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Tales of research misconduct
a lacanian diagnostics of integrity challenges in science novels
Abstract
This monograph contributes to the scientific misconduct debate from an oblique perspective, by analysing seven novels devoted to this issue, namely: Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis (1925), The affair by C.P. Snow (1960), Cantor's Dilemma by Carl Djerassi (1989), Perlmann's Silence by Pascal Mercier (1995), Intuition by Allegra Goodman (2006), Solar by Ian McEwan (2010) and Derailment by Diederik Stapel (2012). Scientific misconduct, i.e. fabrication, falsification, plagiarism, but also other questionable research practices, have become a focus of concern for academic communities worldwide, but also for managers, funders and publishers of research. The aforementioned novels offer intriguing windows into integrity challenges emerging in contemporary research practices. They are analysed from a continental philosophical perspective, providing a stage where various voices, positions and modes of discourse are mutually exposed to one another, so that they critically address and question one another. They force us to start from the admission that we do not really know what misconduct is. Subsequently, by providing case histories of misconduct, they address integrity challenges not only in terms of individual deviance but also in terms of systemic crisis, due to current transformations in the ways in which knowledge is produced. Rather than functioning as moral vignettes, the author argues that misconduct novels challenge us to reconsider some of the basic conceptual building blocks of integrity discourse.
Details | Table of Contents
an oblique perspective on research misconduct
pp.1-23
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_1Lacanian psychoanalysis
pp.25-55
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_2preliminary explorations
pp.57-83
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_3the case of Robert Oppenheimer
pp.85-118
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_4a lacanian reading of Sinclair Lewis's arrowsmith
pp.119-139
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_5Snow's The affaire
pp.141-150
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_6perverse incentives and replication traumas in Cantor's dilemma
pp.151-163
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_7plagiarism and self-exploitation in Perlmann's silence
pp.165-182
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_8Allegra Goodman's intuition
pp.183-196
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_9plagiarism in Ian McEwan's solar
pp.197-210
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_10reading Diederik Stapel's Derailment as a misconduct novel
pp.211-244
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65554-3_11Publication details
Publisher: Springer
Place: Dordrecht
Year: 2017
Pages: 263
ISBN (hardback): 978-3-319-65553-6
ISBN (digital): 978-3-319-65554-3
Full citation:
Zwart Hub (2017) Tales of research misconduct: a lacanian diagnostics of integrity challenges in science novels. Dordrecht, Springer.