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How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

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Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#111

Post by dmix »

michaelbarton wrote: post #108
svara wrote: post #100

A super interesting article, but the title is pure clickbait. In this day and age, feeding into the narrative that science is just another competitive team sport where people compete with whatever means necessary is downright dangerous. Reality is much more nuanced, and the article actually does a good job of detailing that. In some sense this all started from the very beginning, from when Alzheimer's disease (AD) wa…

> science is just another competitive team sport where people compete with whatever means necessary Just one data point, but in my experience in academia that was almost exactly how I found it. The exception that it wasn't a team sport because there's only space for one first author. My feeling is that the recognition and 'impactfulness' tied to being successful in academia are antagonistic to conducting unbiased res…

If you watched the NBA the top 5% of players/top 5 teams get 90% of the media attention. The rest who are still doing good and interesting things fight for the last 10% of the crumbs and are forever complaining they are being excluded despite performance and other factors.

It happens in a lot of places. And to be honest it’s what most of the people want and while places like r/nba are more neutral and give respect where it is due, ESPN knows the casual 12yr old knows Lebron James and Steph Curry and they recruit “talent” to only talk about them, not just what is going well for the sport as a whole.

It’s a difficult balance that is really up to the power players and the quality of leadership to get right.

With science though you’d hope far more meritocracy than big names, but sadly I believe this is a human and non-expert efficiency thing (as most people are not really experts). Some people might blame capitalism of the bio firms but they are just the sum of their people who run and fund them too.

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#112

Post by Certhas »

michaelbarton wrote: post #108
svara wrote: post #100

A super interesting article, but the title is pure clickbait. In this day and age, feeding into the narrative that science is just another competitive team sport where people compete with whatever means necessary is downright dangerous. Reality is much more nuanced, and the article actually does a good job of detailing that. In some sense this all started from the very beginning, from when Alzheimer's disease (AD) wa…

> science is just another competitive team sport where people compete with whatever means necessary Just one data point, but in my experience in academia that was almost exactly how I found it. The exception that it wasn't a team sport because there's only space for one first author. My feeling is that the recognition and 'impactfulness' tied to being successful in academia are antagonistic to conducting unbiased res…

I completely agree with your second sentence, but also with the OPs statement that there is no conspiracy to suppress correct results. There is intense competition to be right. There is intense competition for funds, so being perceived to be promising is hugely important. But at the end of the day I haven't really ever seen any explicit attempts to suppress uncomfortable results.

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#113

Post by SiempreViernes »

ben_w wrote: post #81
light_hue_1 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't the same as the situation around low fat diet at all. That research is intentionally distorted by companies who want to avoid the reality of what is needed: moderation, modest calorie intake and low sugar diets. The situation in the scientific literature was always far more fluid and complicated than what was communicated to the public because industry paid to communicate only the research they wanted. htt…

The underlying cause may be completely different, but it’s probably useful to group them together under the category “ways our societies can be wrong, even if part of that society tries to correct the whole”.

Useful if you want to make a list of all the different ways, but not at all meaningfull if you want to make society steer a sensible course as they cannot be treated the same way.

I think your list needs to have religion and political game theory on it as well.

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#114

Post by aaron695 »

svara wrote: post #100

A super interesting article, but the title is pure clickbait. In this day and age, feeding into the narrative that science is just another competitive team sport where people compete with whatever means necessary is downright dangerous. Reality is much more nuanced, and the article actually does a good job of detailing that. In some sense this all started from the very beginning, from when Alzheimer's disease (AD) wa…

> There was, however, no conspiracy or "cabal". These were simply people who were convinced they were on the right track.

No one thought the weapons of mass destruction were fake and lied and said they were real.

The conspiracy was "These were simply people who were convinced they were on the right track." so did not allow competing theories.

Exactly the same with the VW emissions issue.

This is exactly how conspiracies and cabals work. They are emergent behaviour.

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#115

Post by dnautics »

svara wrote: post #100

A super interesting article, but the title is pure clickbait. In this day and age, feeding into the narrative that science is just another competitive team sport where people compete with whatever means necessary is downright dangerous. Reality is much more nuanced, and the article actually does a good job of detailing that. In some sense this all started from the very beginning, from when Alzheimer's disease (AD) wa…

I think the evidence goes deeper than that. Humans with downs syndrome, which duplicates the APP gene, evince symptoms of Alzheimer's as they reach their 40s.

