CharonY

Yet the article seems to address entirely different issues that you have brought forth so far. For starters, you have argued against bias in science, yet this article suggest subjectivity, i.e. a major source of bias, needs to be included. The reasoning is that it is an integral part that allows It is mostly a philosophical treatise and there is unfortunately not a lot on the practicalities in how it can or should be implemented. Also, it deals with a high-level idea on information and from what I see tries to include thoughts that are closer to social science methodologies. Unfortunately, it does not seem that this approach has been demonstrated to provide good applications in natural sciences (perhaps aside from more abstract areas such as information theory?).

There is an infinite amount of nonsense and a finite amount of sense. If you give both the same amount of time, you are elevating nonsense. It only makes sense if nonsense has already been elevated in public consciousness so that it has to be addressed. For example, if you wanted to teach history, you would focus on things that happened rather spending time explaining that cowboys did not, in fact fight aliens. Cancel culture did not need encouraging, it was always there. It only appeared more broadly due to social media. In the past, the groups shaping what was cancelled were just smaller. Carlin had a famous routine regarding the seven dirty words. As such, I think complaints regarding cancel culture (from Dawkins and others) often miss the mark and I really wished that it would be replaced by a more meaningful discussion.

Not to mention that at best all the examples can be put into the psychology section, which is not really part of natural sciences (there are overlaps, but for a big chunk their methodologies align more with social sciences). It surely sounds like an extreme form of selective reading and wild extrapolation here. A geographer got the bend of a local river wrong. I am sure that also applies to quantum mechanics.

Not true. Authors pay the fees. Usually they secure grants for the purpose.

Food in Europe is tested which provides safety (and luckily EU levels are on the stricter side) , but there is increasing concern that also in Europe grain and maize can be increasingly contaminated ( beyond what is already the case). Does not affect PB as long as food testing is done. But in recent years recalls due to exceeding mycotoxins limits have increased. But you are right if it wasn't there already due to contamination, you probably will notice mold before dealing with the toxins (there is arguably a transition period where some mold may be invisible to the naked eye while toxins might be able to do low level harm). I think my overall off topic (and preachy) point is that dangers to the food chain are often way closer than we intuitively think.

I think prevalence of the fungus in Europe, incl. UK. However, all things considered, it is more likely found in a damp and forgotten corner in your home than in you peanut butter jar. If we talk specifically about aspergillosis rather than general fungal infections, the highest in Europe are in Greece and Ireland, UK is a bit lower. Mexico is a bit lower than UK, and the lowest surveyed are Canada, Russia, Sri Lanka and Portugal. It is likely not only weather but also how homes are built.

You have it backwards. In science, if things have merit, they go somewhere (eventually). If they are going nowhere for a long period of time it fundamentally means that either a) folks worked on it and found nothing and abandoned that line of thought or b) the evidence that it might be something is so weak, that folks ultimately see no merit in spending time and effort studying something that goes nowhere. Ideas are cheap, but actually working on it is where a random thought becomes science. Conversely, if something doesn't move much, it means that the foundation has been rock solid. Also, if you think there has been no rethinking in evolution, you really have not even scratched the surface of literature. However, the high level basics still hold true, because that it is how things happen. So for example Darwin was not wrong, he just had a lot of gaps and some have been closed during modern synthesis and folks are ever pushing evolutionary questions that have not been solved yet. Your examples are individual articles, not a review on field. You have been mostly talking about observations, not research directions. As mentioned above, it has to lead to something specific to be investigated. I can write a paper and postulate that mitochondria are the source of souls and if I get the right articles and/or reviewers I might even get published. It does not mean that it leads itself to a research program, especially if it does not make it clear how to study it. Again, postulating things or throwing out idea is cheap. There are expected to be fewer the more we figure out. If there are constant paradigm shifts, it would suggest we know too little to develop paradigms in the first place. But even so, smaller shifts happen all the time, but they apply to areas in a field and rarely to whole fields. On big shift for example is the issue of low reproducibility in certain types of research (e.g. psych) and how to address this issue. Edit: I think an underlying issue in this discussion is that your view how science should work is at odds with the methodology. In order to get as close to reality as we can, we whittle down ideas and prune away things that do not match data. In other words, the whole scientific process is to reduce all possible hypotheses to the most likely ones. If we go and throw away everything every time has a minute idea, there simply would be no progress.

