XFrequentist comments on Alternative Places to Get Ideas (Also, "In Defense of Food") - Less Wrong

14 Post author: Raemon 26 December 2010 06:36PM

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Comment author: Eugine_Nier 28 December 2010 02:13:52AM 2 points [-]

1) Very little of the Hansonian critique of medicine involves researchers making stuff up, and I doubt this is a major problem.

Sorry about that, I didn't meant more generate results based on statistical noise, then outright faking research.

Comment author: XFrequentist 28 December 2010 02:22:12AM 1 point [-]

Ah. Then yeah that's a problem, but I'm not sure why this would be worse with recent research.

This article gives a pretty good overview of the shortcomings of medical statistics, and includes one of my favorite lines ever:

Such sad statistical situations suggest that the marriage of science and math may be desperately in need of counseling. Perhaps it could be provided by the Rev. Thomas Bayes.

Comment author: Eugine_Nier 28 December 2010 04:49:33AM 3 points [-]

Ah. Then yeah that's a problem, but I'm not sure why this would be worse with recent research.

Because the earlier stuff, e.g., sanitation, vaccines, and antibiotics, had a stronger effect and thus was easier to notice above the noise.

Comment author: mwengler 01 January 2011 01:03:56AM 1 point [-]

And also the older stuff has been around long enough to get the bad results beaten out of it.

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