Wenn es nur so einfach wäre, Lügen in der Wissenschaft zu erkennen … Die “Welt” hatte eine interessante Zusammenfassung über Lügen allgemein

So ist aus bisherigen – fast ausschließlich westlichen – Studien bekannt, dass Lügner weniger oft das Wort „ich“ verwenden, wohl um sich zu distanzieren.

Das nützt leider nichts in den Biowissenschaften, da der übliche Duktus -ältere Kollegen mal ausgenommen- sich gerne auf ein kollektives “wir” beschränkt und selbst das gerne vermeidet, um einen maximal objektiven Eindruck zu unterlassen.

Auch enthalten Lügen relativ wenig Kontext, wie zum Beispiel nebensächliche Informationen.

Hilft auch wenig, weil der Kontext fast immer auch da ist.

Lügner verwenden zudem eine negativere Sprache, wahrscheinlich weil sie sich schuldig fühlen.

Auch das hilft nicht viel, leider.

Einfach phänomenal ist der neue Artikel (S.22+23) von Ulrich Dirnagl über das Exzellenztheater Akt 1 “Die falsch positiven ziehen nur Ressourcen aus dem System” und Akt 2 “Der Drang zur Exzellenz ist ein Hemmnis für normale Wissenschaft”.

The Edge Newsletter has an obituary of Anne Treisman.

if there ever was a paper that launched a thousand ships it was Anne Treisman’s paper with her student Gelade in 1980. With over 6,000 citations the paper laid the groundwork for her Feature Integration Theory, the idea that while the brain seemed to automatically divide up aspects of objects into color, shape, motion and so on, it also had to glue them back together in way that we obviously experience as unitary wholes.

I just received a Google alert of a new paper that cites our earlier work. The authors describe a Twitter analysis””23andMe confirms: I’m super white“. It showcases a lot of noise …

The two most popular DTC companies, 23andMe and AncestryDNA, also generate the most tweets. However, al-though 23andMe has half the customers, it produces almost 5 times more tweets, which is also due to controversy around their failure to get FDA approval in 2015.

and even more noise

In particular, the “ethnic” breakdown provided by ancestry reports seems to spur several instances of negative sentiment tweets associated with racism and disapproval of multi-cultural/multi-ethnic values. For instance, a user with more than 3K followers self-describing as a “Yuge fan for Donald Trump”, tweets: “Get this race mixing shit off my time line!!” in response to a 23andMe video about ancestry […] Also, Twitter might be removing tweets with hate words as claimed in their hateful conduct policy. Nonetheless, we do find instances of hate speech, e.g., antisemitic tweets […]

This what I already feared, the largely useless genetic testing is being misused for inferior interests. It is dangerous too, just read the recent case history.

There are news on the “forgetting curve”

In 1885, Hermann Ebbinghaus collected data to plot a forgetting curve. Today, we approximate forgetting with an exponential curve where R is retrievability (a measure of how easy it is to retrieve a piece of information from memory), S is stability of memory (determines how fast R falls over time in the absence of training, testing or other recall), and t is time.

The Atlantic now adds to this

In the internet age, recall memory—the ability to spontaneously call information up in your mind—has become less necessary. It’s still good for bar trivia, or remembering your to-do list, but largely, Horvath says, what’s called recognition memory is more important. “So long as you know where that information is at and how to access it, then you don’t really need to recall it,” he says … Socrates hates writing because he thinks it’s going to kill memory,” Horvath says. “And he’s right. Writing absolutely killed memory. But think of all the incredible things we got because of writing. I wouldn’t trade writing for a better recall memory, ever.” Perhaps the internet offers a similar tradeoff: You can access and consume as much information and entertainment as you want, but you won’t retain most of it.

Ulrich Dirnagl hat ein lesenswertes Stück im LJ 11/2017, S.25

… Wir arbeiten in Gruppen von im Schnitt acht Forschern (inklusive Studenten), die durchweg Arbeitsverträge über wenige Jahre haben – und mit Fördergeldern, die höchstens für drei Jahre gesichert sind. Die Forschungsstrategien und Ergebnisse werden bis zur endgültigen Publikation unter Verschluss gehalten, man könnte ja gescoopt werden.

Data Sharing? Um Himmels willen. Hab’ ich ja nichts davon, könnte im Zweifelsfall sogar schaden. Wie verrückt aber ist die Frage, ob sich die grundlegenden Fragen der Biowissenschaften und der Medizin nicht besser in multinationalen, koordinierten sowie ausreichend und langfristig alimentierten Kooperationsprojek-ten aufklären ließen? Sollte man das wenigstens nicht mal ausprobieren? Continue reading Beutegemeinschaften →

wissenschaftsrat.de schreibt

Das Begutachtungswesen (peer review) steht nach Ansicht des Wissenschaftsrates unter zunehmendem Druck. Sowohl die Erwartungen an die Leistungen von Gutachterinnen und Gutachtern als auch die Nachfrage nach Begutachtungen seien aus verschiedenen Gründen deutlich gewachsen, ohne dass die Gruppe der Gutachtenden systematisch vergrößert und Wissen über Begutachtungen strukturierter vermittelt wurden.

Positionspapier 23.10.2017

There is an interesting story at harzing.com: A conference template with a dummy reference, that was supposed to be edited by abstract authors, was finally cited by 400 authors :) I find even more citations at Google Scholar, 703 to be exact. Low  quality, missing  control, careless editing, and fake journals, creepy…

AS A MEMBER OF THE MEDICAL PROFESSION:

I SOLEMNLY PLEDGE to dedicate my life to the service of humanity;

THE HEALTH AND WELL-BEING OF MY PATIENT will be my first consideration;

I WILL RESPECT the autonomy and dignity of my patient;

I WILL MAINTAIN the utmost respect for human life;

I WILL NOT PERMIT considerations of age, disease or disability, creed, ethnic origin, gender, nationality, political affiliation, race, sexual orientation, social standing, or any other factor to intervene between my duty and my patient;

I WILL RESPECT the secrets that are confided in me, even after the patient has died;

I WILL PRACTISE my profession with conscience and dignity and in accordance with good medical practice;

I WILL FOSTER the honour and noble traditions of the medical profession;

I WILL GIVE to my teachers, colleagues, and students the respect and gratitude that is their due;

I WILL SHARE my medical knowledge for the benefit of the patient and the advancement of healthcare;

I WILL ATTEND TO my own health, well-being, and abilities in order to provide care of the highest standard;

I WILL NOT USE my medical knowledge to violate human rights and civil liberties, even under threat;

I MAKE THESE PROMISES solemnly, freely, and upon my honour.