I specifically said don't throw out nudges - some of them work and replicate e.g., retirement savings defaults, while others are BS like the honesty pledge. Real experimental/behavioral economics is not this media-attention-grabbing garbage anyway. As I said, I have friends in the field. They don't do this BS.
> Doesn't he work with entire teams of others, don't others review his work, his analysis, the data collection, etc.?
No, he doesn't. See the Data Colada responses from his three coauthors on the car insurance paper. All admit he was the only author to have data access. If you can find it, check the earlier, separate investigation into his other fabricated paper w/ Delta Dental where the insurer itself said "we didn't give him that data."
> Some additional context here is that in academia, there has been a lot of pushback on the burgeoning field of behavioral economics as a result of political viewpoints; nudge is inherently a liberal concept, and puts conservative viewpoints of personal responsibility in a negative light.
I disagree on many dimensions w/ your characterization of behavioral econ AND the entire point is irrelevant here.
> economics isn't strictly a "hard science" insofar as it can't really run experiments the way physics can, so it's easy for economists to point out experimental issues
I can introduce you to ten experimental economists who would disagree. Economists have also been pioneers in figuring out when non-experimental situations parallel experiments enough that we can make the same inferences.
> Ariely's books aren't "BS"
Please continue enjoying them if you like them, but I don't have any idea how you'd separate fact from fiction. Ariely is not the first researcher in this exact field who has been revealed to be a fraud.