Revisiting: The best-written scientific paper you have read posts 91–120
This is a continuation of a long topic, addressed by post number rather than by page. Start at post 1.
Loosely related and not worth its own topic: the vocabulary here has leaked into how I read everything. I now notice when a press release gives a relative figure and no absolute one, which is most of the time.
It is the kind of thing that is obvious once and never again.
Newer drugs and mechanisms: when a new drug launches or a new mechanism is discovered, the Lounge is a place to discuss the news and speculate before hard data exists.
I would put a moderate confidence on that and no more.
I would call the community position on best-written scientific paper likely rather than established, and I would be comfortable defending that hedge.
That is true everywhere. The reference material that gets used is the material that answers a question you have at the moment you have it, and glamour has nothing to do with it.
That is the honest state of it as of this week.
Summarising the best-written scientific paper thread so far, since it is long and the answer is buried: the first reply has the method, the fourth has the correction to it, and the rest is people agreeing at length.
The most useful reply I ever got about best-written scientific paper was a request to state my units. It sounds like pedantry and it has saved me twice.
Something I have wondered without ever asking: is there a good reason the vocabulary in this field is so inconsistent between suppliers? Half the disagreements here start as terminology.
Speaking only to best-written scientific paper as I have actually seen it, rather than as it is usually described: the effect is real, it is smaller than the thread suggests, and the variance between people is larger than the effect.
Analytics first, in my case, and I still find the practice category the harder read. Chromatography has one right answer more often than logistics does.
Two claims get bundled together under best-written scientific paper and they need separating. The descriptive one — this is what was observed — is usually well supported. The causal one — this is why — usually is not.
Almost every disagreement in threads like this one dissolves once you say which of the two you are making.
A digression that keeps occurring to me: the most-linked documents here are the dullest ones. Nothing gets cited like the unit-arithmetic page.
A request rather than an answer: could whoever has the primary source for best-written scientific paper post it? I have seen the claim three times this month and each version had lost a qualifier.
Loosely related and not worth its own topic: the vocabulary here has leaked into how I read everything. I now notice when a press release gives a relative figure and no absolute one, which is most of the time.
Posting it because the silence on this was starting to look like agreement.
Source for the best-written scientific paper figure, since it was asked for. It is in the discussion rather than the abstract, which is why the version circulating is stronger than the paper is.
Reading the surrounding paragraph is worth the two minutes. The authors are more careful than their summarisers.
For anyone finding this later: the short answer on best-written scientific paper is that it depends on one thing, and the rest of the thread is people identifying which thing.
Science communication: if you come across an interesting science paper or article about peptides or metabolism, sharing it and discussing the idea is on-topic.
That is the practical version. The rigorous version is longer and says the same thing.
Agreed on best-written scientific paper, with one qualification that I think matters. The reasoning holds for the case as described. Change the starting assumption and it does not, and the starting assumption is the part nobody states.
Agreed, and the corollary is that a place with no visible corrections is not a place with fewer errors.
Off-topic but genuinely curious: how many people here came in through the analytics side rather than the practical side? The two groups seem to read completely different parts of the site.
For what it is worth, the same held on the two occasions I checked.
That is true everywhere. The reference material that gets used is the material that answers a question you have at the moment you have it, and glamour has nothing to do with it.
Practical answer on best-written scientific paper, since the theoretical one is upthread: do the simplest check first, write down the result, and only then decide whether the complicated explanation is needed. It usually is not.
Answering the best-written scientific paper question as asked, then the question I think is meant. As asked: yes, with the qualification below. As meant: it depends on how the first measurement was taken.
Lounge question, no agenda: does anyone else keep a physical notebook for this rather than a file? Mine is more use than anything I have typed, and I cannot entirely explain why.