Hybris

FBI admits flaws in hair analysis over decades

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/crime/fbi-overstated-forensic-hair-matches-in-nearly-all-criminal-trials-for-decades/2015/04/18/39c8d8c6-e515-11e4-b510-962fcfabc310_story.html

“Well,” I say, “as a scientist my occupation grapples with the fundamental nature of truth. It is worth reflecting that before the emergence of a robust scientific class in the 19th century, truth was defined by the whim of the ruling class. Indeed, we scientists wrested truth away from the claws of religious dogma and liberated humanity from the leaden hand of ignorance and, in the process, provided the evidenced-based infrastructure required for a truly democratic society – namely individual liberty and equality of opportunity. I suppose I’m just part of that meritocratic force that has defined our civilisation.”
http://thonyc.wordpress.com/2013/12/13/resignation/

Problems

I Fooled Millions Into Thinking Chocolate Helps Weight Loss. Here's How.

http://io9.com/i-fooled-millions-into-thinking-chocolate-helps-weight-1707251800

How journals like Nature, Cell and Science are damaging science
The incentives offered by top journals distort science, just as big bonuses distort banking

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/09/how-journals-nature-science-cell-damage-science

Restrictions

Muzzling of federal scientists widespread, survey suggests

http://voxday.blogspot.se/2013/11/fear-of-hand-that-feeds.html

Court Bans Scientific Publications on Viruses

http://www.nisnews.nl/court-bans-scientific-publications.html

Forgeries

'The oldest work of art ever': 42,000-year-old paintings of seals found in Spanish cave

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2097869/The-oldest-work-art-42-000-year-old-paintings-seals-Spanish-cave.html

'Moon rock' in museum is just petrified wood

http://technology-science.newsvine.com/_news/2009/08/27/3198520-moon-rock-in-museum-is-just-petrified-wood#comments

The Piltdown Man

A hoax in which bone fragments were presented as the fossilised remains of a previously unknownearly human. The Piltdown hoax is perhaps the most famous paleoanthropological hoax ever to have been perpetrated. It is prominent for two reasons: the attention paid to the issue of human evolution, and the length of time (more than 40 years) that elapsed from its discovery to its full exposure as a forgery.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piltdown_Man

The epic inside story of long-term criminal fraud at Ranbaxy, the Indian drug company that makes generic Lipitor for millions of Americans. 

As Thakur read, his jaw dropped. The WHO had uncovered what seemed to the two men to be astonishing fraud. The Vimta tests appeared to be fabricated. Test results from separate patients, which normally would have differed from one another, were identical, as if xeroxed.
What Thakur unearthed over the next months would form some of the most devastating allegations ever made about the conduct of a drug company. His information would lead Ranbaxy into a multiyear regulatory battle with the FDA, and into the crosshairs of a Justice Department investigation that, almost nine years later, has finally come to a resolution.
On May 13, [2013] Ranbaxy pleaded guilty to seven federal criminal counts of selling adulterated drugs with intent to defraud, failing to report that its drugs didn't meet specifications, and making intentionally false statements to the government. Ranbaxy agreed to pay $500 million in fines, forfeitures, and penalties -- the most ever levied against a generic-drug company.

http://isteve.blogspot.se/2013/05/red-pill-indian-generic-drug-maker.html?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
http://www.livemint.com/Opinion/1wbHWnjJBsrKgXKz3o76QL/Ranbaxy-holds-up-an-ugly-mirror-to-corporate-India.html

Peer Review

The randomness of scientistry

http://voxday.blogspot.se/2014/12/the-randomness-of-scientistry.html

Peer-review practices of psychological journals: The fate of published articles, submitted again 

With fictitious names and institutions substituted for the original ones (e.g., Tri-Valley Center for Human Potential), the altered manuscripts were formally resubmitted to the journals that had originally refereed and published them 18 to 32 months earlier. Of the sample of 38 editors and reviewers, only three (8%) detected the resubmissions. This result allowed nine of the 12 articles to continue through the review process to receive an actual evaluation: eight of the nine were rejected. Sixteen of the 18 referees (89%) recommended against publication and the editors concurred. The grounds for rejection were in many cases described as “serious methodological flaws.” A number of possible interpretations of these data are reviewed and evaluated.

http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract?fromPage=online&aid=6577844

Scientific Insurgents Say 'Journal Impact Factors' Distort Science

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/05/130516142537.htm

Anti-Christian Bias

Method

There is No Scientific Method 

"There’s no magic formula that gets us there. There’s no set of rules. There’s no methodology that gets us there. So why does science work? Paul Feyerabend believed - and he’s often misunderstood – that science worked, and he deeply loved science. I met him and talked with him a number of times.