Generally speaking, I would advise to confer with supervisor regarding basic lab tasks. The reason for that is that you and your lab have to be in sync when it comes to basic procedures as miscommunication will jeopardize any analyses you want to do. Based on your question you might be a bit confused how molarities are calculated (i.e. your question regarding 1L water and changing it to 800 mL does not make much sense to me, especially if you want to make 7.5 mL of the buffer). The other issue is that tris-base has a pKa of around 8. It is unclear how you want to reach a pH of 10.5, especially with HCl.

Do you understand the concept of likelihood? Uh, I suggest you take a look at how proteins are formed... Uh, nope.

I disagree with this premise. I think what you do not quite appreciate is that there are things that are well-established and things that are still under investigation. Among the former, the key elements have been investigated so thoroughly that most reasonable folks with knowledge simply have no objections to the assumption. To a lay person it might seem like homogeneity, but it is really just because hundreds or thousands of scientists worked on that view and that it all the alternative explanations have been effective discarded because of the accumulated evidence. The laws of thermodynamics are such an example, in hundred of years no one really managed to challenge them meaningfully, so it makes a lot of sense to start with them as a given. Similarly, you probably would not want to consider flat Earth as a reasonable starting point. no This does not make sense. If you have a model it has to allow for predictions under the situation covered by your model. Data measured under those conditions either fall in line with the prediction or they don't. In the latter case you have to revise your model. This does not make sense. Either the field is fringe, which basically just means that not a lot of folks are interested in it (could be for a lot reason, personal interest, difficulty or insufficiently developed to do proper science). Or it is a field in which case by definition it is not fringe. I don't know either. But there are quite a few papers on near death experiences. Probably just not discussing it in a way that you find attractive. Natural science deals with the material world. It would be weird to criticize something, which is the basis for your work. It is likely trying build a religion but decide that humans have no place in it and only squirrels are allowed to follow it. I have worked with hundreds of scientists who are not famous (and I am certainly not myself). You should define mainstream here. If you mean with areas that are obscure, you are likely wrong. I know specialists in very weird and specific fields that do not make much sense to me, but they still follow scientific approaches. If you mean that they are doing non-mainstream approaches then I refer you to my above comment regarding rigor. If you cannot show that your approach is scientifically sound, folks will not consider it much more than unscientific guessing. When I develop a new method, I have to compare it with existing best practices. I cannot just make something up. This seems like a random statement without context. There are many scientists working on various aspects of consciousness. Probably someone should tell them that it is somehow bas for their careers. You are missing the point that some things are well established and some other parts (which are usually the key elements of the paper) are novel. But to understand the novelty you have to understand the field. If you have only a cursory understanding (if at all) it may not look like a difference to you. What I am sensing is that you have an assumption regarding science that confuses you, and it is clear that you would need more understanding of a given field (rather than superficial in multiple) to get a sense what is really going on.

By investigating methodologies and figuring out where in a given experiment or method bias can creep in and how to avoid that. The outcome is what we generally refer to as best practice. That is why a certain rigidity is presence of science and why if you come up with an entirely new approach, you have to provide evidence that your approach has less error than prevailing one. Otherwise it will get dismissed. This is also why I mentioned earlier that more rigour will throw out more claims rather than allowing more to prevail. No, if you have a group of three scientists, you likely have at least four competing worldviews. They may have similar levels of training, though the form is very discipline-dependent. A mathematician will have little experimental training, but might be able to tell you why your statistical analysis of your data is stupid. Again, rigour requires understanding of potential issues. By definition, it narrows it down to established best practices. Generally speaking, we do not want to entirely throw out new ideas if they might have merit, that is why some speculation is permissible. If you solidify it, you are more likely to reduce diversity.

