The basis of good science is critical thinking and a healthy scepticism about claims, theories and experimental results. Another important ingredient of good science is that scientists themselves have no personal stake in the outcome of the research. Indeed, consistent exercise of the former requirement is an essential part of ensuring that the latter one is followed – scientists and the public should always ask probing questions about claimed scientific results, and the question “Who’s funding you?” should be one of these.
Writing in The Guardian, George Monbiot discusses an interesting example of what happens when this system fails.
Three weeks ago, while looking for something else, I came across one of the most extraordinary documents I have ever read. It relates to an organisation called Arise (Associates for Research into the Science of Enjoyment). Though largely forgotten today, in the 1990s it was one of the world’s most influential public-health groups. First I should explain what it claimed to stand for.
Arise, founded in 1988, seems to have been active until 2004. It described itself as “a worldwide association of eminent scientists who act as independent commentators”. Its purpose, these eminent scientists said, was to show how “everyday pleasures, such as eating chocolate, smoking, drinking tea, coffee and alcohol, contribute to the quality of life”.It maintained that there were good reasons for dropping our inhibitions and indulging ourselves. “Scientific studies show that enjoying the simple pleasures in life, without feeling guilty, can reduce stress and increase resistance to disease … Conversely, guilt can increase stress and undermine the immune system … This can lead to, for instance, forgetfulness, eating disorders, heart problems or brain damage.” The “health police”, as Arise sometimes called them, could be causing more harm than good.
Arise received an astonishing amount of coverage. Between September 1993 and March 1994, for example, it generated 195 newspaper articles and radio and television interviews, in places such as the Wall Street Journal, the International Herald Tribune, the Independent, the Evening Standard, El PaÃs, La Repubblica, Rai and the BBC.
Already, sensible scientists would be worried by the description of this organization. Having a stated purpose of demonstrating a particular result, decided ahead of time, is a hallmark of bad science. One should immediately ask why a group of scientists might have such an agenda. Reading on, Monboit suggests an answer.
In 1998, as part of a settlement of a class action against the tobacco companies in the US, the firms were obliged to place their internal documents in a public archive. Among them is the one I came across last month. It is a memo from an executive in the corporate services department of Philip Morris – the world’s largest tobacco company – to one of her colleagues. The title is “Arise 1994-95 Activities and Funding”. “I had a meeting,” she began, “with Charles Hay and Jacqui Smithson (Rothmans) to agree on the 1994-1995 activity plan for Arise and to discuss the funding needed. Enclosed is a copy of our presentation.”
This showed that in the previous financial year Arise had received $373,400: $2,000 from Coca-Cola, $900 from other firms and the rest – over 99% – from Philip Morris, British American Tobacco, RJ Reynolds and Rothmans. In 1994-95 its budget would be $773,750. Rothmans and RJ Reynolds had each committed to provide $200,000, and BAT “has also shown interest”.
The article goes on to describe Monbiot’s attempts to get straight answers concerning this from various academics and universities involved, and the evasion and hedging that he encounters.
As a scientist who interacts with colleagues from many different corners of the scientific community, I honestly think that the amount of unethical and troubling behavior like this is quite small. Nevertheless, I think it is extremely important that scientists avoid such conflicts of interest, be vigilant about them occurring in our institutions and be prepared to speak out against them when they happen. We need to do this because it is right and also because only then can we expect the public to trust us and listen to us on critical scientific issues. I’m not saying that industrial funding of science is necessarily bad. But anyone accepting such funding needs to make that very clear when reporting results, particularly when those results have the potential for a clear financial impact on the funding source.
Sufficient federal funding for science is one thing that can help in such matters, in principle providing unbiased backing for good science. However, as we have seen recently, vigilance is still necessary to ensure that the ideological biases of individuals in a given administration do not influence how such science is reported and even conducted.
