Validity of research results.

business_kid · 05-22-2021, 10:47 AM

Here's a side of it I never would have thought of …
research-findings-that-are-probably-wrong-cited-far-more-than-robust-ones-study-finds

Lucko666 · 05-22-2021, 11:25 AM

One recent study showed that when people use statistics in casual conversation, 78.3 percent of the time they are just making them up.

Ser Olmy · 05-22-2021, 11:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lucko666

One recent study showed that when people use statistics in casual conversation, 78.3 percent of the time they are just making them up.

And their references are dubious too. We've known this for quite some time:

Quote:

"The problem with quotes found on the Internet is that they are often not true."

- Abraham Lincoln (source)

business_kid · 05-22-2021, 01:32 PM

I think the gist of that was that the attention-grabbing headline-type subject matter gets less scrutiny and more attention than the more rigorous, dull & boring papers that disprove the headline.

So it appears people are coming away with the disproved paper's ideas.

enorbet · 05-23-2021, 06:57 PM

Re:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lucko666

One recent study showed that when people use statistics in casual conversation, 78.3 percent of the time they are just making them up.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ser Olmy

And their references are dubious too. We've known this for quite some time:

I'm quite confidant that was a funny joke. Good one, Lucko666

ntubski · 05-31-2021, 05:35 PM

A couple links to projects that could give hope for the future... or just more cynicism.

http://www.papr.io/

Quote:

Tinder, but for papers & preprints
[...]
We all know the peer review system is hopelessly overmatched by the deludge of papers coming out. papr reviews use the wisdom of the crowd to quickly filter papers that are considered interesting and accurate. Add your quick judgements about papers to those of thousands of scientists around the world.

https://newscience.org/

Quote:

New Science aims to build new institutions of basic science, starting with the life sciences.

Over the next several decades, New Science will create a network of new scientific institutes pursuing basic research while not being dependent on universities, the NIH, and the rest of traditional academia and, importantly, not being dominated culturally by academia.

Our goal is not to replace universities, but to develop complementary institutions and to provide the much needed “competitive pressure” on the existing ones and to prevent their further ossification. New Science will do to science what Silicon Valley did to entrepreneurship.

fido_dogstoyevsky · 05-31-2021, 07:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ntubski

A couple links to projects that could give hope for the future... or just more cynicism.

http://www.papr.io/

https://newscience.org/

The former might give me hope, the latter looks like it may be vulnerable to takeover by lunatic groups if they're not careful.

hazel · 06-01-2021, 03:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fido_dogstoyevsky

The former might give me hope, the latter looks like it may be vulnerable to takeover by lunatic groups if they're not careful.

In other words, it could go down the same road as our regular universities.

fido_dogstoyevsky · 06-01-2021, 04:10 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hazel

In other words, it could go down the same road as our regular universities.

Don't know how things are in the UK, but over here all the problems with university research (as well as falling undergraduate standards) are due to the government's refusal to fund the tertiary education sector properly.