The Replication Crisis: Why Scientific Findings Fall Apart

Why do celebrated findings fail—and does that failure weaken science or demonstrate its corrective machinery? This episode maps an incentive system that can manufacture false confidence without widespread fraud: reward novelty, hide null results, use small samples, permit many analytical choices, and tie professional identity to a result.

The practical rule is simple: look for replications, preregistration, open methods, sample size, and the full body of evidence—not the most memorable headline or talk.

Named studies, disputes, percentages, and retraction status can change and require primary-source verification before reuse. The framework does not imply that every field or finding is equally fragile. Sources were curated by Alex; dialogue audio was generated with NotebookLM.