“Many studies have documented a decreasing risk tolerance in scientific research. A core driver has been the dominance of citation-driven metrics to evaluate, fund, and promote scientific research — a process that parallels the ever-increasing bureaucratization of science itself (interestingly, as measured by the increase of academic administration staff, the onset of this trend coincides with the first safetyism conferences that were held in the 1970s). Citations have become the decisive factor in publications, grant-making, and tenure. Consequently, as crowded scientific fields attract the most citations, high-risk, exploratory science, in turn, gets less attention and funding. And, in addition to the risk aversion of scientists, ethics committees, peer reviewers, and commissions are now slowing down scientific progress. This scientific risk aversion, coupled with the increase in bureaucratization, helps explain why scientific productivity has been significantly declining over the past decades."
Byrne Hobart and Tobias Huber on the dangers of safetyism in science
Against Safetyism
why safetyism — and not climate change or artificial intelligence — has become one of the
