OSTP Releases Scientific Integrity Guidelines

Last Friday, more than 21 months after President Obama requested them, the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) released government-wide guidelines on scientific integrity.  The concise (four page) document elaborates on the principles laid out by the President on March 9, 2009, providing guidance to executive departments and agencies on the implementation of those principles.  Among its provisions, it calls for agencies to communicate scientific findings clearly, including an "explication of underlying assumptions; accurate contextualization of uncertainties; and a description of the probabilities associated with both optimistic and pessimistic projections, including best-case and worst-case scenarios where appropriate." Reaction to the guidelines was mixed, as some observers felt they left too much discretion to the individual agencies in implementation.