rationality and randomness http://awmitchell.posterous.com a personal blog of eclectic interests posterous.com Tue, 06 Oct 2009 17:50:48 -0700 Compassion only goes so far http://awmitchell.posterous.com/compassion-only-goes-so-far http://awmitchell.posterous.com/compassion-only-goes-so-far
But the stereotype is what people like the anti-vaccination proponents would like you to think. Their message goes further when “the opposition” — also known as medical science — is painted as heartless, solely profit-driven, and without a thought for, who else, the children. (This argument of course falls flat when you consider how many children, or entire communities of children, are harmed when parents decide not to vaccinate.)

A worthwile read, including the comments.

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Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:53:00 -0700 Scanning Dead Salmon in fMRI Machine Highlights Risk of Red Herrings http://awmitchell.posterous.com/scanning-dead-salmon-in-fmri-machine-highligh-0 http://awmitchell.posterous.com/scanning-dead-salmon-in-fmri-machine-highligh-0

Some researchers have created some fMRI images which, at first glance, show that a dead salmon had a brain response when asked to interpret images of human emotion. Funny? Hell yeah! But instructive also.

Bennett’s point is that a suite of methods known as multiple comparisons correction can allow researchers to maintain most of their statistical power while keeping the danger of false positives at bay.

The work highlights that brain science is highly data-driven and statistical now. Although the visualizations — usually some orangey spots on an otherwise dark brain scan — seem simple, the data collection and interpretation that go into producing them is intense.

Vul, who published a controversial paper earlier this year that was critical of some statistical methods used in the field, said he appreciated that Bennett was also trying to do some “internal policing” to make fMRI practitioners’ methods as rigorous as possible.

Unfortunately...

Bennett’s paper has been turned down by several publications, but a poster on the work received an appreciative audience at the Human Brain Mapping conference earlier this summer. Neuroscience researchers have been forwarding it to each other for weeks.

via wired.com and thanks to bfchirpy's blog for the link to this item.

It's distressing that publications continue to have a bias towards papers with positive results. Negative results, including false positives, can be even more instructive. On the flip side, the informal networks are spreading the story anyway.

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Mon, 14 Sep 2009 00:27:11 -0700 Science, Reason and Critical Thinking: If homeopathy works ... I'll drink my own piss http://awmitchell.posterous.com/science-reason-and-critical-thinking-if-homeo http://awmitchell.posterous.com/science-reason-and-critical-thinking-if-homeo

Thanks to Tim Minchin for this one.

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Sun, 06 Sep 2009 03:23:19 -0700 Doonesbury consipiracies and rationalism http://awmitchell.posterous.com/doonesbury-consipiracies-and-rationalism http://awmitchell.posterous.com/doonesbury-consipiracies-and-rationalism
Media_httpimgsrvgocomicscomdimfhc8252dca4ecb580964ab857e41ca6359_ljeqoevfhglfwhc

So we're "a tiny group, not so influential".

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Wed, 26 Aug 2009 14:34:58 -0700 Miami News - The God of Skeptics http://awmitchell.posterous.com/miami-news-the-god-of-skeptics http://awmitchell.posterous.com/miami-news-the-god-of-skeptics

For more than 60 years, "the Amazing Randi" has performed magic, debunked psychics, and discussed the perils of all things paranormal. He has debunked more than 100 psychics and faith healers in a quest to rid the world of hucksters. It has also made him the subject of scorn among purveyors of the paranormal, true believers who say Randi has made himself rich, pulling in nearly $200,000 a year from his foundation, at the expense of others' careers.

Now, however, Randi's work might be in jeopardy. His foundation has been hemorrhaging money, and Randi, who has spent his career challenging the notion of an afterlife, now faces his own mortality. He has intestinal cancer and might not have long to live. Randi has been a commanding presence for four decades, but it's unclear who could fill his role as the face of the skeptic community.

The skeptical movement is way bigger than James Randi.

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Tue, 25 Aug 2009 03:35:00 -0700 Our theories may be wrong?!? That IS Good News. http://awmitchell.posterous.com/mystery-of-the-missing-mini-galaxies-space-24 http://awmitchell.posterous.com/mystery-of-the-missing-mini-galaxies-space-24
Media_httpwwwnewscientistcomdataimagesnscmsmg20327220300mg203272203001300jpg_hadqhvjihblngcb

Fantastic item from http://www.newscientist.com/this evening. Mystery of the missing mini-galaxies explores an issue with the number of mini-galaxies orbiting our Milky Way galaxy.

As far as we can tell, barely 25 straggly satellites loiter forlornly around the outskirts of the Milky Way. “We see only about 1 per cent of the predicted number of satellite galaxies,” says Pavel Kroupa of the University of Bonn in Germany. “It is the cleanest case in which we can see there is something badly wrong with our standard picture of the origin of galaxies.”

And another issue had been reported earlier where

… most of those galaxies orbit the Milky Way in an unexpected manner and that, taken together, their results are at odds with mainstream cosmology. There is “only one way” to explain the results, says Kroupa: “Gravity has to be stronger than predicted by Newton.”

This latest data is a problem for ‘cold dark matter’ theories which predicted many times more satellite galaxies than have been found. The data supports modified gravity theories.

It’s great for science when evidence mounts that current established theories, such as Newtonian Gravity, need modification. Science is a process that re-works theories to fit all available data. Evidence from nature is the only supreme truth. No theory about how things work is ever accepted as 100% certain and it’s good to be sceptical of current theories no matter how well they may fit available data. When science runs into an uncomfortable truth, it is scientific theories that bend. Science does not bend the evidence to fit the orthodoxy.

Readers may care to consider for themselves how this process differs from theological practice.

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