Source
Gelman (2025), LIT-014, “Reckless disregard for the truth coming from cops, doctors, and scientists: A rant”, read in NOTE-019. Section numbers are the post’s.
What was actually shown
Nothing is measured. The post argues from examples in three domains.
- Scientists (§1). A paper described as “long-term” studied effects over three days; a power-pose abstract said people “instantly become more powerful” with no measure of power. Gelman’s concern is that “the authors involved never even saw the problem”.
- Paid testimony (§2). Ludmerer testified in 2002 to “no opinion” on whether smoking contributes to lung cancer.
- Official statements (§3). DHS called Lander’s conduct “assaulting law enforcement” and Padilla’s “lung[ing]”, accounts quoted journalists say video disputes. Bump could not get ICE to source a “413 percent increase in assaults” claim.
The account (§4a–d). False claims are added when the real arguments are not good enough (motive). A channel carries them: journals that let “just about anything” into a title given significant p-values, courts, and media repeating official statements (mechanism). Inside the community the phrases “function as terms of art”, and critics are outsiders (acceptance). There are no consequences beyond “the occasional angry columnist or blogger” (§4d). By “a form of Gresham’s Law, liars win” in the short run, and lying is negative-sum. Bystanders who tolerate it tip the incentives.
What could have come out otherwise. Nothing in the post could. The examples were chosen to illustrate it.
What this does not say
- How common it is. Three to five anecdotes, chosen, not sampled (NOTE-019, Limitations). NOTE-019 rates the persistence claim (C5) weak.
- That the speakers know they are lying. §4c says “I don’t even think the people saying these false statements recognize them as lies”; §4a says of Ludmerer that “he was lying”. The account works either way only if acceptance, not intent, carries it, and the post does not say which.
- That the channel works in every case. Gelman concedes the testimony case probably did not persuade anyone (§4b).
- The legal standard. “Reckless disregard for the truth” is a commenter’s phrase, not the defamation-law actual-malice test.
- That the police examples are established. They rest on quoted journalism; neither the author nor this reading examined the video.
Connections
- In the anthology the same failure, titles and abstracts that overstate a paper, is what its reading scheme guards against (ANTH-ADR-025); NOTE-019 reads the post as anecdotal support for that design.
- THEORY-639, on inductive risk in the dioxin studies, places value judgements inside characterising and interpreting data. This account is about what happens after: claims that outrun the data and meet no cost.
- The context of §3, DHS statements during enforcement operations, overlaps the Minnesota show-cause transcript, LIT-012, where the court questioned an unexplained “safety concern”. Neither document cites the other.