It's Friday, September 23rd, 2016, and you're listening to Inquiring Minds. I'm Indra Viscontas.

And I'm Kishoreh. Each week, we bring you a new, in-depth exploration of the space where science,

politics, and society collide. We endeavor. We endeavor to find out what's true, what's left to discover,

and why it all matters. You can find us online at motherjones.com

slash inquiring minds or inquiringshow.tumbar.com. You can also find us on Twitter at

Inquiring Show and on Facebook. And you can subscribe to the show on iTunes or any other

podcasting app. On October 9th, 2015, Azeen Gorashi published a story in BuzzFeed that shook the entire science community.

She detailed the story of a university-led sexual harassment investigation of famed exoplanet astronomer Jeff Marcy.

Azeen spoke to three of the four complainants

involved in the investigation, all relating harrowing tales of inappropriate behavior.

Marcy publicly apologized for his actions, and he posted a response on his website,

in which he denies some of the allegations in the Berkeley investigation. He ultimately retired from Berkeley as a result of the controversy.

But this article served as a match to a tremendous amount of fuel.

In the firestorm that followed, we've seen nearly a dozen academic researchers

publicly named in various sexual harassment investigations.

Many have denied the allegations. Some have been dismissed, but there is no doubt that 2016 has been a year of deep

introspection on the topic of sexual harassment in science. Naturally, this is a really

difficult subject to cover, both in terms of just establishing facts,

but also the guidelines and sanctions related to this issue very wildly from institution

to institution.

But undeniably, we're left with many questions.

Is this an epidemic that we're barely scratching the surface of? Are we creating

...