The replicability crisis? Philosophical, legal and sociological perspectives

International workshop, Université de Lyon, France

Lyon, June 11-12, 2020

The results of good science are supposed to be true everywhere and at any time: replicability is traditionally considered a ground of the epistemic authority of modern science. However, in some cases (especially in biomedical, social and psychological studies), important published scientific findings have failed to replicate. What does this say about scientific practices? What are the causes and significance of this “replicability crisis”? And how should scientific communities, scientific institutions, policy makers and the general public react to it? The workshop will explore these multifaceted issues by combining philosophical, sociological and legal perspectives.

 Confirmed plenary speakers

– Alexander Bird (Department of philosophy, King’s College London)

– Eva Barlösius (Leibniz Center for Science and Society, University of Leibniz)

– Marie Cornu (Law, Institut des sciences sociales du politique, CNRS)

– Andreas Diekmann (Institute of Sociology, University of Leipzig / ETH Zürich)

– Julian Reiss (Institute for Philosophy and Scientific Method, Johannes Kepler University Linz)

– Felipe Romero (Faculty of Philosophy, University of Gröningen)

– Jacob Sherkow (New York Law School)

To be confirmed : 

– Jan Sprenger (Center for Logic, language and cognition, University of Turin)

 Possible topics include but are by no means limited to:

– “Internal” aspects of the replication crisis such as issues of scientific method and statistical confirmation

– “External” aspects of the replication crisis such as the consequences of the crisis for the trust in science and its relation to society and the public

– Disciplinarity issues: In which disciplines has replicability emerged as a major issue? Which disciplines set standards for replication? In which disciplines replication has proven to be difficult to achieve? Whose work is replicated and who are the “replicators”?

– Replication in Historical and Social Sciences: how disciplines which value historicity and contexts (history, geography, anthropology) deal with replicability?

– Replicability as a norm: how replicability has become a norm (shared by scientists and valued by science policy and/or other actors)?

– Replication and innovation: how does replication find its place in the global economy of (technoscientific) innovation, and how do actors from the industrial world react to the replication crisis?

– Legal aspects of the replication crisis: How does intellectual property law and scientific authorship regulation favor, impede or interfere with replicability? What are the impacts of the regulation of scientific work (internal regulation of the laboratory, scientific archives, research agreements, contracts of employment and working arrangements…) on replicability?

– Replicability and scientific integrity: Does the replication crisis pave the way to a crisis in scientific integrity?

Organizers: Anouk Barberousse (Sorbonne Université), Olivier Leclerc (CNRS, Université de Lyon), Jérôme Michalon (CNRS, Université de Lyon), Kelly Picard (Université de Lyon), Stéphanie Ruphy (Université de Lyon)

Submissions: Please send an abstract (no more than 500 words) of the talk with your name and affiliation and a list of keywords to stephanie.ruphy@universite-lyon.fr and anouk.barberousse@sorbonne-universite.fr

Deadline for submissions: 30 March 2020.  Notification of acceptance will be sent within ten days.

Participants who do not give a talk are also welcome and are asked to register in advance. There is no registration fee.