A 2002 paper with more than 4,000 citations has been retracted due to allegations of manipulation, adding to the ever-growing list of bad papers being retracted.
Why would a renowned scientist resort to doctoring their own paper? Getting free funding and stable employment is not enough. Public recognition and respect is not enough. Being published is not enough. What’s the next best prize?
Dealing with one of the most difficult conditions for families… What has happened to basic human decency and honesty? You can extrapolate this: if they can manipulate such big issues, what about minor conditions and health in general - do they care at all?
Has any of those who put their names as authors been held liable? Or are they in business as usual?
I don’t mean “they are guilty”. But… they must have been working on this paper for quite a time. Sixteen (16) authors. They had to make a decision at some point. And then proceed with it, and submit the paper as a follow-up to that decision.
Now that the publisher is ashamed of their own negligence, you are not even allowed to read the paper - you have to pay them 30 quid to get a PDF. Weird logic…
Well, remember that many of these people are not renowned until the publication of said papers. We may more plausibly argue that the pursuit of accolades and funding may lead to overlook or even egregiously manipulate data.
It's a harsh reality that there's a marketing scheme when it comes to science. You have to have a marketable disease in order to get attention and funding. Most people don't care about minor maladies or things that may seem trivial but otherwise don't evoke the same degree of emotions.
And honestly, you can see this happening a lot even when it comes to the vaccines- if it's not myocarditis, "sudden death", or neurodegeneration then most people won't bother covering the minor adverse events because most people won't bother reading about such things, even if they help provide a perspective regarding possible mechanistic explanations. Why exactly has no one covered the fact that we have nearly elucidated the blood clots associated with the adenoviral vaccines? Isn't this important, and so why is it all about the mRNA?
There's a huge bias in what gets reported, and hence why I make it a point to comment that people should not be seeking out things that only agree with their positions.
To the layers of malfeasance I am curious how many hands actually touched the paper-we won't know who actually did what when it comes to the study. In many cases the lead author/first author is usually "hands off" as a PI, and usually the lower names may end up just being undergraduates involved with trivial matters like cleaning up glassware.
What's important is figuring out all of the editorial and peer-review avenues which didn't recognize that there may have been some issues. There's a lot of questionable stuff that could have happened throughout the entire process.
Is it the pdf that needs to be paid for? The paper should be free, but that being said there is a serious issue regarding how much gatekeeping happens with papers. It's why I believe most journalists aren't actually reading the papers they are covering since I highly doubt many of these people have subscriptions or know how to access many of these papers. They likely just copy and paste what other people say which further conflates the misinformation that is being put out.
Yes, they need money for PDFs. Only the abstract is “open”, the rest conveniently hidden. I would think that compromised papers should be a) free (as “useless”), b) annotated with clear indication of what went wrong and why, so as to prevent it in the future.
Your description of the situation is nice, cool and reserved. We have what we have. People do things because they do things. In the ultimate accounting, everything happens for a reason, I guess. Some of us may want to be honest and expect honesty from others. Where “honesty” means being true to the actual events, facts, data and reliable conclusions. The rest use their professions to accumulate various benefits at the expense of everybody. Not criticizing, it’s how things are.
The only takeaway from this story: don’t believe what they tell you because they were taught so or read this somewhere. Double check, seek second and third opinion, read and verify. This is the only body that you have.
PS. Thank you for your excellent work and sharing it with us, non-professionals.
Honestly, if it wasn't for finding alternative places to read papers this Substack likely never would have taken off since there's no way someone can dish out hundreds of dollars to write one single post. That has been my biggest gripe in many COVID papers now being put behind paywall. It reinforces the gatekeeping of science so that people can't actually look past the curtain and figure out what is actually going on.
With everything going on I'm not above scientists operating within their own interest rather than the pursuit of scientific endeavors. The group here may not have been household names prior to the paper but I wouldn't be surprised if part of the intention to publish is to become known. I think people forget that scientists can be just as petty and arrogant as celebrities or social media influencers. So like with many things I can't say for certain why this paper was published showing alleged signs of manipulation, but I can say that I won't be surprised if there was a perverse incentive to do so.
I absolutely agree with the last part, and it's something I hope readers can imbibe. The best thing to do is to do your own research and be able to spot bad science rather than relying on others to tell you what to think.
I don't know if I've heard about that issue. Do you have an article that could provide context? Honestly, if it wasn't for COVID I would have stayed completely naïve to the nature of science publications. During my undergrad I had a lot of classes where we had to read papers so I thought I was more prepared than the typical undergraduate student, and yet even then I did not realize how biased or corrupted some of these publications were.
Oh jeez, sorry for being obtuse I guess I overlooked them! I can sometimes have blinders/situational blindness when writing and miss out on some things that aren't specific to the person or study I am looking into.
I did quick look and came across this editorial. It seems like an interesting scenario, and I may look into as something to read more about in the future:
Why would a renowned scientist resort to doctoring their own paper? Getting free funding and stable employment is not enough. Public recognition and respect is not enough. Being published is not enough. What’s the next best prize?
