I've been following Andrew Gelman's blog for a while. It is typically worth my while. Although he refers to this particular post as a rant, as rants go, it's quite substantial. It's not a purely scientific post, but it is one in which Gelman makes a connection between various sectors of society (science/academia, medical, and law enforcement/political) when it comes to various actors engaged in a reckless disregard for the truth. In each case, Gelman outlines how the individuals involved stretched the truth to the breaking point, often with minimal repercussions. Misleading spin on research results? That's just "normal science", right? Testimony as an expert witness that makes you look idiotic or dishonest? The paycheck will more than cover the ding to one's reputation. ICE "agents" (there are much more accurate words, although they will sound derogatory) claim being "assaulted" by elected officials when every bit of recorded evidence screams the opposite? The White House is above the law, apparently, so that's also business as usual. As Gelman notes, "the scandal isn't that it's illegal, but rather that it is legal."
So, that's the world we've been living in. Doesn't mean we have to accept it, right? Think of the repercussions to what we're going to call a reckless disregard for the truth. In my own line of work, one can publish findings that are obvious bovine fecal matter, but as long as it gets through peer review that's good enough, we're told. Here's the thing: some people will actually believe what is published and they will go off and use those dubious findings to guide their lives and policy decisions, leading them to take some wrong turns along the way. In other words, the outcomes are not necessarily no harm no foul. To the contrary, the outcomes could be more nefarious, as the actors in the scenarios Gelman laid out muddy the waters, blurring the bounds between fact and fiction, leading to zombie ideas spreading, harming the population at large in the long run. He's also right that we can't stop folks from recklessly disregarding the truth, but we don't have to stand by and tolerate it.
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