[crpatino]

No, no, no, no. You miss the point.

If you claim to be a scientist, you leave your personal beliefs at the lab door and abide to the experimental results. If you cannot do that, you pick a different subject of study and let some other unbiased scientist pick on the thorny (for you) subject.

How would you feel if Hawkings were a Christian, and he would take money from the Pope and then wrote a report on how he saw Jesus in the black hole?

[fredkbloggs]

> How would you feel if Hawkings were a Christian, and he would take money from the Pope and then wrote a report on how he saw Jesus in the black hole?

The same way I feel about all such claims: if they can't be independently reproduced, they're garbage. The more bizarre the claim, the easier it should be to disprove it. Authors who publish outlandish claims that cannot be substantiated by others will be first disgraced and then, worse, ignored.

Hawking and the pope aren't relevant to your example. All that matters is that someone claims he saw Jesus in a black hole. It's not even clear that such a thing is a falsifiable claim, and if it weren't, it wouldn't be accepted for publication anyway. But even if it took the form of one, it would be immediately disproved and that would be the end of it. It's the claim that's important, not who made it or who paid him to do so.

[crpatino]

Let me clarify, I did not ask how do you feel about reports of metaphysical/paranormal events.

My question was, how would you feel about:

1. A scientist with strong political/religious views.

2. That works in a scientific problem that have strong implicationis for his strong views.

3. Then he does accept funding from established political players that allign with his strong views. He fails to report his funding sources.

4. And finally - surprise, surprise - goes on to write articles that "reach" to the "conclusion" that validate his political/religious views.

The reason is that the GP claimed that there is nothing morally wrong with said scientist because of #2. (the scientist sincerily believes in those biased views). And that the former example has no difference with:

a) Scientist picks one field of study.

b) Scientist accepts funding from a third party that is interested in such field of study.

c) Scientist produces results in his field of study.

[fredkbloggs]

I see your point, but I guess I don't feel that strongly about it. We all have biases, and the way to ensure good results is to document them thoroughly and make sure they're reproduced. After all, some of the people with biases are right. Another good way to make this better has been suggested many times, perhaps most famously by Feynman: require that everyone publish their results, even if they're negative or inconclusive. That way you can't just publish a steady stream of things you agree with, and everyone gets to learn whatever you learned (or ought to have learned) from whatever experiments you did.

There's also your point in:

> He fails to report his funding sources.

Which to me is inherently dishonest, especially in a world where you can decide not to publish your results.

So I guess I still don't think what you're suggesting is ok, but my solution is different and more complex than I think you're suggesting. Mainly because I don't think unanimity is healthy and I don't think lack of bias is achievable or even necessarily desirable. But I still agree that what you've suggested is a problem given how science is done right now.

[Albright]

There is no such thing as an unbiased scientist. They are human, after all. Whenever you read about scientists reporting on X or discovering Y, you should absolutely consider their motives, especially in contentious subjects such as this one.

And your analogy is only comparable if Hawking already had a history of reporting about seeing Jesus in black holes.

[shkkmo]

> you should absolutely consider their motives, especially in contentious subjects such as this one.

Which is why deliberately concealing and lying about funding sources in the manner described is SO BAD