Rigor Mortis: How Sloppy Science Creates Worthless Cures, Crushes Hope, and Wastes Billions - Hardcover

Harris, Richard

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0465097901 ISBN 13: 9780465097906

Publisher: Basic Books, 2017

Synopsis

An essential book to understanding whether the new miracle cure is good science or simply too good to be true
American taxpayers spend $30 billion annually funding biomedical research, but over half of these studies can't be replicated due to poor experimental design, improper methods, and sloppy statistics. Bad science doesn't just hold back medical progress, it can sign the equivalent of a death sentence for terminal patients. In Rigor Mortis, Richard Harris explores these urgent issues with vivid anecdotes, personal stories, and interviews with the top biomedical researchers. We need to fix our dysfunctional biomedical system--before it's too late.

About this title

About the Author:

Richard Harris is one of the nation's most celebrated science journalists, covering science, medicine, and the environment for more than thirty years for NPR, and the three-time winner of the AAAS Science Journalism Award. He lives in Washington, DC.

Review:

Named by Amazon as one of their "Best Nonfiction Books of the Month"

Named one of PRI/SCIENCE FRIDAY's "Best Science Books of 2017"

"Rigor Mortis provides an excellent summation of the case for fixing science."―SLATE

"Harris makes a strong case that the biomedical research culture is seriously in need of repair."―Nature

"Rigor Mortis effectively illustrates what can happen when a convergence of social, cultural, and scientific forces...conspires to create a real crisis of confidence in the research process."―Science

"A rewarding read for anyone who wants to know the unvarnished truth about how science really gets done."―Financial Times

"Rigor Mortis effectively illustrates what can happen when a convergence of social, cultural, and scientific forces, as well as basic human motivation, conspires to create a real crisis of confidence in the research process."―SCIENCE

"Rigor Mortis is rife with examples of things that go awry in medical studies, how they happen, and how they can be avoided and fixed. For the most part, academic biomedical scientists are not evil, malicious, or liars at heart."―Ars Technica

"An alarming and highly readable summation of what has been called the 'reproducibility crisis' in science--the growing realization that large swathes of the biomedical literature may be wrong."―Spectrum Magazine

"This engaging book will inform and challenge readers who care about the public image of science, the state of peer review, and US funding for science."―Physics Today

About this edition

• Publisher: Basic Books
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 0465097901
• ISBN 13: 9780465097906
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 288