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Peer Review Quotes

Browse 24 quotes about Peer Review.

Peer Review Quotes

“It would be good if peer review actually worked, if it actually challenged and questioned what scientists write. Did you know that the Koran is peer reviewed by 100% of Muslims and always receives a 100% pass mark? Funny that! Who in their right mind would claim that peer review is an intrinsic good? Nobel laureate Max Planck said that science progressed funeral by funeral. So much for peer review. You actually need the peer reviewers to die before new ideas can be entertained! Peer reviewers are in fact the midwit, careerist paradigm enforcers. They shut down all new thinking.”

ScienceReligionFaithIslamConformityDogmaGroup ThinkPeer ReviewKoran
Book:Universals Versus Particulars: The Ultimate Intellectual War
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“There were several key American scientists that favorably reported on Nazi eugenics after visiting Hitler's Germany in order to provide it cover.”

ScienceRacismNaziWwiiEugenicsNazismScientistsProgressivismJewish HistoryHolocaust HistoryAdolf HitlerWwii HistoryScientific RacismPeer ReviewEugenicistHitlerism
Book:H.H. Laughlin: American Scientist, American Progressive, Nazi Collaborator
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“How can you say one thing when your data shows something else. One doesn't know what was on the authors' minds and maybe they interpreted things differently but the sense is that the literature maintains an attitude somewhat like the approach of lawyers. If the jury buys it, it doesn't matter whether or not it's true. In scientific publishing, the jury are the reviewers and the editors. If they are already convinced of the conclusion, if there is no voir dire, you will surely win the case.”

ScienceScientific MethodRelative TruthPeer ReviewVoir DireVoir
Book:The World Turned Upside Down: The Second Low-Carbohydrate Revolution
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“Why do we put up with it? Do we like to be criticized? No, no scientist enjoys it. Every scientist feels a proprietary affection for his or her ideas and findings. Even so, you don’t reply to critics, Wait a minute; this is a really good idea; I’m very fond of it; it’s done you no harm; please leave it alone. Instead, the hard but just rule is that if the ideas don’t work, you must throw them away.”

ScienceResearchCriticismSkepticismScientific MethodSaganPeer Review
Book:The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark
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“Science has a culture that is inherently cautious and that is normally not a bad thing. You could even say conservative, because of the peer review process and because the scientific method prizes uncertainty and penalises anyone who goes out on any sort of a limb that is not held in place by abundant and well-documented evidence.”

WellsCultureProcessEvidenceMethodConservativeUncertaintyPrizeBad ThingsReviewsPeersLimbsCautiousGoreScientific MethodPeer Review
Author:Al Gore
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“There are, by the most conservative counting, two grave and deeply regrettable collateral victims of the peer-review gruesome stratagem: one is the daring of thought (wished-washed to the lowest common denominator), and the other is the individuality, as well as the responsibility, of editors (those seeking shelter behind the anonymity of "peers", but in fact dissolved in it, in many cases without a trace).”

WellsTwoFactsCommonBehindsResponsibilityCasesVictimIndividualityConservativeSeekingGravesEditorsReviewsDaringShelterPeersLowestCountingAnonymityCommon DenominatorStratagemCollateralLowest Common DenominatorWithout A TracePeer Review
Author:Zygmunt Bauman
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“I suspect that the peer-review system carries a good part of blame for the fact that something like sixty percent or more of journal articles are never quoted (which means leaving no trace on our joint scholarly pursuits), and (in my reception at any rate) the "learned journals" (with a few miraculous exceptions that entail, prominently, TCS) ooze monumental boredom.”

MeanFactsPercentBlameRateLeavingPursuitBoredomExceptionCarrieSuspectsReviewsArticlesSixtyPeersJournalMiraculousJointsReceptionScholarlyPeer Review
Author:Zygmunt Bauman
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“Under true peer-review...a panel of reviewers must accept a study before it can be published in a scientific journal. If the reviewers have objections the author must answer them or change the article to take reviewers' objections into account. Under the IPCC review process, the authors are at liberty to ignore criticisms.”

IfsEnergyProcessAnswersLibertyAcceptingStudyEnvironmentCriticismAccountsClimate ChangeReviewsArticlesPeersJournalObjectionsReviewersPeer Review
Author:Richard Lindzen
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“In my more than 60 years as a member of the American scientific community, including service as president of both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Physical Society, I have never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process than the events that led to this IPCC report.”

YearsEnergyProcessPresidentCommunityEnvironmentEventsMembersClimate ChangeIncludingCorruptionReportsReviewsPeersDisturbingAcademyPeer Review
Author:Frederick Seitz
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“Science advances by trial and error. When mistakes are made, the peer-review publication process usually roots them out. Cuccinelli's version of the scientific process would be "make an error and go to trial." Einstein did not arrive at E=mc2 in his first attempt. If he were working in the state of Virginia under Cuccinelli today, he could be jailed for his initial mistakes and perhaps never achieve that landmark equation.”

IfsFirstsMadeStatesWould BeTodayProcessMistakeAchieveRootsErrorsClimate ChangeTrialsVersionsReviewsPeersEquationsInitialsPublicationVirginiaTrial And ErrorLandmarksPeer Review
Author:Scott Mandia
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“Wikipedia took the idea of peer review and applied it to volunteers on a global scale, becoming the most important English reference work in less than 10 years. Yet the cumulative time devoted to creating Wikipedia, something like 100 million hours of human thought, is expended by Americans every weekend, just watching ads.”

YearsHumansImportantIdeasHoursMillionsBecomingCreatingScalesReviewsWeekendAdsDevotedPeersVolunteerWikipediaHuman ThoughtCumulativePeer Review
Author:Clay Shirky
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