Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Leukemia Has Won

alex.blog

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 196 posts

Re: Leukemia Has Won

#11

Post by delusional »

Bucephalus355 wrote: post #6

Whenever I’m studying a given topic, I like to buy maybe 6 or 7 books on it to skim-read from someplace where that’s afforable like HPB or Thriftbooks. Gives you a good overview of field and also each of the books fills in the holes of the other books. Recently did this on the topic of “cancer”. All recent books published in the last 15 years by Big 5 Publishers. Every single book had intense criticism for the NIH. I…

What is the alternative? Wild guess based research? Faith based research? I'm having a hard time envisioning how you'd design an experiment, and extract knowledge, without a hypothesis.

Re: Leukemia Has Won

#14

Post by [deleted] »

omegaworks wrote: post #9
Bucephalus355 wrote: post #6

Whenever I’m studying a given topic, I like to buy maybe 6 or 7 books on it to skim-read from someplace where that’s afforable like HPB or Thriftbooks. Gives you a good overview of field and also each of the books fills in the holes of the other books. Recently did this on the topic of “cancer”. All recent books published in the last 15 years by Big 5 Publishers. Every single book had intense criticism for the NIH. I…

>their singular focus on only funding “hypothesis based research” What is the alternative to "hypothesis-based research?"

[deleted]

Re: Leukemia Has Won

#15

Post by joshgel »

As a human it makes me so sad to read this post. I hope the rest of his life is meaningful, comfortable and pain-free.

As a doctor it makes me so mad. We talk about winning and losing against cancer like its some game or some foe personified. Just because there aren't any more chemo therapy options doesn't mean there aren't treatment options. Just because he'll be home and not in the hospital doesn't mean his doctors will stop caring for him. He and they will have different goals. Cure seems like a goal that isn't realistic anymore. But there are goals that are realistic. So I hope his doctors are trying to help him live a meaningful, comfortable and pain-free life, like they would for any other patient. And we need to make sure he doesn't think he lost anything. Its not fair and its incorrect. We need to change our language around cancer.

Read a more articulate explanation of the problem with language around cancer here: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaoncology/fullarticle/21...

Re: Leukemia Has Won

#16

Post by mattigames »

omegaworks wrote: post #9
Bucephalus355 wrote: post #6

Whenever I’m studying a given topic, I like to buy maybe 6 or 7 books on it to skim-read from someplace where that’s afforable like HPB or Thriftbooks. Gives you a good overview of field and also each of the books fills in the holes of the other books. Recently did this on the topic of “cancer”. All recent books published in the last 15 years by Big 5 Publishers. Every single book had intense criticism for the NIH. I…

>their singular focus on only funding “hypothesis based research” What is the alternative to "hypothesis-based research?"

OP probably means exploratory science, in the sense of not starting with a claim to confirm (or deny) but with procedures to discover features of a system (e.g. about human red cells) that hypothesis may not be targeting.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130927105138.h...

Re: Leukemia Has Won

#17

Post by [deleted] »

delusional wrote: post #11
Bucephalus355 wrote: post #6

Whenever I’m studying a given topic, I like to buy maybe 6 or 7 books on it to skim-read from someplace where that’s afforable like HPB or Thriftbooks. Gives you a good overview of field and also each of the books fills in the holes of the other books. Recently did this on the topic of “cancer”. All recent books published in the last 15 years by Big 5 Publishers. Every single book had intense criticism for the NIH. I…

What is the alternative? Wild guess based research? Faith based research? I'm having a hard time envisioning how you'd design an experiment, and extract knowledge, without a hypothesis.

[deleted]

Re: Leukemia Has Won

#18

Post by komali2 »

Jeeeesus. I'm incapable of understanding the mindset the man is in - total awareness of impending death. It must take tremendous courage - I think I would have been reduced to a quaking pile of jelly faced with the fact of mortality. What a person, what a reality.

Re: Leukemia Has Won

#19

Post by jodrellblank »

delusional wrote: post #11
Bucephalus355 wrote: post #6

Whenever I’m studying a given topic, I like to buy maybe 6 or 7 books on it to skim-read from someplace where that’s afforable like HPB or Thriftbooks. Gives you a good overview of field and also each of the books fills in the holes of the other books. Recently did this on the topic of “cancer”. All recent books published in the last 15 years by Big 5 Publishers. Every single book had intense criticism for the NIH. I…

What is the alternative? Wild guess based research? Faith based research? I'm having a hard time envisioning how you'd design an experiment, and extract knowledge, without a hypothesis.

"Hypothesis-driven research is based on scientific theories, while exploration is based on a search for discovery backed by few theories or none at all."

"With hypothesis testing, researchers present what the study hopes to accomplish, how it will be done and possible outcomes. [..] Meanwhile, exploratory research examines unknown areas with no or little-known theories to back them -- perceived as a riskier bet."

- https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130927105138.h...

> I'm having a hard time envisioning how you'd design an experiment, and extract knowledge, without a hypothesis

"Often, a proposal to gain observational experience is dismissed as being a "fishing expedition"…but how can one devise a workable hypothesis to test without first acquiring basic knowledge of the system, and how better to obtain such basic knowledge than to observe the system without any preconceived notions?" - https://www.edge.org/response-detail/11702

Post reply on HN