Workshop on Academic Ethics

The Institute of Mathematical Sciences, in association with the Forum for Global Knowledge Sharing, is organising a two-day Workshop on Academic Ethics from July 15-16, 2011. We are hoping for participation from academic researchers, teachers, and journalists. The goal is to discuss various forms of academic misconduct, across disciplines, and look for solutions.

NEW: Schedule of talks, with linked abstracts

INVITED SPEAKERS

• T A Abinandanan (Materials Engineering, IISc Bangalore)
• P Balaram (Director, IISc Bangalore; Editor, Current Science)
• Aparna Basu (NISTADS, Delhi)
• Gautam R Desiraju (Solid State & Structural Chemistry, IISc Bangalore)
• Neelima Gupte (Physics, IIT Madras)
• S R Hashim (former Member Secretary, Planning Commission; former Chairman UPSC)
• Ashok Jain (former director, NISTADS Delhi)
• Amar Jesani (Editorial Board, Indian Journal of Medical Ethics)
• Anuradha Lohia (CEO, Wellcome-DBT India Alliance)
• Sunil Mukhi (Theoretical Physics, TIFR Mumbai)
• Rohini Muthuswami (Life Sciences, JNU, Delhi)
• K Narayanan (Head, Humanities and Social Sciences, IIT Bombay)
• B L Pandit (panel discussion) (ICRIER, Delhi)
• N Raghuram (Biotechnology, GGS Indraprastha University, Delhi; former Secretary, Society for Scientific Values)
• Y S Rajan (ISRO; former VC Punjab Technical University)
• Satyajit Rath (National Institute of Immunology, Delhi)
• Chiranjib Sen (IIM Bangalore)
• L S Shashidhara (Biology, IISER Pune)
• D K Srivastava (Director, Madras School of Economics)
• K VijayRaghavan (Director, NCBS, TIFR, Bangalore)

We are aiming for a participative and interactive atmosphere, with sufficient discussion time after talks, and also plan to have panel discussions.

Examples of topics to be discussed

Specific examples of research-related misconduct may include:

• Plagiarism (uncredited use of others' material); self-plagiarism (unacknowledged recycling of one's own material for multiple publications)
• Data falsification, fabrication, and selective presentation/suppression
• Undeclared conflicts of interest, both in authorship and in reviewing
• Inappropriate authorship (non-contributing researchers being given authorship, or contributors being denied authorship).

Possible outcomes from the meeting:

• A perspective on how these problems are viewed globally and what various national academies and scientific societies, including our own are doing to address these problems
• Proposals for a syllabus (readings, material, discussion topics, case studies) for a module on "Scientific Ethics" to be introduced in the University syllabus as part of the "Methodology" exam. Indian Academies could collaborate on creating this material and liaise with UGC to ensure its implementation.
• Formal mechanisms for examining ethics issues: What avenues exist currently? How does a university Vice-Chancellor deal with ethics issues? Is there a natural way in which such discussions might find their way to the Academies? Is there a need for a formal research ethics values watchdog, and should the academic community take the initiative in forming one?
• Legal aspects of action which can be taken in respect of scientific ethics complaints. What can institutions/universities do at all in terms of mechanisms to evaluate these complaints? If they are upheld, what mechanisms are there to discipline the persons involved?
• General guidelines for maintenance of repositories, lab books, computer code etc. Are there typically institutional guidelines for these? Should the Academies discuss and propose such guidelines as a general rule?
• Any other issues that participants may raise.

Venue

Participation

Please contact us if you are interested in attending or participating in this meeting. Email: ethicsmeet (at) imsc (dot) res (dot) in

Organisers: Gautam Menon (IMSc), N S Siddharthan (FGKS), Rahul Siddharthan (IMSc)