IF YOU are a scientist and you want to avoid controversy, don鈥檛 sideline colleagues who hold unorthodox views. Otherwise you鈥檒l drive them into the arms of the media and make them your enemies.
So says a study that has looked at how researchers in the UK and Sweden treat peers whose ideas are not mainstream. According to the survey, scientists in Sweden try to include unconventional thinkers, whereas in the UK they try to exclude mavericks to ensure they do not gain scientific legitimacy. But that comes at a cost, says Lena Eriksson of the University of Cardiff鈥檚 School of Social Sciences, who interviewed 15 senior scientists from each country, from universities, research institutes and industry.
鈥淚f you ostracise people, they turn against you, and you end up turning a colleague into an enemy. If you want to avoid [controversy], make sure people don鈥檛 go to the press because they鈥檙e not heard within their own scientific communities,鈥� she says. Exclusion can also mean being bypassed for grants, having papers automatically rejected and affiliations suspended.
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The Royal Society, the professional body of scientists in the UK, says Eriksson鈥檚 study unfairly confuses unorthodox scientific thought with the failure to ensure that potentially controversial work is complete and peer-reviewed before it is made public. 鈥淢ost Nobel prizewinners are mavericks, in terms of having radical ideas, but they stand the test of scrutiny by other scientists,鈥� says a spokesman.