[HN Gopher] Data sleuths who spotted research misconduct cleared...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       Data sleuths who spotted research misconduct cleared of defamation
        
       Author : dangle1
       Score  : 530 points
       Date   : 2024-09-12 21:28 UTC (1 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (arstechnica.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (arstechnica.com)
        
       | teekert wrote:
       | "... the court has ruled that evidence-backed conclusions
       | regarding fabricated data cannot constitute defamation--which is
       | probably a very good thing for science."
       | 
       | "Probably good for science"? That _is_ science!
        
         | kortilla wrote:
         | Yes, that's why the ruling is good for science. It would be a
         | dark world if publishing statistical analysis opened you up to
         | defamation
        
           | bluGill wrote:
           | In the uk at least truth is not defense againts defamation.
           | Beware if you live there.
        
             | bugglebeetle wrote:
             | The same is true in Japan. Very few are aware of how little
             | press freedoms and speech rights are protected there and
             | have regressed further under assault from the ruling LDP
             | party.
        
             | cortesoft wrote:
             | My understanding is it is a little more nuanced than that.
             | 
             | The truth is still an absolute defense against defamation
             | in the UK, just like it is in the US, but the difference is
             | who the burden of proof is on.
             | 
             | In the US, it is up to the person suing for defamation to
             | prove the statements were false AND that the person knew
             | them to be false when they said them (or should have known
             | they were false).
             | 
             | In the UK, for someone to use the truth as an absolute
             | defense, they have to prove the statements were true, which
             | is often not very easy.
        
               | mr_toad wrote:
               | In both bases proof is only on balance of evidence, so
               | the difference between proving something is or isn't true
               | is not as great as it would be if the standard was proof
               | beyond reasonable doubt.
        
               | dgfitz wrote:
               | It's a lot easier to prove that there is a white swan
               | than a black swan in the world somewhere.
        
             | appendix-rock wrote:
             | Very 'ironic' that this is quite a...dishonest
             | representation of the truth.
        
             | smcin wrote:
             | My own post here [0] got suddenly multiply downvoted and
             | flagged, even though I wrote it very carefully and double-
             | checked every single statement. Truth defense.
             | 
             | [0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41526702
        
               | oefrha wrote:
               | TL;DRs are frowned upon on HN because HN encourages
               | people to read the article (especially before commenting)
               | rather than Don't Read the article.[1] You're further
               | breaking guidelines by complaining about votes.
               | 
               | That said, your comment isn't a summary of the article at
               | all.
               | 
               | [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12667459
        
             | mr_toad wrote:
             | This is ironically, not true.
             | 
             | "It is a defence for defamation to show the imputation in
             | the statement complained of is substantially true."
             | 
             | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Defamation_Act_2013#Defences
        
             | immibis wrote:
             | The same in Germany.
        
         | komali2 wrote:
         | It also cited a precedent I didn't know existed for the courts:
         | 
         | > The court cites precedent to note that "[s]cientific
         | controversies must be settled by the methods of science rather
         | than by the methods of litigation"
         | 
         | I wonder if this a specific case or just a general precedent?
         | Is general precedent a thing?
        
           | exegete wrote:
           | I saw that quote in the article but cannot find it in the
           | ruling itself: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us
           | courts.mad.259...
           | 
           | It seems to be a quote from a London court ruling in 2010:
           | https://www.bmj.com/content/340/bmj.c1895
        
             | vitus wrote:
             | It's mentioned around page 30-31:
             | 
             | > Instead, this is a case where the trial of ideas plays
             | out in the pages of peer
             | 
             | > reviewed journals, and the scientific public sits as the
             | jury." (cleaned up)); Underwager v. Salter,
             | 
             | > 22 F.3d 730, 736 (7th Cir. 1994) (affirming summary
             | judgment against defamation claims and
             | 
             | > stating that "[s]cientific controversies must be settled
             | by the methods of science rather than by
             | 
             | > the methods of litigation").
             | 
             | So, https://casetext.com/case/underwager-v-salter
        
               | exegete wrote:
               | Thanks! I don't know why my search didn't find that.
        
