"Is science unscientific now?" seems a crazy question to open an article in a serious publication, but I hope by the end of this to win you over to an affirmative response the goal of this piece is to outline that very case, or at least to ask questions about how the material reality of science is manipulated by the forces of capital.
The nature of Crises being embedded in the capitalist system of production has been explained in many ways, but the most consistent criticisms come from Marxist thinkers.
To keep the article from becoming too long, and to allow a clean comparison, I will hone in on the idea of the rational investor (capitalist, to move to Marxist terminology).
As Marxists, we believe that under capitalism, the contradictions inherent in the system lead to events where the system collapses and needs the intervention of a government body to rearrange the agreements surrounding capital.
While fascinating (but most often unproductive) debates trace the origins of core concepts (universal grammar of geometry being a favourite of mine) we use in the scientific process, it is relatively uncontroversial to say that the foundation of the scientific process is observation and interpretation.
Be it Archimedes in the bath, Newton under a tree or Einstein's pollen grains, events and observations have always been at the core of developing theories. Without fundamental observations and repeated testing, even the most theoretical fields like string theory and statistical physics would have no grounding.
We do not need to answer the chicken and egg question of observation and proposed theory leading to further developments down the line. No matter the degree to which previous explanations led to theories such as Evolution when it was proposed by Darwin, it is the theory emerging or being verified from a vast set of observations, experiments, results and successful predictions that have lead to it being accepted.
Theories stem from repeated observation and testing, with the more something is observed and recorded, the more it becomes akin to established fact. Here emerges the origin of a crisis in science - theories and disciplines forming based on incorrect, faked or withheld information.
The scientific process builds on all that came before it, hence a problem being found far back in the chain sets research back considerably. Famously, Newton said "If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants".
There are multiple selfish reasons for a crisis to emerge. If a scientist wishes to claim all the credit for a work they may stifle the readership of pubications of others. While we recognize science is a collaborative process by design, this does not make individual scientists immune from selfish motivations. Indeed, Newton himself wasted a vast amount of experts' time with his personal quest to be seen as the 'inventor' of calculus (it is of course the correct Marxist take that Leibniz is owed this honour).
But under a utopian scientific system, all assumptions we rest further work on are to be tested repeatedly until proven beyond doubt. We would not see arguments between people trying to claim ideas and studies, as it would be more collaborative by design.
We are used to the hypothetical rational investor being raised to explain the mechanics of markets under capitalism, so now I ask, who wins between the rational scientist and the rational investor? Will the schools of thought that emerge be the guiding figures in what research is carried out? Of course not.
Often, as happy coincidence, there will be an agreement between the rational scientist and the rational investor, with both parties needing the other for their interests. What we know to be true, however, is that it is the capitalist/investor ultimately decides the direction research will take.
We must ask, does capitalism, which modern science must work within, affect science in any way, and if so, is it positive or negative for science itself and the rest of the world? The motive which now drives the research which can be done is profit projections, with the goal of delivering an end product which can be sold. By design, this means scientists are primed to frame a lot of their work within the nature of what can be delivered if they are granted future funding. The rational investor will not want to fund repeat experiments to verify results, so in order to chase profits/provide steady returns, we must assume it is rational for both the scientist wishing to continue work (which requires funding) and the investor seeking the best return on investment (lowest cost, highest return).
Under this model, we see a tendency towards trying to accelerate the process by which we can create a product, which does not neccessarily find itself based on any true theory, but can give some result suited to profit. If I want to continue to work as a scientist and that work is decided by this process, I will not likely be guided by return to fundamentals as I am constantly seeking the next product, under the assumption previous research holds up enough.
I will accept some immediate criticisms of the argument I am outlining here, namely that there are scenarios in which products like well-established medicines and software have their fundamentals reassessed to sell an updated (reformulated) product, or hold onto patent rights as an example of capitalism furthering research on previous parts of the development of a theory/product. However, the easy point for me to raise here is the underlying mechanism here is still that the majority of these products would be from the same process of selection which meant other possible avenues of thought/products were discounted on behalf of the projections of profit not being adequate for the investor. So the cycle does not fundamentally change because of the forces at play. A clean comparison is that Microsoft, Adobe and others do not invest in new products that fix the flaws of their original models, but continuously patch bulky products we have had for decades while charging subscription fees.
For many of us on the sphere of public health research, a sudden shock hit us recently that the dominant theory of the cause of Alzheimer's is potentially based on fraudulent foundations. A groundbreaking study from 2006 - which purported to show that one specific protein likely led to Alzheimer's developing - has been all but confirmed to include doctored imagery as an extensive investigation by Science Magazine has outlined, the opposition from members of the scientific community isn't new, but has not been taken as important until an investigation was funded by those with a financial interest (people with a short position on the stock).
What has been overlooked in the initial shock for many of us is how billions would likely be continued to be pumped into this theory based on sketchy fundamentals, if it wasn't for competing private interests to the authors of the original paper.
Does this counter the proposal that capitalism has a negative effect on science, then?
No - It confirms it!
Capitalism led all important stages in the process to be underfunded and underresourced where it mattered. As asked previously, the answer is always the rational investor has more influence than the rational scientist. The pure motive of research pointed to problems in the chain of the theory of this specific protein years before billions were spent worldwide, based on the motive of a return on investment.