Making Sokaling a routine part of the academic process would go a long way towards fixing it, I think. A few dozen Sokalings are a good start to raise awareness, but if—say—5% of all submitted papers were Sokals, reviewers and editors would become much more careful.
-
Show this thread
-
How would this work in practice? A paper would have to be registered as a Sokaling before first submission, along with an explanation of what the author thinks is wrong with it. A cryptographic time-locked database could ensure honesty about this.4 replies 6 retweets 69 likesShow this thread -
½ [That is, everyone could publicly verify whether or not a paper was intended as a Sokal. Once it was accepted, the author could unlock the pre-registration; after a determinate time period had elapsed, it would automatically unlock in any case.]1 reply 3 retweets 34 likesShow this thread -
Fraud—invented facts—are a different problem from nonsense. In science, publishing a paper based on false, made-up data would not generally count. Either you use real data and give a bogus interpretation, or you describe a worthless data-collection process (with fake data).1 reply 7 retweets 46 likesShow this thread -
This proposal is not nice. Unfortunately, it is too late for nice. Many-to-most academic fields run on a go-along-to-get-along basis, and now have large negative net value as a result.
Some fields should simply end. I suggested that for nutrition:https://meaningness.com/nutrition-resigns …1 reply 11 retweets 81 likesShow this thread -
A tension here: academia is increasingly awful as a career. That drives away many of the best researchers. Reforms that add to the suffering risk making a bad situation even worse.
Currently, reviewing papers is unpaid scut-work. Not surprising not everyone does it well.1 reply 8 retweets 51 likesShow this thread -

If peer review has reputational risk—it will be public knowledge if you recommend accepting a deliberately bad paper—many people may decline the job. (Though, successful detection of a hoax should look good on your CV!)
Publishers might have to pay reviewers…2 replies 3 retweets 37 likesShow this thread -

… and the total number of papers published might drop precipitously if reviewers were more reluctant to recommend publication.
That would be good. Everyone agrees there’s WAY too much stuff published under the current system. A 90% reduction would be great.4 replies 3 retweets 57 likesShow this thread -

I’d suggest that every PhD student be required to perform at least one attempt at Sokaling as a graduation requirement.
Learning what should count as unacceptably bad research is a critical part of learning how to do it well. And of spotting the difference in the lit.3 replies 12 retweets 65 likesShow this thread -
Replying to @Meaningness
One defence journals could adopt might be: Don't publish PhD students. Stick with sound authors with a history of rightthink.
2 replies 0 retweets 0 likes
Yes; would need to be combined with a blind review process. Which is a good idea anyway, and some jounals do it.
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.