Maths becomes biology's magic number • Hacker News Board

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#11

Post by inopinatus » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 2:57 AM UTC

catnaroek wrote: post #10

inopinatus wrote: post #9

Mathematics can spoil you in some ways. It's all very well to show that your longitudinal treatment study rejected a null hypothesis at p of 0.05 or better. It's another to prove that a theorem is true in all possible universes. I'm married to a doctor and we have medical/science friends so I regularly have the pleasure of wielding my mathematician's overbearing sense of superiority when it comes to standards of proo…

Science doesn't have "standards of proof" because it doesn't have proofs in the first place, nor is it supposed to. Also, when you say "in all possible universes", do you actually mean "in all models of mathematical theory"?

That is my cue in this particular dinner party to accuse you of being a philosopher, or worse, a lawyer, and flourish the quip about the wastepaper basket.

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#12

Post by vacri » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 3:19 AM UTC

inopinatus wrote: post #9

Mathematics can spoil you in some ways. It's all very well to show that your longitudinal treatment study rejected a null hypothesis at p of 0.05 or better. It's another to prove that a theorem is true in all possible universes. I'm married to a doctor and we have medical/science friends so I regularly have the pleasure of wielding my mathematician's overbearing sense of superiority when it comes to standards of proo…

And so you rule in the virtual world of your own mind, while your medical friends are actually making a difference in the observable world, using good science that merely doesn't reach the mathematical proof level.

Biology and medicine often get besmirched by 'hard' science people and mathematicians, but you never see any of those besmirchers actually come up with pragmatic solutions to the problems biologists face.

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#13

Post by Xcelerate » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 4:03 AM UTC

Mathematics and computer science are slowly taking over every other field. I would hazard a guess that it's just a matter of time before psychology meets the same fate. The goal would be to develop predictive models that can solve personal problems — depression, addiction, anxiety, etc. Eventually, machine learning will be able to do this better than people (exactly how much time until this occurs is hotly contested though).

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#14

Post by wyager » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 4:08 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #12

inopinatus wrote: post #9

Mathematics can spoil you in some ways. It's all very well to show that your longitudinal treatment study rejected a null hypothesis at p of 0.05 or better. It's another to prove that a theorem is true in all possible universes. I'm married to a doctor and we have medical/science friends so I regularly have the pleasure of wielding my mathematician's overbearing sense of superiority when it comes to standards of proo…

And so you rule in the virtual world of your own mind, while your medical friends are actually making a difference in the observable world, using good science that merely doesn't reach the mathematical proof level. Biology and medicine often get besmirched by 'hard' science people and mathematicians, but you never see any of those besmirchers actually come up with pragmatic solutions to the problems biologists face.

> but you never see any of those besmirchers actually come up with pragmatic solutions to the problems biologists face.

You may be interested to know that all statistical methods originate in pure math.

The "mathematicians don't do anything real" meme is even more inane than the accusation that biological science can't be rigorous.

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#15

Post by qud » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 4:19 AM UTC

GarrisonPrime wrote: post #4

As a physician who was a mathematics major in undergrad, I completely agree. An astonishing amount of biology is rather mechanistic, systematic, and logical. I feel my math (and minor programming) experience trained my brain in such a way as to understand complex biological interactions more intuitively. I'm not bragging here, but while I was actually understanding the theories behind what we were learning, on a fund…

How did you transition from a Maths/Programming undergrad to doing medicine? I'm doing Computer engineering and plan to do go into medicine later, any tips?

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#16

Post by qud » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 4:21 AM UTC

Xcelerate wrote: post #13

Mathematics and computer science are slowly taking over every other field. I would hazard a guess that it's just a matter of time before psychology meets the same fate. The goal would be to develop predictive models that can solve personal problems — depression, addiction, anxiety, etc. Eventually, machine learning will be able to do this better than people (exactly how much time until this occurs is hotly contested…

It already is! Cognitive psychology (currently the largest field in psychology) has strong connections with Neuroscience and in many cases Computational Neuroscience, which is just engineering and mathematical modelling of the brain.

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#17

Post by vacri » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 5:30 AM UTC

wyager wrote: post #14

vacri wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And so you rule in the virtual world of your own mind, while your medical friends are actually making a difference in the observable world, using good science that merely doesn't reach the mathematical proof level. Biology and medicine often get besmirched by 'hard' science people and mathematicians, but you never see any of those besmirchers actually come up with pragmatic solutions to the problems biologists face.

