Volkskrant (Dutch newspaper) article on PACE study

[Keith Geraghty]

blind belief you are 'right' is the greatest example of how a researcher can be biased and not even realise it.

 

[user9876]

Van der Meer said that the research leaders shared indeed in recent years at the request data with colleagues. 'But to give all data to your enemies.' Enemies? 'Yes, there are people who have apparently interest in this to find a bad study. It is a personal vendetta to be against two scientists of renown. '

I think this quote shows an arrogance that is placing researchers about rights of patients and patient autonomy. Patients have a right to know about treatments and to ask questions in doing so they should not be seen as the 'enemy'.

There is also another message in his quotes that he realizes that the science is fragile and won't stand up to examination. He talks of small mistakes but good science does stand up to public scrutiny and mistakes need to be assessed. With PACE the mistakes involve massive methodological and reporting issues. Suggesting that others, particularly those affected by the conclusions should not be able to see the data to have a better understanding is outrageous.

 

[Bob]

I think Van der Meer forgets who funded this data. It was the public. And the research was carried out at a public institution, for the public good (supposedly). It's the not private property of the two researchers he mentions.

 

[Snow Leopard]

It's the old, "we're the experts and we know best, don't worry your little minds!"

 

[Bob]

As others have said, it's fascinating that he describes patients who wish to scrutinise trial data as "enemies". It makes you wonder if that's how they view all their ME/CFS patients.

 

[Bob]

Has Google translate been getting worse recently? It doesn't seem to be getting better with time.

 

[Valentijn]

Has Google translate been getting worse recently? It doesn't seem to be getting better with time.

Dutch is a bitch I doubt Google Translate can keep up with the grammatical rules, which get pretty complicated.

And based on the translation which was posted, there were several typos in the article itself, which couldn't get translated.

 

[Esther12]

Compared to my trying to read Dutch without google-translate, I'm pretty pleased with it!

 

[A.B.]

Amongst a select group of back-slapping cronies reviewing their own and each other's work conclusions are unanimous, yes. If he'd care to cast his net a little wider than his own clique he'd find that scientists researching ME are far from unanimous, or they wouldn't all be signing letters to the Lancet.

A good example of circular logic. All the experts who agree, agree. Therefore it's unanimous. Nevermind those 43 scientists who were so alarmed about the study that they sent letters to The Lancet.

 

[Bob]

I doubt Google Translate can keep up with the grammatical rules, which get pretty

I know that Dutch is difficult but it's not an obscure language. It's not Bhutanese! And the recent German Huffington Post blog was even worse than this translation! But perhaps I'm expecting too much of our technology! I just thought it seemed slightly worse recently.

 

[NL93]

Oh the irony.
Wasn't Van Der Meer the first person to comment on all the flaws he saw in the 2011 rituximab study on plos one? He had an entire list of all the things he perceived problematic.

But sure, when the exact same mistakes are made in the PACE study (+some way bigger errors) they are no big deal at all, because every study has flaws.

 

[Valentijn]

But perhaps I'm expecting too much of our technology!

I think so ... computers and natural language have never got along well Hence the extreme simplicity of the syntax of programming languages.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machine_translation has a pretty good description of the problems inherent in automatic translations. The program not only needs to fully understand the sentence being translated, but has to construct a new sentence in the desired language. Lots of places for things to go wrong.

 

[Marc_NL]

I guess if I translate this translation back to Dutch that would not lead back to the original text (since you need to make an account for this website to see it).

I'll not even try it, I've seen enough in the comments

 

[Dolphin]

Outgoing Vice President of Dutch Academy of Science warns of sharing data with “your enemies”
September 17, 2016
cognitive therapy, conflict of interest, data sharing, Data sharing, PACE, Netherlands,, PACE, Uncategorized Jos van der Meer, Peter White, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences

https://jcoynester.wordpress.com/20...ence-warns-of-sharing-data-with-your-enemies/

 

[Effi]

Has Google translate been getting worse recently? It doesn't seem to be getting better with time.

Bob, Google took your criticism to heart and is trying to do a better job!
http://qz.com/792621/googles-new-ai...tool-is-nearly-as-good-as-a-human-translator/

Starting today, Google will rely more heavily on artificial intelligence when it translates language. The new method, called Google Machine Neural Translation, cuts down errors by 80% compared to its current algorithm, and is nearly indistinguishable from human translation on standardized tests, the company said.

We'll see how that turns out... I'm not holding my breath!