Sunday, April 29, 2012
Stapel retracts another two papers
The Dutch researcher Diederik Stapel, accused of making up data on a grand scale, has been forced to retract two more papers, according to Retraction Watch. The universities of Tilburg, Groningen, and Amsterdam have set up a joint web site for documenting their findings. They are in the process of analyzing all papers published by him and questioning all co-authors. This is a good way of letting the public know what is currently happening. The list of fraud currently determined is, however, depressingly long.
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Just a quick comment: Of course, if dubious papers which have made it past the supposedly "rigorous" peer review process of well-known journals have to be retracted, this should be publicized. On the other hand, if authors discover genuine mistakes in their experimental setup, code, or previously unknown sources of systematic error, they should be encouraged to retract their erroneous papers, so that other researchers are not mislead in the future - in my opinion, this does not happen often enough. Hence, unlike plagiarism, there are valid reasons for retractions. It's a fine line.
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