       | anitil wrote:
       | We're lucky to have hard-headed people willing to put up with
       | legal threats and bullying tactics. I'm not sure I'd have the
       | spine for it. It reminds me of when Ben Goldacre was sued [0]
       | which luckily his publisher covered the costs for.
       | 
       | [0] https://www.badscience.net/files/The-Doctor-Will-Sue-You-
       | Now...
        
         | afh1 wrote:
         | The problem is being able to sue for something like defamation.
         | At the extreme, like happens in Brazil, innocent people are
         | sent to jail for criticizing politicians.
         | 
         | https://mises.org/mises-wire/rothbard-suits-defamation
        
           | AtlasBarfed wrote:
           | That is true, but this is so much worse.
           | 
           | 1) this is a college
           | 
           | 2) it was about research, fundamental to the mission of
           | higher education
           | 
           | 3) it was fraud, not error
           | 
           | 4) It was HARVARD, exalted bastion of elite colleges, the
           | most prestigious university in the US
           | 
           | I get Harvard is always more about influence and an insiders
           | club rather than any real academic work, but still ... So
           | many heads should roll over this.
        
       | smcin wrote:
       | [tl;dr] US District Court dismisses Francesca Gino's
       | controversial $25m defamation lawsuit against Harvard Business
       | School and DataColada scientist-bloggers (Simonsohn, Nelson, and
       | Simmons). The judge allowed Gino's breach of contract claim
       | against Harvard to continue.
       | 
       | DataColada's legal defense (so far) was paid for by their own
       | universities; there is also a $378K private GoFundMe organized by
       | Simine Vazire [https://www.gofundme.com/f/uhbka-support-data-
       | coladas-legal-...]. Yet apparently not a penny from the journals
       | which Gino published in, or by HBS, or the funders of Gino's
       | research.
       | 
       | (EDIT: this got upvoted, then suddenly multiply downvoted and
       | flagged - why? I wrote it very carefully and double-checked every
       | single statement. If anyone's quibbling the term "Francesca
       | Gino's controversial $25m defamation lawsuit", that term was used
       | by the MBA-watching blog
       | https://poetsandquants.com/2024/09/12/judge-dismisses-france... )
        
         | 0cf8612b2e1e wrote:
         | Do universities typically go to bat for their faculty?
         | Presumably the blog investigation is not done with any direct
         | university involvement.
        
           | smcin wrote:
           | I can't comment, but it's a truly bizarre spectacle to see
           | research integrity being upheld by three public-minded
           | researchers (one of them based in Spain) and a defense fund
           | on GoFundMe organized by an Australian academic. The academic
           | publishers didn't fund them and neither did the funders of
           | the research. We need a discussion about frameworks to fund
           | misconduct researchers (including related legal defense),
           | also about pressures to publish irreproducible results with
           | mediagenic, counterfactual findings.
           | 
           | The entity with the least incentive to fully investigate HBS
           | is, paradoxically... HBS itself... because questions have
           | been raised about multiple other coauthors, the reputational
           | and financial consequences and wrongful termination claims
           | look set to run for a decade. Some have conjectured that
           | whenever the full facts are finally disclosed, this scandal
           | will take out the reputation of Harvard in general (not just
           | HBS, or Behavioral Economics as a field, or priming), or all
           | the Ivies, at least for business-school.
        
           | dotnet00 wrote:
           | The universities might've deemed it to be an important enough
           | PR situation and low risk enough to do it.
           | 
           | Alternatively maybe they were obligated to back them up if
           | the work was done in their official capacity as faculty?
        
