Returning Scientific Research to Honesty

    There is a 2-page article entitled, "Restoring Respect For Research" by Andrea Widener in the April 23 issue of Chemical and Engineering News.
    Three years ago, in January, Pres. Obama issued a call to "restore science to its rightful place". The main responsibility was given to John P. Holden, Director of the White House Office of Science & Technology Policy (OSTP). The process is now essentially complete. Director Holden recently said, "This process has been time-consuming but exceedingly important. Through it all, the prime importance of scientific integrity -- the need to ensure that Americans can trust the results of federally supported science -- has been has been elevated and made explicit in numerous ways."
    Perhaps, but I doubt it. Simply because it runs contrary to human nature.
    Human beings operate primarily on the basis of serving self. Whether they are independent businessmen or employees of private companies or government, that aspect still holds. As a government employee, any person is interested primarily in holding his job to maintain his salary and where possible to improve his position of power in order to gain further salary benefits, as well as the feeling of power. This applies to clerks, as well as research scientists in government employ at the various agencies. The net result is that scientists follow the stated and implied desires of their bosses. If their bosses are pushing electric cars, scientists will do everything they can to do the same, because it is to their potential benefit in their careers, and working contrary to the ideology would likely have them lose their jobs. This is not to say that government scientists will change data to be consistent with the "program", but they will be able to adjust the scientific activity and concentrate on interpretations which will be "program" favorable. The result is that I always question government scientific reports, because they are a mixture of true science, as performed by the scientific integrity of an individual, and modified according to the ideology of the system.
    At one time, scientific research from universities could be held in high esteem of relevance of scientific documents, without modification by ideology, unless some small aspect of that seeped in through the personal preference of the researcher. However, that has changed, with the influx of tremendous amounts of money to University research through grants by various federal agencies. The receivers of these grant monies then have the same position as previously described for government research employees. They know where their bread is buttered and they know how to come up with the "right answers".
    How can we then bring science research back into a state of integrity? Because of the above human characteristics, it is almost impossible to do so. However, we can make improvements. It cannot be done by talk, although so claimed by Pres. Obama and Director Holdren, and improvement of government scientific research is almost impossible. Conversely, there is hope that we can bring University research back into a position of research with a minimum taint of ideology by eliminating federal research grants. The implication is that this would doom research, but it existed prior to government support, and it can do so again. Universities can support research through University funding and through private grants. One might say that private grants will again introduce painting by ideology, and that is possible. However, grants from private companies have less chance of ideology contamination than grants from foundations. Private companies usually work with universities on specific projects which tend to be closely associated with the company's business. This usually involves new products or new aspects of the business in which the company is interested. The only ideology available in that case is the company's desire to improve its product line and make a profit. Some of us find this to be not particularly obnoxious.
    In summary, it is my belief that talk about improving scientific integrity in government is a waste of time. The only hope for honest science research is back to the universities, without the tainting influence of government funding.