80,000 Hours Podcast With Rob Wiblin

Can you trust the things you read in published scientific research? Not really. About 40% of experiments in top social science journals don't get the same result if the experiments are repeated. Two key reasons are 'p-hacking' and 'publication bias'. P-hacking is when researchers run a lot of slightly different statistical tests until they find a way to make findings appear statistically significant when they're actually not — a problem first discussed over 50 years ago. And because journals are more likely to publish positive than negative results, you might be reading about the one time an experiment worked, while the 10 times was run and got a 'null result' never saw the light of day. The resulting phenomenon of publication bias is one we've understood for 60 years. Today's repeat guest, social scientist and entrepreneur Spencer Greenberg, has followed these issues closely for years. Links to learn more, summary and full transcript. He recently checked whether p-values, an indicator of how likely a