Math Drudge

In a previous Math Drudge blog, on the growth in scientific fraud, we described the case of Netherlands social psychologist Diederik Stapel, who, based on an initial investigation, had been accused of serious and serial fraud in his work in the field of social psychology.

Now a more detailed report has been released on the affair. As summarized in a November 29, 2012 article in Science, the report paints a picture not only of widespread fraud, but more generally asserts that “from the bottom to the top there was a general neglect of fundamental scientific standards and methodological requirements.”

Some

Continue reading Study released on Dutch researcher’s “culture of fraud”

A fascinating posthumous autobiography of famed mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot has just been published by Pantheon Books.

The book includes a fascinating account of his youth growing up as a Jew in the war-torn years of the 1930s and 1940s. Born in Warsaw in 1924 and raised in a well-educated household whose Lithuanian roots were said to have produced “men of great learning.” His uncle, Szolem Mandelbrojt, was a star among French mathematicians in the early 20th century. In 1931 his father emigrated to Paris, to be joined by Benoit and the rest of the family in 1936. It was a

Continue reading Benoit Mandelbrot’s memoir is published