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Hi Fil, Don, Peter, Ken, Jean and all

On 01-Jun-2015, at 9:14 am, Ken Friedman <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
To my knowledge, Stone never suggested that all universities, professors, and academic publishers lie. What he said was “All governments are run by liars . . . ” (MacPherson 2008, 2015). There is a difference between these two statements.

No-one is suggesting 'all universities, professors, and academic publishers lie’, and certainly not that IF Stone said this. I used the term ‘In the tradition of I.F. Stone’ to reference the position of leading investigative journalists of the present and recent past, who have been inspired by and built on IF Stone’s work, Glenn Greenwald, Jeremy Scahill etc. Their position is one of skepticism of the words of the powerful, and in their own words, they have expanded IF Stone’s statement to include many more power structures than he originally did (see Legacy of IF Stone<https://vimeo.com/123974841> if you would like to hear it from the horse’s mouth).

On May 31, 2015, at 5:32 PM, Filippo Salustri <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
I'm curious if you and I have the same notion of "we" in this particular
case. Given that you're in a journalism school, I wonder if your "we"
referred to journalists.

I am thinking as a design researcher :)

I believe that academics are, on the whole, more ethical with respect to
their professional activities (e.g., publishing their research) than many
other groups; "we" have a pretty good record of regulating ourselves.

This is where we disagree. Call me cynical, but I don’t think academics have any less a claim than others to the undesirable parts of human behavior or professional misdemeanor. Both the pressure to publish that Don, Ken and Jean mention, and the pressure to get funding (in some fields) act as added incentives for academics to misbehave. For further reading on this, see research on academic misconduct and retractions<http://www.pnas.org/content/109/42/17028>, and the ethical problem of coercive citations<http://www.sciencemag.org/content/335/6068/542>.

And most of all, I worry about the public's perceptions and the potential
to undermine trust in experts.

Trust in experts is constantly being eroded, and I don’t think there’s much anyone can do about it. We bring a lot of this on ourselves, as Don points out…

On Jun 1, 2015, at 8:25 AM, Don Norman <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
I know of some major design schools that require publication in a peer-reviewed journal for the Phd, a requirement that clogs the journals and wears out the reviewers.
Design conferences have become graduate student practice grounds.
Professor's stick their names on papers to embellish their own publication record, but do not even go to the
presentation? I wonder if they have even read the paper. No wonder quality sucks.
We are in a crisis, and it is our own fault.

Also, as Peter points out...

On May 31, 2015, at 5:25 PM, Peter Jones | Redesign <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
There are some sciences where financial gain has changed the reward structure (pharma, medicine, engineering IP).

Corporate funding of academic research, while having some benefits, bring the problem of eroding trust in research. The political and legal use of experts to support all kinds of claims, including spurious ones, also adds to general suspicion of expert opinion.

Unlike Don, this doesn’t make me cross. I see the same trend arising in academia as has happened in journalism. While public trust in news outlets has eroded, trust in particular journalists has increased. For better or worse, in the future the onus will be on us to prove our trustworthiness as individual researchers, beyond the status of the ‘academic’ or ‘expert’ title. Not that those terms won’t have value, but they won’t be enough to instill trust on their own.

Katherine

________________
Katherine Hepworth
Assistant Professor of Visual Journalism
The Reynolds School of Journalism
1664 N. Virginia St, Reno NV, 89557

Phone: +1 (775) 784 4423
Website: kathep.com<http://kathep.com>

On May 31, 2015, at 5:32 PM, Filippo Salustri <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:

Katherine,

I'm curious if you and I have the same notion of "we" in this particular
case. Given that you're in a journalism school, I wonder if your "we"
referred to journalists.

What I mean it this.
Standards are, in principle, good. I have no problem with journalists
deciding that they should have a standard that requires them to always
treat their information sources with some healthy skepticism.

When I used "we" in my post, I was referring to design researchers,
scientists, and, more broadly, academics.
I believe that academics are, on the whole, more ethical with respect to
their professional activities (e.g., publishing their research) than many
other groups; "we" have a pretty good record of regulating ourselves.
Considering that academics generally are members of legally defined
professions (i.e., engineering, medicine, law, nursing, social work, and
other self-regulating groups with legally defined mandates), that's pretty
darned good.

And most of all, I worry about the public's perceptions and the potential
to undermine trust in experts.

There's a bit of a disconnect in the public eye, that perhaps can be
addressed through appropriate education. That is, that even if journalists
(rightly) apply a uniform degree of skepticism to all their information
sources, this is not to be construed as indicative of a uniform lack of
robustness in the information coming from different sources.

\V/_ /fas

*Prof. Filippo A. Salustri, Ph.D., P.Eng.*
Email: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
http://deseng.ryerson.ca/~fil/

On 31 May 2015 at 15:36, Katherine J Hepworth <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

Hi Filippo and Don

On May 30, 2015, at 4:48 PM, Filippo Salustri <[log in to unmask]<mailto:
[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
Assuming that I read it correctly, I have to wonder: ought we really expect
journalists to treat academics exactly the same as everyone else?

Speaking as someone who teaches in a journalism school: Yes. Absolutely.

Is it really the case that published
academic work ought to be treated with the same suspicion as a "deep
throat" informant?

Yes.

In the tradition of I.F. Stone<https://vimeo.com/123974841>
investigative journalists start their work from the position that all
powerful people and organizations lie. This of course includes
universities, professors, and academic publishers.

Katherine

________________
Katherine Hepworth
Assistant Professor of Visual Journalism
The Reynolds School of Journalism
1664 N. Virginia St, Reno NV, 89557

Phone: +1 (775) 784 4423
Website: kathep.com<http://kathep.com>

On May 30, 2015, at 4:48 PM, Filippo Salustri <[log in to unmask]<mailto:
[log in to unmask]>> wrote:

I saw that article too, and had a good chuckle.
But then I had an odd (for me) thought.
I read the article as suggesting that science writers ought to be doing
more fact-checking, because that's what a good journalist does on every
story.
Here's my logic: If we expect journalists to apply all their usual
fact-checking standards to academic publications, then one may infer that
this is because academic publications are no more reliable than other,
non-academic sources of information.
I see this as conflicting with what I think would be typical ethical
expectations in academia surrounding publishing.
And if it really is necessary for journalists to treat academic
publications as they would any other publication, what does that say about
the ability of the public to trust the opinions of experts?

I'm not trying to be elitist about it, but journalists draw information
from all kinds of different sources. Is it really the case that published
academic work ought to be treated with the same suspicion as a "deep
throat" informant?

I worry about this - especially the degradation of the public trust in
academia.

If the kind of expertise that academia really ought to embody is important
to society, general well-being, progress, etc. then perhaps we ought expect
journalists to trust academics more and undertake to ensure a higher
standard of ethics in academic publishing. Perhaps we ought to be taking a
harder line against, for instance, "predatory publishers" and peer-review,
and develop better checks and balances. If journalists can "trust" us
more, then it should also translate into greater trust by the general
public. And I think that would be a good thing all round.

\V/_ /fas

*Prof. Filippo A. Salustri, Ph.D., P.Eng.*
Email: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
http://deseng.ryerson.ca/~fil/

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