Required reading for all scientists and anyone interested in how knowledge is made

Being a scientist and academic, I was aware of all of the broad issues presented, though not all of the detail. But hearing it all put together like this makes you wonder why any of us still put up the system as it’s currently set up. Scientists and scholars are supposed to be the cleverest people but we have really let ourselves be manipulated into playing into this corrupt system. A system which filters the worst of us upwards, rewards sociopaths for their bad behaviour and marginalises those with exemplary ethics. It’s kind of depressing to hear it all laid out like this, but the hope is in those who are fighting back and developing systems to root out the liars and chancers.

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Highly interesting, balanced, intelligent

The discussion of the various forms of scientific malpractice is comprehensive, fascinating and at times lurid. The discussion of what to do about such malpractice is, perhaps necessarily, briefer and more speculative -- a lot of interesting ideas but little realised success.

Ritchie avoids two of my pet peeves with pop science books -- long pointless tangents about the author's life and patronisingly dumbed down and dramatised explanations. In contrast, Ritchie's anecdotes are invariably pertinent and to the point, illustrating his own direct experience combatting negligence and misconduct in the science. Moreover, the text is both easy to understand and intellectually honest -- Ritchie alleges no grand conspiracies and offers no panaceas. Instead, the limitations of science arise from the very human limitations of its practitioners: their ignorance, their desire for recognition, for pecuniary reward, for novel results and for the verification of their pet hypotheses. And the solutions, he concludes, most be equally multifarious: incentivising reporting of null results and replication studies, and the sharing of preprints and datasets; requiring pre-registration of experimental hypotheses; and reforming the scientific journal system are among the solutions he proposes. Moreover, he suggests an incremental trial-and-error approach -- some solutions may create problems of their own, so aggressively replacing the current system with something radically different would be ill-advised.

The narration is outstanding -- the best of the 20-odd non-fiction audiobooks I've listened to. After listening for a while I thought "what a fantastic narrator -- I hope he has more stuff". Lo and behold, Ritchie himself is the narrator!

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Reformar la Ciencia

Un libro imprescindible para cualquier persona que se quiera dedicar a la ciencia y también para aquellas que la estudian. La narración es muy buena (por el mismo autor)

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An Good Insight

I did learn a lot from this book. Perhaps some confirmation bias on my part, but it is obvious there is a serious problem with the state of the practice of the scientific process, so I was very receptive to the methods and techniques used to achieve the desired than the objective results.

However, the anti-Trump inserts are getting tedious. No other politician is mentioned during the 100 years that science has managed to diverge from its ideals, but everything bad in the world is now about Trump (not forgetting climate change deniers). Pathetic.

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This is very well supported

i may be biased, but this book's arguments are very well grounded. I have long ago found that climate showed that no scientist can be trusted. in fact I have shown so using the scientific method.
Thecauthor idenymtifies a numbercof problems, and offers possible solutions to them.
this makes for a very nice scientific read
The Scottish accent is present, but mild (elegant, in fact)

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Revealing and necessary

This book is absolutely necessary and it is a great relief to find someone eruditely explaining some of the worst practices in science. Much of academia needs to change, and Ritchie highlights many of its grave faults.

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2 people found this helpful

Started the hard copy...

Before deciding to get the audio version. A good decision as it turned out. Highly recommended read.

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fascinating and surprisingly funny

A really fascinating book and well narrated. If you're a researcher or at all interested in science this is well worth a read.

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Brilliant

A comprehensive but easy to understand look at how science needs, and can be, changed to benefit us all.
The narration is great.

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3 people found this helpful

Very important book!

Basically a book that questions the ethics of scientific research and leaves the reader in no doubt that there are serious issues with policing science. The book is relentless, shocking and disturbing. While there is great depth of analysis the author does everything possible for a non expert to grasp the overall bigger picture. Every third level student looking to undertake empirical research needs to read this book.

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