Dealing with one of the most difficult conditions for families… What has happened to basic human decency and honesty? You can extrapolate this: if they can manipulate such big issues, what about minor conditions and health in general - do they care at all?
Has any of those who put their names as authors been held liable? Or are they in business as usual?
I don’t mean “they are guilty”. But… they must have been working on this paper for quite a time. Sixteen (16) authors. They had to make a decision at some point. And then proceed with it, and submit the paper as a follow-up to that decision.
Now that the publisher is ashamed of their own negligence, you are not even allowed to read the paper - you have to pay them 30 quid to get a PDF. Weird logic…
Well, remember that many of these people are not renowned until the publication of said papers. We may more plausibly argue that the pursuit of accolades and funding may lead to overlook or even egregiously manipulate data.
It's a harsh reality that there's a marketing scheme when it comes to science. You have to have a marketable disease in order to get attention and funding. Most people don't care about minor maladies or things that may seem trivial but otherwise don't evoke the same degree of emotions.
And honestly, you can see this happening a lot even when it comes to the vaccines- if it's not myocarditis, "sudden death", or neurodegeneration then most people won't bother covering the minor adverse events because most people won't bother reading about such things, even if they help provide a perspective regarding possible mechanistic explanations. Why exactly has no one covered the fact that we have nearly elucidated the blood clots associated with the adenoviral vaccines? Isn't this important, and so why is it all about the mRNA?
There's a huge bias in what gets reported, and hence why I make it a point to comment that people should not be seeking out things that only agree with their positions.
To the layers of malfeasance I am curious how many hands actually touched the paper-we won't know who actually did what when it comes to the study. In many cases the lead author/first author is usually "hands off" as a PI, and usually the lower names may end up just being undergraduates involved with trivial matters like cleaning up glassware.
What's important is figuring out all of the editorial and peer-review avenues which didn't recognize that there may have been some issues. There's a lot of questionable stuff that could have happened throughout the entire process.
Is it the pdf that needs to be paid for? The paper should be free, but that being said there is a serious issue regarding how much gatekeeping happens with papers. It's why I believe most journalists aren't actually reading the papers they are covering since I highly doubt many of these people have subscriptions or know how to access many of these papers. They likely just copy and paste what other people say which further conflates the misinformation that is being put out.
Yes, they need money for PDFs. Only the abstract is “open”, the rest conveniently hidden. I would think that compromised papers should be a) free (as “useless”), b) annotated with clear indication of what went wrong and why, so as to prevent it in the future.
Your description of the situation is nice, cool and reserved. We have what we have. People do things because they do things. In the ultimate accounting, everything happens for a reason, I guess. Some of us may want to be honest and expect honesty from others. Where “honesty” means being true to the actual events, facts, data and reliable conclusions. The rest use their professions to accumulate various benefits at the expense of everybody. Not criticizing, it’s how things are.
The only takeaway from this story: don’t believe what they tell you because they were taught so or read this somewhere. Double check, seek second and third opinion, read and verify. This is the only body that you have.
PS. Thank you for your excellent work and sharing it with us, non-professionals.
Honestly, if it wasn't for finding alternative places to read papers this Substack likely never would have taken off since there's no way someone can dish out hundreds of dollars to write one single post. That has been my biggest gripe in many COVID papers now being put behind paywall. It reinforces the gatekeeping of science so that people can't actually look past the curtain and figure out what is actually going on.
With everything going on I'm not above scientists operating within their own interest rather than the pursuit of scientific endeavors. The group here may not have been household names prior to the paper but I wouldn't be surprised if part of the intention to publish is to become known. I think people forget that scientists can be just as petty and arrogant as celebrities or social media influencers. So like with many things I can't say for certain why this paper was published showing alleged signs of manipulation, but I can say that I won't be surprised if there was a perverse incentive to do so.
I absolutely agree with the last part, and it's something I hope readers can imbibe. The best thing to do is to do your own research and be able to spot bad science rather than relying on others to tell you what to think.
Thank you. As a young, naïve graduate student, the first scientific fraud I was exposed was the Spector / Racket debacle. I was stunned.
I don't know if I've heard about that issue. Do you have an article that could provide context? Honestly, if it wasn't for COVID I would have stayed completely naïve to the nature of science publications. During my undergrad I had a lot of classes where we had to read papers so I thought I was more prepared than the typical undergraduate student, and yet even then I did not realize how biased or corrupted some of these publications were.
Spector & Racker were referenced in the paper you cited.
I believe they were at Cornell. I’ll find a reference other than the cited reference.
Oh jeez, sorry for being obtuse I guess I overlooked them! I can sometimes have blinders/situational blindness when writing and miss out on some things that aren't specific to the person or study I am looking into.
I did quick look and came across this editorial. It seems like an interesting scenario, and I may look into as something to read more about in the future:
https://www.nature.com/articles/339091a0