Dear Ferret Folks-

Yesterday, someone posted:

>Know your sources? Certainly! And realize that a scientific study is
>NOT a representation of the real world!

Um...yeah, it is...in it's proper context of reproducable results.
The scientific method does not *exist* outside of replicability. This
means that any study whose results cannot be replicated, seen by others
experimentally has no value, does not represent the "real world."
Remember a few years back when someone claimed to have experimentally
produced "Cold fusion" in a lab setting? Cold fusion would be the end
all solution to our planet's energy needs. It's like the Holy Grail,
constantly sought after. There was a huge media hoopla. Then, other
scientists studied the paper the claimants published, used the same
substances, same techniques described, and nobody to date has ever even
come *close* to creating cold fusion. And the original claimants have
never been able to display proof of the existence of cold fusion. As
in, to date, there is no proof of any method that will yield cold
fusion. In the "real world" that you and I inhabit, it is still an
idea. Nobody can create it.

Now, if scientists could take the original "recipe" described by the
original claimants and whip up a batch whenever they wanted, we would
say that cold fusion existed, and here is how you go about it. The
results of the original claimant's study would be replicable. Saying
you have the technology to make a pan of brownies, and here is my study
proving it has NO Scientific value if nobody else on the planet can
make brownies using your recipe. Unless you cough up a pan of brownies
to show the scientific community, you have NO proof that your claims
are "real." One of the things that scientists do *all the time* is try
to reproduce the results of someone else's study to see if the original
claim holds up. If it doesn't, there is no proof of the original claim.

This applies to experiments in cold fusion, brownies,(materials
science!) and ferrets. This is science. This is what we can see, what
we can do, the results that we can *reproduce.* This is the essence
of what we define as "real." Science, like everything else, is not
perfect. But cherry-picking the studies that agree or disagree with our
own personal views is not perfect either. Be very careful when you come
across any "new scientific breakthrough" in the media these days. The
media picks up on an important claim and prints it as being completely
valid, long before the real nuts and bolts work has been done by
scientists around the world, testing to see if the claimed results
are reproducable. People hear it on CNN, and assume it must be "real."
They saw it on the news after all, right? Wrong.

Alexandra in MX 
Only slightly dead today. Feeling much better. Think I'll go for a
walk.

[Posted in FML 6247]