> but you never see any of those besmirchers actually come up with pragmatic solutions to the problems biologists face. You may be interested to know that all statistical methods originate in pure math. The "mathematicians don't do anything real" meme is even more inane than the accusation that biological science can't be rigorous.

I am very aware about statistical methods originating in mathematics - I did statistics every semester as part of my biology degree. Indeed, half the reason why the mathematics department existed at my university was to support the biological sciences.

You may be interested to know that my point is that you don't need mathematical proofs to have a pragmatic, beneficial effect - and while the OP is sitting there feeling smug, the others at that dinner table are actually out there reducing pain and disorder in the people around them. Some medical tools are completely impossible without maths - MRIs are the poster child for this - but feeling superior because "my field uses proofs and yours doesn't" is just obnoxious. This vid link is about teachers rather than medicos, but it's the same sitation; a response to the smug one denigrating the others at the dinner table, because those others don't match up to a very narrow standard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxsOVK4syxU

Besides, as the saying goes: "In theory, there is no difference between practice and theory. In practice, there is".

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#18

Post by evoloution » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 5:58 AM UTC

GarrisonPrime wrote: post #4

As a physician who was a mathematics major in undergrad, I completely agree. An astonishing amount of biology is rather mechanistic, systematic, and logical. I feel my math (and minor programming) experience trained my brain in such a way as to understand complex biological interactions more intuitively. I'm not bragging here, but while I was actually understanding the theories behind what we were learning, on a fund…

You have a valid point. I felt that my love for math and algorithmic thinking (although not part of a formal curriculum) have been very helpful. Medicine is more like engineering than most people think. Keep in mind though that everything looks like a nail to a hammer. The same way they lacked in some way, you lack too. Unless you expand your knowledge base in the end you will be limited in analyzing similarly generated data with slightly better ways, as is so often seen in the literature. At the same time researchers who possess the knowledge to work "under the hood" are designing novel ways to obtain data, ask new questions and design the accompanying pipelines in the process. Where you put mathematics major feel free to insert molecular biologist/ nuclear physicist/ organic chemist/ or whatever else you like. I feel that if you really want to be spectacular and at the interface of many sciences you have to master one and have a good understanding of the others. And as a doctor you will always have it easier to lead a team for human disease research, the prestige of the degree by itself and the fact that you have actually seen what is being studied will always give you some respect if you are not a complete jerk. The bar can only be set higher and higher...

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#19

Post by llamaz » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 5:59 AM UTC

vacri wrote: post #17

wyager wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but you never see any of those besmirchers actually come up with pragmatic solutions to the problems biologists face. You may be interested to know that all statistical methods originate in pure math. The "mathematicians don't do anything real" meme is even more inane than the accusation that biological science can't be rigorous.

I am very aware about statistical methods originating in mathematics - I did statistics every semester as part of my biology degree. Indeed, half the reason why the mathematics department existed at my university was to support the biological sciences. You may be interested to know that my point is that you don't need mathematical proofs to have a pragmatic, beneficial effect - and while the OP is sitting there feeli…

I think he/she is just being playful and humorous. But since I'm studying math along side EE, I feel like I should comment about the role (or lack thereof) of proof in practical applications.

MRIs fall into the field of electrical engineering, and EEs generally don't understand the math they use. e.g. when working with medical imaging the radon transform is used, which would require a post graduate mathematical education to understand.

That's why it annoys me when the math/physics types think that if they don't make it in academia they can "fall back on engineering", even though they're studying something completely different.

By the time you get to 4th year math, you will be able to prove things about the existence and uniqueness of the Fourier transform. That's one way to understand it. On the other hand, you use Fourier transform (more specifically, the frequency domain), from first year EE - you can see the frequency spectrum on an oscilloscope. That's another way of understanding the Fourier transform.

Re: Maths becomes biology's magic number

#20

Post by llamaz » Sat, Oct 15, 2016, 6:03 AM UTC

davidf18 wrote: post #8

I'm a physician with BS EE/CS. The problem solving skills and the view of systems certainly helped understanding biology/medicine mechanistically. I actually keep track of doctors with undergrad degrees in math/engineering because I've noticed we do see medicine differently than our colleagues who did not have this training. I work with health analytics and knowing both worlds is unquestionably helpful. Interestingly…

What fields of medicine do you think are particularly suited to the mindsets of EE/CS/Math people? I would think "memorisers" would be best at general practitice.