           | rebanevapustus wrote:
           | I was the victim of a pretty bizarre super in-your-face
           | academic theft. Someone snooped a half-finished draft of mine
           | off GitHub and...actually got it published in a real journal.
           | 
           | https://forbetterscience.com/2023/10/30/stephensons-
           | alternat...
           | 
           | My institution completely brushed it off as a no problem, and
           | said that it wasn't worth pursuing it at all.
           | 
           | It was very traumatising (and still is). I lost all faith in
           | academia.
        
         | teractiveodular wrote:
         | Do you have a source for their universities paying? Their
         | fundraising page states that "their employers have so far only
         | agreed to pay part of the legal fees".
         | 
         | https://www.gofundme.com/f/uhbka-support-data-coladas-legal-...
        
           | alach11 wrote:
           | In the August 2nd, 2024 update on the GoFundMe:
           | 
           | "Because our universities have generously funded our defense
           | up to this point, we have not (yet) had to use any of the
           | GoFundMe money... we are reaching out to you to explain how
           | we intend to use it. Obviously if we need the money for our
           | defense, we will use it for our defense. Our plan is to
           | donate any money we do not use to The Scientific Integrity
           | Fund, an organization that defends scientists who find
           | themselves in a predicament that is very similar to ours. "
        
       | PaulKeeble wrote:
       | There is no limits a grifter wont go to in order to continue
       | their grift. Those with the funds regularly get away with it
       | purely because they have the funds to sue their opponents into
       | bankruptcy. The system worked in this case but it so rarely does
       | and we see so often people having to back down due to legal
       | threats.
        
         | onlypassingthru wrote:
         | see: Lance Armstrong.+
         | 
         | +
         | https://www.abajournal.com/news/article/lance_armstrong_admi...
        
         | jujube3 wrote:
         | Time flies when you're having funds.
        
       | taeric wrote:
       | This whole ordeal has been crazy. Glad to see some sanity
       | prevailing at this level. Curious where the rest of the story is
       | at. Anyone have a good primer on where things ultimately are, at
       | this point?
       | 
       | Curious on more than just this case. If I recall, there were
       | several large scale misconduct cases that hit back to back. All
       | of those still in flight?
        
         | nikcub wrote:
         | Pete Judo's channel on YouTube has been covering this since the
         | beginning, and other cases:
         | 
         | https://www.youtube.com/@PeteJudo1
        
         | IG_Semmelweiss wrote:
         | I'd love to hear more about the outcome for harvard.
         | 
         | it seems that they mostly did the right thing, but how they
         | went about it may not have been conforming to the pre-
         | determined rules for employees.
        
       | apwheele wrote:
       | While a favorable ruling for the Data Colada defendants seemed
       | incredibly likely in the end (and of course being dismissed pre-
       | trial before discovery is a good thing). But it still took over a
       | year, and consisted of several pre-trial hearings with multiple
       | back and forths between them. If I ctrl-f
       | https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.mad.259... I
       | see Pyle (their lawyer) listed 11 times. All the motions and
       | responses are a non-trivial amount of work.
       | 
       | Do folks have a sense of how much the costs would have been just
       | to get dismissed for DC? Seems to be definitely over 10k (50k?)
       | Or am I overestimating.
        
         | teractiveodular wrote:
         | I'm pretty sure this guy wouldn't get out of bed for $10k:
         | 
         | https://princelobel.com/professional/jeffrey-j-pyle/
         | 
         | Although given that the New Yorker stated that Pyle "appeared
         | not only professionally but personally incensed by the fact of
         | the lawsuit", perhaps some of the work was pro bono.
         | 
         | https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-a-scientific-di...
        
           | pclmulqdq wrote:
           | Thankfully, a lot of the filings appear short enough that I
           | doubt he's going to charge very much. I assume the retainer
           | was still $20-30k, but they may get some of it back.
           | 
           | I was hoping that there would be some fee-shifting here, but
           | it's federal court.
        
             | yial wrote:
             | I would guess a 20-30k retainer in this occurrence would be
             | a discounted retainer as well. I say this just based upon
             | my personal experience with a few smaller firms.
        
