Scientific merit is the degree to which a research contribution reliably advances knowledge or improves the scientific process. It includes not only whether a result is novel, but also whether […]
Reproducibility Is Infrastructure, Not Just Researcher Virtue
Reproducible science requires more than careful, honest researchers. It requires institutions that preserve data, execute code, finance replication, verify research artifacts, document methods, and reward the people who perform this […]
Mandatory Research Artifacts: Should Every Paper Include Data and Code?
Scientific papers traditionally present conclusions, methods, and selected results. Yet in many fields, the paper itself is no longer enough to evaluate the research. The underlying datasets, source code, computational […]
Why Research Integrity Cannot Depend Only on Journal Editors
Research integrity cannot depend only on journal editors because editors see only one stage of a much larger research process. They generally evaluate manuscripts after experiments have been designed, data […]
Retractions Should Correct Science, Not Permanently Destroy Careers
How to Distinguish Scientific Error, Negligence, and Fraud A scientific paper can become unreliable for many reasons. An author may discover an honest computational mistake, use a method that later […]
How AIIM Could Reward Data, Code, Proofs, and Replications Separately
Scientific funding usually treats a research paper as the main unit of achievement. This approach overlooks much of the work that makes science possible: collecting reliable data, developing research software, […]
Why Replication Should Be a Paid Scientific Profession
Scientific replication should not be treated as an occasional act of academic goodwill. It should be a paid scientific profession with dedicated funding, career paths, technical standards, and rewards tied […]
A Reputation System for Scientific Reviewers
Scientific review depends not only on the quality of submitted research, but also on the reliability of the people evaluating it. A reviewer may be knowledgeable, careless, unusually strict, biased […]
Who Should Pay Peer Reviewers—and for What Exactly?
Peer reviewers should be paid by the parties that benefit from credible scientific evaluation: publishers, research funders, universities, scientific platforms, and donors. However, reviewers should not be paid merely for […]
Can Failed Experiments Be Valuable Public Goods? Funding Negative Results to Stop Science Repeating the Same Mistakes
Yes—failed experiments can be valuable public goods. A rigorous experiment that disproves a hypothesis, identifies an ineffective method, or documents the limits of an intervention gives other researchers information they […]
