5 ms·

Because it was debunked back in 1997: http://www.neurology.org/content/48/3/626.short http://www.neurology.org/content/48/3/626.short Just another case of HN

Because it was debunked back in 1997: http://www.neurology.org/content/48/3/626.short http://www.neurology.org/content/48/3/626.short Just another case of HN users clicking on flashy things without stopping to examine the evidence. Some more examples: - deep brain stimulation: hundreds of upvotes here on stories about this, but then when studies come out showing that it it no better than placebo that story gets 3 upvotes on HN. - fecal transplants for C dificile: again hundreds of upvotes for stories touting this, but then when it is found to be no better than placebo the story gets no upvotes on HN. These are just a few examples, but I see this all the time on HN. It makes me a little disappointed in the community and thinking that perhaps I should be hanging out somewhere else instead.

gamache 11y ago
Re: fecal transplants, do you mean the study with N=46 in which FMT scored a 91% cure rate, 28% higher than placebo? http://www.hcplive.com/conference-coverage/acg-2015/fmt-passes-first-randomized-placebo-controlled-trial-for-treating-c-dif-infection http://www.hcplive.com/conference-coverage/acg-2015/fmt-pass... Citations needed.
- cpncrunch 11y ago
  That was one study. There have been a total of 2 placebo-controlled trials into fecal transplants for C.Diff AFAIK. One showed some benefit over placebo, and the other showed no difference. It looks like that link you posted has just cherry-picked the good result. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10679067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10679067
  - gamache 11y ago
    Post links. The one I posted was the most recent I found (October 2015), but most studies I saw (every one I checked, N > 5) reported distinct success for FMT in their abstracts. [EDIT] You've posted a link now, and the article is behind a paywall. There may be a correlation between that and the fact that it didn't get any upvotes, but we'd need sizable trials to be sure. :)
    - cpncrunch 11y ago
      I didn't realise it was a paywall. If you search for "Mixed Results for Fecal Transplant in First Randomized Trial" you'll get through the paywall. I hate paywalls for this reason, but I didn't find any non-paywalled versions of the article -- they all just seem to cherry-pick the good result and completely ignore the other one.
25cf 11y ago
Not a biologist by any stretch of the imagination, so I am asking purely out of ignorance - how does your study debunk the OP's? Yours is about NSAIDs (i.e. aspirin) decreasing the risk of Alzheimer's, OP's is about paracetamol (not an NSAID) increasing the likelihood of Alzheimers. Correct me if I'm misunderstanding something here...
- cpncrunch 11y ago
  I think perhaps you didn't read it carefully enough: "In addition, we examined use of acetaminophen...No association was found between AD risk and use of acetaminophen"
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  GP's study includes PA (which is also known as acetaminophen) as well as NSAIDs, and finds no effect, so it is a contrary result. Calling it a preemptive debunking may be a bit excessive, but given that it is a more direct study of the relationship, it (from the abstract, at least) seems to be a reason for skepticism.
- ZanyProgrammer 11y ago
  "Not a biologist by any stretch of the imagination"- a problem with the software engineers on Hackernews pontificating about other subjects.
  - pc2g4d 11y ago
    This is quasi-ad hominem, and yet there's a kernel of truth to it, i.e. being a software engineer doesn't necessarily make you a critical thinker.
    - philh 11y ago
      "I am asking purely out of ignorance ... Correct me if I'm misunderstanding something here" How do you think 25cf should have handled this differently?
Laforet 11y ago
>- deep brain stimulation: hundreds of upvotes here on stories about this, but then when studies come out showing that it it no better than placebo that story gets 3 upvotes on HN. I had no idea DBS is no better than placebo, do you have a source to back it up?
- cpncrunch 11y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10447589 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10447589
  - Laforet 11y ago
    Thanks for the link. I assumed that you were commenting on DBS for Parkinsonism and was a bit surprised to find people say a proven therapy does not work.
mystikal 11y ago
There's a strong bias in all disciplines towards "positive" results, i.e. those that demonstrate an effect. They're more exciting, and in the short term they're usually more profitable. There isn't a lot of tolerance for thorough examination. I feel like science didn't use to be this way, or at least the romantic stories I was told about science didn't go like this.
mindviews 11y ago
Clearly the author didn't find the results from the paper you pointed to particularly compelling. It's listed as reference 136 and mentioned several times. The last of which, "In the absence of more precise knowledge of the extents of analgesic consumption and the durations of exposure, the reliability of these reports [45, 136, 137] is open to question." Is there a reason you find the Stewart paper to be more definitive than this author suggests?
- cpncrunch 11y ago
  That reference talks about "gross abuse". I'm not sure exactly what quantities they were talking about, but if you take too much of anything it will cause health problems.
pygy_ 11y ago
The Neurology article is paywalled. From the abstract: > No association was found between AD risk and use of acetaminophen (RR = 1.35; 95% CI: 0.79-2.30), and there was no trend of decreasing risk with increasing duration of use. Depending on the methodology (no multiple regression?) and the possible association between NSAID and paracetamol intake, there may be a smoking gun, right there :-)
jacquesm 11y ago
People like to hope and don't like seeing their hopes destroyed. You see the same with the life-extension and cryogenics or uploaders.
benihana 11y ago
>It makes me a little disappointed in the community and thinking that perhaps I should be hanging out somewhere else instead. Please go. Please go find that perfect place where you can hang out with people who are as smart and thoughtful as you and think exactly like you do, and only upvote the correct things that you agree with. It'll be better for us all.
- cpncrunch 11y ago
  I would if I could find it, but I've been thinking I might need to create it myself. You make it sound like it's just my opinion. That's not what I'm talking about at all. I'm saying that I would prefer if people upvoted good science rather than spammy press releases. Is that too much to ask?
  - dang 11y ago
    Given human nature, that probably is too much to ask for stories in fields where the community has a low density of specialists. Excessive claims about, say, computing are less likely to be entertained here, simply because HN has lots of users who know about computing. We see the same thing with big news stories: often a sensational splash with tons of upvotes and comments is followed a few days later by a follow-up showing how the original story was wrong, but going largely un-noticed. I don't think it's too much to ask, though, for substantive articles reporting debunkings and refutations to get their share of attention. We just emailed you a repost invite for the one on deep brain stimulation, and I hope you'll continue to post those as you find them. It is a valuable service to the community. Btw, any time you (or anyone) know of a particularly good article that fell through the cracks, you should email us at hn@ycombinator.com so we can send a repost invite or put it in the second-chance pool. Some of the most interesting and popular links that have appeared on HN recently have been rescued from oblivion this way, so there's evidence that it works. We'll probably eventually add a feature to HN for people to nominate stories for a second chance this way.
    - cpncrunch 11y ago
      Thanks, got it. Yes, it would be good to have a prominent mechanism to request a second-chance for a good article, although I can imagine it could be prone to either abuse or a lot of work on your end.