               | pclmulqdq wrote:
               | If you're known to be good for the money, you can often
               | get lower retainer bills from lawyers. That's why Donald
               | Trump has to put up tens of millions for any legal
               | project. Many of my lawyers do not ask for retainers for
               | work at all, even for bigger things.
        
           | jhauris wrote:
           | I don't know him or this case, but lawyers tend to often feel
           | that way about the cases they are representing. I wouldn't
           | think that means he's not billing.
        
         | rudyfink wrote:
         | You are probably not overestimating.
         | 
         | Generally, I would guess conferring with the client on the
         | facts, briefing, preparing for a hearing, and arguing a hearing
         | would be north of, at least, 25k, assuming a lower-end rate
         | estimate in the $800+ range and a lower-end work estimate of
         | 30+ hours. If I had to bet, I'd go higher than the low-end
         | estimate: both the rate and hours could be close to double.
         | That said, the attorney / firm could be donating the time on
         | this one.
        
         | rfw300 wrote:
         | Fortunately, they were able to raise quite a bit of money
         | (>$300K) on GoFundMe: https://www.gofundme.com/f/uhbka-support-
         | data-coladas-legal-...
        
           | teractiveodular wrote:
           | From the page: _At present, Leif, Joe, and Uri do not have
           | pro bono representation. The lawyers they've spoken to
           | currently estimate that their defense could cost anywhere
           | between $50,000 and $600,000 (depending on how far the
           | lawsuit progresses)._
        
             | yard2010 wrote:
             | That's scary, really. Having no money for this means you
             | can't afford to fight these criminal crooks. Is this how
             | this works in europe too?
        
               | Mkengine wrote:
               | No, where I live (Germany) you usually have a legal
               | insurance to cover this. The costs are around 30EUR per
               | month in my case.
        
               | Cthulhu_ wrote:
               | I live next door and have some legal insurance, but you
               | need to pay attention to what coverage you get, because
               | you need to select what categories you want coverage for;
               | vehicles (e.g. if someone who caused an accident refuses
               | to cooperate with you), consumer/housing disputes, work
               | and salary, taxes / stocks, family issues like
               | inheritances, second homes / real estate, etc etc etc.
               | And of course, you can't take out insurance for an
               | ongoing issue, it doesn't cover criminal cases (when you
               | did a bad), business cases, etc.
        
               | pclmulqdq wrote:
               | Corporate liability insurance in the US, which is also a
               | very common thing to get, often does not cover your
               | defense against "intentional torts" such as defamation or
               | fraud. It usually covers things like slips and falls,
               | product-related liability, etc. I would be surprised if
               | your German version covers defamation.
        
               | Hamuko wrote:
               | In Europe, the losing party of a lawsuit generally has to
               | pay for the winner's legal expenses ("English rule").
               | Never had to go to court so I don't know what you do
               | about the expenses in the meanwhile, but at least there's
               | light at the end of the tunnel when someone sues you just
               | for the heck of it.
        
               | jaclaz wrote:
               | Europe may be too wide a categorization, I am pretty sure
               | that different countries have different ways to deal with
               | the matter.
               | 
               | My (thankfully very little) experience in Italy is for
               | civil litigations at least (where it is rare that one of
               | the two parties get 100% reason) expenses are usually
               | compensated (i.e. every party pays their own ones), in
               | the more rare case where all expenses are paid by the
               | succumbing party, what is liquidated is not really what
               | has been paid, but rather what the expenses would be
               | along some sort of tariff.
               | 
               | If your solicitor/lawyer is a famous (presumably very
               | good as you won) one, it is likely that the amount you
               | spend is much higher than what the judge condemned the
               | other party to reimburse you.
        
