RapierFugue
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Joined: 3/16/2006
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Hippiekinkster
There is an amazing amount of bullshit masquerading as "research" in the field of medicine.
Not really, unless by "amazing amount" you mean "not very much". There's some poor research, yes, but that tends to get blown out of the water at the review stage. As just one example, once something's been through, say, “The Lancet” wringer (as just one example), it'll tend to stand on its own two feet, or not.
That said, you do get the odd whack-job maintaining that a statistical blip is an important discovery or lead on a disease. They eventually come unstuck.
The key difference is, scientific studies are subject to both peer review, and general review by a generally sceptical scientific community. Horseshit posing as "medicine" tends to only have itself looked at by its own people.
As an example, there is not a single study of decent sample size that points to homeopathy being anything other than horseshit. The Lambeth, Southwark, and Lewisham Health Authority report of 1997, for example, looked at every single statistical survey of any size at all, and concluded that a) most of those producing the studies didn't understand the first thing about statistics and b) of the studies that followed any kind of proper statistical rigour, there was not a single one where the "results" were worth a light.
Similarly, the 2005 Lancet meta-data study, which sought to remove the "Pro/con" arguments by analysing the meta-data supporting a large number of studies, concluded that homeopathy could demonstrate no therapeutic value whatsoever.
quote:
ORIGINAL: Hippiekinkster
There are, also, quite a few people who use statistical analytical techniques to "analyze" data without having the slightest idea of what they are doing. "Look, Fred! It's significant! We plugged the numbers into Joe Blow's "Student's T for Dumbasses" V3.1415928 for Windows98-1/2 and we got p<0.05!!! What's that mean, anyway?" "Means it's MILLER TIME!!! Yuk yuk yuk..."
It certainly happens, from time to time. But they never get anywhere when they try it. What happens when scientific or clinical expertise deals in statistics is that there is a primary study, whose results are published; this then becomes a target for others to critique said study, or to re-assess the meta-data driving the results and therefore the conclusions.
In other words, you can say whatever you want to with your statistics, and draw whatever conclusions you wish to, but since others will be subsequently be taking your statistics apart with a fine tooth comb (and since in order to have your study taking seriously at all you have to publish the statistical data and methods used in its production – to effectively “show your working” in public, as it were), then you're just wasting your own time and destroying your own reputation if you go with a "sexed-up" study. So yes, of course some scientists occasionally publish results of studies that are statistically incorrect, but these are always corrected in time, and with further peer review. That’s how science works; research, results, conclusions, publication, review, critique, further study, research, results ... etc. It’s a cyclical system.
I think science does have one genuine problem; it doesn't explain itself very well, and so some people, not understanding the basis for, say, scientifically correct clinical research, make assumptions that are incorrect, or, being ignorant and scared by science, believe bullshit that simply runs counter to the scientific evidence, or fail to understand that people sometimes get better on their own (leading to someone thinking that whatever crap they were taking at the time was a "cure") and so turn to bullshit remedies and "there, there" crap, or sometimes simply blame science for being "wrong" when the only "wrong" is their poor understanding of the way in which scientific studies work. Thus there are a number of people in the world who simply don't understand scientific research, don't want to, and are happy to rely on dubious New Age crapola of various stripes.
As Stephen Fry said; "people say "Science doesn't know everything", and that's true. But just because science doesn't know everything doesn't mean that science knows nothing".
Sometimes I read posts, and not just on CM, and it's like The Enlightenment never happened.
< Message edited by RapierFugue -- 7/26/2011 1:17:16 AM >
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