Her concluding paragraphs: "As the House Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic continues to investigate Covid’s origins and the Covid response, it is essential that we recognize the lessons of the “Proximal Origin” debacle. What the authors’ Slack messages have exposed more than anything else is that peer-reviewed science is not sacred and that scientists are not neutral arbiters of truth.
Today, the scientific process and scientific institutions are dominated by warped financial incentives, military contracts, and political motives. When the next medical and scientific crisis inevitably arrives, it is incumbent on us all to remember that “scientific consensus” is not always determined by discovery and open debate, but often by the demands of dishonest and self-interested “higher ups.” "
This applies to the Climate Change science community in spades. The notion that it can fix itself from within is naive.
An excellent article. You have a rare ability to articulate the scientific method and its ethics that is head and shoulders above your peers. I first recognized this when, years ago as a scientist dedicated to the Scientific Method, I read your book "The Rightful Place of Science". Thank you.
Forgot to add: You say "I believe Proximal Origins to be the most significant corruption of scientific integrity this century, and probably much longer. The only comparable corruption was the “weapons of mass destruction” fiasco that was used to justify the war in Iraq. " To this I would add Climategate/ the Hockey Stick Affair. This makes three such attacks on scientific integrity this century alone. It is to weep.
As past chairman of a non technical professional journal's editorial board, albeit with technical submissions, I agree with your premise. I would give the editors wide authority on rejection, however; to reject a submission based on future possible data, only to accept that submission before that data is finalized but after the conclusion is changed is, in my opinion, editorial malpractice. I don't fault the reviewers. They should have wide latitude on their opinions and recommendations. It is the editor, or editorial board that is responsible for distilling those opinions into a position.
Related..perhaps.. I think scientific journals are getting lazy on the difference between original research and letters or perspectives.. what I call "op-eds with research citations". Media outlets are the same.. they say it's analysis, but it tends to be a group's opinion, supported by facts that they select . to support their position. And we see how this works in the real world. I have learned to be very wary of papers that have no new data and are suddenly published as some new political controversy gets hot.
Thank you Roger for putting all of this down on paper in a meticulous manner. How this happened and what should be done about it is a testament of your integrity as a scientist. Bravo.
On the “why did the US government want to close off the lab leak theory” - I’ll offer this. Because the perpetrators of this ruse knew it was a lab leak - from a Chinese lab funded by the US, they were forced to cover it up with this fraudulent paper. If they did not, wild speculation would have ensued, with fingers pointing to China - while the crisis was brewing globally. But we all know what China would have done when boxed into this corner. It would have released the relevant information that showed that the US funded this bio-terrorist escapade in the first place. And that would have been devastating.
Now that the emergency is over, our government can “correct” the story on a Friday night in the middle of August and no one will say a peep.
Ironically this has been well broadcasted in a number of places. NY Post as example. Epoch Times another. The problem is to this days those outlets are the outliers. These guys will never retract because there is no pressure to do so. Thanks for your efforts.
Roger - unbelievable. I just googled "proximal origins" and the news results are...meager at best. I don't know why I keep being surprised that the only actual journalism being done is on Substacks like this one.
In Nov 2020, Bad Orange Man lost Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin and Nebraska 2 by a combined total of fewer than 66k votes. If 33k people in the right places vote the other way, Trump wins the electoral college, 270-268.
A 43k vote difference existed just in the three big states, so the difference to an electoral vote tie was a tiny 22k people switching sides.
If "Trump v China lab leak" had escaped the lab in March 2020 as "an acceptable possibility, according to leading scientists," then our politics & COVID debates would have looked very different over the ensuing 9 months.
It's too easy to let this off as politics corrupting science. It was something far worse.... Scientists corrupting politics (aka an election).
Doesn't matter what you think. Matters what the Chinese think.
It's all about ego. If they admit they were wrong, so wrong, for such a long time then questions will arise: What else are they wrong about? Climate Change for a start? Other things? Best not to ask.
Jul 24, 2023·edited Jul 24, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.
This is really a different subject, but when I read an account of the resignation of Stanford president Marc Tessier-Lavigne I came to the conclusion that there are far too many scientific papers published. From my own experience doing graduate research (in thin film physics) most papers don't have anything new or useful in them. Their only purpose is to enhance someone's publication record. (Disclosure: I'm guilty of publishing some useless papers which my advisor expected. I did publish one that was really worthy and SPIE recognized it with a Milestone Award.)
My conclusions:
Scientific research needs far fewer papers. Only those with something new should be published.
Research needs more funding. Probably much more. And funding needs to come with accountability for producing new knowledge. If a principal investigator gets funded but doesn't produce new knowledge that should reduce his/her chances of getting additional funding. (Like the one guy in the Parable of the Talents that did nothing with the money given to him. He gets weeping and gnashing of teeth.)
