One rat is just not statistically significant evidence—especially not when the rat is also the salesman. I don’t know whether Roberts is motivated by wealth, fame, or whatever—nor do I care very much.
Many tests on the same rat can be statistically significant! Do X, Y changes in the rat. Undo it, Y changes back. Repeat until it’s statistically certain connection...
We just have no particular reason to expect that it’ll generalize well to others.
This really stands out to me as a physicist because we do things like one rat tests all the time. Well, usually we get a few other ‘rats’, but we rely heavily on the notion that identically prepared matter is… identical. Biology, of course, doesn’t allow that shortcut.
Clinicians sometimes have a cohort of 1 for rare diseases… but of course that’s simply the best they can do under the circumstances.
Many tests on the same rat can be statistically significant! Do X, Y changes in the rat. Undo it, Y changes back. Repeat until it’s statistically certain connection...
True—but it won’t be too convincing if self-experimenting on yourself with your own diet. Science is based on confirmations of experiments by other scientists.
One rat is just not statistically significant evidence—especially not when the rat is also the salesman. I don’t know whether Roberts is motivated by wealth, fame, or whatever—nor do I care very much.
Many tests on the same rat can be statistically significant! Do X, Y changes in the rat. Undo it, Y changes back. Repeat until it’s statistically certain connection...
We just have no particular reason to expect that it’ll generalize well to others.
This really stands out to me as a physicist because we do things like one rat tests all the time. Well, usually we get a few other ‘rats’, but we rely heavily on the notion that identically prepared matter is… identical. Biology, of course, doesn’t allow that shortcut.
Clinicians sometimes have a cohort of 1 for rare diseases… but of course that’s simply the best they can do under the circumstances.
True—but it won’t be too convincing if self-experimenting on yourself with your own diet. Science is based on confirmations of experiments by other scientists.
The rat being the salesman is the more serious issue there, yes.