gamache 11y ago

Re: fecal transplants, do you mean the study with N=46 in which FMT scored a 91% cure rate, 28% higher than placebo? http://www.hcplive.com/conference-coverage/acg-2015/fmt-passes-first-randomized-placebo-controlled-trial-for-treating-c-dif-infection http://www.hcplive.com/conference-coverage/acg-2015/fmt-pass... Citations needed.

cpncrunch 11y ago
That was one study. There have been a total of 2 placebo-controlled trials into fecal transplants for C.Diff AFAIK. One showed some benefit over placebo, and the other showed no difference. It looks like that link you posted has just cherry-picked the good result. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10679067 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10679067
- gamache 11y ago
  Post links. The one I posted was the most recent I found (October 2015), but most studies I saw (every one I checked, N > 5) reported distinct success for FMT in their abstracts. [EDIT] You've posted a link now, and the article is behind a paywall. There may be a correlation between that and the fact that it didn't get any upvotes, but we'd need sizable trials to be sure. :)
  - cpncrunch 11y ago
    I didn't realise it was a paywall. If you search for "Mixed Results for Fecal Transplant in First Randomized Trial" you'll get through the paywall. I hate paywalls for this reason, but I didn't find any non-paywalled versions of the article -- they all just seem to cherry-pick the good result and completely ignore the other one.

