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Majority of Landmark Cancer Studies Cannot Be Replicated
New submitter Beeftopia writes with perhaps distressing news about cancer research. From the article: "During a decade as head of global cancer research at Amgen, C. Glenn Begley identified 53 'landmark' publications — papers in top journals, from reputable labs — for his team to reproduce. Begley sought to double-check the findings before trying to build on them for drug development. Result: 47 of the 53 could not be replicated. He described his findings in a commentary piece published on Wednesday in the journal Nature (paywalled) . ... But they and others fear the phenomenon is the product of a skewed system of incentives that has academics cutting corners to further their careers."
As is the fashion at Nature, you can only read the actual article if you are a subscriber or want to fork over $32. Anyone with access care to provide more insight?
Update: 04/06 14:00 GMT by U L : Naffer pointed us toward informative commentary in Pipeline. Thanks!
But they and others fear the phenomenon is the product of a skewed system of incentives that has academics cutting corners to further their careers.
As I've said before, back when I was in academia, there were always grant-whores and academics more interested in their own interests than science around. Too many people have come to treat science with a reverence more appropriate to a religion than a system of knowledge and discovery, however. And so when I point out that there are scientists out there willing to cook the numbers, exaggerate, play to politics and/or public opinion, etc. I inevitably run into those who say "Science wouldn't allow that" (like my friend who's still in the field). But science is only as good as the people practicing it. And, in any field, there are always those willing to put their own personal interests ahead of the greater good.
I just hope this doesn't cast a shadow over those out there who *are* doing good work and *are* trying to do honest work. Sadly, some of the best researchers out there are the ones who make the least noise, get the least attention, get the least grants, and are least likely to get tenure.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
See this discussion of the same paper on In the Pipeline, a blog devoted to organic chemistry and drug discovery. http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/2012/03/29/sloppy_science.php
My first thought is "man, what a bummer". My second thought is "Hmmm, academics/scientists skewing results for the sake of their own careers. Global warming, anyone?"
PDF : www.anonstorage.net/PStorage/510.483531a.pdf
This is just part of the scientific process. Stuff usually does not stick. It is most often falsified. As more things are falsified, we end up with a better overall understanding of the processes we are trying to understand. Although it may be a bit disturbing if scientists are being dishonest, other researchers have a very strong incentive to go back and fact check.
Scientists are not always honest when it comes to furthering their careers and getting that lovely new research grant............. Some scientists are even wondering why the public has little faith in what scientists say and the so-called science going on now: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00y4yql. It's a little worrying when a geneticist has seemingly little idea of the far reaching future ethical questions posed in his own field.
That's mostly why I never donate to charities touting cancer research. It all goes into one black hole, never to be seen again. There are people who have cancer now who need help and I donate to charities that look after those people. Cynically, why would anyone try and 'cure' cancer when you can keep the gravy train of research papers and expensive drugs going?
There is no greater "absolute power" than knowing that if you say or write something that others will like, they will pay you lots of money and make you famous.
It's not that money corrupts. Money is not the root of all evil; the full quote is "the love of money is the root of all evil." When our society decided that money was more important than truth, we surrendered truth to the void.
A research scientist thinks about his day. He can slightly fudge his cancer study, make big headlines, get a ton of grant money and get appointed chair at the university. Or he can go down the long hall to his boss and say, "Nope, this one didn't work either, and while I'd like to start a religion based on false hope, this isn't the false hope you're looking for." If he does that, he can then watch one of his subordinates fudge the cancer study, make big headlines, and be his boss at the same time next year.
Which choice would you make?
Most academics I know are on grants, living hand-to-mouth on short term grants below or close to the poverty line. And when your next grant depends only on whether you have produced a paper, one simply must put quantity over quality when publishing. The alternative is flipping burgers at the corner shop (which actually probably pays better).
But everyone in science knows this. And such papers rarely become "landmark". They are know to be toiletpaper (worthless, unless you happen to need it), and treated as such. I'd wager there is something else behind this - rather alarming - finding.
