Reproducibility and Other Problems: Practical and Institutional Responses to Contemporary Crises in Science - I

Abstract

There is an emerging sense that science writ large is facing an unprecedented set of crises and pressures. Oft mentioned is the politicization and public contestation of climate science, nutrition research, vaccines, and the like. But there is another set of crises, less about the politicization of science and much more about doubts among scientists about the credibility of their research. At least since biomathematician John Ioannidis’s 2005 paper, “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False,” there has been widespread anxiety about the epistemological reliability of science. Since then scientists have raised the alarm about a range of crises across a variety of fields: the reproducibility crisis, the ubiquity of questionable research practices, rising rates of retraction, high profile revelations of scientific fraud, predatory publishing, rampant conflicts of interest, and the general inadequacy of peer review. Scientists and scientific institutions have launched an array of responses: Metascientific research, mass replication experiments, new journal standards, open science frameworks aiming to enhance research transparency and data sharing, post publication peer review systems and misconduct clearinghouses like PubPeer and Retraction Watch, and even blogs and tweetstorms publicizing supposed scientific transgressions in real time. This panel invites papers probing the history, development, dimensions, and boundaries of this scientific crisis or crises; formal and informal efforts to respond; and the epistemic, practical, and institutional implications for scientific organization and especially the dilemmas and contradictions that emerge.

Individual Presentations

• The Origins of Statistical Significance Testing in Medical Research - Christopher J Holmes, University of Wisconsin - Madison

• Scientific Publishing and the Marketisation of Biomedical Knowledge: A Sociology of Conflict of Interest Policies - Boris Hauray, Inserm

• Achieving Scientific Reliability in Climate Science via Intercomparisons: Institutional and Infrastructural Coupling - Matthew Mayernik, National Center for Atmospheric Research

• No Replication, No Reality: Irreproducible Science in a Post-Truth Climate - Kelsey Ichikawa, Harvard University; Julie Chung, Harvard University

• Images, Evidence, and the Arts of Attention - Alison Gerber, Lund University

• Misconduct vs. Mistakes: Effects of Scientific Retractions on Trust in Science - Dilshani Sarathchandra, University of Idaho; Aaron McCright, Michigan State University

Session Organizer

• Aaron Panofsky, University of California, Los Angeles