Comments on: Durham fish oil (non)trial: confusing numbers, and the dangers of science by press release http://holfordwatch.info/2008/09/26/durham-fish-oil-nontrial-some-confusing-numbers/ The truth about Patrick Holford, media nutritionist Fri, 14 Oct 2011 15:11:39 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: jonhw http://holfordwatch.info/2008/09/26/durham-fish-oil-nontrial-some-confusing-numbers/comment-page-1/#comment-12131 Fri, 26 Sep 2008 17:12:26 +0000 http://holfordwatch.wordpress.com/?p=1579#comment-12131 Yes – the effects of focusing just on the more compliant students (or, to be more exact, 629/832 of the more compliant students) could well be one of many serious problems with this (non)trial. It’s hard to even be sure of this, though: for example, if the matched pairs compared, say, students with 78% compliance with students with 82% compliance, I doubt that the bias of compliance would be a big issue (although there are, of course, plenty of other reasons why this would be a shockingly bad idea).

The (non)trial has been so badly reported that one can’t even properly assess the problems with it.

]]> By: jdc325 http://holfordwatch.info/2008/09/26/durham-fish-oil-nontrial-some-confusing-numbers/comment-page-1/#comment-12128 Fri, 26 Sep 2008 14:05:03 +0000 http://holfordwatch.wordpress.com/?p=1579#comment-12128 “I still cannot even be sure of very basic information…”
I’m not surprised. I can’t find a single piece of information about this botched trial that Durham County Council has released that can be relied on – it’s almost as if they are ‘throwing up chaff’ in a bid to make the whole thing as confusing as possible. They are refusing to allow themselves to be pinned down, and are managing to avoid this at the moment by providing at least two answers for each question.

I’ve been banging on about the contradictory nature of statements from figures involved in this and someone referred to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum theory and Schrodinger’s thought experiment. As Schrodinger’s cat was both dead and alive, so this was a trial and yet also was not a trial. The number of participants was 5000, 3000 and 2000. The results are being published and are not being published. Durham CC both always and never meant to analyse the data. The measurement was actual versus predicted grades – except when it was the performance of pupils who took the pills versus the performance of those who didn’t.*

*Which, incidentally, reminded me of the Taubes piece in the NYT (that has been linked to on this blog before) about the Bias of Compliance.

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