NorthWest Biotherapeutics Inc (NWBO)

[CogDiss 1188X]

Harvard-laundering (the next stage of the Lancet scandal)

This post on the Stanford statistical modeling blog makes the point about using reputation (argument from authority fallacy) to launder bad science. Links and comments of interest too.


https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2020/06/03/harvard-laundering/


A cursory review of the Surgisphere paper should have set off alarm bells by the Lancet editors and reviewers—but did not.

Blows a big hole in the confidence we should have in the peer-review process, if it wasn’t already shot. It should be worth following the details of this scandal closely as it unfolds. We may learn a few more twists about how the world operates. Many thanks for the links you posted — a good start in the process of following the leads.

My horror at this is entirely non party political, I should say.

Agreed. Spinning in a partisan way is one of the major sources of the misinformation fog that we have to try to see through somehow, though I thought the Christopher Steele comment was pretty innocuous as far as these things typically go and at least had the virtue of being witty. Unfortunately, any whiff of taking a side in the insane split in politics these days sends too many people running to their partisan corners to man the battlements.

I completely understand the temptation and have sinned far, far worse in this regard many times in the past. It is nearly impossible to resist if one’s identity is tied to a party or political ideology. Truisms, no doubt, but even they become suspect in this environment.

Re: health-related information specifically— unfortunately, it has been corrupted by the vast amounts of money involved for a loooong time, as you know well. It is a tragedy of huge proportions and no doubt has led to the early deaths of millions.

To paraphrase a comedian, “Finding truth these days is as difficult as finding a virgin in California.”