From the Brit Med J - in response to a libel suit in UK based on a techncial dispute

BMJ 2009;339:b2783

Editor's Choice

Keep libel laws out of science

Fiona Godlee, editor, BMJ

I hope all readers of the BMJ are signed up to organised scepticism. It’s not a blog, but it could be. It’s one of the four principles of good science as articulated by Robert Merton nearly 70 years ago. The other three—communalism, universalism, and disinterestedness—are no less important, but I had to turn to Wikipedia to remind me what they were. Merton defined organised scepticism as the requirement that scientific claims be exposed to critical scrutiny before they are accepted.

This wasn’t a new idea. Tony Delamothe reminds us (doi:10.1136/bmj.b2771) that the motto of the Royal Society translates as "Take nobody’s word for it," showing its commitment "to withstand the domination of authority...and to verify all statements by an appeal to fact determined by experiment."

GeorgeWolff on Jul 10 2009, 11:52 AM said:

I don't have access to the full editorial, George. Can we have more info about this libel suit and why should we insist that science be exempt from it?

PS...ok, after googling...was it the case of a Guardian journalist who was sued for libel by the British chiropractors...it had cost him a lot of money in legal fees already and still the case is far from over...so my interpretation was wrong then....the signature campaign is for the reform of the UK libel laws, not really for demanding that science be exempt from them...if the journalists are not threatened with possible costly lawsuits resulting to articles being withdrawn and financial catastrophe...then the public will be better informed and will hear the truth...

Science shouldn't be exempt from libel, but to sue someone as a response to challenging your conclusions is absurd. If you can't raise doubts to someone else's conclusions without fear of a lawsuit, there's no longer any room for constructive discourse in the scientific community.

gfischer on Jul 10 2009, 11:31 PM said:

Actually, as I wrote in my PS in the previous post, it's not about being exempt or dropping libel suits altogether.....it seems that the British libel laws are very complicated, suits are very slow to be resolved and the whole legal battle could be very, very costly. This then discourages a lot of journalists from publishing articles which they deem the public shld know or for scientists to make comments/criticisms detrimental to certain products/businesses etc., for fear of being sued.

That's right. The article is a short one so I'll track it down and post here.

I posted the snippet in interestr of my bias - many of the posts on Bioforum seem to betray a naivete, a lack of skpeticism. Asking questions that a simple experiment could easily answer - often betraying a lack of controls in experimental design even for such simple elements as reagent and media controls.

GeorgeWolff on Jul 11 2009, 01:21 PM said:

I agree with this however I am guilty too, asking questions like that sometimes.

But I do have to say something about it: sometimes its just not possible to do a certain test. Even the most stupid, simpliest test can sometimes not be done.
It all depends on where you work and what function you have or how high you are "ranked" in the institution.
I remember a moment where I did a little test to see if my media was bad. To check this I took 2 plastic tubes (we had more then 5000 of them and we used 50 a day or so in an experiment) however one of the seniors saw my 2 tubes in the fridge and asked us what it was. I explained him it was to test something etc... His answer was very short: now you wasted 2 good tubes. You should have asked it if the media was still ok or heard around whether someone could give you an answer.
(I did hear around, but you cant expect me to go run around and ask every freaking person in the lab)

So the problem for him wasnt even the fact that I did not ask to use 2 (freaky 2 tubes!) tubes, but that I used them to do a stupid experiment. He simply said that if I was not sure I should simply trow away the media and make new one and ask if the others knew if the media would still be ok.

and do not forget: a lot of students are active here and I can understand they do not dare to do such thing or dare to ask it.

Another example: I once stumbled at something very strange and I asked 2 senior members of the staff and both said it was very very strange and interesting, but did they care? No they didnt and the interseting thing was gone...
I could have easly gotten a publication out of it, but heck, that wasnt the thing I was working on so, who cared...
And it wasnt a big experiment I needed nor a lot of equipment to check it out.


PS. do not forget that a lot of people miss a certain level of assertivity, I see this a lot in girls... (I am linking this with the male/female topic)
For some reason girls or women seem to be more "scared" and less daring to ask questions or to take action themself.
When I was at school and something needed to be asked at a certain prof it was almost always me (a boy) that had the guts to ask the question. The girls asked me to ask something ... I mean....

I certainly understand pito. The response to the situation is documentation - of the assumption that the uncontrolled potential variable is of no consequence, identifcation of the aspect one could not pursue, etc.