I agree with Charlie's quote of Isaac; but what drew my attention in the
article are the court quotes by Poehlman:

"I had placed myself, in all honesty, in a situation, in an academic
position which the amount of grants that you held basically determined
one’s self-worth," [Poehlman] told the court in June. "Everything flowed
from that. ... I take full responsibility for the type of position that
I had that was so grant-dependent. But it created a maladaptive behavior
pattern. I was on a treadmill, and I couldn’t get off."

I've heard other PIs and senior scientists voice similar concerns about
"the treadmill".  It makes me think very long and hard about what this
says/means concerning the balance of discovery and duty within our
academic research system.  While it is the the "eureka!" or "that's
funny .." moments that are the catalyst to prestige (discovery), it is
the daily prospect of influencing our progeny through teaching the
principles of rigourous research (duty) that gets most of the scientists
I know out of bed in the morning.

Waxing philosophical,
Michael DeShazo, CRA
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Fiscal Compliance and Outreach, RAA
University of Washington, Box 351122

Team Email: xxxxxx@u.washington.edu

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Charlie Hathaway said the following on 10/23/2006 7:47 AM:
> Yes, well worth the read.  Blessed are the non-meek technicians.
>
> I found the following particularly interesting:
>
> "Some scientists believe that his ability to beat the system for so long
> had as much to do with the research topics he chose as with his
> aggressive tactics. His work was prominent, but none of his studies
> broke new scientific ground. (This may also be why no other scientists
> working in the field have retracted papers as a result of Poehlman’s
> fraud.) By testing undisputed assumptions on popular topics, Poehlman
> attracted enough attention to maintain his status but not enough to
> invite suspicion. Moreover, replicating his longitudinal data would be
> expensive and difficult to do."
>
> Important to remember that negative results, particularly those
> questioning our sacred cows, may hold subtleties that can lead to great
> things.
>
> "The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds
> new discoveries, is not 'Eureka!' (I've found it!), but 'That's
> funny...'"   --Isaac Asimov
>
>
> CH
>
>
>
> At 10:15 AM 10/23/2006, you wrote:
>
>> interesting backstory how eric poehlman was caught and what the
>> university did to investigate. yesterday's new york times sunday
>> magazine.
>>
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