Tracking the decline …

… We tried to publish a replication of a Science paper in Science. The journal refused.

We believe that it is bad policy for journals like Science to publish big, bold ideas and then leave it to subfield journals to publish replications showing that those ideas aren’t so accurate after all. Subfield journals are less visible, meaning the message often fails to reach the broader public. They are also less authoritative, meaning the failed replication will have less of an impact on the field if it is not published by Science.

Sounds reasonable to me. From now on, I’ll take anything I read in Science with the proverbial grain of salt.