               | pclmulqdq wrote:
               | In the US, you can ask for fee-shifting if you have been
               | sued frivolously or there has otherwise been some
               | wrongdoing on the part of the other side. These guys may
               | be able to motion for fee-shifting given that the case
               | was dismissed at this early stage.
               | 
               | State defamation cases usually apply anti-SLAPP laws that
               | automatically create fee-shifting in this exact
               | circumstance, but this seems to be a federal case.
        
           | apwheele wrote:
           | I was aware of that, but I would still be interested to know
           | the actual costs. I do not think "it is ok to blog about
           | potential fraud in scientific publications because GoFundMe
           | will pay for my lawyers" is a good assumption for most
           | individuals.
           | 
           | I see people saying it is a win for open science, and I just
           | look at that Court Listener page and it still fills me with
           | angst.
        
         | aheilbut wrote:
         | You are underestimating...
        
           | tothrowaway wrote:
           | I would agree. I'm the defendant in a (frivolous) trademark
           | infringement case and my firm (which does work for the EFF)
           | averages about 2 hours per (substantial) page, at a rate of
           | $500/hour. I do wonder in the back of my mind if I'm being
           | taken to the cleaners...
        
             | yial wrote:
             | I have a limited experience, only having been involved in
             | one trademark case professionally and am not a lawyer, but
             | this was a case that very quickly settled and fees were
             | still close to $30,000.
        
         | hn_throwaway_99 wrote:
         | > Or am I overestimating.
         | 
         | Ahh, sweet summer child who has never seen these kind of legal
         | fees.
         | 
         | I do hope Gino gets socked with their legal fees.
        
           | pfdietz wrote:
           | This is why we need anti-SLAPP laws.
        
         | TrackerFF wrote:
         | I'm not familiar with civil court in the US, but wouldn't the
         | plaintiff have to cover the legal expenses of the defendant, if
         | the defendant is cleared? Or similar rulings.
        
           | yard2010 wrote:
           | Even if it is, it happens months or years later, with today's
           | interest rates you would still end up with a debt unless you
           | have the capital. I'm not even talking about the emotional
           | toll and stress, especially when you're the good guy, just
           | have to prove it..
        
           | Hamuko wrote:
           | No, both sides of a lawsuit are generally responsible for
           | their own costs regardless of what the outcome is. There are
           | some caveats to this, like anti-SLAPP laws, but that's how it
           | generally goes. This is basically in contrast to every other
           | western democracy.
           | 
           | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_rule_(attorney%27s_fe.
           | ..
        
         | AtlasBarfed wrote:
         | Have you seen Harvard's endowment?
         | 
         | I'm sure there's counterdamages and he can take a percentage
        
         | nullc wrote:
         | It's not just the money. When you're the target of litigation,
         | particularly irregular specialist domain stuff that it can
         | really take over your life.
         | 
         | You might recover some of your legal costs from your opponent,
         | but the disruption to your life will not be compensated.
        
           | godelski wrote:
           | Not to mention the time it takes. So not only are you losing
           | money, losing time, and it's emotionally taxing, but you
           | often aren't even making money during that time.
        
         | silexia wrote:
         | As someone with extensive experience paying legal bills, I
         | would guess the bill was well over $40,000 unless the lawyer
         | did it pro bono.
         | 
         | Our legal system is badly broken in favor of lawyers making
         | more money.
        
       | Validark wrote:
       | "[s]cientific controversies must be settled by the methods of
       | science rather than by the methods of litigation"
       | 
       | Boom. And the researchers didn't accuse a person of fabrication,
       | they accused the data of being fabricated.
        
         | sparsely wrote:
         | Courts have had little hesitation to decide these matters
         | themselves for a long time - check out "Bite Mark Analysis" or
         | any number of trials involving medical evidence. While I do
         | think that they need to consider scientific matters they are
         | vastly overconfident in the conclusions reached.
        
         | baobabKoodaa wrote:
         | I don't see any distinction there.
        
