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Is the Scientific Paper a Fraud?

Sir Peter Medawar, the Nobel prize winning genius scientist, who also wrote scintillating prose,
wrote a most unusual and iconoclastic article: “Is the Scientific Paper a Fraud?” In it, he posits that
the scientific paper is written in a sanitized and glamourous manner, which does not truly reflect the
way science is usually done: the false starts, the near-misses, the byways, etc. Thus, the very mien in
which scientific research is portrayed is misleading and hence, unethical (Medawar, 1963; Howitt and
Wilson, 2014).
We may not agree with him — after all, that too is the scientific approach: the right to disagree,
respectfully, with another scientist’s views!

Disclaimer: The views in this article are entirely personal and may not reflect the opinions of the
associations, organisations and journals that I am associated with.

Acknowledgements

I am grateful to Prof Sunil K. Pandya and Dr Amar Jesani for their comments and feedback on an
earlier version of the article.

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