5 ms·
I'm remaining skeptical. The NTP study they mention had methodological problems. David Gorski of Science Based Medicine wrote about that study when it made the
by scott_s 9y ago
I'm remaining skeptical. The NTP study they mention had methodological problems. David Gorski of Science Based Medicine wrote about that study when it made the rounds (https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/no-a-rat-study-with-marginal-results-does-not-prove-that-cell-phones-cause-cancer-no-matter-what-mother-jones-and-consumer-reports-say/ https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/no-a-rat-study-with-margina...):
What’s problematic about this study is that, even though there were 90 rats in each group, that’s actually a small number to detect meaningful differences in low frequency events. Here’s what I mean. The study reports increased incidences of tumors in the brains and hearts of the male rats. ... Comparing such low frequency events between groups can be very problematic, particularly in the case low plausibility associations with multiple comparisons.
(I originally wrote something about not knowing the control group cancer rates, but
thaumaturgy has access to the paper and addressed that in a sibling comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16659270 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16659270)
- sethrin 9y agoIt's a very low rate of increase, and while it may be statistically significant given the right statistical massage, I don't think I would hang my reputation on that p-value. This research group has come under fire for their numbers before, both from Congress and I believe from NIH. This is just one of hundreds of similar studies on environmental effects, and I don't want to say that these people are in the profession of making mountains over molehills, but I have not read anything about the authors or their institution which has given me any confidence in their result.
- haZard_OS 9y agoI wouldn't stake my reputation on ANY p-value. I don't want to derail the conversation, but the p- value should have been discarded (more or less) years ago.