       | RachelF wrote:
       | The irony is that Francesca Gino and Dan Ariely are famous for
       | their pop-sci/TED talks studying dishonesty. Turns out they were
       | dishonest themselves.
       | 
       | https://www.npr.org/2023/07/27/1190568472/dan-ariely-frances...
        
         | hughesjj wrote:
         | I'm at the point where if I see it in a TED talk I'm assuming
         | it's a bullshit grifter
        
           | usea wrote:
           | Even 8 years ago that was a safe view to hold.
        
           | hilux wrote:
           | Me too. Same for pretty much any "scientist" on NPR, or with
           | a popular book. Not EVERY one is a hack or a fraud, but
           | enough are that as a group, they're not trustworthy.
           | 
           | That's a big chunk of my adult life I need to forget, because
           | I was so into the broad field of applied social science,
           | Ariely in particular. It's a real shame.
        
           | zo1 wrote:
           | I blocked the TED channel on YouTube a few years back as it
           | was getting bad. They first diluted their "brand" or quality
           | with TEDx, and it's been downhill since as they've been
           | scraping the bottom of the barrel and tried to "scale" or
           | "franchise". Happens everytime, growth at all costs. The only
           | way to stop it is to have passionate leaders who care more
           | about the goal than the money.
           | 
           | Unfortunately, usually by the time these leaders have
           | established their company they are also on a downward life
           | trajectory in terms of years left, so they switch to
           | "extraction" mode.
        
             | Suppafly wrote:
             | I don't have a problem with the concept of locally branded
             | TED talks under the TEDx umbrella, but I do have a problem
             | of TEDx talks pretending that they are genuine TED talks.
             | Generally actual TED talks have some quality checks built
             | in, they sometimes allow garbage through, but it's far more
             | rigid than the stuff you see at the TEDx talks.
        
           | protomolecule wrote:
           | Even if it is a Nobel prize winner like Jennifer Doudna?
        
             | guappa wrote:
             | Well the guy who invented lobotomy got one of those. Or the
             | guy who invented microcredit. To not even venture in the
             | peace nobel prizes area, where getting one is probably
             | indicative of being evil.
        
               | adastra22 wrote:
               | I mean the Nobel committee gave the Peace prize to
               | Kissinger. I'm not sure they're a good bellwether for
               | anything.
        
               | seanhunter wrote:
               | Tom Lehrer famously retired when Kissinger got the peace
               | prize declaring satire to be dead. The really funny one
               | to me is they gave literature to Winston Churchill
               | because they thought they probably couldn't give him
               | peace, then when Kissinger came up they thought "Why
               | not?"
        
               | FergusArgyll wrote:
               | Churchill's autobiography [0] is actually a great read.
               | I'm nowhere near qualified to judge a literature Nobel
               | prize but I loved it. His history of the English speaking
               | peoples is pretty good too.
               | 
               | [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Early_Life
        
               | protomolecule wrote:
               | >Well the guy who invented lobotomy got one of those.
               | 
               | Yeah, and when you see a Nobel prize winner you must be
               | assuming it's a bullshit grifter.
        
             | RachelF wrote:
             | It's hard to generalize. The whole field of behavioural
             | intelligence has lots of fake/unrepeatable studies.
             | 
             | Even Kahneman, who got a Economics Nobel has this issue:
             | 
             | https://retractionwatch.com/2017/02/20/placed-much-faith-
             | und...
        
               | protomolecule wrote:
               | Yep, it's hard, that's why sometimes it's better not to
               | overgeneralize. But sure, that field is full if
               | unreproducible "research".
        
         | yard2010 wrote:
         | I would argue: that's just the tip of the iceberg. This is how
         | it works. In a system in which there are external motivations
         | (power, money, number of citations etc.) it's a problem of
         | incentives, and should be solved by putting the emphasis on
         | other values, as a culture. What you describe is a symptom.
         | 
         | Ofc, I'm not trying to defend such behavior.
        
