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Stepping in the Same River Twice Replication in Biological Research

By: Ayelet Shavit(Editor), Aaron M Ellison(Editor), W John Kress(Foreword By)
318 pages, 38 b/w illustrations, tables
NHBS
Stepping in the Same River Twice is a very necessary primer about replication of research that ought to be read by scientists across all disciplines.
Stepping in the Same River Twice
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  • Stepping in the Same River Twice ISBN: 9780300209549 Hardback Jun 2017 Not in stock: Usually dispatched within 6 days
    £47.50
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Price: £47.50
About this book Customer reviews Biography Related titles

About this book

Without replication, the trustworthiness of scientific research remains in doubt. Although replication is increasingly recognized as a central problem in many scientific disciplines, repeating the same scientific observations of experiments or reproducing the same set of analyses from existing data is remarkably difficult. In this important volume, an international team of biologists, philosophers, and historians of science addresses challenges and solutions for valid replication of research in medicine, ecology, natural history, agriculture, physiology, and computer science.

After the introduction to important concepts and historical background, Stepping in the Same River Twice offers paired chapters that provide theoretical overviews followed by detailed case studies. These studies range widely in topic, from infectious-disease and environmental monitoring to museum collections, meta-analysis, bioinformatics, and more. The closing chapters explicate and quantify problems in the case studies, and Stepping in the Same River Twice concludes with important recommendations for best practices.

Customer Reviews (1)

  • A very important primer for every scientist
    By Leon (NHBS Catalogue Editor) 25 Jul 2017 Written for Hardback


    I ended my recent essay on surviving the misinformation age by mentioning articles that have drawn attention to the problem that a lot of published research cannot be replicated. The popular press has been quick to tarnish the reputation of science amidst claims of misconduct and fraud. Obviously, science stands or falls by its credibility, so, is there a crisis? This book brings together a cross-disciplinary team of authors to examine replication and recommend best practices. And yes, it shows there are many issues, mostly because doing research well is hard, and can be done poorly in many ways, even inadvertently, but systemic fraud and misconduct are not prevalent.

    Stepping in the Same River Twice is divided in three parts. The introductory part is necessarily rather philosophical and conceptual, but makes clear how the problem of replication transcends any particular biological subdiscipline, defines what we even mean with replication and shows how all this matters at each step of a research project.

    The bulk of the book is a series of surprisingly pithy chapters (most less than 20 pages), looking at replication in different disciplines, pairing a theoretical background chapter with one or several case study chapters. If you're a bit of a data nerd, this is easily the most enjoyable section of the book, looking at topics such as specimens in natural history collections, environmental monitoring programmes, the effects of time and space, meta-analyses, and metadata and data provenance. Many reasons why replication is so hard quickly emerge from these chapters. Natural history collections generally reflect the interests of whoever put them together, not necessarily aiming to represent species diversity in a particular habitat. Results from monitoring programmes are difficult to compare as there is little consensus on what should be measured in the first place. The assumption in experiments that – all other things being equal – manipulating a cause wil give a certain effect, often doesn't hold true, as these "other things" are rarely equal (e.g. batch effects in chemicals used, or the fact that you cannot replicate the exact time and place when and where experiments were done). The power of meta-analyses to answer specific questions is often hampered by the differences between studies analysed, leaving only the possibility to draw general conclusions. And, finally, there is no incentive for scientists to record data about their data, which would allow other people at a later date to understand the raw data sets and gauge how trustworthy they are. This last one was painfully recognisable – if you struggle going over old data and are faced with questions of "what exactly did I do here?" (I have), imagine how a complete stranger will struggle understanding your raw data. There is still a dearth of sound statistical know-how amongst most researchers, causing many people to repeat the same old mistakes when collecting and recording data.

    The final section ties it all together and gives a list of best practices. Things have already been changing in recent years, with more and more journals requiring researchers to lodge their raw data as well (though good quality control and conventions on metadata still need work). We are moving from "open access" to "open science", and the need for improved transparency and accountability is becoming more widely understood.

    In many cases, technical solutions and best practices already exist, but cultural and social barriers still stand in the way: researchers remain reluctant to share "their" data, many funding agencies (public and governmental) have no policies on data archiving tied to the funding they award, community-wide standards and consensus on what is sufficient methodological detail in published papers and what metadata is needed with datasets are often lacking, there is insufficient funding available to support all the extra work that scientists need to do to create public data repositories, and there are no sanctions for not archiving data.

    This book, then, is required reading for all scientists, no matter their discipline. I know, you will hear this said of a great many books, but believe me, this one really is. And it is so well written that you can breeze through it in a day. The book will not necessarily hand you solutions on a platter: the chapters are simply too short for that, and the range of subjects covered too wide. Instead, this is a very necessary primer to get you thinking and talking to others about how we can improve our scientific practice: the hard, unglamorous work remains yours to do.
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Biography

Ayelet Shavit, a philosopher of science, is a senior lecturer and head of the philosophy program at Tel Hai College. She lives at Kibbutz K'far Giladi, Israel.

Aaron M. Ellison is the senior research fellow in ecology, Harvard University. He lives in Royalston, MA.

By: Ayelet Shavit(Editor), Aaron M Ellison(Editor), W John Kress(Foreword By)
318 pages, 38 b/w illustrations, tables
NHBS
Stepping in the Same River Twice is a very necessary primer about replication of research that ought to be read by scientists across all disciplines.
Media reviews

"This book mulls and kneads the concept of replicability – moving us toward that point where such a concept is a smooth round pebble, comfortably fitting into our pocket [...] [It is] a model for treating the philosophically rich concepts used (and abused) in science."
– Michael Paul Nelson, Ruth H. Spaniol Chair of Renewable Resources and Professor of Environmental Philosophy and Ethics, Oregon State University

"The central themes of this volume are replication, repeatability, and reproducibility, which individually and in concert form a cornerstone in all fields of science and all aspects of scientific enquiry. [...] this volume has no antecedent."
– James L. Patton, University of California, Berkeley

"The book is a work of surprising breadth, incorporating philosophy and literature, and a wide variety of scientific approaches. It provides insights about replication that would not emerge from any single discipline."
– John H. Porter, University of Virginia

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