Almost all our behaviour is a combination of a genetic basis, that kind of forms a certain baseline, but, especially when the brain is involved, environmental exposures, learning and other feedback modulates the outcome (after all, the brain requires input to develop). So the question of nature vs nurture is, based on what we now know, mostly nonsensical. There is no versus, there is an end. The only part that is often unknown is how much. Also note that many of these non-genetic exposures can happen before birth- exposure to hormones but also chemicals in the womb affect early neuronal development. And yes, homosexuality has been observed in at least 1,500 species, suggesting that it is a common, low-frequency outcome of how sexuality is wired https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-019-1019-7. There have been quite a lot hypotheses why it may arise, and why genes favouring homosexuality persist. Note that genetics is not a 1:1 carbon copy of traits. Combination of genes can result in a wide diversity of traits which can be quite different from the parent. If it wasn't, there wouldn't be any benefit to sexual reproduction and we would more likely continue to procreate e.g. via parthenogenesis. What seems to be the case in humans is that the foundation of sexual orientation is laid early in childhood and, once developed, it is fairly stable. I think it is not yet known if and how much flexibility there is in the developmental path to sexual (and other) identity. There are suggestions that events in early fetal development already could be an important factor. One clue is the fact at least in men, the birth order sees to have a highly reproducible impact. Across many groups men with same-sex attraction have a greater number of older brothers, than heterosexual men. One hypothesis is that had a male child have some sort of immune response that creates antibodies specific to protein involved in male brain development. These antibodies increase with each male fetus and somehow increase the likelihood of developing same-sex preferences. There is some vague support for that (mostly the enrichment of antibodies against certain fetal proteins in mothers with multiple male children), but evidence remains at the correlation stage. So in short, it is complicated and not resolved yet.

I think the main (and off the top of my head only) issue with the case is that the criminality of it hinged on a state law that has not been tested yet (or in other words, it was tested in this case). The law in question (basically prohibiting conspiring in the use of unlawful means to influence election). Without that, he would have been (clearly) guilty of misdemeanors only. The actual acts and their role in the violations on the other hand were fairly clear (and apparently perceived as such by the jury). But this does not stop the GOP from pretending to be stupid and even those with legal training claiming that no one knows what he is being accused of (which is of course preposterous).

And it also should be added that these markers are usually linked to location and time. So for example a dark skinned person in the caribbean will more likely to share those markers with a light-skinned person in that region (assuming their ancestors lived there for an extended time) than with a random dark-skinned person in, say, Madagaskar. And to add a cherry on top, the group with the largest genetic diversity are groups in Africa. So putting all dark skinned folks into single group is utterly nonsensical. But then coherence is probably too much to expect from someone who on the one hand emphasizes a soul over the physical body but then two paragraphs further forgets all about it and then overemphasizes superficial features. "We are all souls! Except when you got curly hair!"

Though generally speaking, I never really found a meaningful difference on the undergrad level. Perhaps the one thing is that many top programs are able to delay grade inflation more as they have more applicants. Maybe there is more in other disciplines that I am missing.

Thanks for that info, very interesting- I was not aware of the details just the general sense among (some) social scientists. The issue with terms such as "Bushman" arises from the fact that folks (typically colonizers) invented those names for them. Even if (that is sometimes a bit if) it is not intended in a derogatory way, the argument is that it takes away from their identity. In some cases naming groups is just a language thing (e.g. countries are named differently in different language) and that is OK as it still refers to e.g. a certain geographic origin or identity that makes sense. But giving a group a name that is basically made up and based on some outsiders perception of them, that is where things generally get iffy. I should add that from what I understand even San falls under the same issue- it is just less evocative for English speakers. So I am not saying that these things are straightforward- just the way it was used in this thread by a certain poster was really telling.

