Comments on: Ben Goldacre on more bad data: this time from drug companies

By: Rafael Science

Rafael Science — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 19:07:23 +0000

Paper publishing should be more like a facebook/quora environment, where anyone could read, discuss and aggregate data in one place. Just imagine how much of we are missing by ignoring the power of internet on science …

By: Rich

Rich — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 15:42:21 +0000

This is awesome! Thanks for posting this. My students will be watching this.

By: Nathaniel

Nathaniel — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 00:28:32 +0000

This is exactly why I do my own research. Yes, it means taking a lot of drugs, (most of which you shouldn’t interact), and eating all sorts of undigestible food stuffs, but the truth beckons!

“In a time of universal deceit – telling the truth is a revolutionary act.” – George Orwell

By: gaddeswarup

gaddeswarup — Sun, 30 Sep 2012 22:32:27 +0000

Carl,
Yours is one of the blogs I read for informed comment on these topics about which I have meagre background. About these alleged accusations, I can only refer to your article “How to Make a Superweed”
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2010/05/04/how-to-make-a-superweed/
About the current topic, you were justifiably upset by the behaviour of the French scientists. But I did wonder whether some of the authors you referred to actually read their paper.I browsed through the paper but I do not have the background to actually understand it well. It is confusingly written, may be because they are writing in a foreign language. It is difficult to distinguish between suggestions and assertions. But I did get the impression that it is more about roundup than GM maize, though there are some speculations about GM maize too. My overall impression is that it is a preliminary study which suggests more long term studies.
In any case, I still look to your blog for informed comment.

[CZ: The authors of the paper themselves in their remarks to the press did not treat the study as preliminary, but rather as an indictment of GMOs and Roundup. As for the scientists who commented on the quality of the paper, they displayed a familiarity with the details of the study. I agree that it is confusingly written, and the figures are dismal. But they argued that both GM maize and Roundup produced tumors, not Roundup alone.]

By: Thanny

Thanny — Sun, 30 Sep 2012 16:52:44 +0000

If you don’t support every single anti-GMO statement ever made, regardless of evidentiary support, you are a corporate whore, in the eyes of anti-GMO fanatics. It’s one of those groups that wouldn’t exist if the members could be reasoned with (immunity to reason being an entrance requirement), so you’ll just have to don the asbestos and stick to your guns.