4 ms·

As ever I think the bigger problem is grey areas, fooling oneself, etc rather than outright fraud. If you really are self-interested and greedy, you’ll probably

by dash2 2y ago

As ever I think the bigger problem is grey areas, fooling oneself, etc rather than outright fraud. If you really are self-interested and greedy, you’ll probably choose another career than academia.

ttoinou 2y ago
* You could be self interested & greedy and like to see yourself as a famous researcher * Some researchers make good money * You could start honest, then realize cheating is the only good way forward given the incentives
gsf_emergency_2 2y ago
Regarding 'cad-bloggers from Columbia: Woit does do a bit of grey area coverage. Likewise, his academic pubs are more interesting to me, personally! His reputation, however, is mixed at best. A real hero! Gelman: maybe he's trying to subdue the neuroticism*. I look forward to more compassionate, less overtly "curiosity"-driven grey-area coverage (not to mention stats papers) from him! Here is recent one, sadly also about psychologists (would be more interesting to do it to card carrying statisticians) http://stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/research/published/healing3.pdf http://stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/research/published/healing3... *Not many people describe themselves as an exponent of radical self-honesty since radicality isn't a palatable, much less enjoyable, thing. It takes a real saint (or logician) not to reflexively flinch from the imagined tsunami of incoming pity. Grey areas-- you can safely explore
- senderista 2y ago
  Does Woit actually publish anything in well-regarded journals? My impression was that he wasn't really an active researcher at all.
  - gsf_emergency_2 2y ago
    Sorry, was trying to be generous with "mixed rep at best". He is reasonably active (on arxiv,say, which is a red flag I suppose). Just that his blog gets far more attention. I would say that anybody in theory more active than Woit would immediately arouse my suspicion :)
n2d4 2y ago
Eh, very few fraudsters start with a plan to commit fraud. More often than not, it's legitimate intent, but then thoughts happen along the lines of "I could make my ten years of work much more effective by just being a tiny little bit dishonest!" And then it becomes, "but now I have to lie about this other slightly bigger thing too, else it will become suspicious!" And eventually, "now that I've already lied so much, I might just make stuff up." Particularly in research, where you may be working on the same idea for decades, it can be damning when you realize that the idea might just be fruitless. If all you had to do was remove one or two zeroes, and finally your colleagues would praise instead of mock you, wouldn't that be great?

by dash2 2y ago

As ever I think the bigger problem is grey areas, fooling oneself, etc rather than outright fraud. If you really are self-interested and greedy, you’ll probably choose another career than academia.

ttoinou 2y ago

* You could be self interested & greedy and like to see yourself as a famous researcher * Some researchers make good money * You could start honest, then realize cheating is the only good way forward given the incentives

gsf_emergency_2 2y ago

Regarding 'cad-bloggers from Columbia: Woit does do a bit of grey area coverage. Likewise, his academic pubs are more interesting to me, personally! His reputation, however, is mixed at best. A real hero! Gelman: maybe he's trying to subdue the neuroticism*. I look forward to more compassionate, less overtly "curiosity"-driven grey-area coverage (not to mention stats papers) from him! Here is recent one, sadly also about psychologists (would be more interesting to do it to card carrying statisticians) http://stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/research/published/healing3.pdf http://stat.columbia.edu/~gelman/research/published/healing3... *Not many people describe themselves as an exponent of radical self-honesty since radicality isn't a palatable, much less enjoyable, thing. It takes a real saint (or logician) not to reflexively flinch from the imagined tsunami of incoming pity. Grey areas-- you can safely explore

senderista 2y ago
Does Woit actually publish anything in well-regarded journals? My impression was that he wasn't really an active researcher at all.
- gsf_emergency_2 2y ago
  Sorry, was trying to be generous with "mixed rep at best". He is reasonably active (on arxiv,say, which is a red flag I suppose). Just that his blog gets far more attention. I would say that anybody in theory more active than Woit would immediately arouse my suspicion :)

n2d4 2y ago

Eh, very few fraudsters start with a plan to commit fraud. More often than not, it's legitimate intent, but then thoughts happen along the lines of "I could make my ten years of work much more effective by just being a tiny little bit dishonest!" And then it becomes, "but now I have to lie about this other slightly bigger thing too, else it will become suspicious!" And eventually, "now that I've already lied so much, I might just make stuff up." Particularly in research, where you may be working on the same idea for decades, it can be damning when you realize that the idea might just be fruitless. If all you had to do was remove one or two zeroes, and finally your colleagues would praise instead of mock you, wouldn't that be great?