Topic: Science is self-correcting: Lessons from the arsenic controversy

[sam]

Recent attention to NASA’s announcement of ‘arsenic-based life’  has provided a very public window into how science and scientists operate. Debate surrounds the announcement of any controversial scientific finding. In the case of arseno-DNA, the discussion that is playing out on the blogs  is very similar to the process that usually plays out in conferences and seminars. This discussion is a core process by which science works.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/12/science-is-self-correcting-lessons-from-the-arsenic-controversy/

[Rik]

A clear demonstration that fast isn't always good, and that paper still has a use, Sam.

[sam]

it does. Though I don't think the journal Science would be considered as a fast way of publishing. Still science is all about publishing and having people say you are wrong, so there is nothing really that wrong with what happened, just the processing being pointed out to people. The real problem is press releases 

[Rik]

I know, I spent many years writing them and they were all crap! 

[sam]

I know, I spent many years writing them and they were all crap! 

lol

[Clive]

A very well written article Sam.  Peer review is only unpopular among the fringe scientists, most of whom are out to con.      

[sam]

indeed, science needs peer review and one of the thing that stops the free-online only journals really - too costly to run with some kind of management