Science or Fiction?

In his 2005 modeling paper, John Ioannidis suggested that most published research findings were false—causing quite a stir in the scientific community. This claim was later examined by Stuart Ritchie in his book Science Fictions, in which he reviewed numerous examples and provided a synthesis explaining when and why science can go wrong. He identified fraud, bias, negligence, and hype as the principal causes of scientific failure.Ritchie’s book is neither an attack on the scientific method nor a critique of how pseudoscientists misuse science or how some members of society reject it. Instead, it raises awareness of the pitfalls in peer review and shows how human flaws, cognitive biases, and questionable incentives can steer science away from its core values. I have condensed Ritchie’s main findings into a seminar and look forward to discussing them with the graduate research community in our IMPRS.