That’s a pretty strong statement. What makes you believe that it can only by one of those two cases?
Apart from that I’m not even sure whether she believes that she has an excelent test given that she writes: There is no simple test currently available to diagnose CFS because, as I have said already, CFS is not a diagnosis – it is a symptom.
Because her evidence is very strong. She hasn’t got it by luck or a bit of innocent p-hacking. Her test score correlates very nicely with her assessment of severity of symptoms.
I think in the quote she’s saying ‘I wouldn’t diagnose someone with CFS, that’s what they present with, my test is for mitochondrial dysfunction and that can be a cause of those symptoms, but so can e.g. lack of sleep or bad diet or hypothyroidism’. But I don’t know. Of course I think that hypothyroidism can cause mitochondrial dysfunction.
Everyone involved is using words differently, and that’s obviously confusing, but I think we have to avoid getting hung up on it and try to look for the predictions we have in common and our ways of carving reality up.
Everyone involved is using words differently, and that’s obviously confusing, but I think we have to avoid getting hung up on it and try to look for the predictions we have in common and our ways of carving reality up.
But it is ever so important not to get into pointless bunfights about words.
Fights about words are not pointless. Finding the right words is important to understand unclear territory. Getting clear about words allows to make more precise statements.
That’s a pretty strong statement. What makes you believe that it can only by one of those two cases?
Apart from that I’m not even sure whether she believes that she has an excelent test given that she writes:
There is no simple test currently available to diagnose CFS because, as I have said already, CFS is not a diagnosis – it is a symptom.Because her evidence is very strong. She hasn’t got it by luck or a bit of innocent p-hacking. Her test score correlates very nicely with her assessment of severity of symptoms.
I think in the quote she’s saying ‘I wouldn’t diagnose someone with CFS, that’s what they present with, my test is for mitochondrial dysfunction and that can be a cause of those symptoms, but so can e.g. lack of sleep or bad diet or hypothyroidism’. But I don’t know. Of course I think that hypothyroidism can cause mitochondrial dysfunction.
Everyone involved is using words differently, and that’s obviously confusing, but I think we have to avoid getting hung up on it and try to look for the predictions we have in common and our ways of carving reality up.
That reminds me of Jay A. Labinger: The language you use to talk about something influences the way you think about it. If the chemistry you’re talking about is truly something new, then a fight over terminology may be quite an important part of getting to understand that chemistry better.
Mitochondrial dysfunction might be a much better disease target than CFS.
Absolutely. We need to ‘carve reality at its joints’ (may his name be praised), and naming things is important, whatever St Feynman said.
But it is ever so important not to get into pointless bunfights about words.
Fights about words are not pointless. Finding the right words is important to understand unclear territory. Getting clear about words allows to make more precise statements.
Agreed, let us not get into a pointless meta-bunfight