• Guilherme@lemm.ee
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    4 days ago

    I browse Windy but don’t rely on any of those 4 weather forecasting models: I take the median of predicted temperatures and rainfalls instead. Also, I predict rain only if the median exceeds 1mm, and if it’s below that threshold but at least 3 models predict (some) rainfall I predict drizzle. Which is the same approach I had at my previous job, using data of doubtful quality to adjust Holt-Winters and Box-Jenkins models in order to forecast drug sales for Big Pharma.

    Kaggle by the way began to demand users engaged on modelling competitions to make PDFs explaining their methodologies after learning some cheaters would just combine results from other competitors.

    P.S. - Don’t average results from different models unless you are really, really sure of what you’re doing. Many times the models take turns on which one will output garbage, and you don’t want garbage contaminating your average. By switching to median you avoid the crap they sometimes spit altogether - not to mention it’s so simple you don’t even need to write numbers on paper or use a pocket calculator.

  • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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    6 days ago

    Actual genuine scientists tend to be the nerd type excited about whatever it is they’re studying. They can’t wait to tell you about the frequency oscillations of some quasar or the courtship rituals of hagfish or whatever.

    The journals they have to publish in are shady as a cave though.

  • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    7 days ago

    science makes me have faith in science.

    Science is unironically one of the only things i ever trust because truth prevails, always…

      • angrystego@lemmy.world
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        7 days ago

        My own experience leaves me a bit more optimistic, although I do see some cursed bits.

        The presence of money in research depends greatly on the field and the ability of the scientists to make their research sound sexy. You can mask a lot of wierd niche basic research topics with sexy applied research talk.

        Also, there’s still a lot of science research without much money, being sustained by sheer enthusiasm.

        • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net
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          6 days ago

          I agree. A great example of why can be found in this excellent article about an extensive “dossier” of fraud allegations against a top Alzheimer’s researcher: (https://www.science.org/content/article/research-misconduct-finding-neuroscientist-eliezer-masliah-papers-under-suspicion)

          Specifically, this snippet:

          “Microbiologist and research integrity expert Elisabeth Bik, who also worked on the Zlokovic dossier, contributed other Masliah examples and reviewed and concurred with almost all of the findings.”

          Elisabeth Bik is someone who has an incredible eye for fraudulently edited Western Blots images and someone I greatly admire. Calling her a “research integrity expert” is accurate, but what I find neat is that (to my knowledge) she doesn’t have any particular training or funding towards this work. A lot of work she does in this area starts on, or is made public on PubPeer, an online forum. This is all to say that Elisabeth Bik’s expertise and reputation in this area effectively stems from her just being a nerd on the internet.

          I find it quite beautiful in a way, because she’s far from the only example of this. I especially find it neat when non-scientists are able to help root out scientific fraud specifically through non-scientist expertise. As a scientist who often finds herself propelled by sheer enthusiasm, sometimes feels overwhelmed by the “Publish or Perish” atmosphere in research, and who worries about the integrity of science when there’s so much trash being published, it’s heartening to see that enthusiasm and commitment to Truth still matters.

      • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        6 days ago

        thankfully i’m not a scientist, but if the people much smarter than me, and collective consensus say one thing, i’m likely to agree broadly with that sentiment. If not, same goes but in reverse.

        Now if i were doing science on the other hand…

    • justme@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      7 days ago

      Research is based on the so-called scientific method (therefore science) and that is something you can’t proof, just belief in. But it’s the best we have with extraordinary amount of evidence to back it up.

      • infinite_ass@leminal.space
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        7 days ago

        There was this guy who spent his whole life in rural Arizona. All evidence indicated that the world is made of sand.

        Never discount errors of perspective.

        If you consider something that all scientists do then you might see a vast shared error.

        • justme@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          7 days ago

          It was evident that the world was bigger than what the guy saw, he was just not checking (lazy or insatiable or whatever) what’s further. There is the difference.

      • KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        6 days ago

        using the scientific method to demonstrate that the scientific method is the most effective method of science is definitely one of the moments of all time, for science.

  • surph_ninja@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    That secret being ‘the oil/sugar/etc lobby paid me to create this fake study to mislead you.’

  • humanspiral@lemmy.ca
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    6 days ago

    Fun fact about Christmas. In next 5 years tops, the north pole will completely melt in summer thereby drowning every last motherfucker that works and lives there!

  • _____@lemm.ee
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    7 days ago

    maybe this wording works on a certain kind of voter because of the “fuck you I got mine” attitude, they probably think that if they were the scientist they would reap the benefits for themselves

  • ItsLucky@pawb.social
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    4 days ago

    In vulcano seismology there is this fun little thing called a tremor and its really annoying but also really mysterious as no one knows where it is coming from or what cases it. I’ve had multiple people try to explain it or I was listenin to talks about it and I have yet to hear solidly overlapping theories. Also not only does the signal look different at every single opportunity (aka every vulcano) that you to look at it, it also hides within a frequency range that is mostly overlapped with random background signal. So to look at it you need to do analzye your seismometers for a directional eigenvalue (not sure if its the correct word or even the only what its just what I’m doing. I’m normally German speaking but what we do is look at the seismometers and whether or nor all or most of the signals are comming from the same direction) so that you can even detect it, meanin just to look at it you already need some statistics.

