5 ms·

I wonder what his book would look like if published today. Would he still find big problems with the smoking studies?

by a2tech 8y ago

Arnt 8y ago
I doubt it. Finding problems in e.g. a small-sample, 22-month study is one thing, finding problems in studies that cover entire nations over several decades is quite another.
- vectorEQ 8y ago
  point to 1 such study on smoking, where they did actual measurements on an entire nation. i bet you they just sampled a subset and called it statistically sound. ;D
  - Arnt 8y ago
    Can't. I heard that when I was a conscientous objector at the university hospital in Trondheim, Norway. One of the physicians there told me that they'd done statistics on all patients. Norway has a single-payer system, so that would really be all patients. But it's a while ago and I can't find email addresses for anyone whose name I still remember, so I can't.
    - vectorEQ 8y ago
      all patients and 'nation' seems a bit overconfident of said doctor (even though i respect their work a lot!)... i guess his world IS the hospital patients but vice versa i think the world or a nation includes (a lot) more than its hospital patients.
      - Arnt 8y ago
        So I looked, starting at fhi.no, and found quickly found several studies that use data based on either the Norwegian cancer registry, the cause-of-death registry or both. These aren't samples. The cause of death registry includes all deaths and the cancer registry includes everyone who's been diagnosed with cancer, even people who received no treatment. This means that studies that investigate e.g. cancer caused by smoking and use these data sources are nationwide rather than sampled.
- capnrefsmmat 8y ago
  Darrell Huff's style in How to Lie with Smoking Statistics was to marshal an army of minor quibbles to apparently undermine the entire body of research: find a small flaw in one study, a minor error in another, and pretty soon you've made it appear like all the research is flawed. He didn't need to actually prove any one study wrong. He also relied pretty heavily on arguments that correlation is not causation because smokers are genetically predisposed to smoke, and may also be predisposed to cancer and other maladies. He even quoted R.A. Fisher's argument that people smoke to quell irritation and annoyance, and having a chronic inflammation or cancer might just be the kind of irritation that makes you subconsciously want to smoke. No number of enormous well-conducted observational studies would prevent Huff from making up scenarios for other types of confounding. Check out Chapter 12 of the book.
Gupie 8y ago
Yes, presumably he would, if he were paid enough. However he would probably writing on climate change.
- coldtea 8y ago
  Or about how GMOs and modern nuclear are perfectly safe.
  - himlion 8y ago
    Those topics are way too broad to brush off in one sentence.
  - whatshisface 8y ago
    Honestly, arguing over whether or not GMOs or nuclear plants are safe is a bit like asking whether or not powered flight is safe. You could be talking about anything from a fighter jet locked in a dogfight to a child's RC toy - or, less abstractly, anything from a contentious and ethical research group/engineering team to a corporation/government trapped in short term thinking, violently ignoring negative signs (I can't think of a good way to describe the corporate mentality of "sad words bad, happy words good" but it is out there), and pushing off every externality they can.
    - coldtea 8y ago
      >anything from a contentious and ethical research group/engineering team to a corporation/government trapped in short term thinking, violently ignoring negative signs Well, in the real world, it's 99% the latter.
  - scrollaway 8y ago
    Or perfectly unsafe. Unlike the somewhat-corporately-one-sided debates of climate change and tobacco, there's powerful interest groups on both sides of the nuclear/gmo debates. Be mindful of what you read, coldtea.
    - 8y ago
Udik 8y ago
I'm not sure, but I have the impression that studies on passive smoking have been mostly debunked.
efitz 8y ago
I haven’t read the second book, does it misuse statistics to support the tobacco industry?

I wonder what his book would look like if published today. Would he still find big problems with the smoking studies?

by a2tech 8y ago

I wonder what his book would look like if published today. Would he still find big problems with the smoking studies?

Arnt 8y ago

I doubt it. Finding problems in e.g. a small-sample, 22-month study is one thing, finding problems in studies that cover entire nations over several decades is quite another.

vectorEQ 8y ago
point to 1 such study on smoking, where they did actual measurements on an entire nation. i bet you they just sampled a subset and called it statistically sound. ;D
- Arnt 8y ago
  Can't. I heard that when I was a conscientous objector at the university hospital in Trondheim, Norway. One of the physicians there told me that they'd done statistics on all patients. Norway has a single-payer system, so that would really be all patients. But it's a while ago and I can't find email addresses for anyone whose name I still remember, so I can't.
  - vectorEQ 8y ago
    all patients and 'nation' seems a bit overconfident of said doctor (even though i respect their work a lot!)... i guess his world IS the hospital patients but vice versa i think the world or a nation includes (a lot) more than its hospital patients.
    - Arnt 8y ago
      So I looked, starting at fhi.no, and found quickly found several studies that use data based on either the Norwegian cancer registry, the cause-of-death registry or both. These aren't samples. The cause of death registry includes all deaths and the cancer registry includes everyone who's been diagnosed with cancer, even people who received no treatment. This means that studies that investigate e.g. cancer caused by smoking and use these data sources are nationwide rather than sampled.
capnrefsmmat 8y ago
Darrell Huff's style in How to Lie with Smoking Statistics was to marshal an army of minor quibbles to apparently undermine the entire body of research: find a small flaw in one study, a minor error in another, and pretty soon you've made it appear like all the research is flawed. He didn't need to actually prove any one study wrong. He also relied pretty heavily on arguments that correlation is not causation because smokers are genetically predisposed to smoke, and may also be predisposed to cancer and other maladies. He even quoted R.A. Fisher's argument that people smoke to quell irritation and annoyance, and having a chronic inflammation or cancer might just be the kind of irritation that makes you subconsciously want to smoke. No number of enormous well-conducted observational studies would prevent Huff from making up scenarios for other types of confounding. Check out Chapter 12 of the book.

Gupie 8y ago

Yes, presumably he would, if he were paid enough. However he would probably writing on climate change.

coldtea 8y ago
Or about how GMOs and modern nuclear are perfectly safe.
- himlion 8y ago
  Those topics are way too broad to brush off in one sentence.
- whatshisface 8y ago
  Honestly, arguing over whether or not GMOs or nuclear plants are safe is a bit like asking whether or not powered flight is safe. You could be talking about anything from a fighter jet locked in a dogfight to a child's RC toy - or, less abstractly, anything from a contentious and ethical research group/engineering team to a corporation/government trapped in short term thinking, violently ignoring negative signs (I can't think of a good way to describe the corporate mentality of "sad words bad, happy words good" but it is out there), and pushing off every externality they can.
  - coldtea 8y ago
    >anything from a contentious and ethical research group/engineering team to a corporation/government trapped in short term thinking, violently ignoring negative signs Well, in the real world, it's 99% the latter.
- scrollaway 8y ago
  Or perfectly unsafe. Unlike the somewhat-corporately-one-sided debates of climate change and tobacco, there's powerful interest groups on both sides of the nuclear/gmo debates. Be mindful of what you read, coldtea.
  - 8y ago

Udik 8y ago

I'm not sure, but I have the impression that studies on passive smoking have been mostly debunked.

efitz 8y ago

I haven’t read the second book, does it misuse statistics to support the tobacco industry?