Yet another academic outrage, although this one concerning not the classroom but published science journals.

We science geeks have long since got used to the fact that Scientific American magazine, which we once revered, now has an editorial board composed entirely of hysterical 13-year-old girls.

• SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN Blogger Turfed Out—Defenestrations Will Continue Until Morale Improves
• SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN Goes Even Woker: ”Why Scientists Must Stand For Affirmative Action And Against Scientific Racism”
• John Derbyshire: SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN Blogger Accuses Nicholas Wade Of Saying Some Races Are Better Than Others—Which May Be True
• John Derbyshire: ”We Are All Michael Reinoehl Now!” (At Least, The American Psychological Association, Yale School Of Medicine, WASHINGTON POST, And SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN Say They Are.)
• “They Might As Well Put Bones Through Their Noses”— John Derbyshire On The Corruption Of Scientific America

That’s popular science journalism, though. We’d supposed that real, authoritative science journals, with science written for working scientists, had maintained their integrity. Well, goodbye to all hope.

The October 2023 issue of Psychological Review, flagship journal of the American Psychological Association, has an article with the title ”Open science: Friend, foe, or both to an antiracist psychology?” It is coauthored by four credentialed academics affiliated with Montclair State University, Brown University School of Public Health, Harvard Medical School, and the University of Georgia.

So: solid science, right? Permit me, please, to read you the entire abstract of this article. Quote:

The open science framework has garnered increased visibility and has been partially implemented in recent years. Open science underscores the importance of transparency and reproducibility to conduct rigorous science. Recently, several journals published by the American Psychological Association have begun adopting the open science framework. At the same time, the field of psychology has been reckoning with the current sociopolitical climate regarding anti-Blackness and White supremacy. As psychology begins to adopt the open science framework into its journals, the authors underscore the importance of embracing and aligning open science with frameworks and theories that have the potential to move the field toward antiracism and away from the embedded White supremacy value systems and ideals. The present article provides an overview of the open science framework; an examination of White supremacist ideology in research and publishing; guidance on how to move away from these pernicious values; and a proposal on alternate value systems to center equity, diversity, and inclusion with the aim of establishing an antiracist open science framework.

 Open science: Friend, foe, or both to an antiracist psychology?, by Fuentes, Milton A., Zelaya, David G., Delgado-Romero, Edward A. and Butt, Mamona

I was alerted to that by a post on X by social scientist Lee Jussim, with whom my acquaintance—I mean, as a reader, although we were once at a dinner table together—goes back twenty-three years. I trust the guy. Here’s what he said Thursday on X:

Psychological Review, once a bastion for the best, empirically & theoretically driven psychology, a place where the likes of Kahneman & Tversky pubbed some of their best work, has fallen.

Psychological Review, once a bastion for the best, empirically & theoretically driven psychology, a place where the likes of Kahneman&Tversky pubbed some of their best work, has fallen.https://t.co/0C9THWtDQ4
🧵 pic.twitter.com/iN5OeQPOZA

— The Dark Fiddling Pirate Jussim (@PsychRabble) April 4, 2024

Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky were pioneers in the science of behavioral economics. Kahneman got the Nobel Prize in 2002; it’s generally agreed that Tversky would have shared the prize had he not died six years earlier. (Nobels are not awarded posthumously.)

So yes, what a falling off there has been. This once serious, respectable academic journal has gone from deep insights into cognitive biases [On The Reality Of Cognitive Illusions, Kahneman & Tversky, Psychological Review, October 1996] to fashionable gibbering about ”white supremacy.”

On the bright side, I note that in the abstract I quoted for you, both of the words ”Blackness” and ”White” are printed with capital initial letters. No biases there!