One might think that considerations of the underlying motives of funding sources are important only for quite applied science, like that pertaining to public health and nutrition, global warming, pharmaceuticals, warfare or energy sources. However, even those of us working in more abstract areas need to keep our eyes wide open and avoid external influences, both real and perceived. One example that springs to mind is the Templeton Foundation, which has a particular agenda – to reconcile science and religion – and which therefore is interested in funding research into, for example, cosmology, which might be said to support this goal. (Former readers of Preposterous Universe might remember this coming up before)
Monbiot concludes nicely, emphasizing the question that we all, scientists and non-scientists alike, should always ask
How much more science is being published in academic journals with undeclared interests like these? How many more media campaigns against “overregulation”, the “compensation culture” or “unfounded public fears” have been secretly funded and steered by corporations? How many more undeclared recipients of corporate money have been appearing on the Today programme, providing free public relations for their sponsors? This case suggests that academia and the media have failed dismally to exercise sufficient scepticism. Surely there is one obvious question with which every journal and every journalist should begin. “Who’s funding you?”
February 10th, 2006 at 3:15 pm
The funding of clinical trials for new drugs is almost entire provided by the large pharmaceutical companies. It’s amazing to me how “dangerous” previously somewhat benign illinesses such as Chickenpox become once somebody can make a buck off a vaccine.
I am also somewhat skeptical of the ever more aggresive guidlines for cholesterol levels, blood pressure, and many other “risk factors”, that have available treatments from the people funding the studies upon which these guidelines are based.
Caveat Emptor
Elliot
February 10th, 2006 at 5:26 pm
You look for those oportunities that companies that might provide the “seed bed” for the greater minds to produce.
Should all sign a release saying you provide this money free and irrespective of the position you hold on the product you sell? “A gift” has no binding considerations, or lobbyist incentive to encourage an outcome on the state of affairs ,with regards to your company.
PI(Perimeter Institute) up in Toronto had to take on a life of it’s own. Any influence that could jeopardize the “creative surges” and “undermine” continued research, by holding funding as a tool(?)
For companies:
This is more of a “window dressing” to what good companies might be in relation to the “health issues” that smoking or drinking the beverage might have on you? So by nature such funding is nice, but not at the cost of holding science hostage while they illicite your health. Are there standards on this?
Media( equilibrium state of being?)Impartial
Media “is” and “can be” controlled? Paint what ever picture you like, depending on who and what political views are held by the owners/government. What they would like to see as to the political output of the democratic system. Drum up the public to a frenzy of “war” about being patriotic, while smearing the good name of truth and honest patriots?
Just “adding more” to your observations Mark. There are such things as “good citizens” while one could hold a counter view of the “politcal system” and, current state of affairs. We are always more then ID related if counter views are held( to whatever model assumption) or “Religious freak” if we have “ethical behavior” as to the conditions and plight of human life.
February 11th, 2006 at 3:39 pm
It’s not an issue who does the funding, but the purpose for it. Dynamite man Nobel funds the major prizes, the reason originally being to clear his reputation as war mongerer. He made a profit from the Crimean War, and accidentally blew up his brother and associates in laboratory accidents.
But that is not used to discredit the Nobel Prize today. Hitler’s funding of rocketry led, via Van Dorn and von Braun, to the Saturn V and the moon. But Hitler doesn’t deserve credit for anything because his intentions were not decent.
What matters is not the person’s name who funds the early research, but what their intentions are. If the researcher knows that more money will be forthcoming from Uncle Sam, say, if they produce a positive report about progress in string theory (or anything else), they’ll do their best to write that glowing report, to keep the bucks coming in. So I agree that we should be skeptical, but of intentions not of the person’s name or background. What matters are OBJECTIVES and RESULTS, not creed, colour, politics.
February 11th, 2006 at 3:49 pm
Please, somebody just tell me that ideological prejudice won’t cause scientists to willfully ignore evidence that we’re not here by accident, if this turns out to support some philosophical aspect of the right more than the left, and that does not mean that god has anything to do with it.
I’m talking about purpose in nature like they were looking for here:
http://www.templeton.org/biochem-finetuning/
Is this really entirely true?!? I thought that templeton simply supports any crazy idea that might work to shake things loose?