Many of these scientists are getting big grants to do their research. At least a few of them might be skewing their results, even just a little, to give the answers their backers want, in order to keep the money flow open. This goes for a lot of scientific research. (Not to mention the politics of getting published if your research contradicts a heavyweight in your field).
For "conservatives" to be skeptical of scientists?
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
Two weeks ago said the social science studies are usually not replicated. Either because they are not true or too expensive. They were trying to explain the rise in psychology paper retractions and job firings as poor science.
Given the expense, I flat don't believe that a private company just decided to replicate 53 studies.
And he claims that authors "made" his team sign confidentiality agreements. How do authors force that?
So, he claims, he can't even tell us which studies failed.
Now he works at a different cancer research company. Conflict of interests?
I don't doubt that we've got problems in the "medical industry", but the linked article reeks of bullshit.
Has anyone looked at Nature?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
While certainly there are those who will publish findings they know to be false, that's not really the big issue I see here. Good science demands that studies be replicated so they can be upheld or refuted. Sure, there's confirmation bias in science all over the place - the bigger problem I see is that there's very little incentive to publish a paper that simply refutes another. Busting existing studies should be a glorious field, but it's not. If big-name scientist A publishes a result in nature, and no-name scientist B publishes a paper in the journal-of-no-one-reads-it, everyone just assumes scientist B is just a bad scientist (assuming he even managed to actually get published at all).
Another major issue is that the null hypothesis is a very un-enticing story. No one wants to publish the paper: "New Drug does nothing to cure cancer". If you spent a year and a ton of money researching New Drug, you're damn sure going to try and make it work. It's unfortunate, because often the null hypothesis is very informative, but it doesn't get you paid or published. Or how about the psychology paper: "Brain does not respond to stimulus A in any meaningful way", don't remember that paper? That's because it never got published.
I think this is less about malicious behavior, and more about a lack of interest (which can somewhat be blamed on the way universities/journals/grants handle funding, notoriety, etc) in replicating and refuting studies.
Do you want to be the guy who cured cancer, or the guy who disproved a bunch of studies?
Ze Atomic Device! It iz Ztolen!
Here's the full text, for anyone interested.
are famously bad at sceince and statistics.
And there's no benefit (to the researcher) in replicating a study that's already been done which makes for an obvious problem.
Medical science isn't alone in this of course, it just seems to be worse than most.
http://davidrasnick.com/Home_files/Begley%202012.pdf
A recent PLOS article (free to view!) analyses modern research, coming to the conclusion that most research findings are false.
TLDR: Because of the nature of the statistics used and the fact that only positive results are reported.
http://www.plosmedicine.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pmed.0020124
Efforts over the past decade to characterize the genetic alterations in human cancers have led to a better understanding of molecular drivers of this complex set of diseases. Although we in the cancer field hoped that this would lead to more effective drugs, historically, our ability to translate cancer research to clinical success has been remarkably low1. Sadly, clinical trials in oncology have the highest failure rate compared with other therapeutic areas. Given the high unmet need in oncology, it is understandable that barriers to clinical development may be lower than for other disease areas, and a larger number of drugs with suboptimal preclinical validation will enter oncology trials. However, this low success rate is not sustainable or acceptable, and investigators must reassess their approach to translating discovery research into greater clinical success and impact.
Many factors are responsible for the high failure rate, notwithstanding the inherently difficult nature of this disease. Certainly, the limitations of preclinical tools such as inadequate cancer-cell-line and mouse models2 make it difficult for even the best scientists working in optimal conditions to make a discovery that will ultimately have an impact in the clinic. Issues related to clinical-trial design — such as uncontrolled phase II studies, a reliance on standard criteria for evaluating tumour response and the challenges of selecting patients prospectively — also play a significant part in the dismal success rate3.
Many landmark findings in preclinical oncology research are not reproducible, in part because of inadequate cell lines and animal models.
Unquestionably, a significant contributor to failure in oncology trials is the quality of published preclinical data. Drug development relies heavily on the literature, especially with regards to new targets and biology. Moreover, clinical endpoints in cancer are defined mainly in terms of patient survival, rather than by the intermediate endpoints seen in other disciplines (for example, cholesterol levels for statins). Thus, it takes many years before the clinical applicability of initial preclinical observations is known. The results of preclinical studies must therefore be very robust to withstand the rigours and challenges of clinical trials, stemming from the heterogeneity of both tumours and patients.
