[R] Why software fails in scientific research

[Murray M Cooper, PhD]

For what its worth!

A good friend who also happens to be an ecologist
told me "An ecologist is a statistician who likes to be
outside".

Murray M Cooper, Phd
Richland Statistics

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Gavin Simpson" <gavin.simpson at ucl.ac.uk>
To: "Bert Gunter" <gunter.berton at gene.com>
Cc: <r-help at r-project.org>
Sent: Thursday, July 01, 2010 11:57 AM
Subject: Re: [R] Why software fails in scientific research


> On Wed, 2010-06-30 at 11:17 -0700, Bert Gunter wrote:
>> Just one small additional note below ...
>>
>> Bert Gunter
>> Genentech Nonclinical Biostatistics
>>
>>
>> "But a lot of academics are not going to "waste" their time documenting 
>> code
>>
>> properly, so others can reap the benefits of it. They would rather get on
>> with
>> the next project, to get the next paper. "
>>
>>
>> -- Indeed. My personal experience over 3 decades in industrial (private)
>> research is that data analysis is viewed as relatively
>> unimportant/straightforward/pedestrian and is left to technicians (or
>> postdocs) -- often with what is done being largely dictated by the
>> conventions of a particular journal or discipline. The lab heads and
>> research directors are responsible for the grand research strategies,
>> managing resources, etc. and don't want to waste much time on something 
>> that
>> routine. So worrying about reproducibility of data analysis "code" (if 
>> there
>> is any, given the use of GUI software like Excel) falls beneath their 
>> radar.
>>
>> Clearly there are disciplines (e.g. ecology?) where this may NOT be the
>> case.
>
> If ecology is anything to go by (and I am an ecologist, sort of, just
> about), there is a large body of the community doing things because i)
> that is how they've always been done, or ii) because that's what
> reviewers/editors expect etc. with a much smaller group of researchers
> pushing at the boundaries (of their field) to use techniques
> statisticians and the like have been using for a very long time.
>
> Reproducible research is still very much in the (very, very) small
> minority of the work I come across reviewing papers etc. But I am
> encouraged by the number of people I know who are starting to use tools
> like R to conduct their research.
>
>> -- Bert
>
> G
>
> -- 
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> ECRC, UCL Geography,          [f] +44 (0)20 7679 0565
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