of course it's going to be populated by frauds)

malkia 3y ago

This reminds of a completely different joke about fishes, and getting caught: Police officer stops someone for driving over the limit. The driver: - But I wasn't the fastest going on the road. What about the others? - So when you go fishing, do you always catch the biggest fish? anyway...

pmoriarty 3y ago

"If you put too much requisites and ask for only ideal flawless careers, made in some unicornia university; in the short time the candidates interested in your job position will start lying. After a while all that remain at your door are cheaters" Are you saying doing science is so hard the only way to succeed is to cheat? This is a slap in the face to scientists doing honest work.

rcxdude 3y ago
How is it a slap in the face? The point is the metrics by which academia judges science have been divorced from what actually produces good science for a while (and you'll find very few scientists who disagree with that), but it does reward cheaters quite well.
- shortlongterm 3y ago
  Short term or long term? Sure in the short term dishonesty might work for a scientist but long term? Legacy after death? I'm not so sure on that. Surely the conditions for being a professional academic are much more favorable than times in the past. (By virtue only that University is more accessible to more people today than any other time) Just because we see flaws today doesn't mean that those flaws can not be 'fixed'. (Nor that we won't discover new flaws and new fixes: engineering is an interative process).
  - rcxdude 3y ago
    Well, cheaters are generally more interested in the short term than the long term, and non-cheaters have to content with it too, before they can get to the long term. > Surely the conditions for being a professional academic are much more favorable than times in the past. (By virtue only that University is more accessible to more people today than any other time) If anything this has made things worse in the current system, because it has grown so much more competitive. Competition is good only so far as success in the competition is based on contributing to the overall goal, and academia lacks a good alignment between that and rewards, so the competition has some fairly significant negative effects. I agree there are likely ways to fix the current system, but it will require a concerted effort from many directions, as the current incentive structure rewards many in the current system for perpetuating it.