Confirming research findings
The scientific community assumes that the claims in a preclinical study can be taken at face value — that although there might be some errors in detail, the main message of the paper can be relied on and the data will, for the most part, stand the test of time. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Although the issue of irreproducible data has been discussed between scientists for decades, it has recently received greater attention (see go.nature.com/q7i2up) as the costs of drug development have increased along with the number of late-stage clinical-trial failures and the demand for more effective therapies.
Over the past decade, before pursuing a particular line of research, scientists (including C.G.B.) in the haematology and oncology department at the biotechnology firm Amgen in Thousand Oaks, California, tried to confirm published findings related to that work. Fifty-three papers were deemed 'landmark' studies (see 'Reproducibility of research findings'). It was acknowledged from the outset that some of the data might not hold up, because papers were deliberately selected that described something completely new, such as fresh approaches to targeting cancers or alternative clinical uses for existing therapeutics. Nevertheless, scientific findings were confirmed in only 6 (11%) cases. Even knowing the limitations of preclinical research, this was a shocking result.
Table 1: Reproducibility of research findings
Preclinical research generates many secondary publications, even when results cannot be reproduced.
Full table
Of course, the validation attempts may have failed because of technical
Because they blindly and uncritically report everything they read, regardless of whether it can be replicated or not. Sometimes they even publish bare press releases as final truth. Remember people, unless it's been replicated it isn't science. No matter how nice the scientists look, no matter how scientific the journal looks, no matter how professional the equipment looks.
A lot (in this case, almost everything) of what's first published is crap. Also remember that one of the original reasons people published in journals was to ask their colleagues: "Is this actually true?" A journal article shouldn't be regarded as a statement of scientific fact, but as an invitation to replication and criticism.
Let's publish it quickly, then get a tenured job and change topic before others find out it's all wrong!
Conservative can mean many things but in the end one key value is caution, bordering on skepticism - unwilling to believe a claim just because someone says it is so.
Are conservatives so "unwilling to believe" to statements of religious authorities? I'm skeptical about that.
It's fine to be skeptical of new findings. In fact it is healthy, and most good scientists are skeptical about anything new. TFA is an example of healthy skepticism. I am curious about the findings that could not be reproduced by this group- how many of those had already been passed off as weak in the field. This is what scientists do to arrive at consensus - continuous testing. The goal of scientists is to find what is real. Granted it can be affected by human nature and desires, but the profession diligently seeks to limit these effects. The conservative anti-scientist campaign, as far as I can tell, takes aim at scientists when scientific findings do not favor the political will of the conservative. It ignores what is real in favor of what is desired.
These findings are no surprise to those who have been following medical science and research for the past decades. See for example what Dr John Ioannidis has to say about the consistency, accuracy and honesty (or lack thereof) of medical science in general: "as much as 90 percent of the published medical information that doctors rely on is flawed","There was plenty of published research, but much of it was remarkably unscientific, based largely on observations of a small number of cases", "he was struck by how many findings of all types were refuted by later findings" - and not just in epidemiological (statistical) studies, but also in randomized, double-blind clinical trials: "Baffled, he started looking for the specific ways in which studies were going wrong. And before long he discovered that the range of errors being committed was astonishing: from what questions researchers posed, to how they set up the studies, to which patients they recruited for the studies, to which measurements they took, to how they analyzed the data, to how they presented their results, to how particular studies came to be published in medical journals ... 80 percent of non-randomized studies (by far the most common type) turn out to be wrong, as do 25 percent of supposedly gold-standard randomized trials, and as much as 10 percent of the platinum-standard large randomized trials."
Gary Taubes too denounced this accumulation of bias back in 2007: compliance bias, information bias, confirmation bias, etc. routinely introduce non-uniform effects that can be bigger than what you try to measure. And you cannot compensate for them because you cannot quantify them.
As Sander Greenland, one of the editor/authors of Modern Epidemiology, wrote in chapter 19 "Bias Analysis":
Here is an article on it
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/12/13/101213fa_fact_lehrer
It's about scientific replication, and that the initial result decrease over repetition.