25cf 11y ago

Not a biologist by any stretch of the imagination, so I am asking purely out of ignorance - how does your study debunk the OP's? Yours is about NSAIDs (i.e. aspirin) decreasing the risk of Alzheimer's, OP's is about paracetamol (not an NSAID) increasing the likelihood of Alzheimers. Correct me if I'm misunderstanding something here...

cpncrunch 11y ago
I think perhaps you didn't read it carefully enough: "In addition, we examined use of acetaminophen...No association was found between AD risk and use of acetaminophen"
dragonwriter 11y ago
GP's study includes PA (which is also known as acetaminophen) as well as NSAIDs, and finds no effect, so it is a contrary result. Calling it a preemptive debunking may be a bit excessive, but given that it is a more direct study of the relationship, it (from the abstract, at least) seems to be a reason for skepticism.
ZanyProgrammer 11y ago
"Not a biologist by any stretch of the imagination"- a problem with the software engineers on Hackernews pontificating about other subjects.
- pc2g4d 11y ago
  This is quasi-ad hominem, and yet there's a kernel of truth to it, i.e. being a software engineer doesn't necessarily make you a critical thinker.
  - philh 11y ago
    "I am asking purely out of ignorance ... Correct me if I'm misunderstanding something here" How do you think 25cf should have handled this differently?

Laforet 11y ago

>- deep brain stimulation: hundreds of upvotes here on stories about this, but then when studies come out showing that it it no better than placebo that story gets 3 upvotes on HN. I had no idea DBS is no better than placebo, do you have a source to back it up?

cpncrunch 11y ago
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10447589 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10447589
- Laforet 11y ago
  Thanks for the link. I assumed that you were commenting on DBS for Parkinsonism and was a bit surprised to find people say a proven therapy does not work.

mystikal 11y ago

There's a strong bias in all disciplines towards "positive" results, i.e. those that demonstrate an effect. They're more exciting, and in the short term they're usually more profitable. There isn't a lot of tolerance for thorough examination. I feel like science didn't use to be this way, or at least the romantic stories I was told about science didn't go like this.

mindviews 11y ago

Clearly the author didn't find the results from the paper you pointed to particularly compelling. It's listed as reference 136 and mentioned several times. The last of which, "In the absence of more precise knowledge of the extents of analgesic consumption and the durations of exposure, the reliability of these reports [45, 136, 137] is open to question." Is there a reason you find the Stewart paper to be more definitive than this author suggests?

cpncrunch 11y ago
That reference talks about "gross abuse". I'm not sure exactly what quantities they were talking about, but if you take too much of anything it will cause health problems.

pygy_ 11y ago

The Neurology article is paywalled. From the abstract: > No association was found between AD risk and use of acetaminophen (RR = 1.35; 95% CI: 0.79-2.30), and there was no trend of decreasing risk with increasing duration of use. Depending on the methodology (no multiple regression?) and the possible association between NSAID and paracetamol intake, there may be a smoking gun, right there :-)

jacquesm 11y ago

People like to hope and don't like seeing their hopes destroyed. You see the same with the life-extension and cryogenics or uploaders.

benihana 11y ago

>It makes me a little disappointed in the community and thinking that perhaps I should be hanging out somewhere else instead. Please go. Please go find that perfect place where you can hang out with people who are as smart and thoughtful as you and think exactly like you do, and only upvote the correct things that you agree with. It'll be better for us all.

cpncrunch 11y ago
I would if I could find it, but I've been thinking I might need to create it myself. You make it sound like it's just my opinion. That's not what I'm talking about at all. I'm saying that I would prefer if people upvoted good science rather than spammy press releases. Is that too much to ask?
- dang 11y ago
  Given human nature, that probably is too much to ask for stories in fields where the community has a low density of specialists. Excessive claims about, say, computing are less likely to be entertained here, simply because HN has lots of users who know about computing. We see the same thing with big news stories: often a sensational splash with tons of upvotes and comments is followed a few days later by a follow-up showing how the original story was wrong, but going largely un-noticed. I don't think it's too much to ask, though, for substantive articles reporting debunkings and refutations to get their share of attention. We just emailed you a repost invite for the one on deep brain stimulation, and I hope you'll continue to post those as you find them. It is a valuable service to the community. Btw, any time you (or anyone) know of a particularly good article that fell through the cracks, you should email us at hn@ycombinator.com so we can send a repost invite or put it in the second-chance pool. Some of the most interesting and popular links that have appeared on HN recently have been rescued from oblivion this way, so there's evidence that it works. We'll probably eventually add a feature to HN for people to nominate stories for a second chance this way.
  - cpncrunch 11y ago
    Thanks, got it. Yes, it would be good to have a prominent mechanism to request a second-chance for a good article, although I can imagine it could be prone to either abuse or a lot of work on your end.