The optimistic side of all this is that what we are seeing is the advancement of science. It certainly didn't happen in one experiment- not even in 100- but ta

The optimistic side of all this is that what we are seeing is the advancement of science. It certainly didn't happen in one experiment- not even in 100- but taking something that is considered "accepted" and throwing it out on further evidence is a good thing and says ultimately positive things about the field. Experiments in areas with huge numbers of degrees of freedom are difficult to sort out. I mean, if we just take just the chocolate cookie experiment, and assume that we can replicate that particular experiment. We run 100 versions of that experiment and find that students will attempt the impossible for about twice as long as those who had to eat radishes. What is the most general thing that we can conclude? How about if we find the same result with candy vs celery? Twinkies vs nothing? What can we possibly be sure we learned from such experiments?