Schooler says. "One of my mentors told me that my real mistake was trying to replicate my work. He told me doing that was just setting myself up for disappointment."
John Ioannidis, a medical statistics researcher on a small island in the Aegean, leads a group that has done significant work in this area. Here is an article in The Atlantic about his work.
From the article: ". . . Ioannidis laid out a detailed mathematical proof that, assuming modest levels of researcher bias, typically imperfect research techniques, and the well-known tendency to focus on exciting rather than highly plausible theories, researchers will come up with wrong findings most of the time. Simply put, if you’re attracted to ideas that have a good chance of being wrong, and if you’re motivated to prove them right, and if you have a little wiggle room in how you assemble the evidence, you’ll probably succeed in proving wrong theories right."
The glass is half glass.
...re: double slit experiment and what happens when you try to observe....the experiment.
If they want the same results then don't observe..... As apparently they didn't the first time
No, you don't. You demand that scientific results match your preconceived notions. Conservatives are easily swayed by anything claiming to be science that matches what you want to be true. Just look at the people who listen to Christophen Monckton, he has a bachelor of arts and claims to have cured AIDS and cancer, yet conservatives love to listen to him tell them how global warming isn't occurring, how the earth is actually cooling not warming and all sorts of other nonsense that matches how you want the world to be.
You don't trust science because you don't like the results regardless of how many times the experiments have been replicated. This article is about an inordinately high rate of failure in one particular area of research where not enough verification of results is being performed. The problem is easily fixed, the question is whether the corporations paying for the research will be willing to pay for the verifications and release the results.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
heterogeneity of both tumours and patients.
There is an enormous amount of pressure, from desperate patients who are out of treatment options, resulting in cases where physicians have been uncovered faking records to try to find their patient a spot in someone's clinical trial (I remember one post on Slashdot or some other forum that related a military physician's experience at a VA hospital, where a high-ranking officer pretty much pulled him aside and told him point-blank something like "You will find a spot, doctor" for his family member.
While the research and regulatory sides of medicine tends to be pretty strict regarding the rules, there is some suspicion that the clinical side bends the rules and diagnosis much more often than the handful of cases that have been publicized.
We demand real proof
I've never seen this from any modern conservative. Which is why Fox News attracts most of them.
And you wonder why conservatives are distrustful of science these days. These people are wasting everyone's time twice over- once by making people think invalid lines of research are worth exploring, and 2nd by not publishing the conclusions that actually match their facts. Anyone responsible should be fired.
and does a nice bit of back reasearch Reason http://reason.com/archives/2012/04/03/can-most-cancer-research-be-trusted
Vision with execution is hallucination.
"But they and others fear the phenomenon is the product of a skewed system of incentives that has academics cutting corners to further their careers"
I'm sure glad that this is just an isolated incident and there are no other politically charged areas of science suffering the same sort of bias.
I think it's time that medical research adopts the notion that "peer review" requires replication. We need to junk the current system of publication, and replace it with submission for third-party replication. We need a group of disinterested science staff (with no academic ax to grind) who repeat the experiment before it gets published. Only after confirmation do the original team get credit.
captcha: clarify
It seems to be affecting all branches of science - http://wmbriggs.com/blog/?p=4832
Conservative can mean many things but in the end one key value is caution, bordering on skepticism - unwilling to believe a claim just because someone says it is so. We demand real proof
Then why do so many conservatives claim to be Christian?
Free Martian Whores!
How many of those 47 were published in Nature.
Why would anyone publish an article with such wide interest on a closed rag like Nature.
In my opinion, C. Glenn Begley has displayed lack of sound judgment for making this choice.
Does that mean he also lacked sound judgment when attempting to replicate the work of others?
If your work is honest and important, publish where people can read it.
Otherwise, continue to hide behind a paywall.
When drug companies force you to sign NDAs to conduct studies, what they're really doing is putting a failsafe in so that if the study goes bad they can sit on it and not let the bad news get out.
Don't you know how to shorten your reply? I don't want a Twitter sized reply but this is almost thesis sized.
