"It was a great fight and I don't think there was anything wrong," announced racer Lewis Hamilton, who was accused of cutting a comer at the Belgian Formula One Grand Prix. As I watched, I mused about corner-cutting in science, and whether such practices are justified or even necessary in order to succeed. When data are presented, the reader or listener assumes they are robustly reproducible. One trusts that quantitative results are based on an adequate number of experimental replicates and reproducible results, and that the design includes appropriate controls. Are such assumptions necessarily valid? Much may be left unsaid, especially in a culture in which it is important to save face.
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