Agreed. For example, I think it was a lack of background experience
with biology and science that lead to Johnson's joining the "HIV
doesn't cause AIDS" imbroglio with Duesberg et al (I don't know if Johnson
is still involved). Frankly, the sources and "contradictory" data that
Johnson embraced when he joined that "club" would have been easily
defused had Phil really understood some of the basic experimental tools
of molecular biology and biochemistry.
[...]
>BTW I disagree strongly with the notion that scientists aren't formally
>trained in rules of logic or rules of evidence. Peer review of grants and
>papers as well as discussion of controversial opinions at seminars are
>ruthless in their application of those rules. The fact that this is so
>true is what leads scientists to trust the primary literature. No doubt,
>different communities of scientists are varying in their degree of
>ruthlessness, but in general, I believe that the principle holds.
*sigh*...most of the time...
One rule of thumb I find helpful when looking at literature outside
of my field is that if I can find any obvious errors, then there are
probably more that I'm not detecting and I'd better get a second opinion
or read more skeptically. Another method is to pick out a few of the
references cited and see if these references really say what the authors
claim they say. Had Phil done this with the literature he used to
reach his conclusions (in the case of HIV & AIDS there was one horrible
review paper he discussed on the newsgroup, sci.med.aids), he might not
have gotten involved with the "it's not HIV" crowd.
Regards, Tim Ikeda (timi@mendel.berkeley.edu)