Joan Warmbold writes:
>This is fascinating Allen and I, for one, would appreciate knowing
>where to locate resources that discuss this requirement of physical
>sciences re: important experimental claims need to be replicated
>before they are published.
Hi, Joan! I fear my wording must have misled you! What I wrote was this:
>In physical science any important experimental claim requires
>independent replication before being accepted by peers.
By "being accepted by peers" I was not referring to peer review, which
is what your response seems to imply, but generally accepted by those
in the relevant field competent to make a judgement after independent
replication has been obtained. (I was certainly not referring to
publication. Unless it is published relevant scientists round the world
would not be in a position to assess the claimed result and -- for
those in a position to --- to undertake experiments to replicate it.)
>I also would be interested in who conducts these replication studies
Anybody who has sufficient expertise and can drum up the finances from
their university department!
>and what type of relationship they have with the researchers
>involved in the initial important experimental claim.
They would normally have no direct relationship with the original
researchers.
I can't claim universality on what I wrote, only on significant
experimental results that affect theoretical concepts. Some classic
examples:
1. The recent claim to have discovered that under certain conditions
neutrinos can exceed the speed of light. ('nuff said!)
2. When the first claims to have produced cold fusion were published,
physicists around the world set out to try to replicate the results –
so far without sufficient success to convince the relevant part of the
physics community:
http://tinyurl.com/6cwgtze
3. Otto Hahn and Fritz Strassmann performed the first known experiment
in Berlin in 1938 that produced nuclear fission. However, being
chemists, they needed a physicist to explain what had happened. :-)
Hahn sent the results to his erstwhile physicist colleague Lise
Meitner, who had recently had to flee Germany to Sweden as she was
Jewish. Visiting her just at that time was her physicist nephew Otto
Frisch (who was at Copenhagen working with Niels Bohr), and together
they worked out the theoretical explanation of the experiment. As soon
as Frisch was back in Copenhagen he set out to confirm Hahn and
Strassman's discovery, and published his confirmation in 1939.
http://www.chemheritage.org/discover/chemistry-in-history/themes/atomic-and-nuclear-structure/hahn-meitner-strassman.aspx
Joan writes:
>And to add something new to the mix, how much do the biases
>of the review committees for journals contribute to determining
>which studies are worth of being published or not? Of course,
>that's a whole different prickly area to ponder but certainly one
>worth exploring.
Absolutely! An interesting discussion of the issues here:
http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/rethinking-peer-review
And here:
"Peer review is like democracy was to Churchill: the worst form of
government except all
those other forms that have been tried from time to time."
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/21stC/issue-1.1/peer.htm
Allen Esterson
Former lecturer, Science Department
Southwark College, London
allenester...@compuserve.com
http://www.esterson.org
------------------------------------------------------
From: Joan Warmbold <jwarm...@oakton.edu>
Subject: Re: Stapel's faking of social psychology data
Date: Sat, 05 Nov 2011 17:20:15 -0500
This is fascinating Allen and I, for one, would appreciate knowing
where
to locate resources that discuss this requirement of physical sciences
re: important experimental claims need to be replicated before they are
published. Sounds like such a logical and crucial requirement. I also
would be interested in who conducts these replication studies and what
type of relationship they have with the researchers involved in the
initial important experimental claim. Also, how common is it for these
replication studies to be published and are the researchers who conduct
them given their due as having provided a crucial contribution to the
field of scientific endeavor?
I realize that I have mentioned the Wakefield study before but it does
seem especially relevant to our discussion. No reputable medical
researcher could replicate Wakefield's data for more than a decade
after
his study was published in Lancet medical journal. Imagine all the
havoc in the autism community that could have been avoided if only
Lancet had had the same requirement of replication of Wakefield's
experimental claim BEFORE they published his bogus research data. In
reality, it seems that all journals who claim to be sources of
scientifically valid research need to require that crucial replication
of new experimental claims. If this step is ignored/skipped, then
compromises in the reporting of data will continue to occur and the
public-at-large will continue to be skeptical of the scientific
research
published in journals reported, and rightly so.
And to add something new to the mix, how much do the biases of the
review committees for journals contribute to determining which studies
are worth of being published or not? Of course, that's a whole
different prickly area to ponder but certainly one worth exploring.
Joan
jwarm...@oakton.edu
Allen Esterson wrote:
> Though there are certainly known cases of scientists making their
> results conform to theoretical expectations more closely than their
> experiments justify (e.g., by the choice of relative outliers that
are
> chosen to be ignored as anomalous), there seems to be one difference
> compared to psychology. In physical science any important
experimental
> claim requires independent replication before being accepted by
peers.
> My impression is that this is frequently not the case in psychology,
> with results of studies sometimes being widely cited regardless of
> whether they have been replicated.
>
> Allen Esterson
> Former lecturer, Science Department
> Southwark College, London
> allenester...@compuserve.com
> http://www.esterson.org
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