The seven deadly sins of scientific bullshit.
Here's a great article on how to spot bullshit science. It was originally written for judges to help filter through the B.S. testimony of "expert" witnesses and lawyers."1. The discoverer pitches the claim directly to the media."
"2. The discoverer says that a powerful establishment is trying to suppress his or her work."
6 Comments:
I feel like all of those are OBVIOUS signs of bogus science. There should be the more subtle ones as well.
Hey I subscribe to the chronicle of higher ed so if you ever need to see a members-only article let me know! (yes, I'm a huge nerd)
Fri Mar 31, 08:52:16 AM CST
lol! so true.
there are much more subtle ways too, which are all the more insidious.
for instance, giving the view your opponents espouse a name which sounds dumb. it's amazing how well a superficial tactic like that works.
or, perhaps in addition, failing to adequately describe that view so it appears to not make sense.
Fri Mar 31, 10:44:43 AM CST
yeah.. i was thinking of subscribing to that ;) but i have a hard enough time getting the newyorker read.
Fri Mar 31, 02:54:59 PM CST
I had a professor in grad school who insisted that any science that added the word "science" to its name was likely bogus. Being in cognitive science, I was a little offended.
Fri Mar 31, 03:57:18 PM CST
hey chris, were you at rochester for grad school? i know somebody there who says the same thing :)
you guys know why it's called the "bulletin of the psychonomic society"??? they were trying to change "psychology" to "psychonomy", just as "astrology" is to "astronomy"
At least they didn't try to call it "psychoscience"
Even if that's true! hah.
Sat Apr 01, 07:18:18 PM CST
Hah! No, not at Rochester, but it's disheartening to learn that there are others who say that.
The psychonomic society's origins are pretty interesting, really. The APA became basically a trade guild for clinical psychologists, so research psychologists decided to start their own organization. And they require 3 post-phd publications for membership, so that they can assure a research focus.
Sun Apr 02, 05:37:49 PM CDT
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