Theor Med Bioeth. 2012 Oct;33(5):359-76. doi: 10.1007/s11017-012-9233-1.
Peer review is a widely accepted instrument for raising the quality of science. Peer review limits the enormous unstructured influx of information and the sheer amount of dubious data, which in its absence would plunge science into chaos. In particular, peer review offers the benefit of eliminating papers that suffer from poor craftsmanship or methodological shortcomings, especially in the experimental sciences. However, we believe that peer review is not always appropriate for the evaluation of controversial hypothetical science. We argue that the process of peer review can be prone to bias towards ideas that affirm the prior convictions of reviewers and against innovation and radical new ideas. Innovative hypotheses are thus highly vulnerable to being "filtered out" or made to accord with conventional wisdom by the peer review process. Consequently, having introduced peer review, the Elsevier journal Medical Hypotheses may be unable to continue its tradition as a radical journal allowing discussion of improbable or unconventional ideas. Hence we conclude by asking the publisher to consider re-introducing the system of editorial review to Medical Hypotheses.
同行评议是提高科学质量的广泛认可手段。同行评议限制了大量无结构的信息涌入和可疑数据的数量，如果没有同行评议，科学将陷入混乱。特别是，同行评议提供了消除那些因工艺差或方法学缺陷而出现问题的论文的好处，特别是在实验科学中。然而，我们认为，同行评议并不总是适合评估有争议的假设性科学。我们认为，同行评议的过程可能容易受到偏向于肯定评审员先前信念的想法的影响，而不利于创新和激进的新想法。因此，具有创新性的假设很容易被“过滤掉”，或者被同行评议过程迫使符合传统智慧。因此，在引入同行评议之后，爱思唯尔期刊《医学假说》可能无法继续其作为一个激进期刊的传统，允许讨论不太可能或非常规的想法。因此，我们最后要求出版商考虑重新引入编辑审查制度到《医学假说》中。
