Damn Activist Coroners
I will be interesting to see how the results of the Teri Schiavo autopsy will be addressed by both sides of this event.
I just read the autopsy report especially the neuropathological examination by Stephen Nelson, M.D. P.A the Chief Medical Examiner for the 10th Judicial Circuit of Florida. (pages 12-20)
I was impressed by the thoroughness of the report and the scientific honesty of the last paragraph.
He is simply stating the limits of his examination. Will this be seized upon by the non-scientists?
This is the kind of statement that you see lawyers in courtroom dramas use all the time with medical experts, "Dr. Smith, can you say with 100% certainty that the..." and if the good Dr. hasn't been trained for this and wants to be true to his scientific principles will say. "No. With this method I can't be 100% certain." and the questioning lawyer will sit down in triumph. Then the opposing lawyer will stand and ask, "Dr. Smith, isn't it also the case that you can't be 100% certain of ANY result with this method?" Relieved, Dr. Smith will say, "Yes. With this method alone you can not be 100% certain. This method may provide you with a very high statistical correlation, but not 100%. Nothing can be 100% certain."
Watch how people will change the topic, subject and say things like, "But the bigger issue is..."
Kudos to MrNiX at Fark for the great headline!
I just read the autopsy report especially the neuropathological examination by Stephen Nelson, M.D. P.A the Chief Medical Examiner for the 10th Judicial Circuit of Florida. (pages 12-20)
I was impressed by the thoroughness of the report and the scientific honesty of the last paragraph.
He is simply stating the limits of his examination. Will this be seized upon by the non-scientists?
This is the kind of statement that you see lawyers in courtroom dramas use all the time with medical experts, "Dr. Smith, can you say with 100% certainty that the..." and if the good Dr. hasn't been trained for this and wants to be true to his scientific principles will say. "No. With this method I can't be 100% certain." and the questioning lawyer will sit down in triumph. Then the opposing lawyer will stand and ask, "Dr. Smith, isn't it also the case that you can't be 100% certain of ANY result with this method?" Relieved, Dr. Smith will say, "Yes. With this method alone you can not be 100% certain. This method may provide you with a very high statistical correlation, but not 100%. Nothing can be 100% certain."
Watch how people will change the topic, subject and say things like, "But the bigger issue is..."
Kudos to MrNiX at Fark for the great headline!
2 Comments:
The rabid righteous will leap upon the 'nothing is 100%' with tooth and claw, declaring that God is always 100%. Therefore science is unreliable and should not be taught in schools.
Strange how they don't realize how much they rely on medicine, geology, biology, chemistry, engineering etc etc etc for their daily needs.
Growing up in a religious family, we were fully able to live with the contradictions of faith and the secular world and in fact used the disparity to illustrate how we were different. Why on earth must these bozos get preferential treatment?
As I grew up and away from my religion, I could see how inturned and incestuous the religious thought process can be. They can deflect logical arguments with ease. Faith alone matters.
So they will soon be declaring that Schiavo was only apparently brain-dead, that the doctors could not see what the faithful can see, that science failed once again. Such circular logic will again announce that they were right.
we were fully able to live with the contradictions of faith and the secular world and in fact used the disparity to illustrate how we were different.
Me to. That's what I don't get. My parents were great about so many things that way. For them believing in God and science wasn't mutually exclusive. I know that this world view was worked out by the Catholic Church.
It is really sad that the God of the fundamentalist's is so small that it can't incorporate science.
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