I had an argument recently about why fundamental research was important. The other person insisted that money should only be spent on endeavors where the outcome is known to benefit humanity. They couldn't accept, despite not having any science or math training, that sometimes we study things that start off seemingly useless and become important, or that we sometimes stumble upon things. (And this is why we should spend money on science in general).
Think about all the scientifically illiterate politicians who control money and funding who probably have similar views.
I can totally understand how we let things get this bad. If you don't provide a positive result, you might be facing unemployment. It's not about advancing our knowledge anymore.
If we are to be allowed to publish papers from negative results then I should go and dig out my PhD notes and get writing!
Seriously, though, I started noticing the many broken incentives early on, after a explanation about "impact factor" from an older PhD student in our lab.
This was one of (and unfortunately not the only) reason I decided to leave academia after my Ph.D., leaving my field entirely and going into software engineering rather than taking a postdoc position. Academia isn't for everyone, and neither is industry... but wow, I sure am happier where I am now.
What often happens though is that the paper will get retracted but then the authors play hot potato in blaming different people for faking it and it turns into a whole mess where you don't always know (i.e. cannot prove) exactly who did the faking.
"Someone else faked it and I missed it, just like all the reviewers!!"
Maybe there should be a bounty on uncovering these?
This shit has to stop. If publish or perish is going to continue to be a thing, maybe just switch to publishing negative results. It's not sexy, but it's valuable too.