Knowing about the incentive problem doesn’t mean that scientists should be let off the hook when they engage in malpractice. We all feel the force of the incentives, but we still ought to do our best to defy them, for the sake of the science.63 It would be better, though, if we didn’t have to resist the crushing weight of the publish-or-perish system when trying to make discoveries about the world. It would be better if we could reach a happy medium where scientists are incentivized towards hard work and creativity, but also caution and rigour; where the bias is towards getting it right rather
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