Sunday, December 19, 2010

Seeing what you want to see

There is a good Opinion piece in the November Scientific American, Fudge Factor: a look at Harvard science fraud case by Scott O. Lillienfeld. He discusses the problem of distinguishing intentional scientific fraud from confirmation bias, the tendency we have as scientists to selectively interpret data in order to confirm our own theories.

This is a good reminder that the easiest person to fool is yourself.

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A forgotten physicist: Amelia Frank (1906-1937)

In honour of International Women's Day, I bring to your attention a fascinating recent piece in The Conversation , Who was Amelia Frank?...