“Astralcodexten IRB history error” by Paul Crowley
Description
I discovered a small error in Scott Alexander's recent book review of "From Oversight to Overkill" that conflates two different periods of aggressive research oversight enforcement. The review reads:
This changed in 1998. A Johns Hopkins doctor tested a new asthma treatment. A patient got sick and died. Fingers were pointed. Congress got involved. Grandstanding Congressmen competed to look Tough On Scientific Misconduct by yelling at Gary Ellis, head of the Office For Protection From Research Risks. They made it clear that he had to get tougher or get fired.
In order to look tough, he shut down every study at Johns Hopkins, a measure so severe it was called "the institutional death penalty".
I looked into it and to my surprise this mis-states the timeline. What actually happened was that there were two distinct periods of aggressive enforcement that got conflated:
- The Ellis Era (1998-2000): Gary Ellis [...]
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First published:
September 20th, 2025
Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/LhjLomn2zKhzmsdez/astralcodexten-irb-history-error
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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.
United States
