Cancer cells start accumulating mutations as a consequence of rapid cell division and poor quality control on DNA replication; they also have problems keeping their chromosomes intact. This is called "genomic instability" and it is a hallmark of cancer.
The critical point here is that most of these mutations are acquired *after* the cancer gets going, regardless of whether the mutagen in question is still being administered.
Therefore, it's not proper to infer a linear relationship between the dose of mutagen and the number of mutations.
Beyond that, the numbers involved in that extrapolation seem to have been pulled out of thin air, and I question whether they knew the smoking history of the individual who donated the material that created that cell line. (The lung cancer in question had 30,000 mutations, so by their logic the smoker must have smoked 345,000 cigarettes, or 17,250 packs of 20. That's a pack a day for 47 years, which is admittedly within the bounds of possibility, but still an awful lot of smoking.)
Whatever. Smoking is still awful for you, but this kind of nonsensical extrapolation without regard to detail is terribly annoying.
The article is a discussion about the use of programming methodologies (traditional, open source, "extreme") to create something that isn't software -- in this case, a cookie.
It's n=1 but the conclusion is that there are some good reasons why an expertly run traditional team is better at producing goods, even if some of the alternate programming methodologies are sometimes better at producing code.
I submitted this story to Slashdot early yesterday, when AMERICAblog broke the story -- before the vote, when there was still time to spread the word, contact public officials (including people at Microsoft), and do something positive to change the situation.
The story was rejected.
Just venting, but -- to the moderator who decided that the story was newsworthy only after it was too late to do anything about it -- thanks for nothing! Judging from the comments above, it seems likely that the Slashdot community would have liked to know about this YESTERDAY.
Slashdot Mirror
Maybe it's different people doing the complaining in this case than were doing the complaining before.
The critical point here is that most of these mutations are acquired *after* the cancer gets going, regardless of whether the mutagen in question is still being administered.
Therefore, it's not proper to infer a linear relationship between the dose of mutagen and the number of mutations.
Beyond that, the numbers involved in that extrapolation seem to have been pulled out of thin air, and I question whether they knew the smoking history of the individual who donated the material that created that cell line. (The lung cancer in question had 30,000 mutations, so by their logic the smoker must have smoked 345,000 cigarettes, or 17,250 packs of 20. That's a pack a day for 47 years, which is admittedly within the bounds of possibility, but still an awful lot of smoking.)
Whatever. Smoking is still awful for you, but this kind of nonsensical extrapolation without regard to detail is terribly annoying.
"The Bakeoff"
http://www.gladwell.com/2005/2005_09_05_a_bakeoff. html
The article is a discussion about the use of programming methodologies (traditional, open source, "extreme") to create something that isn't software -- in this case, a cookie.
It's n=1 but the conclusion is that there are some good reasons why an expertly run traditional team is better at producing goods, even if some of the alternate programming methodologies are sometimes better at producing code.
The story was rejected.
Just venting, but -- to the moderator who decided that the story was newsworthy only after it was too late to do anything about it -- thanks for nothing! Judging from the comments above, it seems likely that the Slashdot community would have liked to know about this YESTERDAY.