A rather bold post regarding RCR
I have always been slightly skeptical about scientific research. Having attended a high school with a strong emphasis on research, I've noticed some things about research. 1) Strong high school research programs are like breeding student research robots and sending them to competitions by the masses. Yes, this motivates students and the trips are undoubtedly fun. However, even from the start, we are in the mindset that research is about competing for fame and scholarships. This brings me to my second point: 2) Research at the high school and undergraduate level is so simple. Don't get me wrong, I am not talking about the content of the research. It is almost effortless for us to fill out a piece of paper, get placed in a lab, and start working. And we think we're hot stuff now.
I find that I am talking about somewhat contradictory statements: we work to win stuff, yet we have it easy? From the get-go, before I ever started research, I have always been aware of the realities of the profession. It's hard to get funding. It's hard to get a job. I've never had to write a grant. I've never had to worry about maintaining a lab. All I have to do is come, work, and eventually leave the lab. And I think about how a PI has to make his/her name known, scavenge for money to buy supplies, equipment, and pay the salaries to keep everyone else from becoming unemployed.
Science is never purely objective, and never will be. It probably wouldn't be a human concoction anymore if it was. Sometimes, in a struggle for scientific survival, individuals will compromise proper scientific conduct keep their reputation. Other times, it is a struggle for survival that propels scientists to commit misconduct (if you are about to lose your job or can't support your family, it wouldn't be very pleasant...). Of courses, there are cases of accidents, of other members in the lab who committed the act etc.
As all of us know, the scientific community is brutal and critical, as it should be in order to maintain legitimacy. As a result, those who can't publish get "weeded out" and don't receive any funding. A lot of people would do almost anything to get a paper out. Hopefully, it is also for the sake of scientific progress. Labs can be collaborative, friendly, and very helpful to one another. They can also work against each other in competition, as we saw in the movie. The latter relationship is another cause for the breakdown of scientific integrity.
Of course, proper education, especially at the high school and college level, about scientific conduct would further deter rates of misconduct (I actually don't see that much emphasis on it at all, outside of our program). But only if there was infinite funding and scientists were all reduced to equal status would misconduct disappear. It's kind of like a function approaching an asymptote (at zero). We can do much more to get closer, albeit never hitting zero.
Maybe it's the pessimist or critic in me to write all of that (I guess I would be a hypocrite too, yay). But please, before we look at a case of misconduct, gasp, and say "This is so wrong, why would anybody ever do that," consider that science is a product of humans, and humans are, well, complicated.