As I look down the list of the above linked research plan, I see some religious motivations, but I also see that science writer, Paul Davies, is on that list, as well as others that I recognize, whom I cannot believe are motivated to do anything other than to get money to do fringe-or-beyond-science.
Based on this… I fear the worst fate of all may be in store for both, science and humanity, because it most certainly does appear that my first mentioned worst nightmare will come true if chance doesn’t rule the universe, because politics will supercede rationality, and the left has the upper hand in the manner that these matters are decided.
Tell me I’m wrong… please.
What the hell ever happened to Einstein’s purposefully structured worldview, which still, to this day, falls directly from relativity without uncertainty, and nothing has been decided for certain yet, but people sure do act like they *believe* that it has.
February 11th, 2006 at 4:02 pm
As I said Science
island. No, you need not worry. Science is not about right or left ideological agendas; it is about evidence supporting or ruling out hypotheses.
Also, from http://www.templeton.org/science_and_religion/index.asp
February 11th, 2006 at 4:04 pm
Gotcha… and thanks, I’ll make a note to stay the heck away from Templeton…
February 11th, 2006 at 4:13 pm
Science is not about right or left ideological agendas; it is about evidence supporting or ruling out hypotheses.
FYI: I don’t entirely agree with the above, as I find this to be more-true of physicists than evobiolgists, and this worries me because other scientists have rightfully supported them… but to the point that some of the same lame arguments come out.
As most here know, Lenny said that “the appearance of design is undeniable”… qualified by something like… ‘unless the landscape fails, and then we’ll find something else to blame it on…’
I don’t believe that he means anything other than another manner for rationalizing “chance occurrence” when when he says that.
February 11th, 2006 at 4:21 pm
But the point is that occasionally individual scientists say things that aren’t right or won’t stand the test of time. What I’m saying is that is in no way driven by left/right ideology. The current debate about the string theory landscape (which is, by the way, a tiny debate among a small subset of the subfield of theoretical physics that is high energy theory) will shake out eventually, but is a scientific discussion nevertheless, and people hold views about it that are distinct from political leanings.
February 11th, 2006 at 4:33 pm
Thanks again, Mark, and I know that I should shut-up now, but that’s not my cage rattling nature, so I’ll just say I see what Lenny sees when he looks at the universe, only I believe that I have good reason to believe that this has nothing to do with intelligence or “design” in context with the way that people generally associate design with human-like-intent.
To me, Lenny has made yet ANOTHER independent derivation that supports my belief.
I want Lenny’s interpretation to stand as a valid scientific interpretation of the special implications of the AP, which actually only indicates purposeful structuring in nature… if the landscape fails.
It really burns me to see scientists *automatically* bi-pass this most-obvious, most natural, “closest at hand” answer, by reaching for more complex answers that don’t solve the problems any better.
/rant
sorry for the OT.
February 11th, 2006 at 11:56 pm
Monbiot offers some wise advice about watching out for agendas and conflicts of interest. I’d just like to comment on one of Mark’s introductory statements:
That makes scientists sound like automatons — devoid of passion and uninterested in the success of their ideas. I suspect science would grind to a halt if that were the case. As Henry Bauer has persuasively argued, science produces reliable knowledge not by requiring its practitioners to be superhuman but by accepting their frailities and seeking to filter them out.
George
February 12th, 2006 at 2:44 am
Another important ingredient of good science is that scientists themselves have no personal stake in the outcome of the research.
This seems surprisingly naive to me. Of course all scientists have a very personal stake in the outcome of their research. Fame and fortune (or at least the continuation of their meagre career) depends on it.
Science doesn’t work because all its practitioners are purer than the driven snow. It works because the mistakes get uncovered, and if your work matters, they will usually get uncovered quickly. Knowing that is a strong disincentive for fraud.
February 12th, 2006 at 7:52 am
James, that’s not the point. Fame and fortune are ok to aspire too when they are achieved within the scientific field. Of course we have professional stakes in our research, which compells us to produce correct research which is good.
