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There should be stronger consequences for this behavior. It costs hundreds of millions of dollars and several careers to deal with the outcome of data fabricati
by epups 3y ago
There should be stronger consequences for this behavior. It costs hundreds of millions of dollars and several careers to deal with the outcome of data fabrication. Meanwhile, the worst case scenario for the fraudster is losing their job.
- ceejayoz 3y agoIt also indirectly delays advances in medical care that, on a population-level scale, undoubtedly kills people. Murder in everything but name.
- packetlost 3y agoDoes it though? I find it hard to believe that this type of fraud wouldn't also lead death in some circumstances (maybe not this one).
- bumby 3y agoThe difficulty is in proving damages, though. Even if probable, it's still conjecture and our court systems have a higher bar than that, generally.
- ceejayoz 3y agoYeah, we have a societal problem in this regard; statistical murder is tough to quantify and thus is largely unpunishable. Coal power, for example, likely kills thousands of people a year in the USA, but none of it directly enough to count as a crime. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/23/coal-power-plants-deaths-pollution https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/23/coal-pow...
- bumby 3y agoI think negative externalities should be priced in. But it's a very complicated problem. With the above premise, where do you draw the line? For example, are you complicit if you use that electricity (or buy that cell phone made from unsavory practices)? From a legal standpoint, should you be charged because you materially benefitted from a criminal action?
- codedokode 3y agoBut copyright owners prove damages by number of torrent file downloads pretty easily.
- bumby 3y agoCopyright infringement is easier to quantify because you can quite literally count the number of copies. How do you copy the number of deaths that happened because Research_X went unfunded due to fraud occurring in Research_Y?
- nairboon 3y agoYou could start with claimed increase in life expectancy in the target population times actual deaths during the fraudulent research funding period times the usual value of a life.
- bumby 3y agoBut again, this is just a statistical argument, not actual damages. For a tort case, you generally need to show real damages. For a criminal case, I don't think a statistical argument would sway a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that academic fraud caused specific deaths. There's a reason why the burden of proof in our court systems is structured the way it is. Besides, you don't even know that the unfunded research would have resulted in increased life expectancy because the research was never conducted. You're trying to prove a counter-factual where you don't have data. Additionally, there are probably far too many confounding factors in health science to make a strong statistical claim against a single action as you're insinuating.