The opposite is going to happen, if you want to address bias, you have to increase rigour. I.e. you throw out more of the perhaps in order to ensure that you only keep the most scrutinized parts. There is always a balance between how many false positives to false negatives do we want to have. But if you think bias is a problem, it means we have to scrutinize more, not less.

Also, he would post it on social media how clever he was for doing that, resulting in yet another lawsuit.

They also have learned that the simple act of repeating falsehoods can make things "feel" real (which apparently is the current benchmark of things). Essentially all bases are covered. If it is a fine or probation, it is evidence that the whole thing is a witch hunt and no big deal in the first place. They are being persecuted (which apparently everyone wants to be and therefore feels real). If he gets the maximum sentence, it is clearly evidence of a witch hunt and shows that conservatives are persecuted. As apparently nothing exists beyond short-term memory (and I have doubts about that), one cane remodel reality at any moment, which is incredibly convenient if one does not want to take personal responsibility for anything. I feel like that folks think folks think that politicians have to do this complicated maneuvering and mind manipulation and so one to get folks on their side. Meanwhile current predominantly right-wing populists realized that just making stuff up on the spot works even better. Having no shame somehow became a superpower over the years. Missed that part earlier, but IIRC in the US, criminal cases does not allow for majority convictions (that would only work for civil cases). I.e. the verdict had to be unanimous, otherwise it would be considered a hung jury. I think Cruz in an interview mentioned something to the effect that one of the jurors should stand up and take one for the team to create a mistrial. Which basically tells you all you need to know about their regard for law and order.

I think the arguments also conflate two very different things. One, individual bias of researchers. These are addressed by best practices that, depending on field and question can reduce or eliminate biases, whereas in newer and fast-moving fields it might still take time to identify those best practices. The other aspect is just flawed or bad science, which does not necessarily arise from anything like bias but could be malicious, but also just based on incomplete data. These are also getting weeded out over time as new data arises. What Luc seems to propose is that because things are not perfect, we should just ignore the existing body of knowledge, which obviously does not make sense.

One thing related to perception: the USA has some of the largest federal expenditures relative to GDP in the world >3%). There are a number of European countries e.g. Germany, Sweden, Switzerland who are at similar or higher levels. However, due to the large GDP of the USA, in absolute terms it is a larger chunk of money that they can concentrate on prestige projects. In that regard, countries like Canada and UK (~1.6%) are falling behind even relative to the European average (~2%). I will also note that quite a bit of that is also pop culture and the US universities do quite a lot of PR work (which is largely absent in Europe).

Nope, even in the US tuition usually does not cover the cost of teaching. In public unis, each student is still subsidized by public monies. Tuition just covers the short fall. Similarly, the largest chunk of money in private unis are endowements. The only group making money from tuition are for-profits, but their quality is so bad, it is often around scam levels. I forgot the precise numbers, but I think tuition covers roughly 30-60% of the cost per student. So tuition does not provide excess funding.

I am not saying that there is no bias in science, there are plenty examples for that and how it created bad science (most notably around issues of race, for example). But, as you know that is not my point- rather that arguing about interpretations requires a deep knowledge of, well, what is known. And there are plenty of cases where the data simply does not rule out alternate interpretation. But obviously Bohr and Heisenberg disagreeing is not the same thing as a random youtuber deciding that infection biology is all wrong. Uh, must have missed it. I had to walk my partridge.

Yeah, but that also shows where the standard is. The evidence, especially the paper trail and the almost grotesquely inept way where they tried to conceal it. Adding to how the defense basically put themselves on fire, likely in an attempt to appease Trump, even a hung jury (not guilty was pretty much out of the window) would have been at least a major surprise.

Well, the issue is that if there is no trial until election and he wins, the federal prosecutions are likely to go away. Well, that is true.