If there are extra scientific stakes though this does not apply.
And anyways, yes science works because of these mechanisms, too. But these mechanisms alone would be worthless if most scientists weren’t in this field for the joy of understanding and teaching.
February 13th, 2006 at 10:39 am
Mark,
The question of who is funding is beside the point. Why do people have to disclose the source of their funding or anything of that sort?
It will just become another pseudo-scientific, group-think way to rank scientific papers without actually reading them. So-and-so’s research is funded by x, so we don’t need to read it. Somebody else’s is funded by y, so it is reputable. There is too much sneering at people as it is, when it is the content or lack of content that’s important.
The majority will do anything to stereotype things, and worrying about who is funding things will create additional unwanted sources of bias to slow down the acceptable of new ideas even more. I can understand your question if you were dealing with political candidates, but not for scientific work.
February 13th, 2006 at 10:43 am
(BTW, some scientists have been self-funded, which would presumably put them into the same funding category as crackpots. Einstein, 1905, funded himself and didn’t have a university position. Luckly the world was more interested in results than in these details.)
February 13th, 2006 at 11:05 am
Science. You are misreading what I had to say and twisting it so as to make your own point. I didn’t say that people should think that work is by crackpots or not on the basis of who is funding it. What I said is that the funding source needs to be clearly acknowledged up front.
I think this makes perfect sense for the reasons I said. There is no way that the public or our politicians will always be able to work through the details of all scientific studies etc., and they deserve to know, for example, whether research saying that cigarettes don’t increase the chance of lung cancer is being funded by the tobacco industry.
There is no way this is about the scientific establishment trying to keep the poor little overlooked and opressed “Einsteins” of the world down.
February 13th, 2006 at 11:25 am
The comments here prompt me to believe the creative ambiguity of the convolution congress is the group assessing the intent of science. What you people need is a skeptical poet to look over your shoulders and make fun of you. Laughter might be better than tobacco or results that go awry.
February 13th, 2006 at 12:46 pm
‘…they deserve to know, for example, whether research saying that cigarettes don’t increase the chance of lung cancer is being funded by the tobacco industry.’
The tobacco industry should fund research into cancer effects from its profits, similarly the nuclear industry should fund research into radiation effects and the ecology of fission products, etc.
Unfortunately, you don’t get my point, and you falsely claim that I’ve got my own axe to grind. The only axe is this: the public should be exposed to any technical details that are controversial.
They don’t need more bureaucracy to hint at political affiliations prejudicing results. The public would be more interested in science if the exact details are debated openly.
Your solution seems to be guilt by association, which I don’t think is scientific. Thanks for understanding.
February 13th, 2006 at 1:30 pm
Not guilt by association but free and open acknowledgement of funding. Every paper I write acknowledges my funding sources openly – this should be true of every piece of research.
February 13th, 2006 at 2:40 pm
Thanks! I’m glad you do acknowledge your sponsors.
I’m only saying that not everyone is so fortunate, and just because a person doesn’t want to release sponsor details, doesn’t say anything about their science. Some very good health physicists are employed by the nuclear industry for example, and adding a manditory note to their papers saying their research is “sponsored” by the nuclear industry would not help them present their evidence!
February 13th, 2006 at 3:31 pm
It wouldn’t help them present it – it would provide others with full disclosure about possible conflicts of interest.
February 13th, 2006 at 7:51 pm
Some people will lie, or toe the line of lying, when reporting results if the rewards for doing so are great enough. This is handled by ensuring that the results are repeatable.
Once the repeatablility of a result is ensured beyond all doubt, there is only the matter of logical development, interpretation, etc., which clearly has nothing to do with who funds you. (We’ve all got brains, haven’t we?) Of course, it takes time to become acquainted with a subject, and so a faulty study showing smoking is safe can give a nice sense of security.
Unfortunately, there is a sizable segment of the population with little knowledge of critical thinking and skepticism. However, the answer to “Who funds you?” is a poor substitute.
February 13th, 2006 at 8:12 pm
It is not supposed to be a substitute.