Journals of Negative Results

[nancylebov]

The Forum for Negative Results is a journal for publishing papers about hypotheses which turned out to be irretreviably wrong.

This is important because most publications have a bias towards publishing papers which prove hypotheses, so a lot of valuable information about what didn't work gets lost.

The link includes a list of negative results journals in other fields.

All Results Journals is an additional bunch of nothing-under-the-rug journals for various fields.

Links thanks to Morendil and Kyrie, respectively.

Comments

[oursin]

We could so do with one of those for history. Unfortunately, it wouldn't stop hasty journalists and media people reiterating some complete factoid that they picked up from, well, some other television programme or media piece, because it makes some point for them and is colourful piece of historical assumption.

(No, really, there is absolutely no evidence that Queen Victoria's doctor prescribed cannabis for period pains.)

[nancylebov]

I don't think anything will slow the media down other than a public which becomes more interested in accuracy.

How sure are you that there isn't such a journal for history?

[oursin]

I haven't come across it, and having spent not inconsiderable time and effort in my life trying to counter various historical myths, I would have thought somebody might have drawn my attention to it, did it exist.

[nancylebov]

It's a shame that no such journal for history seems to exist, but I hope the negative results journals for science start a trend.

Do you have any favorite lists of historical myths?

Your bit about cannabis (which I don't think I'd heard) reminds me of the one about Victorian women having ribs removed to make tighter corsetting possible-- the surgery of the era simply wasn't up to it.

[oursin]

I like this list just because in my own scholarly area I come across so many of these.

A recent example in a slightly different area would be the claim that late C18th anatomists were commissioning the murders of pregnant women in order to dissect them and advance their anatomical knowledge.

[sodyera.livejournal.com]

So it's like Mah Jong: Anything you do will be wrong.