ABOUT THIS EPISODE
Eugenie Reich is an attorney committed to taking on scientific fraud, understanding the incentives that drive it, and recovering misdirected research funding. She is also a former investigative science journalist committed to correcting the scientific record. Her 2009 book Plastic Fantastic, details a major fraud cause in physics at Bell Labs. Two of the cases she has litigated cases were against Biogen ($900 million settlement), and the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute ($15 million settlement).
CONTACT RANDY:
metasciencematters@gmail.com
EPISODE LINKS:
Cargo Cult Science:
https://calteches.library.caltech.edu...
The PubPeer Conundrum:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/epdf/...
New Scientist:
Skeptical Inquirer:
https://skepticalinquirer.org/
Special thanks to Dylan Bouscher
OUTLINE:
0:00 - Introduction
4:20 - How Eugenie became interested in science
6:25 - Interest in scientific fraud
7:38 - Deciding to become a science journalist
8:58 - Fraud in physics at Bell Labs (the subject of her 2009 book Plastic Fantastic)
20:15 - Bell Labs coming under private ownership
22:53 - Interviewing scientists for her book
26:50 - The response from the physics community
31:10 - Deciding to become a lawyer
33:28 - The False Claims Act
36:29 - The qui tam provision of the False Claims Act
37:46 - The $900M case against Biogen
44:02 - The day-to-day of working on this case
46:30 - Impact of the case on biotech and pharma
48:40 - The $15M case against Dana-Farber
50:42 - Do universities have an incentive to protect accused researchers?
54:15 - Is the scale of fraud too large to be fixed?
57:56 - Does fraud damage public trust in science?
1:00:44 - Tools/solutions to combat these problems
1:04:32 - Advice to practicing scientists
1:05:55 - Advice and resources for listeners
1:08:28 - Outro
