Nullius in Verba

In our third episode, we discuss confirmation bias, which affects not only how scientists generate and test their own hypotheses, but also how they evaluate the scientific evidence presented by others. We discuss guardrails against confirmation bias that are already in place, and others that could potentially improve scientific practice if adopted.    Shownotes Wason, P. C. (1960). On the failure to eliminate hypotheses in a conceptual task. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 12(3), 129-140. Nickerson, R. S. (1998). Confirmation bias: A ubiquitous phenomenon in many guises. Review of General Psychology, 2(2), 175-220. Mellers, B., Hertwig, R., & Kahneman, D. (2001). Do frequency representations eliminate conjunction effects? An exercise in adversarial collaboration. Psychological Science, 12(4), 269-275. Coles, N. A., March, D. S., Marmolejo-Ramos, F., Larsen, J. T., Arinze, N. C., Ndukaihe, I. L., ... & Liuzza, M. T. (2022). A multi-lab test of the facial feedback hypothesis by the many smiles collaboration. Nature Human Behaviour, 1-12. Dutilh, G., Sarafoglou, A., & Wagenmakers, E. J. (2021). Flexible yet fair: Blinding analyses in experimental psychology. Synthese, 198(23), 5745-5772. Sarafoglou, A., Hoogeveen, S., & Wagenmakers, E. J. (2023). Comparing analysis blinding with preregistration in the many-analysts religion project. Advances in Methods and Practices in Psychological Science, 6(1), 25152459221128319.  Faster-than-light neutrino anomaly  

The podcast discusses the role of skepticism in science, the impact of skepticism on scientific research, and the problem with most published research findings. They explore the various forms of skepticism, the motivations behind skepticism in the field, and the concept of selective skepticism. The episode emphasizes the importance of teaching skepticism in education to improve work and trust in literature.

In our first episode, we discuss a quote from the preface to The Instauratio Magna (of which Novum Organum is a part), in which Bacon claims that scientists should be motivated to do science for the betterment of mankind, and not for personal motives like fame, fortune, or even fun.  Here is the tweet (by Heidi Seibold) on academia not being aligned with good scientific practices.   An unedited transcript of the episode can be found here. 

In this introductory episode, Daniël and Smriti share which podcasts they like, why they are starting their own, and how their connection to each other is also tied to podcasting. They also talk about the theme of the podcast, which is inspired by Francis Bacon’s delineation of the scientific method 400 years ago.