The peer review system no longer works to guarantee academic rigour - a different approach is needed — The Conversation

The “conclusions”

Full Article: https://theconversation.com/the-pee...-rigour-a-different-approach-is-needed-244092

 

I don't see how they can make progress without understanding and addressing why so much garbage research goes through peer review, in fact why so much makes it to peer review at all. Or why most journals have zero interest in correcting even glaring mistakes unless nagged and nagged and nagged for months or even years, sometimes to no effect. Why researchers have even fewer incentives and interest to do so. Being right is basically irrelevant. Appearing to be right is all there is, just like in politics. Exactly like in politics. Just look at Cochrane's behavior. They clearly don't give a damn about the quality of their work, as long as it's perceived to be good. For inexplicable reasons because it's terrible.

There are reasons for this. It's not happening in a vacuum, and it isn't about the sequences of steps. When you see things like David Tuller's recent efforts to correct the REGAIN study, then the same journal publishes an editorial with the same mistake, and the non-stop chase for the wildly inflated numbers in the functional labeling of psychosomatic ideology, where simple numbers that are clearly wrong keep getting repeated, you can clearly see that there are zero incentives or interest for accuracy. Most of the time journals and authors can simply never admit mistakes and... it's fine. Somehow. Stuff that would put to shame most politicians. Seriously. Not all of them, but most of them.

Then you have the absolute mass of completely useless and basically copy-paste 'studies' in so-called evidence-based medicine, which are highly encouraged, sought after and clearly a new normal. Research that literally serves no purpose, it's all been done at least 100x already. But they have no interest or incentive to do anything different. It's an industry that pretty much fabricates its own alternative bubble universe, which then goes on to perpetuate itself simply because, well, some work has been done and so on and it would be embarrassing for everyone to admit it was all a bunch of bullshit.

This goes so far beyond the publishing model, which is highly problematic in itself. Because it starts so much earlier than the publishing steps. The widespread rejection, based on arbitrary denial of reality, of research into certain areas like ME/CFS, the widespread denial of Long Covid that has made it impossible to make progress in a major time of opportunity. The whole system has long reached the limits of what it can do with its primitive makeup. It's that no one seems to notice, because unlike a crumbling building, they can simply ignore the fact that barely anything is still standing around them because it's a metaphorical structure. No rocks falling on anyone's heads. Instead: here's yet another big budget for yet another useless copy-paste study.

Also I would dispute the framing that peer review no longer guarantees quality. It very likely never did. It's just that, the same problem as today, no one noticed and there used to be so many easy hanging fruits that it didn't matter, researchers back then could fumble their way onto a Nobel prize for simply forgetting to wash something. The easy times are over, they're playing on hardcore mode now but are still stuck on cheesing through it. (It's a gaming reference where you win an encounter by exploiting an easy loophole)

 

It feels like in practice peer review serves more as an enforcement of “bias” and pet theories of the current group of “experts” than it does to ensure quality.

 

Taps sign

https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_institutions

 

In the Uk the Rae (rather than ref) introduced citations as a measure people were assessed by

which means people can’t afford to pee off other people and reminds me of when websites used to reciprocal link agreements to help the seo on their website.

It likely made the hierarchy and play nice to play the game more embedded ie cliquing up bring an important strategy for success rather than just bring straight.

it also meant that it’s risky to do research that won’t get cited because it’s critical in areas where people don’t do balanced literature review parts in their articles … and it seems the psychosomatic people do not allow a critical mass if people to ever build up whilst they have control of the jobs and editor positions of journals etc

and they don’t acknowledge their work being reviewed in the manner of the bigger scientific field or reference it

I hear institutions do internal peer review as standard with two colleagues these days. Which they think is robust but it sounds like when a friend asks you to check over their child’s application for something and you’ll offend them if you go too red pen mad. These are people you will work with and worse academia is now full of people of fixed term contracts who at the end of the three years desperately need such colleagues on their side if it’s a voting decision for a job there or if they have to apply to posts elsewhere (and it’s a small world in many subjects so putting good words in matters)