A somewhat in-depth profile of disgraced social psychologist Diederik Stapel in this Sunday's NY Times Magazine. One passage I found interesting:
“People think of scientists as monks in a monastery looking out for the truth,” he said. “People have lost faith in the church, but they haven’t lost faith in science. My behavior shows that science is not holy.”
What the public didn’t realize, he said, was that academic science, too, was becoming a business. “There are scarce resources, you need grants, you need money, there is competition,” he said. “Normal people go to the edge to get that money. Science is of course about discovery, about digging to discover the truth. But it is also communication, persuasion, marketing. I am a salesman. I am on the road. People are on the road with their talk. With the same talk. It’s like a circus.” He named two psychologists he admired — John Cacioppo and Daniel Gilbert — neither of whom has been accused of fraud. “They give a talk in Berlin, two days later they give the same talk in Amsterdam, then they go to London. They are traveling salesmen selling their story.”
Read it all here. In my opinion, the scope of the piece was woefully inadequate. The writer should have included profiles of some of Stapel's former students and how their professional lives have been affected. I heard a story (from an insider) about one of his former PhD students, for example, who had to start over--from scratch--at a new school. Years of this person's life were lost. And who knows whether the negative associations will ever be shaken. Stapel's crimes were NOT victim-less.
