301–310 of 639 posts
Amazing that bit about child welfare organisations fighting against the science, when clearly taking children away based on false accusations is clearly far worse for the child’s welfare, not to mention the parents’! It’s just incredible the injustice that can be done in the name of protecting children. I really do wonder if it’s cultural or some kind of innate psychological irrarionality that seems stronger in some…
> Amazing that bit about child welfare organisations fighting against the science, when clearly taking children away based on false accusations is clearly far worse for the child’s welfare, not to mention the parents’! This is just speculation, but I bet those groups (or their members) aren't always calmly and coolly trying to find the best policies protect the welfare of children. Instead they feel themselves on a k…
It's interesting the instance cited about authors of a scientific paper being compelled to remove a reference because a peer reviewer alleged that the researcher behind it is "a lousy and dishonest researcher". What's more interesting is that PLOS ONE repeated the allegation. I am curious whether there is a case for defamation for the publication of such an allegation. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/peerRe…
I have recommended some citations to be removed as a reviewer. It’s not useful to keep citing discredited articles that should have been retracted. Keeping them in new articles just makes them more likely to be read uncritically and further propagate bullshit.
OTOH, the argument is “the article is rubbish”, not some kind of as hominem attack because I don’t like the main author.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> - Medical science handles variation by simply assuming that large enough samples will average out variation. This loses a ton of information as the “average person” is a construct that almost certainly doesn’t exist. Well, this wouldn't even be that bad, if sample size were actually large enough.
No I think the point that was being made is that the "average person" idea is not that great if you have huge variance. If I have a uniform distribution from 0 to 1, average is '0.5', but its just as likely to get 0. or 1.
My point goes beyond that one: yes, variance is a problem. But _even_ _just_ getting good averages, for all their faults, requires a bigger n than many studies have. Especially observational studies.
Amazing that bit about child welfare organisations fighting against the science, when clearly taking children away based on false accusations is clearly far worse for the child’s welfare, not to mention the parents’! It’s just incredible the injustice that can be done in the name of protecting children. I really do wonder if it’s cultural or some kind of innate psychological irrarionality that seems stronger in some…
> It’s just incredible the injustice that can be done in the name of protecting children Whatever it is: - If it's in the name of protecting the children, odds are it is not justice. - If it is not justice, at some point the excuse will be to protect the children
I don't think this is a very solid maxim. It seems to imply things other than justice can only occur if protecting children is a claimed motive.
When I was getting ready to turn dad for the first time, I read a few books on pregnancy, children and parenting. My trust on medicine dropped substantially when I discovered that doctors have poor notion of statistics, so they take for granted improper studies results. I remember one classic one is the "no coffee when pregnant", the study says this causes problems, the test was performed on rats and by feeding them…
> I remember one classic one is the "no coffee when pregnant", the study says this causes problems, the test was performed on rats and by feeding them coffee in the amount of 3/4 of their body weight. We can agree that with this amount, it's reasonable it could cause problems. Very different from one cup of coffee though. Honestly I don't know which study you're talking about, and I'm not trying to question what you'…
> I couldn’t live with this uncertainty any longer. But first, I had to get my son back. As a precautionary measure, the hospital followed mandatory reporting statutes and my wife and I temporarily lost custody of David. Thanks to our incredibly effective defense lawyer, we were cleared of all charges within two months, during which we stayed at the hospital 24/7 with David until we sorted out the legal procedures. I…
Is the criminal justice system in France based on a presumption of innonce?
A bit like temporary restraining orders pending trial in the US.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems like the bias is on your part… Which is ironic, given the articles content…. Or do you have _evidence_?
Not everything comes with evidence, nor is everything a court case. If you have experienced racism again and again though, you can often tell when you see it, or you can quite safely deduce it in a case or wrong treatment, even without hard proof.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Then he lost five pounds. He still felt better than he ever had and neither of us were concerned. His medical team implied I was in danger of being reported to children's services as an abusive mother. But wasn't that valid cause for concern, especially for someone who should be a growing boy? If being underweight was a serious medical concern for him, losing 5 pounds seems like a big flashing red warning that some…
You are missing the part where I harmed his health to comply with their expectations. He was fine and does better on a high quality diet than on a junk food diet. Weight isn't the only metric that matters.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's just people "doing their jobs" and trying to get ahead. That's the banality of evil.
Lest we forget the very systems enabling this behavior of banal evil were created and maintained by perhaps the most evil of them all.