alt Hacker NewsOliver Sacks put himself into his case studies. What was the cost?
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Or more recently Dan Kahneman, Dan Arielly or Stephen Jay Gould have also been caught fabricating details or whole results.
Already posted:
I actually set that book down while reading it and said, “this sounds made up.” Ahh the quiet satisfaction of witnessless vindication.
> When [Sacks] woke up in the middle of the night with an erection, he would cool his penis by putting it in orange jello.
This is a remarkable sentence, and it appears suddenly in the article without context or explanation.
Naturally, there are questions. Was it necessarily orange jello? Does orange refer to the flavor or the color? What property of this particular jello made it preferable to other flavors and colors of jello? Did he prepare the jello for this particular purpose, or did he have other uses for the orange jello? What were they? Did he reuse jello or discard it after one use? Most important though: why would he do this??
The article does not say.
Capitalize "Sacks", please.
Not shocked.
"Science" of the 1900s was heavily influenced by people willing to do whatever it took to achieve fame or fortune.
The replication crisis is the result.
Maybe a better source, linked in the article: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/12/15/oliver-sacks-p...
I think the title doesn't really give a good impression of the contents of the article.
The article spends most time on evolution Sacks' homosexual identity and struggle with sexuality and repression.
His uncertainty and melancholical bouts maar him question his own work and make the author conclude him 'putting himself in his work'.
However very little evidence is presented. Most insinuated about is 'awakenings' yet even in that case it's hard to reach conclusions.
The author plays of his perennial self-doubt as aan admission, but there's very scant evidence about him actually making up stories.
I'm not saying his method is our isn't flawed, it's just that the title belies the story. The struggle with his sexuality is the main subject and only small bits are about his uncertainty of his work.