President Donald Trump has signed an executive order that seeks to restore agency use of “gold standard science” to spur innovation and ensure that federally funded research is impactful, transparent and rigorous.
The White House said Friday the EO directs the director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy to work with agency heads to release guidance for implementing gold standard science in managing their scientific activities.
The policy defines gold standard science as science conducted in a way that is reproducible; transparent; communicative of error and uncertainty; collaborative and interdisciplinary; skeptical of its findings and assumptions; structured for falsifiability of hypotheses; subject to unbiased peer review; accepting of negative results as positive outcomes; and without conflicts of interest.
Upon the guidance’s release, agency heads should update their agency policies governing the production and use of scientific information to implement the guidance. They should also report their implementation progress to the OSTP director within 60 days.
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Enhancing Scientific Data Use & Communication
The EO requires agency heads and employees to publicly share data, analyses, models and conclusions related to scientific and technological information generated or used by the agency no later than 30 days following the policy’s issuance.
Employees should acknowledge and document uncertainties when using scientific data in agency decision-making. They should also be transparent about the likelihood of the assumptions used and implement a “weight of scientific evidence” approach when scientific or technological data is used to inform agency assessments and decision-making.
The policy directs agency employees to communicate scientific data in accordance with the results of the relevant analysis and evaluation. It also states that communications involving a scientific model or information derived from a scientific model should include reference to any material assumptions that inform the outputs of the model.
Reinstating Scientific Integrity Policies
The order claims to reinstate the scientific integrity policies of the first Trump administration.
When updating such policies in accordance with the EO, agencies should ensure that they encourage the open exchange of ideas, allow for consideration of dissenting or different viewpoints and protect employees from efforts to prevent or deter consideration of alternative scientific opinions.
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