Even Science Can Be Wrong #
I’ve been waiting for a story like this. I thought maybe this from Spiked! would work, but its overwrought climate-change denialism made me discard it. This piece, which may be a little overlong and focuses a little too much on statistics, feels good enough to make one consider the idea seriously.
Ioannidis claimed to prove that more than half of published findings are false, but his analysis came under fire for statistical shortcomings of its own. “It may be true, but he didn’t prove it,” says biostatistician Steven Goodman of the Johns Hopkins University School of Public Health. On the other hand, says Goodman, the basic message stands. “There are more false claims made in the medical literature than anybody appreciates,” he says. “There’s no question about that.”
(via 3qd)