In advance of the next three episodes discussing the Philosophical Psychology lectures by Paul E. Meehl, we present a brief reading from his autobiography in A history of psychology in autobiography.

• Meehl, P. E. (1989). Paul E. Meehl. In G. Lindzey (Ed.), A history of psychology in autobiography (Vol. 8, pp. 337–389). Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

In this episode, we discuss objectivity and disinterestedness in science. We talk about norms, values, interests, and objectivity in research practice, peer review, and hiring decisions. Is it possible to be completely objective? Is objectivity a feature of epistemic products or epistemic processes? And most importantly, how would you objectively rate this podcast?

Shownotes

• Armstrong, J. S. (1979). Advocacy and objectivity in science. Management Science, 25(5), 423–428.
• Declaration of Interest by Stephen Senn: http://senns.uk/Declaration_Interest.htm
• Djørup, S., & Kappel, K. (2013). The norm of disinterestedness in science; a restorative analysis. SATS, 14(2). https://doi.org/10.1515/sats-2013-0009
• Elliott, K. C. (2017). A Tapestry of Values: An Introduction to Values in Science. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190260804.001.0001
• Feyerabend, Paul. "How to defend society against science." Philosophy: Basic Readings (1975): 261-271.
• Jamieson, K. H., McNutt, M., Kiermer, V., & Sever, R. (2019). Signaling the trustworthiness of science. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 116(39), 19231–19236. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1913039116
• Janack, M. (2002). Dilemmas of objectivity. Social Epistemology, 16(3), 267-281.
• John, S. (2021). Objectivity in science. Cambridge University Press.
• Merton, R. K. (1973). The sociology of science: Theoretical and empirical investigations. University of Chicago Press.
• Mitroff, I. I. (1974). Norms and Counter-Norms in a Select Group of the Apollo Moon Scientists: A Case Study of the Ambivalence of Scientists. American Sociological Review, 39(4), 579–595. https://doi.org/10.2307/2094423
• Mitroff, I. I. (1974). The subjective side of science: A philosophical inquiry into the psychology of the Apollo moon scientists (First Edition). Elsevier.
• A Russian polar researcher has been charged trying to stab a colleague to death at a remote Antarctic base https://www.businessinsider.com/sergey-savitsky-alleged-attempted-murder-at-antarctic-bellingshausen-2018-10
• Stamenkovic, P. (2023). Facts and objectivity in science. Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1080/03080188.2022.2150807

In this episode, we discuss the role of criticism in science. When is criticism constructive as opposed to obsessive? What are the features of fair and useful scientific criticism? And should we explicitly teach junior researchers to both give and accept criticism?

Shownotes:

• Babbage, C. (1830). Reflections on the Decline of Science in England: And on Some of Its Causes.
• Prasad, Vinay, and John PA Ioannidis. "Constructive and obsessive criticism in science." European journal of clinical investigation 52.11 (2022): e13839.
• Lakatos, I. (1968, January). Criticism and the methodology of scientific research programmes. In Proceedings of the Aristotelian society (Vol. 69, pp. 149-186). Aristotelian Society, Wiley.
• LOWI: https://lowi.nl/en/home/ As an independent advisory body it plays a role in the complaints procedure about alleged violations of principles of research integrity.
• Holcombe, A. O. (2022). Ad hominem rhetoric in scientific psychology. British Journal of Psychology, 113(2), 434–454. https://doi.org/10.1111/bjop.12541
• Daniel C. Dennett: I've Been Thinking https://wwnorton.com/books/9780393868050
• Phillip Stark textbook chapter on logical fallacies: https://www.stat.berkeley.edu/~stark/SticiGui/Text/reasoning.htm
• Gelman, A., & Tuerlinckx, F. (2000). Type S error rates for classical and Bayesian single and multiple comparison procedures. Computational Statistics, 15(3), 373–390. https://doi.org/10.1007/s001800000040
• Popper, K. R. (1959). The logic of scientific discovery. Routledge.
• PubPeer: https://pubpeer.com