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> That's the sense in which the numbers game is more important than the genius factor. Numbers game doesn't work in the idealized way you think it does. if yo

> That's the sense in which the numbers game is more important than the genius factor. Numbers game doesn't work in the idealized way you think it does. if you let too many mediocre or bad people become scientists, some of them engage in fraud or ill- considered modelmaking, which wastes the time of good scientists who are in the place of having to reproduce results that were never going to work.

aDyslecticCrow 1y ago
Pretty impossible to compensate for or prevent. The day doctor or phd because a prestigious title; the first fraudsters were born. If the title becomes even more prestigious, the more damage can a bad actor be able to evoke with its influence.
jasperry 1y ago
I didn't say more people should become career scientists; the incentives of that are all messed up from trying to measure research output like it's a product. IMO the best way to prevent junk science is to teach more people to tell good science from bad. Better understanding is empowering regardless of career.
vladms 1y ago
Would you have any reference of why it matters the number of people doing something for some to engage in something nefarious? I would expect to happen no matter the number of people. I feel it is more connected to the culture (for example I would expect to happen more in a hierarchical culture than in an egalitarian culture, or more in a believing culture than in a critical culture).
- throwawaymaths 1y ago
  it happens no matter the number of people. but if you create a directive to dump more people into science than the capacity of society to produce scientists, (and there isn't an aggressive system to cull fraudsters) you will wind up with a linear increase of fraud/bad science, and a superlinear negative effect.
  - vladms 1y ago
    Isn't the ratio that is important? You can have a linear increase in good science. And, intuitively, the bad science would be "fragmented" (many clusters of lunatics) so good science would "prevail" at some point. Most things that I follow seem to have progressed a lot in the last 30 years... (as well as the nutcases, but there were many before as well) We worry about "bad science", but I read a physicist that claimed that the theory of relativity was really accepted and used only when the older generation (which were generally reasonable scientists) died and not before, because they just would not wrap their mind around "something that different". Which I don't think is the way "we" perceive scientific progress (a scientist looking at proofs/logic/building on others/impartial/rational/etc.)
    - throwawaymaths 1y ago
      bad science is not fragmented. let me give you ONE example. Homme Hellinga (tenured professor at Duke) claimed to have designed a triosephosphate isomerase. his grad student Mary Dwyer (science hero) recognized it was an artefact and called him out on it, got railroaded and i think even sued. after the dust settled, hellinga was merely forced to give up his named seat (he kept tenure and was still getting grants). meanwhile my grad student friend burned three years of his life doing a project based on a different hellinga result. i have many, many more examples (this one is publically known, so its safe to talk about and i personally know someone who lost years to it), some worse, some not as bad. here's two more publically known incidents just at duke: https://caffeinatedchemist.medium.com/hellinga-66449cf4699e https://caffeinatedchemist.medium.com/hellinga-66449cf4699e

aDyslecticCrow 1y ago

Pretty impossible to compensate for or prevent. The day doctor or phd because a prestigious title; the first fraudsters were born. If the title becomes even more prestigious, the more damage can a bad actor be able to evoke with its influence.

jasperry 1y ago

I didn't say more people should become career scientists; the incentives of that are all messed up from trying to measure research output like it's a product. IMO the best way to prevent junk science is to teach more people to tell good science from bad. Better understanding is empowering regardless of career.

vladms 1y ago

Would you have any reference of why it matters the number of people doing something for some to engage in something nefarious? I would expect to happen no matter the number of people. I feel it is more connected to the culture (for example I would expect to happen more in a hierarchical culture than in an egalitarian culture, or more in a believing culture than in a critical culture).

throwawaymaths 1y ago
it happens no matter the number of people. but if you create a directive to dump more people into science than the capacity of society to produce scientists, (and there isn't an aggressive system to cull fraudsters) you will wind up with a linear increase of fraud/bad science, and a superlinear negative effect.
- vladms 1y ago
  Isn't the ratio that is important? You can have a linear increase in good science. And, intuitively, the bad science would be "fragmented" (many clusters of lunatics) so good science would "prevail" at some point. Most things that I follow seem to have progressed a lot in the last 30 years... (as well as the nutcases, but there were many before as well) We worry about "bad science", but I read a physicist that claimed that the theory of relativity was really accepted and used only when the older generation (which were generally reasonable scientists) died and not before, because they just would not wrap their mind around "something that different". Which I don't think is the way "we" perceive scientific progress (a scientist looking at proofs/logic/building on others/impartial/rational/etc.)
  - throwawaymaths 1y ago
    bad science is not fragmented. let me give you ONE example. Homme Hellinga (tenured professor at Duke) claimed to have designed a triosephosphate isomerase. his grad student Mary Dwyer (science hero) recognized it was an artefact and called him out on it, got railroaded and i think even sued. after the dust settled, hellinga was merely forced to give up his named seat (he kept tenure and was still getting grants). meanwhile my grad student friend burned three years of his life doing a project based on a different hellinga result. i have many, many more examples (this one is publically known, so its safe to talk about and i personally know someone who lost years to it), some worse, some not as bad. here's two more publically known incidents just at duke: https://caffeinatedchemist.medium.com/hellinga-66449cf4699e https://caffeinatedchemist.medium.com/hellinga-66449cf4699e