Feyerabend thought it was very important to underline that we didn’t know why science works. And so I gave a lot of thought to this problem over the years and my point of view, my proposal, is that science works because scientists form communities and traditions based not on a common set of methods, but a common set of ethical principles. And there are two ethical principles that I think underlie the success of science and I call these the Principles of the Open Future. The first one is that we agree to tell the truth and we agree to be governed by rational argument from public evidence."

http://bigthink.com/in-their-own-words/there-is-no-scientific-method

Reproducibility

They found that about half of scientists at the prominent cancer hospital report being unable to reproduce data in at least one previously published study. The number approaches 60% for faculty members:

Our survey also provides insight regarding the pressure to publish in order to maintain a current position or to promote ones scientific career. Almost one third of all trainees felt pressure to prove a mentor’s hypothesis even when data did not support it.

http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0063221
http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/2013/05/16/half-of-researchers-have-reported-trouble-reproducing-published-findings-md-anderson-survey/?utm_source=feedly

Corruption

His resignation is emblematic of a corruption that has spread throughout American intellectual discourse.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/348323/defense-jason-richwine/page/0/1

Fraud

Diederik Stapel 

In 2011 Tilburg University suspended Stapel, pending further investigation, for fabricating and manipulating data for his research publications. This scientific misconduct took place over a number of years and affected at least 55 publications.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diederik_Stapel
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/28/magazine/diederik-stapels-audacious-academic-fraud.html

Yoshitaka Fujii  

A Japanese researcher in anesthesiology, who in 2012 was found to have fabricated data in at least 172 scientific papers, setting what is believed to be a record for the number of papers by a single author requiring retractions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yoshitaka_Fujii

http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/category/by-author/yoshitaka-fujii/

Joachim Boldt

A German anesthesiologist who used to be considered a leading researcher into colloids. He has been stripped of his professorship and is under criminal investigation for possible forgery of up to 90 research studies.

http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/category/by-author/joachim-boldt-retractions/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joachim_Boldt

Ulrich Lichtenthaler 

Early in 2012, a group of 20 scientists became aware of deficits in Lichtenthaler's publications. This led the group to take a closer look at 50 other publications authored and co-authored by Lichtenthaler. The group's examination concluded with severely criticizing Lichtenthaler's work on the following points:

• lack of cross-referencing to publications of his own;
• his diverging interpretation of the same data set in different publications;
• severe statistical mistakes.

The controversy resulted in several of Lichtenthaler's articles being removed or retracted from the journals Strategic Organization, Research Policy, Strategic Management Journal,Journal of World Business, Organization Science, Journal of Business Venturingand Journal of Product Innovation Management. As a consequence of this controversy, both WHUand the University of Mannheim have created commissions tasked with investigating the suspected transgression of scientific standards by Lichtenthaler.

http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/2013/05/09/lichtenthaler-retraction-count-rises-to-11/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulrich_Lichtenthaler

Rick Heber

Known for his work as principal investigator of the Milwaukee Project and the subsequent controversies surrounding the project. ... Heber was a member of the faculty of the University of Wisconsin at Madison when he was indicted on charges stemming from the misuse of federal funds allocated to the project. He was subsequently convicted and served time in the federal prison in Bastrop, Texas. Previously a respected scholar in the field of mental retardation, his academic work on the Milwaukee Project has been called into serious question. It is now questionable whether the project ever actually existed as it had been described by Heber.

http://books.google.com/books?id=u4uzPlgcWpsC&pg=PA462&lpg=PA462&dq=%22rick+heber%22
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milwaukee_Project

Matthew Poore 

a technician at Advanced Liquid Logic when he committed the misconduct, according to the report. While at North Carolina State University prior to his job at Advanced Liquid Logic, Poore published, by our count, 11 papers, one of which was cited more than 50 times, according to Thomson Scientific’s Web of Knowledge.

http://retractionwatch.wordpress.com/2013/04/29/ori-finds-former-north-carolina-company-lab-tech-faked-data-in-nih-grant