         | visarga wrote:
         | Maybe they were doing "first-person research" on dishonesty. /s
        
       | SMAAART wrote:
       | She wrote the book "Rebel Talent: why it pays to break the
       | rules".
        
         | larsnystrom wrote:
         | Practice what you preach, as they say.
        
       | kmeisthax wrote:
       | In my opinion, defamation law is not fit for purpose, it's far
       | too easy for rich people with axes to grind to sue their accusers
       | in an attempt to stifle speech by putting a price on their words.
       | Anti-SLAPP motions are supposed to fix this by allowing fee
       | shifting, but they only exist in a handful of states, and I'm
       | still not 100% sure how effective that alone can be at restoring
       | freedom of speech[0].
       | 
       | Until such time as that legal system is fixed, the scientific
       | community should take countermeasures against the law. I'm
       | calling for some kind of universal default clause[1]. If you sue
       | scientific accusers for defamation, _you 're not doing science
       | anymore_, so you should be automatically fired from or kicked out
       | of any scientific institution you're a member of. You could
       | obviously restrain this to only unproven allegations - i.e. get a
       | scientific board to call the allegations bullshit first and then
       | you can bring it to a court. But the pathway of allegations of
       | fraud becoming "put up $100k in legal fees or shut up" is not
       | acceptable in a free society.
       | 
       | [0] Related note: do you remember when Donald Trump was saying he
       | wanted to "open up our libel laws" to make it EASIER to pull this
       | shit!?
       | 
       | [1] "Universal default" is a concept in banking that treats
       | defaulting on _any_ loan the same as defaulting on the specific
       | loan mentioned in the contract.
        
         | nullc wrote:
         | Unfortunately for malicious litigants their whole goal is to
         | damage you with the process or to use the threat of doing so to
         | coerce you. They'll use defamation law when its the path of
         | least resistance but if that's off the table they'll just cook
         | up some other claim.
        
       | Simon_ORourke wrote:
       | So what happens with these costs - surely the failed litigant
       | should shoulder some if not all of the costs of defending this
       | defamation claim?
        
         | proto-n wrote:
         | To my (totally uninformed) eyes it looks like maybe this could
         | count as a SLAPP suit [1], in which case there's a possbility
         | for a counterclaim for legal costs. However, Massachusetts
         | apparently has "much weaker anti-SLAPP laws" [2] (than
         | California, in the context of the article)
         | 
         | [1]
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_publ...
         | 
         | [2] https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/23841742/francesca-
         | gino-d...
        
         | perihelions wrote:
         | Often, no. There's a relevant specific fee-recovery mechanism
         | [0] in some, not all, states, because this class of lawsuit
         | acknowledged as being problematic, as being an effective way to
         | silence 1A-protected speech. The deeper problem is that
         | litigation is extraordinarily expensive in the US, and
         | generically easy to abuse as an intimidation weapon--for rich
         | entities to use against those who can't afford lawyers; or for
         | fanatics to use against normal risk-averse people who don't
         | want lawsuits-don't value whatever it is the fanatic is fanatic
         | about, highly enough to go to court to argue it.
         | 
         | [0]
         | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_publ...
        
         | progbits wrote:
         | Sadly it doesn't work like that but even that wouldn't be fair.
         | If you lose the defamation as the plaintiff you should be
         | forced to pay the full amount you were suing for to the
         | defendant. Or even a multiple of that.
        
       | dudeinjapan wrote:
       | If only Prof. Gino had signed her papers at the beginning she
       | would have been less inclined to falsify the data.
       | 
       | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3458378/
        
         | mzs wrote:
         | bravo!
        
       | tanepiper wrote:
       | I posted this a while back on here, but my wife works in
       | Behavioural Science, and wrote this about it last year
       | https://www.squarepeginsight.com/post/the-dark-side-of-behav...
        