Reviewers need to be held accountable for approving useless or incorrect research. Along with the authors, reviewers should be accountable. The dirty secret of peer review is that reviewers are free to do as much or as little as they want when reviewing a paper. Reviewers should be required to do a rigorous review of a paper. They should be paid for that with some of the increased funding.
"Scientific research needs far fewer papers. Only those with something new should be published"
My experience in countless hiring and promotion cases is that quantity of publication typically stands in for quality of publication. Nothing is more depressing in academia than seeing a researcher’s career achievements reduced to a power point slide. Inevitably, the slide will have number of peer-reviewed publications, H-Index, number as first author and other meaningless statistics.
I had a favorite colleague, RIP, who would disrupt every such proceeding by asking - what science have they done?! What have they discovered? Don't tell me the number of papers, show me the 3 most important and tell me why. He was great.
Professor Balloux pointed out that PO is not a scientific paper, but has been submitted as correspondence and as such strictly speaking cannot be retracted. What about that?
One of the most insidious outcomes of publishing scientific papers is feeding the AI beast known as ChatGPT and it many derivatives. Even if papers are retracted and the scientific community tries to police itself, the fact is this (mis) information is already in the ether. It will be accessed, processed and regurgitated in subsequent recombinations for the next user of AI to reinforce their particular point of view. It then gets worse as those new recombinations are published and become the self-reinforcing database that is subsequently incorporated and then presented to the general public.
Anyone who has used chatGPT or the other AI tools knows that you cannot rely on the answers they give. Just like anything you find on the internet it may be wrong.
AI tools amount to a better web search, assuming they get updated frequently. Some are hybrid AI models with web search to include recent results.
No, regarding the most controversial topics of the day, as a whole I do not trust scientists and the politically freighted processes of peer review and publication -- scholarly and popular -- anymore. It seems all have been bought by their favorite view, school of thought, party, or grantor$.
I wonder how much credit (or blame) we should give now to the late 20th-century urgings for science and scientists to annex to their laboratories a direct pipeline to influencing society quickly & directly via, in part, obviously political action not merely as citizens but as scientist experts whose credentials should intimidate to quiet the questioning or unconvinced hoi polloi.
This piece by Alex Gutentag published on PUBLIC today nails it: https://public.substack.com/p/anthony-fauci-behind-covid-origins
Her concluding paragraphs: "As the House Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic continues to investigate Covid’s origins and the Covid response, it is essential that we recognize the lessons of the “Proximal Origin” debacle. What the authors’ Slack messages have exposed more than anything else is that peer-reviewed science is not sacred and that scientists are not neutral arbiters of truth.
Today, the scientific process and scientific institutions are dominated by warped financial incentives, military contracts, and political motives. When the next medical and scientific crisis inevitably arrives, it is incumbent on us all to remember that “scientific consensus” is not always determined by discovery and open debate, but often by the demands of dishonest and self-interested “higher ups.” "
This applies to the Climate Change science community in spades. The notion that it can fix itself from within is naive.
Anyone going to hold their breath waiting for the retraction?
An excellent article. You have a rare ability to articulate the scientific method and its ethics that is head and shoulders above your peers. I first recognized this when, years ago as a scientist dedicated to the Scientific Method, I read your book "The Rightful Place of Science". Thank you.
Thank you, very kind!
Forgot to add: You say "I believe Proximal Origins to be the most significant corruption of scientific integrity this century, and probably much longer. The only comparable corruption was the “weapons of mass destruction” fiasco that was used to justify the war in Iraq. " To this I would add Climategate/ the Hockey Stick Affair. This makes three such attacks on scientific integrity this century alone. It is to weep.
As past chairman of a non technical professional journal's editorial board, albeit with technical submissions, I agree with your premise. I would give the editors wide authority on rejection, however; to reject a submission based on future possible data, only to accept that submission before that data is finalized but after the conclusion is changed is, in my opinion, editorial malpractice. I don't fault the reviewers. They should have wide latitude on their opinions and recommendations. It is the editor, or editorial board that is responsible for distilling those opinions into a position.
Yes, I agree 100%
Related..perhaps.. I think scientific journals are getting lazy on the difference between original research and letters or perspectives.. what I call "op-eds with research citations". Media outlets are the same.. they say it's analysis, but it tends to be a group's opinion, supported by facts that they select . to support their position. And we see how this works in the real world. I have learned to be very wary of papers that have no new data and are suddenly published as some new political controversy gets hot.
Thank you Roger for putting all of this down on paper in a meticulous manner. How this happened and what should be done about it is a testament of your integrity as a scientist. Bravo.
On the “why did the US government want to close off the lab leak theory” - I’ll offer this. Because the perpetrators of this ruse knew it was a lab leak - from a Chinese lab funded by the US, they were forced to cover it up with this fraudulent paper. If they did not, wild speculation would have ensued, with fingers pointing to China - while the crisis was brewing globally. But we all know what China would have done when boxed into this corner. It would have released the relevant information that showed that the US funded this bio-terrorist escapade in the first place. And that would have been devastating.
