Scientific Knowledge Corruption

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  "numericId": null,
  "path": "/knowledge-base/risks/scientific-corruption/",
  "filePath": "knowledge-base/risks/scientific-corruption.mdx",
  "title": "Scientific Knowledge Corruption",
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  "causalLevel": "outcome",
  "lastUpdated": "2026-03-13",
  "dateCreated": "2026-02-15",
  "llmSummary": "Documents AI-enabled scientific fraud with evidence that 2-20% of submissions are from paper mills (field-dependent), 300,000+ fake papers exist, and detection tools are losing an arms race against AI generation. Paper mill output doubles every 1.5 years vs. retractions every 3.5 years. Projects 2027-2030 scenarios ranging from controlled degradation (40% probability) to epistemic collapse (20% probability) affecting medical treatments and policy decisions. Wiley/Hindawi scandal resulted in 11,300+ retractions and \\$35-40M losses.",
  "description": "AI-enabled fraud, fake papers, and the collapse of scientific reliability that threatens evidence-based medicine and policy",
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    "novelty": 4.5,
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    "actionability": 3.5,
    "completeness": 6
  },
  "category": "risks",
  "subcategory": "epistemic",
  "clusters": [
    "epistemics",
    "ai-safety"
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  "metrics": {
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    {
      "text": "Retraction Watch database",
      "url": "https://retractiondatabase.org/",
      "resourceId": "1418e5e55c4e3b9a",
      "resourceTitle": "Retraction Watch Database"
    },
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      "text": "Retraction Watch Database",
      "url": "https://retractiondatabase.org/",
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      "resourceTitle": "Retraction Watch Database"
    }
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  "hallucinationRisk": {
    "level": "medium",
    "score": 50,
    "factors": [
      "no-citations",
      "high-quality"
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  },
  "entityType": "risk",
  "redundancy": {
    "maxSimilarity": 10,
    "similarPages": [
      {
        "id": "historical-revisionism",
        "title": "Historical Revisionism",
        "path": "/knowledge-base/risks/historical-revisionism/",
        "similarity": 10
      }
    ]
  },
  "coverage": {
    "passing": 9,
    "total": 13,
    "targets": {
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    "ratingsString": "N:4.5 R:5 A:3.5 C:6"
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  "readerRank": 397,
  "researchRank": 182,
  "recommendedScore": 222.39
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{
  "lesswrong": "https://www.lesswrong.com/tag/science"
}