Yes, but unless that system is made as efficient as possible, it can take a very long time to correct itself. Eugenics is the classic example. Sure, it was eventually shown to be so much junk science, but not before it contributed to millions being killed/lobotomized/institutionalized.
From a materialistic point of view, a human is no different than any other primate. They may have some skills and abilities (e.g., sentience) that differentiate homo sapiens, but there is not scientific reason to treat them differently. The fact that human beings are "special" or should have protected rights is fairly axiomatic from a scientific point of view IMHO.
If you argue that people are different than animals, you probably need to get into philosophy/meta-physics/religion.
Similarly you can veer into the abortion debate on this general topic: some religious folks believe that since the fetus (zygote?) is a human being (genetically homo sapiens, with DNA distinct from both mother and father, so not part of either one), it should be protected as such. If you're of a more materialistic and don't think that being homo sapiens ipso facto gives the fetus/zygote any special rights or privileges than you can probably safely conclude that it's just destroying some valueless cells.
(I have an EE, but always loved taking philosophy classes whenever I could for my elective courses. :)
Well, it's time to start a new journal (among 100 000 of already existing journals). Create a huge lab, get lots of funding to pay them for their work. And tell the to reproduce every result from every submitted paper. Publish only if result was reproductible. Expensive as hell, but soon that would be the only journal that people will bother to spend time on reading.
#
#\ @ ? Colonize Mars
#
Physicists get cranky if you show them research with p values higher than one in ten thousand, but medical research routinely produces p values as high as 0.2. On top of that, you have a large number of wealthy corporations who have powerful financial motivations to influence the results of medical research fraudulently, which probably doesn't come up as often in other fields. There has been a lot of news about problems with medical research lately, mostly because the medical research community itself is discussing these issues, which is a promising sign.
Most pre-meds go on to become doctors. To be relevant, your comment would have to focus on those pre-med students who go on to become medical researchers. I'm as concerned about the current state of medical research as anyone, but I can't let this argument slide. I believe scientists would call this "bad sample selection" or somesuch. ;)
I assume many here like me engage in conversations with people who are... even less up on science than we are (and most of us here are very far from being actual scientists). This is a good opportunity to clear up a very common misconception I find among the less scientifically literate. Too many people think that once something has been published in a peer-reviewed journal that you can take it as fact, and this is simply false. Getting published in a peer-reviewed journal is the beginning of the peer review process, and one of the most important parts of that process is independent replication of results by other researchers.
If you participate in any other Internet communities, perhaps this article will provide a good opportunity to have that particular discussion about the peer review process.
These replicated studies were a cost saving measure. Doing a clinical trial on people is more expensive than doing a preclinical trail on cell cultures. Before committing to the more expensive trail they tried to repeat the research the trial was based on. Over 10 years they did this 53 times and only got positive results 6 times. They then focused their money on those results.
We demand real proof
That is such a nice weasel word there.... 'real' proof. I'd like to hear what your definition of 'rea' proof is. It seems to me science is never 'real' when it contradicts ideology. This happens on both sides of politics, but IMHO happens on the right more than the left these days. Didn't used to be. This is why I hate politics and cherish the small sectors of society that place importance on science. Politics is too finicky.
What other people think of me is none of my business
yes, because liberals never do that.
And as for climate science, answer honestly, how many research papers have you read on the topic? Not just the headline, but the actual paper. I'm willing to bet the total number is close to zero. I live near noaa in boulder, co, I'm forced to hear about the latest theories damn near daily. My favorite. A bit over a year ago, noaa launched "the search for the missing heat". No bull. The reason, the earth isn't as hot as it should be according to their models, so they think the heat must be trapped deep in the oceans depths. Damn all to thermodynamics and fluid dynamics, they want it to be there.
This gets even funnier, because about that time, NASA released a press release stating that thermal imaging of the earth seemed to indicate more heat radiating from the planet than the climate models indicate should, and maybe their models were wrong. The climate science response? How irresponsible it was of NASA to publish such a thing without running it by them first. Honestly, with behavior like that, is there any wonder why some of us are maybe a bit skeptical? And I haven't even thrown in talk about solar cycles yet and how the sun is currently in a bright period.
