Critical research on the causes of Alzheimer’s may have been falsified — and as a result, researchers may have concentrated too much on a hypothesis that was not as well-supported as they thought. Further investigation will tell whether that’s true, but in any event the story is a useful reminder that we shouldn’t assume that the fudging or outright falsification of scientific data is a victimless crime. In some cases — in this case, if falsified data inappropriately changed the direction of Alzheimer’s research — there could be very many victims indeed before the course of research gets corrected.

UPDATE: David Robert Grimes: “Science may be self-correcting, but only in the long term.”