Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!cs.utexas.edu!turpin
From: turpin@cs.utexas.edu (Russell Turpin)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: What's the Why and How of Mosquito Bites?
Summary: ARF is confused (again).
Message-ID: <6735@cs.utexas.edu>
Date: 21 Aug 89 23:08:44 GMT
References: <5399@mtgzy.att.com> <4948@tank.uchicago.edu> <9263@chinet.chi.il.us> <9309@chinet.chi.il.us>
Organization: U. Texas CS Dept., Austin, Texas
Lines: 44

ARF says: 
> I think we all know that "real", to a scientist, means the  
> results of rigorous, controlled experimentation, the results  
> of which lead to a conclusion. 
>
> > As a molecular biologist, I am quite impressed by what one  
> > can learn from epidemiology...
>  
> As a scientist, I am more impressed by the results of  
> controled experiments.   If you can't or won't do them, that  
> is your privilege, but you can not manufacture the data and  
> call it SCIENCE. 

Who, pray tell, is manufacturing data?  The major fabrication I
see is the specious implication that something is scientific
evidence only if it is garnered by controlled experiment, and
that observation and statistical analysis do not count. 

Since Galen, careful observation has been a cornerstone of
medical science, and it remains so today, though our
methodological requirements have been refined over the centuries.
There are many sciences in which certain crucial evidence can
only be gathered by observation, because controlled
experimentation is impossible.  These include astronomy -- we
cannot create stars in the laboratory; geology -- there is only
one earth to study; and biology -- the epidemiology of every
disease is observed only, since no one would purposely introduce
a disease into a control population to see if its spread matches
what is predicted by theory, not to mention the fact that one
cannot arbitrarily prepare test populations.  In all of these,
laboratory experiments complement observation.  The physical
theories underlying stellar evolution and geological processes
are tested by thousands of experiments.  The biological and
chemical mechanisms of many disease organisms, including HIV, are
studied both in vitro and in animal hosts. 

Perhaps it is because ARF is confused about the nature of
scientific work that he is so suspicious of the way scientists
are studying AIDS.  There have been no controlled experiments to
test whether syphillis can be transmitted by mosquito, or whether
typhus can be spread by air droplets as well as lice.  If ARF is
going to ramble on, perhaps these will provide him more fodder.

Russell