I dont know.... the same group tried to replicate all the experiments. That is really the common thread. I guess I wonder what is more likely, that all (most of) the studies were wrong or the person trying to replicate them is wrong?
This story reminds me of the one on the front page of our local newspaper that breathlessly informed us that contractors lie in order to get government contracts. This is extremely common. That papers are published in such a way as to earn publication in a respected journal or conference proceedings without revealing enough to enable replication is just as common. Money is made via patents and exclusive deals with industry. Yet, the academic still has the charge to publish. Even those of us in industry have a need to publish because of the urges of marketing.
Journals should pick (randomly and secretly) another group of researchers to replicate all studies during the peer review process. Pick two or three groups to be safe. Studies that can't be replicated shouldn't even be published, at least not in the top tier of journals. Only the experimental configuration and the null hypothesis should be sent to the independent groups, and none of the raw data or interpreted results from the study. Experimental designs that don't make sense should be rejected by either the journal and the replicator groups. Poor experimental design is automatically detected if more than one independent group tries to replicate the experiment and some support the null hypothesis and some reject it.
47 failures out of 53 studies is a stunning result, but here's an important consideration which may or may not be contained in the abstract: "papers were deliberately selected that described something completely new, such as fresh approaches to targeting cancers or alternative clinical uses for existing therapeutics". I'm not sure why these are being described as "landmark" studies, when in fact they were unexpected or even black swan results that presumably did not result in significant scientific advancement. It's very likely that the studies selected were also of interest to Amgen because other pharma companies were not following them up - possibly because those companies had ALSO done the replication work unsuccessfully.
By no means am I denying that this is a serious issue, but come on.
Don't tell them that mortality from breast cancer leveled out almost 20 years ago. There's a shit ton in money coming in.
Are these guys who are we supposed to bow as the new holders of the truth? This is ridiculous, if this is rotted in something so important as cancer research, I can only imagine less important fields.
Bring back the catholics, please.
A drug that works no better than the placebo could be used for years or decades before anyone figures out that it doesn't do anything but create side effects.
Not years, more like decades, maybe even a century....
As a child, I was subjected to almost every known type of prescription cough syrup/suppressant stuff to almost no effect (even the heavy duty codine laced stuff). Now ~30years later, they are only just admitting that the non-prescription stuff cough stuff is no better than placebo. Next thing you know they'll say the same thing about the prescription stuff.
By the time they take this stuff off the market I'm sure it'll have been sold for 100 years and then the OTC stuff will probably morph into something like Dr Pepper, Coca-cola, and Hires RootBeer which started life on the medicinal side of the fence.
Yet we never seem to learn the lessons from the past. Here's an excerpt from a popular a speech given by Richard Feyman...
For example, if you're doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid-- not only what you thing is right about it; other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you've eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked-- to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.
... In summary, the idea is to try to give all of the information to help others to judge the value of your contribution; not just the information that leads to judgment in one particular direction or another.
Feynman called this Cargo-cult science...
A dyed in the wool conservative was at some point--usually as children--a sponge for the conventional wisdom in their environment. Later on they stop soaking up their culture and merely become uncritical adherents and cultural wells. Without conservatives, or at least conservative sentiments, there'd be no stable culture, per se; i.e. social customs and ideas passed down generation to generation with strong fidelity.
Conservatism and progressivism are both at odds with the pure form of science. But there's not much "pure science" going on these days, at least relative to all the things we label as science. And as regards those things, a proclivity for believing or disbelieving departures from convention can certainly color your views on things.
that you can't trust humans without doing checkups on what they did.
We are a bunch of liars and glory seekers and lazy fucks. We lie to make ourselves seem better, we lie for food, we lie for money.
Having a good education doesn't change basic human nature.
Human's need checks and balances or the system will get taken over by the greedy and the selfish.
You think I'm wrong? History backs me up.
Be seeing you...
