”Zombie science is defined as a science that is dead but will not lie down. Instead, it keeps twitching and lumbering around so that it somewhat resembles Real science. But on closer examination, the Zombie has no life of its own (i.e. Zombie science is not driven by the scientific search for truth [6]); it is animated and moved only by the incessant pumping of funds. Funding is the necessary and sufficient reason for the existence of Zombie science; which is kept moving for so long as it serves the purposes of its funders (and no longer). So it is a waste of time arguing against Zombie Science because it cannot be stopped by any method except by cutting-off its fund supply. Zombie science cannot be killed because it is already dead.” (Charlton; J. Evaluation in Clinical Practice 15:930, 2009) Även om jag inte vill ansluta mig till den rallarsvingsbetonade kritik som professorn i teoretisk medicin Bruce Charlton här riktar mot fenomenet ”Evidence Based Medicine”, tycks mig begreppet ”Zombie science” fyndigt och rätt träffande för en hel del verksamhet inom det moderna universitetsväsendet. Rätt kul formulerad är beskrivningen av hans försök att ta kål på hypen för Evidence Based Medicine: ”My only misgiving was that destroying the scientific basis of EBM would be about as challenging as shooting fish in a barrel. Well, it was as easy as that. But shooting fish in a barrel is a pointless activity if nobody is interested in the vitality of the fish. As it turned out –the edifice of EBM could be supported as easily by a barrel of dead fish as by one full of lively swimmers. So long as the fish corpses were swirling around (stirred by the influx of research funding) then, for all anyone could see at a quick glance (which is the only kind of glance most people will give), it looked near-enough as if the fish were still alive.”
Posted on: Sat, 17 Aug 2013 22:18:20 +0000
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