The Undergrowth of Science:Delusion, Self-Deception, and Human Frailty

Walter Gratzer's themes in the stories he relates in this book are collective
delusion and human folly. Science is generally seen as a process bound by rigorous
rules, which its practitioners must not transgress. Deliberate fraud occasionally
intrudes, but it is soon detected, the perpetrators cast out and the course of
discovery barely disturbed. Far more interesting are the outbreaks of self-delusion
that from time to time afflict upright and competent researchers, and then
spreadlike an ...