A few years ago I was brought into a room of people and was asked to become an officer of an up and coming scheme that would not only take advantage of people but the government. They wanted to essentially get grants, create pyramid schemes, and spend a ridiculous amount of money on advertising for more money before doing any research. Each officer would be given a starting salary of over $200,000 while the CEO would get $550,000. My "skills" were recognized through various fortune 500 companies which eventually lead to this board to contact me. Basically everything would have been done legally, but gray area and some things were laws didn't exist for it just yet. I was too scared of getting caught as well as my moral obligations turned me away from this project so I declined the offer. I was given a lump sum to shut my mouth about it but if they want to complain, they can complain that I had ever said anything, even if it's anonymously they can do so to the feds. Anyways, this "organization" may or may not still exist, and it was a pretty clever scheme to make a non-profit a very profitable corporation. Because I'm living a good life, I won't say anything else and just leave this be. It's in my past where it needs to be. But this concept was apparently taken from what they claimed one of the cancer organizations would do.
Of course the studies can be replicated.
The results cannot.
You're conflating all creationists with young earth creationists who base their beliefs on a literal reading of the Bible.
let's replay part of the conversation:
me: Those creationists who aren't young earth creationists may very well believe in evolution.
Screwmaster: I think "believe in evolution" would be better phrased as "accept the scientific validity of evolution."
Me: I don't think that the new terminology buys one any additional certainty
You: I could take or leave evolution or whatever it's current state is. You simply cannot say that of a "creationist".
The things to note:
(a) The creationists in question were not young earth creationists. so, presumably, they've already accepted that the account of creation in the Christian scriptures is either irrelevant, meant to be interpreted allegorically, or factually untrue.
(b) I have a hard time believing that by distinguishing between generic belief and acceptance of scientific validity, Screwmaster was trying to state that the scientifically accepted validity was actually more shakable. Rather, it seems to me that he was trying to say that such validity was somehow more certain and less likely to change than belief in general. So I'm not certain this answers the question I was asking.
(c) That science doesn't burn heretics as the stake is more of a function of increasing social distaste for capital punishment than anything else. One need only look at self-styled scientific movements in modern history: eugenics, Hitlerism, Marxist-Leninism, et cetera. I find it hard to believe that if Ferdinand and Isabella shared a scientific outlook but still faced the same cultural, economic, political and ethnic pressures of the time, they would not have been just as brutal in persecuting their opponents under some revised form of the Inquisition. The difference between then and now is less a matter of the advance in science and more of a change in what makes us squeamish.
(d) As for the possibility of change in science, I highly recommend Feyerabend's /Against Method/. I agree that science /should/ allow for changes in worldview. But the fact of the matter is that much of the "scientific" outlook actually locks people into various forms of conceptual conservatism that makes it very difficult, if not impossible, for that worldview to change. Especially interesting is Feyerabend's treatment of Galileo. Most of us have learned in grade school and high school the myth that Galileo invented the telescope, made empirical observations, used those observations to fight against religiously mandated orthodoxy, and was persecuted for doing so. The reality is that Galileo had an unworkable theory (planets orbiting the sun in perfect circles) that was completely unsupported by the evidence that he gathered. Moreover, there was a model put forth by Tycho Brahe that satisfactorily explained the motions of the planets from a geocentric point of view albeit was rather cumbersome to calculate. But Galileo continued despite the physical evidence being plainly against him and started a propaganda campaign to get people to look at the skies differently. Once that conceptual shift occurred, others were able to make new observations and these observations eventually produced a workable model (elliptical orbits) that was as good as the Tychonian system at modeling observations and better at predicting other observations. This new system, however, disproved much of Galileo's work even if it was built upon the conceptual shift started by Galileo. The lesson Feyerabend would have us learn is that Galileo's faith in a Neoplatonic solar system where more perfect entities had more perfect motions is what led to one of the most important conceptual shifts in science but this faith was not only unsupported by evidence, it was contradicted by the evidence at the time. Yet he persevered and knowledge was advanced.
Amazing how far they go to avoid accusing anyone of fraud, even though it is fraud. The whole medical field is tainted with fraud.
It would seem the Journal of Irreproducible Results was ahead of its time.
I refuse to believe corporations are people until Texas executes one. -- desert rain on http://www.dailykos.com/user/
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