Cheaters in Science

As citizens we tend to get our knowledge from journalist, politicians and scientist. It is frustrating that now a days it is hard to belief any of these sources as they always play with our trust and credibility.  They often side with the region that would give them more money, status and fame. These people don’t measure the consequences that their actions may cause to us the readers and listeners.

Out of the three sources expose by Dr McNeill (professor from the department of biology at UWO) I would choose Scientist as most trusted source, because they have to do experiments and run statistics to compare theoretical information with experimental information. Plus allegedly their research is for the common good.   

It’s frustrating to know that there are scientists out there that only care about publishing their work to gain glory or get grants. Some scientists seem not to care about the impact their research have on society. Just take the examples that Dr McNeil gave us on his lecture. The trends of these examples are that these scientists had great reputations, good education and great jobs. But just one mistake, such as plagiarism, made up or manipulated data caused them to lose their integrity, credibility and reputation, it is going to be hard for them to find a job again. This confirms a saying that Colombians have: “he who does well everything goes well and he who does bad everything goes bad”.

There are two examples that Dr. McNeil mentions which in my opinion caused lot havoc in people’s lives. One, in England where Sir Cyril Burt a scientist did a study that defined the education system in England. He did a study with 50 pairs of identical twins where he studied heritability of intelligence. His study was later question because his data was nowhere to be found.  Burt’s study affected a lot of people, because based on his study England created an aptitude test called eleven plus, which decides which type of school the child should go. This for me is wrong because if a child’s dream is to be a doctor or go to university this test would be a dream crusher.

                The second one is the measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine controversy, where Andrew Wakefield did a study with some his colleagues, where he found a causative connection between the MMR vaccine and autism. His study claim that 75% of the sample size (of 12) showed autisms signs. This situation was disapproved by an investigative reporter, Brian Deer which found that there were financial interests behind Wakefield’s study. The consequences of this situation caused many parents to worry and prevent their children from getting the vaccine, also an almost legal action against the creators of MMR vaccine was to be filed. It also caused someone famous like Jenny McCartney to spread the news that this study was real and her influence made parents consider not to get the MMR vaccine. Wakefield caused the measles cases in the UK to increase. The immunity went from being 92% to 80%. In my opinion, just because Wakefield wanted glory and money, he put endanger many kids lives and almost made us go a step backwards in development plus, made us lose credibility on the journal and scientists involved in the study.

Something new I learned from this lecture is that we as scientist should exempt from making up data, it’s not worth it, because it affects our careers and lives. Another thing is watch out where information comes from. The key is to look at all perspectives.