Posted on 07/22/2009 7:26:42 PM PDT by Titus Quinctius Cincinnatus
Scientists at Penn State and the National Institute of Genetics in Japan have demonstrated that several statistical methods commonly used by biologists to detect natural selection at the molecular level tend to produce incorrect results.
"Our finding means that hundreds of published studies on natural selection may have drawn incorrect conclusions," said Masatoshi Nei, Penn State Evan Pugh Professor of Biology and the team's leader. The team's results will be published in the Online Early Edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences during the week ending Friday, April 3, 2009 and also in the journal's print edition at a later date.
Nei said that many scientists who examine human evolution have used faulty statistical methods in their studies and, as a result, their conclusions could be wrong. For example, in one published study the scientists used a statistical method to demonstrate pervasive natural selection during human evolution.
"This group documented adaptive evolution in many genes expressed in the brain, thyroid and placenta, which are assumed to be important for human evolution," said Masafumi Nozawa, a postdoctoral fellow at Penn State and one of the paper's authors. "But if the statistical method that they used is not reliable, then their results also might not be reliable," added Nei. "Of course, we would never say that natural selection is not happening, but we are saying that these statistical methods can lead scientists to make erroneous inferences," he said.
(Excerpt) Read more at live.psu.edu ...
And then another straw word, could, maybe might, meaningless conjectures. A fog maybe could fly if he had wings. LOL
Answer: Because creationists don't perform peer-reviewed research and creationism isn't science.
So now peer review is the criteria for whether something is *science* now?
Too bad for Newton, Kepler, Copernicus, Curie, Pasteur, Mendel, who didn't get their work peer reviewed.
I though peer review was all a joke anyway, along with all conventional scientific research methodology (including this one).
/kənˈdʒɛktʃər/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [kuhn-jek-cher] Show IPA noun, verb, -tured, -tur⋅ing.
Use conjecture in a Sentence
noun 1. the formation or expression of an opinion or theory without sufficient evidence for proof.
2. an opinion or theory so formed or expressed; guess; speculation.
3. Obsolete. the interpretation of signs or omens.
verb (used with object)
4. to conclude or suppose from grounds or evidence insufficient to ensure reliability.
verb (used without object)
5. to form conjectures. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Let's examine my statement to demonstrate where you went wrong. I said "creationists don't perform peer-reviewed research and creationism isn't science." I did not say "creationists don't perform peer-reviewed research, therefore creationism isn't science." See the difference?
Of course peer review is not the definition of science. However, if a modern area of study wholly lacks a peer review process (as does creationism) it is a gigantic red flag that it probably is not producing work that fits any modern notion of "science."
I hope this clears things up for you.
The whole sentence didn’t make sense, not the word *conjecture*.
What’s a *fog* anyway, that if could fly it it had wings?
“In the first place, the editors of journals like Science or Nature refuse such research because of their a priori bias against it.”
—Can you supply such an article? I’d like to read an article that was refused for that reason.
Is there some other method you think would be better?
Either you accept all published research, or none of it, or you view it all with a wary eye. Me, I view it with a wary eye. I believe things can be known in this universe, but I dont accept the first thing that gets spit out by some PhD somewhere.
I don't see either accepting or rejecting all of it out of hand as being practical. If it's all being treated the same, then this research is just as questionable as the natural selection studies it says may be wrong.
Yeah, a scientific paper reviewed in Nature is the same as a creationist paper "reviewed" by the staff scientician at the creationist museum.
Actually, you can get a good debate going on the conclusions of creation science research, as long as you base any objections to their conclusions on scripture.
I also believe its true that Nature does not accept research papers studying the effect of evil spirits on the body’s four humours.
Thousands of articles touting creation rationalization on AiG, etc., consist of laughable tripe. Where’s that post?
Evolution and Christianity are perfectly compatible.
Wonder if the illegitimate president will be calling all those past scientists “stupid”.
Perhaps you should explain to the believers in evolution that there are no Darwinists or Darwinism since they use those terms to refer to themselves.
Could you please be so kind as to provide an example?
Again with the misdirection, I was pointing out by overlooking that part of the article the poster was setting up a straw man.
“Description of Straw Man
The Straw Man fallacy is committed when a person simply ignores a person’s actual position and substitutes a distorted, exaggerated or misrepresented version of that position. This sort of “reasoning” has the following pattern:
1. Person A has position X.
2. Person B presents position Y (which is a distorted version of X).
3. Person B attacks position Y.
4. Therefore X is false/incorrect/flawed.
This sort of “reasoning” is fallacious because attacking a distorted version of a position simply does not constitute an attack on the position itself. One might as well expect an attack on a poor drawing of a person to hurt the person.”
As of today you have yet to provide a direct answer to any question that I have asked, other than to fall back on your Temple of Darwin fallacy.
So the avoidance of questions you cannot answer, misdirection, straw men, and ridicule are the only things I see creationist use. But then when that is the best that you have I guess you have to go with it.
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