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Short abstract:

Open science promised a paradigm shift in research practices, but instead has given us a disconnected bag of single-purpose tools, i.e., techno-solutionism in the form of badges, open data & code platforms, etc. We present “Helio” as the missing social component to realizing Open Science.

Long abstract:

Open Science (OS) promised a paradigm shift, a revolution in how we conduct and share science to create a reliable and accessible scientific knowledge base. It delivered techno-solutionism, e.g., open data, open infrastructure, open access. More than a decade later, there is not a single example of a study documented with complete transparency– instead, we have prioritized archiving experimental results or analysis code, thereby skirting the fundamental issues. Some argue the problem is lackadaisical adoption of OS. We argue the problem runs deeper: we are dealing with a broken metonymy (a literary trope whereby a part represents a whole) where the tools built to address insufficient transparency are conflated with actually addressing insufficient transparency. Those are not the same thing. For example, simply having and knowing how to use tools needed to build a house does not mean one knows how to build a house. We need to understand what the final structure must look like and why, as well as have a plan for how to build it and distribute the labor. We introduce the Heliocentric Model as the framework needed to understand what OS must look like to support process-wide transparency. We argue that tools like open data and open infrastructures should not be promoted separately, but must instead be reconceptualized as mutually dependent and compulsory components of scientific documentation, intended to effectively document researchers’ decisions, actions, & interpretations. In other words, Helio reconceptualizes science as a human process embedded in human cognition, and for human use.