I totally share the opinion of our colleague and friend Orlando. Only the person who surpasses his ego can know the true way not only truths but also humility

Dear Biswanath,

Yes, it it true that some people are reluctant to admit their own mistakes for they feel their social dignity/ prestige are in danger.

I strongly agree with you that people should change their mind in this respect, and to make mistakes provides us with opportunites do do that. Someone once remarked that there is only way to not make mistakes, not to doing nothing. As I see it, to make mistakes is, say, one condition for one to advance knowledge and look for the unknown. To be sincere, I have profited a lot from commiting mistakes. As one maxim say it is human to err and make mistakes.

Best regards,

Orlando

I totally share the opinion of our colleague and friend Orlando. Only the person who surpasses his ego can know the true way not only truths but also humility

That is basic Human Nature unfortunately!

@Fade Enamel

Thank you for sharing your views .

My experience is more precarious . Some time Editor / Editor in chief of impact factor journals avoid to entertain the comment/ remarks saying that " it is not timely important " . Mistake is mistake , somebody has to pointout by argument / analytical / numerical calculation. I feel it is important to understand the meaning of research . It is explore the correct the thing but not the wrong one. I feel somebody should start a journal like

" Comments in Science " . I believe very soon it will gather momentum.

Unbiased people should be in Editorial Dept .But how to select unbiased people ? Probably there is no end to this situation .

@To all

People who do not admit the mistakes , feel they can make fool to others . But they ignore thousands of eyes focussing their mistakes. More

precarious thing is that editor of the journal do not make correspondence .

Our good luck or bad luck these people are respected in society by neglecting their duty.

I think this must be instinctive behaviour. There are many people who would like to project to society that they are perfect and would never make a mistake. they will always behave that way even with advice and experience on their side

I can not say about other persons, but I admit that I perform mistakes very often. It is very common to me to change the direction of thinking after identification of mistakes.

It also happens to me that I started work with an intension, but idea changed totally during performing the work and come to a conclusion with opposite to the idea of beginning.

Thanks.

Thats we are ...just human

Perhaps, because there are too many of them.

There is a strange reluctance on the part of most people to admit that they enjoy life.

- William Lyon Phelps

There is nothing so easy but that it becomes difficult when you do it reluctantly.

- Terence

It's not only mistakes that are reluctantly recognized, an advice is usually recognized no less reluctantly.

It's a matter of fact - many people are reluctant to recognize own lack of knowledge, or attention, or memory weakness, and somebody's strength, knowledge, or kind advice.

@all

In science reluctant to admit mistake is nothing but creating a gap for newcomers in understanding the topic fundamentally .

It is the ego that gets in the way. Fine examples of such people exist who are world leaders. Somehow admitting mistakes is equated to admitting to failure or defeat which is shunned by many societies. Thus, in order to cover up one mistake some people start telling more lies and the deceit propagates exponentially.

The Human Nature

Because of our ego 😎

It is the character of the proud, but the humble always admit its own mistakes.

Valuable contributions from respected colleagues

Recognizing mistakes is just the first step for the wise ones. The next one is a sober analyses of the possible causes, and the third one is measures to eliminate mistakes. That's how a professional is growing.

Hello, It is inevitable that you will make wrong decisions in your life, including ones that harm others as well as yourself. They may be minor ones, such as that dishwasher incident, or ones that have a more significant impact on the people you care about the most. Ironically, it’s when you acknowledge your weakness by admitting to a wrongdoing that you show your strongest side.

The very reason is PRIDE or haughtiness. Arrogance is a baby of these. Could be Egocentricism but could also be chauvinism.

The most important thing is to admit your mistake to yourself.

The hardest thing, dear Leonid...

It is not easy for most people to admit that they made mistakes. This is self esteem.

Some people are not aware of the fact that we learn through our mistakes. In other words, mistakes may have some positive attributes that can be useful for people to avoid making mistakes in the future.

Being 'Reluctant' to admit our own mistakes is psychologically defined as a natural procedure in protecting ourselves from the demands of ego and superego.