Now that the emergency is over, our government can “correct” the story on a Friday night in the middle of August and no one will say a peep.
Ironically this has been well broadcasted in a number of places. NY Post as example. Epoch Times another. The problem is to this days those outlets are the outliers. These guys will never retract because there is no pressure to do so. Thanks for your efforts.
Roger - unbelievable. I just googled "proximal origins" and the news results are...meager at best. I don't know why I keep being surprised that the only actual journalism being done is on Substacks like this one.
Help! What is restacking?
The little circle button at the top with the arrows … that will post this to Notes on Aubstack and hopefully get a few more readers! 👍🙏
Got it! ❤️
In Nov 2020, Bad Orange Man lost Georgia, Arizona, Wisconsin and Nebraska 2 by a combined total of fewer than 66k votes. If 33k people in the right places vote the other way, Trump wins the electoral college, 270-268.
A 43k vote difference existed just in the three big states, so the difference to an electoral vote tie was a tiny 22k people switching sides.
If "Trump v China lab leak" had escaped the lab in March 2020 as "an acceptable possibility, according to leading scientists," then our politics & COVID debates would have looked very different over the ensuing 9 months.
It's too easy to let this off as politics corrupting science. It was something far worse.... Scientists corrupting politics (aka an election).
Doesn't matter what you think. Matters what the Chinese think.
It's all about ego. If they admit they were wrong, so wrong, for such a long time then questions will arise: What else are they wrong about? Climate Change for a start? Other things? Best not to ask.
This is really a different subject, but when I read an account of the resignation of Stanford president Marc Tessier-Lavigne I came to the conclusion that there are far too many scientific papers published. From my own experience doing graduate research (in thin film physics) most papers don't have anything new or useful in them. Their only purpose is to enhance someone's publication record. (Disclosure: I'm guilty of publishing some useless papers which my advisor expected. I did publish one that was really worthy and SPIE recognized it with a Milestone Award.)
My conclusions:
Scientific research needs far fewer papers. Only those with something new should be published.
Research needs more funding. Probably much more. And funding needs to come with accountability for producing new knowledge. If a principal investigator gets funded but doesn't produce new knowledge that should reduce his/her chances of getting additional funding. (Like the one guy in the Parable of the Talents that did nothing with the money given to him. He gets weeping and gnashing of teeth.)
Reviewers need to be held accountable for approving useless or incorrect research. Along with the authors, reviewers should be accountable. The dirty secret of peer review is that reviewers are free to do as much or as little as they want when reviewing a paper. Reviewers should be required to do a rigorous review of a paper. They should be paid for that with some of the increased funding.
I agree with this:
"Scientific research needs far fewer papers. Only those with something new should be published"
My experience in countless hiring and promotion cases is that quantity of publication typically stands in for quality of publication. Nothing is more depressing in academia than seeing a researcher’s career achievements reduced to a power point slide. Inevitably, the slide will have number of peer-reviewed publications, H-Index, number as first author and other meaningless statistics.
I had a favorite colleague, RIP, who would disrupt every such proceeding by asking - what science have they done?! What have they discovered? Don't tell me the number of papers, show me the 3 most important and tell me why. He was great.
Professor Balloux pointed out that PO is not a scientific paper, but has been submitted as correspondence and as such strictly speaking cannot be retracted. What about that?
Her is incorrect, and I think he has accepted my correction
See it here:
https://twitter.com/RogerPielkeJr/status/1682854648212774917?s=20
One of the most insidious outcomes of publishing scientific papers is feeding the AI beast known as ChatGPT and it many derivatives. Even if papers are retracted and the scientific community tries to police itself, the fact is this (mis) information is already in the ether. It will be accessed, processed and regurgitated in subsequent recombinations for the next user of AI to reinforce their particular point of view. It then gets worse as those new recombinations are published and become the self-reinforcing database that is subsequently incorporated and then presented to the general public.
Anyone who has used chatGPT or the other AI tools knows that you cannot rely on the answers they give. Just like anything you find on the internet it may be wrong.
AI tools amount to a better web search, assuming they get updated frequently. Some are hybrid AI models with web search to include recent results.
No, regarding the most controversial topics of the day, as a whole I do not trust scientists and the politically freighted processes of peer review and publication -- scholarly and popular -- anymore. It seems all have been bought by their favorite view, school of thought, party, or grantor$.
I wonder how much credit (or blame) we should give now to the late 20th-century urgings for science and scientists to annex to their laboratories a direct pipeline to influencing society quickly & directly via, in part, obviously political action not merely as citizens but as scientist experts whose credentials should intimidate to quiet the questioning or unconvinced hoi polloi.
"...(Reviewer 2) and their believed..." should be "...(Reviewer 2) and their belief..."
Thanks for the eagle eyes!