    Not really sure where I’m going with this I just find this concept really really and I’m just once again baffled that we simply do not know about things in science.

  • Jimmycrackcrack@lemmy.ml
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    7 days ago

    It’s a secret rouse so you won’t suspect the stuff that they don’t tell you and get together every few months to co-ordinate keeping under wraps.

  • yamanii@lemmy.world
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    6 days ago

    There’s one thing they aren’t screaming about: how free will is a myth. It’s a topic that gets shot down a lot.

    • Gerbylynn@sh.itjust.works
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      6 days ago

      That’s barely an info dump on the subject. Observe -

      Free will is a complicated subject. If there is a divine creation (or simulation or whatever) then then what started the universe was a seed - or rather a set series of circumstances that started everything. Then everything built on that leading to me writing and you reading this.

      Free will is a choice - a decision to choose where your decisions come from. Are you truly in control or do you just choose the best possible outcome based on past relevant experiences? Obviously you will live with the consequences, no one’s saying you wouldn’t 👀

      Regardless, we’re all built on consequences of our past self which’ll in turn become your new past self. And from there it’ll continue till death. Obviously death itself is complicated and you’ll eventually face it. And what happens afterwards is another conversation. But until then you’ll make the most of everything you have. Every damn day.

      Edit: formating

  • drail@fedia.io
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    7 days ago

    Here goes:

    During my dissertation, I was lookig for information on the emissiom of 172nm scintillation light in mixtures of gaseous Xe and CO2 (95:5% - 98:2%), with results being difficult to come by. I found a collaborator who had tested this at lower CO2 concentrations (0-0.5%), but nothing else, no predictions or generalizable applications. Not knowing the optimal search engine terms or what textbook to look in for rules governing gaseous light emission, I ended up looking in fluorescence chemistry papers (my previous field of study) which had something called the Stern-Volmer relation for different concentrations of quenchant in a fluorescent solution. I figured gas scintillation queching was probably similar to liquid fluorescence quenching, but the standard relation didn’t quite fit below 10% additive.

    I dug around more and found a modification of this relation for diffusion-limited quenching of fluorescent solutions (the same limitation imposed in gas mixtures, quenching due to random Brownian collisions) that employed an exponential term, allowing for a smoother curve down to low additive concentrations. This perfectly matched the available data and allowed me to model the predicted behavior. I discussed this with the one member of my committee who was available, an organic chemist (my PI was on vacation, everyone else was sick, and my dissertation defense was in 2 weeks). He said my reasoning and math for using this formula made sense and gave me a thumbs up to include this analysis. When my PI came back from holiday, he asked me why I didn’t use some equation generally used in the field, or even just a generic exponential fit. I was ignorant of his suggestion, but it provided the same general formulation as Stern-Volmer, though Stern-Volmer was more rigorously derived mathematically.

    Mixing fields is super cool and can allow a much deeper understanding of the underlying principles, as opposed to limiting yourself to one branch of science. While my PI’s recommendation would have given approximately the same answer, understanding and applying Stern-Volmer allowed me to really dig at the principles at play and generate a more accurate and in-depth model, which I managed to write up and defend at the 11th hour.

      • MonkeyBusiness@sh.itjust.works
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        7 days ago

        @drail@fedia.io built a wall made up of a 90 mins presentation around himself to defend his dissertation from his committee. The committee members built a wall of 120 mins of questions and internal discussions around that trapping @drail@fedia.io in for even longer. The whole affair was brutal. No one came out unscathed, yet no one can remember what happened except for the extremely troubling moments.

        A moment of silence in remembrance…

        🧑‍🎓 🫡🫡🫡

        • DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social
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          7 days ago

          One of my professors likened it to overeducated wolves surrounding a wounded elk.

          Obviously the elk is weak. But is it weak enough?

        • drail@fedia.io
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          7 days ago

          I’ve seen things. Things you’d never understand. All I can say is that the best dissertation defense is a good dissertation offense. So much blood on my hands…

      • drail@fedia.io
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        7 days ago

        I am now Dr. Drail, so it went well! This was back in August, so I am still in recovery mode while I job search.

  • NounsAndWords@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    This is why the “secret scientists don’t want you to know” always turns out to be some pseudoscience bs that at best is misinformation and at worst is actively harming people. So, yes, they are things scientists don’t want you to know.

    • howrar@lemmy.ca
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      7 days ago

      I would argue that we still want them to know about pseudoscience, but also know enough about everything else to understand how the pseudoscience is wrong.

  • Clent@lemmy.world
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    7 days ago

    Clearly those aren’t real scientists. Real scientists have secret labs, where they do secret research.

    • lugal@sopuli.xyz
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      7 days ago

      That’s why they learn random facts about stink bugs to scare everyone away from their secret knowledge

        • lugal@sopuli.xyz
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          6 days ago

          And remember: the more niche it sounds, the more secret their actual project. When someone tells you they use role and reference grammar to analyze the socio economic implications of the difference in vowel harmony between classical and biblical Hebrew, they basically admit they work for MKUltra. It isn’t debatable in any meaningful way at that point anymore.

  • meep_launcher@lemm.ee
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    7 days ago

    At first I read “have you ever met a single scientist?” As in “don’t you know they’re all fuckin?”