         | lern_too_spel wrote:
         | Unlike Gino, Ariely doesn't seem to have had a downfall. He
         | still has a lab at Duke, he keeps getting invited to give
         | talks, his consultancy is still getting contracts. It doesn't
         | make any sense to me. Maybe another behavioral scientist can
         | fake an experiment to explain it.
        
       | andrelaszlo wrote:
       | > To believe that the Original data are fake and the Posted data
       | are real, you'd have to believe that the sensible data are fake
       | and the backwards data are real. That is a difficult thing to
       | believe.
       | 
       | > We were right about how the data were altered, Gino's
       | prevailing explanation for the alterations does not make sense,
       | and yet _we_ are the defendants in this case.
       | 
       | What's the academic term for "mic drop"?
       | 
       | https://datacolada.org/118
        
         | andrelaszlo wrote:
         | This analysis is simple but brilliant. Some rows appeared out
         | of order. They changed them back to what they should be
         | according to their position, then checked the effects on the
         | distributions:
         | 
         | https://datacolada.org/111
        
         | polartx wrote:
         | If she was falsifying data, I must assume it was to support a
         | biased hypothesis she held however the article doesn't
         | elaborate on what conclusion her fraudulent data supported
         | beyond this being a "behavioral science" study.
         | 
         | Can anyone fill in the gaps to those conspicuously missing
         | details?
        
         | kayge wrote:
         | > What's the academic term for "mic drop"?
         | 
         | I've always gone for "QED" but I'm sure there are better
         | options out there :)
        
       | dang wrote:
       | Related. Others?
       | 
       |  _Harvard Probe Finds Honesty Researcher Engaged in Scientific
       | Misconduct_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39712021 -
       | March 2024 (15 comments)
       | 
       |  _They studied dishonesty - Was their work a lie?_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37714898 - Sept 2023 (153
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Crowdfunding a defense for scientific research_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37393502 - Sept 2023 (47
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _I'm so sorry for psychology's loss, whatever it is_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37315292 - Aug 2023 (94
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Support Academic Freedom of Speech_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37153168 - Aug 2023 (1
       | comment)
       | 
       |  _Is it defamation to point out scientific research fraud?_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37152030 - Aug 2023 (13
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Harvard professor Francesca Gino was accused of faking data_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36968670 - Aug 2023 (146
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Fabricated data in research about honesty_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36907829 - July 2023 (46
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Fraudulent data raise questions about superstar honesty
       | researcher (2021)_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36726485 - July 2023 (33
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Harvard ethics professor allegedly fabricated multiple studies_
       | - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36665247 - July 2023 (215
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Harvard dishonesty expert accused of dishonesty_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36424090 - June 2023 (201
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Data Falsificada (Part 1): "Clusterfake" - Data Colada_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36374255 - June 2023 (7
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Noted study in psychology fails to replicate, crumbles with
       | evidence of fraud_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28264097 - Aug 2021 (102
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _A Big Study About Honesty Turns Out to Be Based on Fake Data_ -
       | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28257860 - Aug 2021 (91
       | comments)
       | 
       |  _Evidence of fraud in an influential field experiment about
       | dishonesty_ - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28210642 - Aug
       | 2021 (51 comments)
        
       | kernal wrote:
       | How ironic that the people exposing a fraudster must defend
       | themselves from the false allegations of a fraudster. The sad and
       | pathetic part is that Francesca Gino even tried to blame her
       | colleagues for the fake data. These videos are a good primer on
       | the dishonesty of Francesca Gino.
       | 
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yNK4nXWA_s8
       | 
       | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QE5V_nW7pPo
        
       | red_admiral wrote:
       | In theory, if the other side can't outpay you on lawyers, truth
       | should be an absolute defense to allegations of defamation. If
       | you're careful enough not to just write "she faked the data" but
       | "based on this evidence ... we believe the data is fake", that
       | should be watertight.
        
       | xbar wrote:
       | Arrivederci, Francesca Gino.
        
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       (page generated 2024-09-13 23:01 UTC)