[ad_1]
On Tuesday, geologist Ross Stein ’75 held a workshop for aspiring researchers on identifying scientific fraud. The talk also focused on the complexities and risks of reporting such fraud to the relevant authorities.
The event was the first in a short series of workshops organized by the Department of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences and aimed at covering various aspects of being a scientist.
Stein’s workshop outlined three real-life examples of ethical dilemmas in science. Throughout his talk, which featured small group discussions, he asked the audience to put themselves in the shoes of those cited.
The first article profiled a Kyoto University researcher who wrote a paper with five other graduate students on the Kumamoto earthquake. The paper was accepted and published in the prestigious scientific journal Nature. Stein said someone noticed an anomaly in the paper and submitted the information to the journal, but no investigation was conducted.
An external panel of experts determined that there had been misconduct by the researchers, but not by the graduate students. Initially, a group of faculty members at Kyoto University’s Faculty of Science criticized the decision, but the university overturned the faculty’s decision, claiming that the paper had been fabricated at a press conference.
Stein then described a scenario in which an individual is given multiple manuscripts and the individual tells multiple researchers that they have submitted their manuscripts to the Journal of Geophysical Research. But over the phone, Stein discovered that the person had lied to the researchers and never submitted the manuscript.
As a third example, Stein described a paper on earthquakes. Stein told the audience that his paper excluded information that could change the hypothesis. Stein refuted his original paper through his own data analysis using a different methodology.
The authors of the original paper maintain that their research and analysis were error-free, and the paper is still available in Nature.
Throughout the workshop, Stein emphasized that fraud is not “black and white.” Most researchers are likely to encounter misconduct at least once in their academic career, he told the audience.
But Stein said researchers’ job is to “recognize the ambiguity” in research and “encourage others to work through it.” He stressed that loyalty is not a substitute for honesty and that scientists should strive to “argue for and against” their hypotheses.
Yilin Xie ’26, who hopes to pursue a career in research, thought the workshop was a “good exercise” that allowed her to consider multiple perspectives related to cheating.
“It was eye-opening to see this happening in the world,” she said. “But I really liked the message that her motivation as a scientist is the pursuit of truth.”
Claire Song is a senior staff writer covering science and research. She is a freshman from California studying Applied Mathematics Biology. She likes drinking boba in her free time.
[ad_2]
Source link
