The week at Retraction Watch began with the retraction of a paper touted by Dr. Oz. Here’s what was happening elsewhere:
- “How to Make More Published Research True:” John Ioannidis strikes again.
- Did you know that Shakespeare wrote about peer review?
- A leading vision researcher has decided to finally do a post-doc — at the age of 79.
- “Young, brilliant, and underfunded:” Are funding trends pushing researchers out of science?
- First, it was Bob Dylan lyrics. Now, we learn that researchers have been adding “a reference to mothers in leopard-print G-strings” to papers.
- Science magazine’s editor in chief is slandering its reporters, says Michael Balter.
- In CJR, Ryan Chittum destroys Steven Pearlstein’s case in The Washington Post against The Street‘s Adam Feuerstein — which The Street has asked to be retracted.
- What’s the best way for doctors and nurses to blow the whistle on potential problems at hospitals?
- “In the wake of a handful of biosafety lapses at federal research facilities, the US government is temporarily halting funding for new studies aiming to give novel functions to influenza, SARS, and MERS viruses.”
- “Government prosecutes alleged scientific fraud on AIDS research:” CNN covers the Dong-Pyou Han case, with a cameo from Retraction Watch at about 2:30.
- Irony much? An ethics professor was among faculty helping college athletes get credit for fake classes.
- Fake news sites are using Facebook to spread Ebola panic, The Verge reports.
- “The American Based Research Journal, which claims to be based in the UK…” The comic relief continues from there.
- “[A]stronomy — one of the grandest achievements of the human race — is still fending off charges of blasphemy,” writes George Johnson.
- A leading critic of academia in China has been erased from the web.
- Phil Davis takes a look at the growth of PeerJ.
- How should researchers respond to allegations that they have p-hacked?
- Low-quality scholarly publishers seem to misunderstand copyright, says Jeffrey Beall.
- “Scientists worry that a popular hormonal contraceptive might increase a woman’s risk of HIV infection,” notes Arielle Duhaime-Ross. “So why can’t they fund a trial to find out?”
- In case you were wondering, “taking a whiff of this comet would be like sharing a horse barn with a drunk and a dozen rotten eggs.”
In the photo accompanying the entry “•First, it was Bob Dylan lyrics. Now, we learn that researchers have been adding “a reference to mothers in leopard-print G-strings” to papers”, the knickers in question obviously are not of the G-string variety. I am sure that Retraction Watch will retract that claim.
Have you read the Acknowledgement of the Ioannidis paper? It states: “Author Contributions: Wrote the first draft of the manuscript: JPAI. Wrote the paper: JPAI. ICMJE criteria for authorship read and met: JPAI. Conceived the ideas and concepts discussed: JPAI.” I should expect so: there is only one author.
Those requirements are not just meant to ward off gift authorships to those who were not sufficiently involved; they also serve to prevent ghost-authorships. So these are not necessarily “obvious” statements to make, I guess…
Six professors of sports medicine at German University of Freiburg are under suspicion of plagiarism.
http://goo.gl/BtKx1i Sounds unsportsmanlike.
There seems to be a problem with your link. Are those the same involved in Tour de France doping?
https://plus.google.com/101046916407340625977/posts/6CfR2QFSYJb
Those are not the same, but these things are related.
Thanks Rolf! One wonders, with all these plagiarism scandals in Germany, are they a sign of a worse than elsewhere misconduct epidemic or the result of what would come out everywhere if someone simply starts looking?
When you say “all these plagiarism scandals”, you probably refer to the suspiciously high number of German politicians losing their doctorates because of plagiarism. I don’t know if this is unique to our country. It could also be due to the fact that we have a very active internet platform of volunteers, Vroniplag, who are hunting for plagiarisms.
Again, I’d recommend Deborah Weber-Wulf’s False Feathers, whcih has much on Vroniplag and related topics.
Maybe the Dowling story offers a solution to the problematic glut of young postdocs and dearth of faculty positions. When a prof hits 65 (though Dowling waited til age 79 – which is typical in academics), make them step down to a postdoc. That way labs can remain staffed with cheap experienced labor while young people can move ahead. Kidding, of course, but really any solution is welcome and I haven’t heard many better solutions.