Scientific authorship, pluralism, and practice

ABSTRACT

In this article, I argue that understanding authorship requires that we grapple with the plurality of distinct accounts of scientific authorship. As a result, we should be careful in how we identify and quantify unethical practices such as ghostwriting. Judgements about who should be able to decide who is an author raise interesting questions about the autonomy of scientific practices.

KEYWORDS:

• Authorship
• research ethics
• scientific pluralism

Acknowledgments

I am thankful for the many helpful comments I received from the Society for Philosophy of Science in Practice, the Philosophy of Science Association poster session, the Mississippi State University Philosophy and Religion works in progress group, Elise Smith, and David Resnik.