来源：《Science》
原文见刊日期：2022年7月15日
Ph.D. recipients in France will soon have to take an integrity oath on the day they successfully defend their thesis, in what seems to be the first national initiative of its kind. Few scientists, in France or elsewhere, believe the oath alone is likely to prevent misconduct. Nonetheless, some see it as a symbolic step in the right direction that might inspire change elsewhere.
法国的博士生很快就要在他们论文答辩成功的那一天宣誓诚信，这似乎是第一个全国性的此类倡议。在法国或其他国家，很少有科学家相信，仅凭誓言就可能防止不端行为。尽管如此，一些人认为这是朝着正确方向迈出的象征性一步，可能会激励其他国家的变革。
“We had a long way to go” compared with some other countries, says Stéphanie Ruphy, director of the French Office for Research Integrity (OFIS), which helped draft the oath. France’s efforts to actively promote honest, trustworthy research have sped up in recent years: introducing a national charter in 2015 laying out researchers’ responsibilities, setting up OFIS in 2017, and writing procedures related to research integrity into law in 2020. Recently enacted rules, for instance, enable universities to ask for OFIS’s help naming an external panel to examine alleged misconduct cases.
帮助起草誓言的法国科研诚信办公室主任Ruphy说，与其他一些国家相比，“我们还有很长的路要走”。近年来，法国积极促进诚实、值得信赖的研究的努力有所加快：2015年推出了国家宪章，规定了研究人员的责任，2017年建立了OFIS，并在2020年将与研究诚信相关的程序写入法律。例如，最近颁布的规定允许大学请求OFIS帮助任命一个外部小组来调查涉嫌的学术不端案件。
The new oath is expected to become mandatory for researchers in all fields beginning their Ph.D.s or renewing their Ph.D. enrollment, starting in the fall. A draft of the oath reads in part: “I pledge, to the greatest of my ability, to continue to maintain integrity in my relationship to knowledge, to my methods and to my results.”
预计从秋季开始，新誓言将成为所有领域开始攻读博士学位或续读博士学位的研究人员的制性要求。宣誓草稿的部分内容如下：“我保证，尽我最大的能力，在我与知识、方法和结果的关系中，继续保持诚信正直。”
It will be mentioned in the charter signed by every Ph.D. candidate—as well as by their supervisor and institution—at the start of their doctorate, and will be taken when the Ph.D. is conferred. It won’t mark entry in a specific professional body, as the Hippocratic oath does for medical doctors, nor will it be legally binding. But researchers could invoke it to bolster their opposition to dubious behavior, Ruphy says. It will also add solemnity to graduation events that, in France, often take place in ordinary rooms, without gowns.
每个博士候选人——以及其导师和所在研究机构——在博士学位开始时都会在章程中提到这一点，并在授予博士学位时采用。它不会像希波克拉底誓言对于医生那样，标志着进入某个特定的专业团体，也不会具有法律约束力。但研究人员可以援引它来支持他们对可疑行为的反对，Ruphy说。它还将为毕业典礼增添庄严感。在法国，毕业典礼通常在普通的房间里举行，不穿毕业礼服。
“It’s a symbolic measure to affirm common values and what makes a good researcher,” says Sylvie Pommier, president of France Ph.D. Yet Pommier, who took part in the consultation about implementing the oath, and others think it should come earlier in the Ph.D. training process to instill integrity principles from the beginning of a research career.
法国博士协会主席Pommier说：“这是一种象征性的措施，它明确了共同的价值观，以及如何成为一名优秀的研究人员。”然而，参加了实施誓言咨询的Pommier和其他人认为，在博士培训过程中，应该更早地从研究生涯的一开始就灌输诚信原则。
Boudewijn de Bruin, an ethics professor at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands who studies oaths in professions such as accounting, is less optimistic. “I’m not against oaths in general,” but their content should be detailed and specific enough to provide actual support for ethical decisions, he says. The French text, however, is brief and generic; this kind of oath will achieve “nothing,” he says.
荷兰格罗宁根大学的伦理学教授布德维恩·德布鲁恩研究会计等职业中的誓言，但他并不乐观。他说：“我一般不反对宣誓”，但宣誓的内容应该足够详细和具体，以便为道德决策提供实际支持。然而，法国宣誓文本简短而笼统；他说，这种誓言将“一事无成”。
The oath alone won’t fix these deeper problems, agrees Dominique Roche, an ecologist at the University of Neuchâtel in Switzerland. But it is a “positive development,” he continues. “I hope other countries will follow France’s lead.”
瑞士Neuchátel大学生态学家多米尼克·罗什同意，单凭誓言并不能解决这些更深层次的问题。但这是一个“积极的发展”，他继续说道。“我希望其他国家也能效仿法国。”