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#116

Post by SiempreViernes »

melling wrote: post #75
igorkraw wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I'm all for changing funding systems I want to point out that there fact we have these scandals is the system somewhat working . Similarly to how constant criticism of the government/large corporations isn't a sign of rot, but of a system where improvements are still possible -as long as someone is pointing out the problems you can fix them. And science is not supposed to be immune to this, the culture of scien…

Hopefully as China comes online, and eventually India, we’ll get a lot more research globally with more ideas. In an earlier submission I made, Peter Thiel, etc discuss how global research is changing in general: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21906424

I wouldn't count on China to provide lots of free research while it further turns into an etno-nationalist dictatorship. For India we better hope that democracy survives the next 5 years of Modi government, because the signs are they want some of that eton-nationalism themselves.

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#117

Post by resoluteteeth »

allovernow wrote: post #31

>scientists whose ideas fell outside the dogma recounted how, for decades, believers in the dominant hypothesis suppressed research on alternative ideas: They influenced what studies got published in top journals, which scientists got funded, who got tenure, and who got speaking slots at reputation-buffing scientific conferences Not quite in topic, but Is it really such a stretch to acknowledge that the same forces i…

> Not quite in topic, but Is it really such a stretch to acknowledge that the same forces in academia might bias climate science too? Except as another commenter pointed out, it doesn't take a shadowy cabal. Just a strong trend that individuals can believe in for ethical or moral reasons. Even when it becomes dogmatic.

Sure, but bear in mind that in the case of the amyloid plaque hypothesis, there wasn't really any bad science going on. It's not as if false results were being published (after all the drugs kept failing in trials); the problem is simply that too many resources were focused on research based on a hypothesis that didn't pan out.

Unfortunately, if there was something similar happening with climate change that would still mean that all the published results are correct and climate change is real, but maybe too much effort is being spent on solutions that aren't realistic (e.g. carbon capture).

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#118

Post by dnautics »

aaron695 wrote: post #114
svara wrote: post #100

A super interesting article, but the title is pure clickbait. In this day and age, feeding into the narrative that science is just another competitive team sport where people compete with whatever means necessary is downright dangerous. Reality is much more nuanced, and the article actually does a good job of detailing that. In some sense this all started from the very beginning, from when Alzheimer's disease (AD) wa…

> There was, however, no conspiracy or "cabal". These were simply people who were convinced they were on the right track. No one thought the weapons of mass destruction were fake and lied and said they were real. The conspiracy was "These were simply people who were convinced they were on the right track." so did not allow competing theories. Exactly the same with the VW emissions issue. This is exactly how conspirac…

The funny thing about that conspiracy is that the WMD were real. Hussein had them, and and its true that he didn't give them up, and he refused access. Here's the but: they were found by the US, under seal exactly in the place of record according to the UN. It's pretty clear that Hussein wasn't actively developing it anymore.

http://www.nbcnews.com/id/25546334

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#119

Post by SiempreViernes »

missosoup wrote: post #43
allovernow wrote: post #31

>scientists whose ideas fell outside the dogma recounted how, for decades, believers in the dominant hypothesis suppressed research on alternative ideas: They influenced what studies got published in top journals, which scientists got funded, who got tenure, and who got speaking slots at reputation-buffing scientific conferences Not quite in topic, but Is it really such a stretch to acknowledge that the same forces i…

It's already happening. Not so much in climate science, but in climate activism. Banning plastic straws, planting trees, etc. are popular yet entirely ineffective measures. Actually effective measures like rolling out nuclear power are unpopular and yet most climate scientists agree that we're likely boned without it. I urge everyone to look at tools like [1] to get an idea of what it takes to deal with climate chang…

The real proposed solutions to reduce emissions are politically too costly, so politicians grab for straws to try to show they do anything at all.

But if you start supporting carbon tax made to decrease emissions, I'll play along with supporting nuclear.

Re: How an Alzheimer’s ‘cabal’ thwarted progress toward a cure

#120

Post by SiempreViernes »

garmaine wrote: post #27
dba7dba wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

think that scarce research funding should flow their way because giving any to other possibly-wrong approaches would be wasteful I heard someone recently tell me how using science to form views on topics (social/psychology/etc) is dangerous, because science is really about funding. AND large donors/entities who can fund science often pick science research projects that sound cool and sexy. They may not be pushing any…

What definition of “science” is this?

Reads like "science = titles of approved funding applications". One would hope people don't form opinions based on that (outside of how the funding system work).
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