The Brexit debate in England and the Trump election has led observers to note that truth no longer plays a dominant role in political discourse.
So-called "fake news" was prominent, either distorting or actually inventing "facts" to advocate certain political positions. For many people, it is now more important to find information that supports their pre-conceived ideas than to really understand what the facts say.
How do you think this trend will affect academic research and publishing?
Will it lead to more scam journals and falsified research?
How can scientists and researchers cope?
Dear Michael:
I think academia has much more rigorous standards than politics. In addition, unlike the public who receives political information, those who read and make use of scientific information --scientists-- are specialists highly trained to discern true and false information.
I am not saying that a particular scientist can not be deceived, but I find it very difficult that anyone can deceive the community of specialists for long.
Dear Michael:
I think academia has much more rigorous standards than politics. In addition, unlike the public who receives political information, those who read and make use of scientific information --scientists-- are specialists highly trained to discern true and false information.
I am not saying that a particular scientist can not be deceived, but I find it very difficult that anyone can deceive the community of specialists for long.
The lie cannot guide to anything good. The truth yes. I appreciate more the "post lie" era than the "post truth" era.
Dear Michael,
I think that academia has the responsibility to pro-actively discuss the thruth-claims of science and at the same time to do a better job of science communication of their findiings.
Best regards,
Patrizia Nanz
Dear All,
In my humble opinion, if moral rectitude, ethics and deontology continue to guide 'genuine' researchers, the 'trend' might not significantly affect research and academic publishing.
Regards,
Godswill N. N.
We may cope because we like our work and we care about our students, especially those gifted and also liking our work. Everything below is just opinion. I am not optimistic at all. You better manifest that everything is science is near "perfect" , you better follow the rules, even the "dogmas" .... In contrast: everything in politics is doubtful. But...science (lower case s) is reflecting our society as politics do. To me today's science is far from being perfect. It may be an opinion but shared (in private) with many people. I am pretty sure that you Michael knows that that "big" scientists in the different fields are referred to as "popes".
Here is my small contribution to this topic: Article The scientific truth and the ethos of the academics: between...
Regarding journals and articles -SUNLIGHT IS THE BEST DISINFECTANT. Sunlight, in this case, is to push for ALL journals to be OPEN ACCESS for free. If a journal is not financially supported by an institution, it should charge publication fees without any stigma. However, the elite journals accept articles from primarily western university-affiliated institutions and then sell the articles. Therefore, it is not possible to access the value of the article without having to pay $45 and up (much more for medical journals). Since the elite western-based journals engaged in very obvious systemic discrimination against authors not affiliated with any western university, many, many good papers end up in non-elite journals -- but most are open access and researchers can download for free and make their own judgment call. The talent of the Third World ends up in these journals and not those owned by SAGE, Taylor & Francis, and Plagrave MacMillian and others who use discriminatory gatekeepers and whose primary goal is to make money selling articles piece-meal. A call for open access for the sake of maximizing reasonable access to research (after all one of the primary functions of the academy is to benefit humanity) is something we should all be advocating.
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