A fine short essay from the Blog More Intelligent Life can be found here. Anthony is the former Executive Editor of The Economist.
His central point, which is well-taken, is that while the scientific method may be flawed, it’s the only game in town….Somewhat in the spirit of Winston’s Churchill’s view of democracy.
I would only add, that issue of publishing negative results he raises is somewhat overblown. Negative results that are truly paradigm-breaking, are newsworthy, and hence will find a scientific (and usually public) audience. So for example the famed 1919 test of Einstein’s theory, not withstanding Einstein’s famous quote, would have definitely have been published even if the result had been negative.
