Comment by gpm
7 years ago
This strikes me as a very weird document, it contains some good advice about keeping a detailed and accurate record. It links to a cool story about why this is important (http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~bioslabs/tools/notebook/ringerstory...).
Then separately it has the whole thing that reads like it's about a protocol to prove you aren't committing fraud. Except it's hard to imagine circumstances outside of undergraduate classes where anyone is going to read your notebook trying to convict you of committing fraud. It's also hard to see how this advice helps because it just makes fraud slightly harder, now instead of editing in place you have to edit by copying things over to a new notebook.
I was at LBNL while the element 118 crisis happened. While ultimately it was figured out using VMS timestamps, well kept lab notebooks helped clear a lot of people from potential guilt.
Considering how bad the replication crisis is, if our society ever gets its shit together, many of these people should actually be convicted of fraud or at least removed from positions where they could commit further frauds.
Is there any good material to read about the forensics that went into the events surrounding the element 118 fraud? It sounds interesting.
Possible, but I doubt it would tell the actual story. I knew two of the coauthors in the Ninov paper (one of my closest friends) and two of the guys who did the computer forensics as it turned out, so I kind of had an inside view.
Anyway, use a paper notebook. It's worth the trouble for lots of reasons. Also use analog chart recorders if you can.
It's important to realize that lab notebooks (in professonal academic research labs) are quasi-legal documents with specific requirements, in that they must document every modification made to an experimental setup, and every measurement made. It's similar to a ship's log (I presume, not being in the shipping business). This is not about keeping a personal notebook, although there's nothing wrong with applying the rigorous standards of a lab notebook to personal notes. "Lab notebooks" in student lab courses are meant to familiarize students with the practices of genuine lab notebooks, but are obviously much less stringent.
plaigarism was egregiously rampant, in my undergrad experience. A handwritten report, experimental notebook, and pre-precis of intended manuscript was mandatory. The blatant xerox copy pasta that occurred, right down to the whiteout over the original authors PII and the toner banding was astonishing. There were several incidents were the entire assignment had to be redone by the entire class, with variations per individual, along with the stated expectation, that this was to be a solo effort. The instructors and the profs had to wrestle with this at personal expense under threat of having the entire year of subject disqualified, for everyone. Anti fraud mechanisms are important for undergrad as an enforcement of ethical habits, ive went through it first hand.
This is (or atleast historically was) important (or perceived to be) in industry labs to prove discovery for intellectual property purposes.
With the US patent system moving from “first to invent” (notebook timestamps become determining) to “first to file”, this is much less of an issue now (with reapect to IP provenance).
In the U.S. patent system, priority now goes to the first inventor to file. If Alice files before Bob, there's always the theoretical possibility that Alice derived her invention from Bob's invention and thereby wasn't really an inventor. In that situation, Bob might try to prove this, so as to be able to (re)claim priority and thereby be the one who is issued a patent instead of Alice. If Alice has a timestamped notebook, that can be powerful evidence of her independent development of the invention, which will help her fend off Bob's claim to priority.
(Much the same is true if Carol discloses confidential information to Dave under an NDA, and Dave realizes that his team had previously known the information and so the information shouldn't be subject to the NDA: If Dave's team has contemporaneous written records of their prior knowledge or independent development of the information, it can really help their case if Carol sues them for breach of the NDA.)