The making of scientific ethics – lessons from unethical conducts

Kholhring Lalchhandama

Science Vision 20 (3), 118-131 | Published on 30 September 2020 | https://doi.org/10.33493/scivis.20.03.03

Abstract

With its importance in and influence to our lives, well-being and survival, science has never been more vulnerable to prejudices and scandals as a platform of all sorts of academic misconducts. Lessons are taught by some of the biggest unethical conducts in the recent past which had prompted more stringent ethical guidelines and publication procedures. The case of Yoshitaka Fujii as a scientist with the most number of publications retracted is unbelievable. The ability of Yoshihiro Sato to deceive the world leading journals and their referees is not the less astonishing. These cases show that individual or few publications with fabricated data is impervious to detection, but when a series of such faked results is available, it cannot dodge the function of reviewing eventually. The story of Hwang Woo-Suk will forever remain a quintessential pitfall of scientific corruption. The way the purported creation of human stem cell deceived one of the leading journals in the world will be a scientific monument. What could more exemplify breaching ethical standards in human experimentation at the highest level than by He Jiankui’s creation of gene-edited babies? These are the chronicles in the science hall of shame.

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