Replies to post #159845 on Biotech Values

[poorgradstudent]

OT:

I guess I wasn't asking for a list of what you do. It's a matter of what ALL researchers do. So I find most of your response to be besides the point.

Nor do I find this a pharma versus academic science thing. I'm just worried about what I contribute to, and that's the academic side. I think we owe it to ourselves as a community to do the most reliable / reproducible science possible, and let history sort out what was important and what was incremental.

Also, I do not agree with this concept that airing basic science's dirty laundry somehow helps those who are against it. Silly senators who are going to complain about 1.5 MILLION DOLLARS SPENT ON FRUIT FLY RESEARCH!!!! are going to complain regardless. Their supposed "ammunition" is science's strength, and they'll never realize that.

That's all I got on this topic.

[jq1234]

Reproducibility of Academic Research:

From WSJ:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203764804577059841672541590.html

From Reuter:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/03/28/us-science-cancer-idUSBRE82R12P20120328

From Bruce Booth:

http://lifescivc.com/2011/03/academic-bias-biotech-failures/#0_undefined,0

[iwfal]

It appears to me in this thread that some people are placing researchers in industry on a pedestal of virtue, and acting as if they don't make errors, or aren't driven by pressures to find results that are significant. That is completely false.

Vin - I would suggest that no one was claiming that any segment of the research community was somehow much cleaner than any other area - industry vs academic, clinical vs pre-clinical, biologics vs small molecule, ... . The problem is a human one and is, IMO, ubiquitous whenever there is opportunity - which is whenever there is fuzz (aka noise) in the system that allows people to see what they want to see. (and note that some areas inherently have more noise than others - but I would suggest none are noise-free.)

To be honest I am surprised that anyone reading this board regularly would think some particular area was somehow much cleaner than other areas (see JQ's list). And I would further add the concept that if researchers in one particular area think they are immune it may be a good indicator that they are not - skepticism is a powerful tool. For instance the psych community is/was freaking out in 2012 about The Reproducibility Project (a project to attempt to reproduce every 2008 paper in one of three influential journals) with many claiming it can't possibly be bad enough to warrant such a project. And that doing such a self examination just gives ammo to the enemies-of-science - despite the large number of scandals in psychology papers over the last decade.