Explained by Freud, it is certain to avoid danger by employing our unconscious reaction towards the the mistakes we made.

What do you think?

Let's discuss it.

Pride is the major cause of such negative attitude and behaviour

Valuable contributions by respected colleagues

Dear All,

As you certainly know, the main findings of the Suiss famous psychologist Jean Piaget on the child's cognitive development were discovered on the basis of children's cognitive mistakes. It was through the mistakes children made when solving his developmental tasks that Piaget was able to show us the very nature of children's logical thinking. For example, Piaget was intriguided by the fact that children under 4/5 years think mistakenly that the amount of elements in a given set (six buttons over a table in a row) varies as as function of their spatial arrangement in the row, that is, the more the row is spatially elongated the more buttons it contains. This findings allowed Piaget to understand that young children confund the notion of "how much" and the notion of "how long". In other words, the longer the row is, the more buttons it contains. I coud provide you with other Piagetian, or even, non-Piagetian examples. But the above mentioned example amply shows the importance of mistakes in the development of science in general and the development of relevant theories in particular.

So, mistakes are not to be always seen negatively because they often they are an opportunity, for example, to personal and scientific growth.

Best regards,

Orlando

So many, though reluctant to admit it. Shun clever men, and rather suffer fools.

- Ivan Krylov

The bed is a bundle of paradoxes: we go to it with reluctance, yet we quit it with regret; we make up our minds every night to leave it early, but we make up our bodies every morning to keep it late.

- Ogden Nash

There is nothing which we receive with so much reluctance as advice.

- Joseph Addison

Pride is the sole reason

The only factor that stops us from admitting our mistake is our egoistic attitude.

Boosting human ego

Ego is the main reason

Because we are mentally weak and it will hurt our ego.

@All

My question was pertaining to science not in others.

Thanks all for sharing views.

Regards

B.Rath

Timidity could be a factor! Timid individuals always fear criticism, and think there's nothing they could do to correct their mistakes. Most tyrants live in fear of criticism. And in truth, timidity, rather than valour, is their undoing.

Emphasized vanity impedes us to recognize our mistakes. It is not a problem to make a mistake.The problem is not corrected the mistake.

@Dragoljub

Nice answer>Mistake is mistake .

For some people it is not easy to admit a mistake because they may find themselves in embarrassing situations. However, for others who are courageous, admitting mistakes make them comfortable and stronger in disclosing reality.

In my opinion, an even bigger problem arises when someone strongly tries to persuade the others that her/his mistakes is the correct attitude.

Regards

It depends on the level of moral courage of individuals to admit a mistake.

But such admit of mistake/s actually increase the status of the person, his/her moral strength and bring mental peace in him/ her.

Thanks.

Human with his nature.

This is a quite often met case, that has the following two root causes:

- First, one hopes that with God's help nobody or very few ones will find a mistake, or make a big deal out of that.

- Second, some believe that no apology does not bring too much publicity and noise to this occurrence, and the less the noise, the quicker all would forget about it.

Certainly, the whole this position and tactic are actually detrimental strategically to this individual's professional future.

I dont think we should be reluctant to accept our own mistakes rather we need to accept it and make improvements wherever needed. Although it is the human nature.

In my own opinion, it boils down to human nature and sometimes from an arrogant heart.

Interesting contributions by respected RG members on this discussion

Hello, because all people are not so strong to admit own mistakes.

Lack of moral and integrity.

Following!

Following!

Lack of humility is one of the reasons why we are reluctant to admit own mistakes. Other reason is not to see that mistakes are often the first step to succeed.

@All

Social prestige addicted people never admit the mistakes.Further in my view they are not true lover of subject or discussion. They only thing of I and never think of he/she .

Agree. Scientific Research is a search for truth. So we must be truthful and honest. Many honest people do admit their mistakes, but most of the time may try to minimize them or give excuses.

@Chandra Sekhar Pande

Suppose the wrong mathematics / concept is written in a book ,then what happens to the reader ?

This is a very common problem especially in research papers. But hard. Science has a very efficient self correcting mechanism, and wrong math will be speedily correcited by others.