I like your idea of making difficult to read literature more accessible to the public. It seems like a step in the right direction.
As for the problem "It's no longer possible to believe clinical research" the fundamental problem is that clinical research experiments are not repeated. Edison repeated experiments frequently. Science is not based on trust. Almost all published papers are basically just "Trust me bro this is what I did and this is what it means". Anonymous peer review is simply "these smart guys you don't know say the author is being straight up". That is not science. You describe your experiment in detail so others can repeat it and verify the results for themselves. That is science.
Medical experiments cannot be repeated for two reasons. First they are too expensive. They cost tens of millions of dollars. No one has the resources to repeat a drug trial and verify the results. Secondly, even if you were somehow to gather up the tens of millions of dollars, the ethics committee will forbid you from repeating the experiment. Why? They will argue that you are denying the placebo group a drug of known efficacy and that is immoral. So not only are drug experiment not science, they can never be science under the current constraints.
Since we cannot repeat the experiments we are stuck with "Trust me bro, this is what I did and this is what it means". I think we can all see the problem with that now.
I have been in the pharm and medical device development field for over 50 years. I have gone from the most basic positon of medical writer to director of clinical research, quality assurance and regulatory affairs. I read your article and it appears you missed your own point...that the data and pubs are tainted. That is absolutely true. But your solution does not address that issue. It is good for the 'average' reader to get a good abstract of a publication or series of publications, but that does not solve the problem you identified.
Bringing a scientific paper down to understandable levels (for your "average" person) is a great goal. My questions are-- will AI be able to objectively tell the reader if the study has any basic inbred flaws in its methodology, are the conclusion drawn in sync with the facts in the study body and are any of the authors influenced (financially or otherwise) by Big Pharma, government agencies, etc. Reading, interpreting, understanding these papers are no small feat. Ask somebody as knowledgeable as Pierre Kory.
This is a great idea. I just hope it will work as advertised. The ability to get these studies out to average people at an understandable level is very important to allowing people to protect and guide their own medical treatments. Thanks for your efforts, Phil.
As someone with one of those pesky autoimmune problems for which no one can identify the culprit, I have been studying “medical studies, journals, etc...” for at least 15 years and the biggest problem I always encounter is that none of us live in a bubble. I completely understand that we need to do studies for the larger population, but until we admit there are just so many other factors many are bringing to the study, nothing will really be helpful. In my case the research and understanding on the ankylosing spondylitis I have had for 40+ years is ever evolving and at the same time quite stagnant. (As an example, so many of the “other symptoms” of AS which happen in less than 20% of those of us with the disease have happened to me while I have no family history, I have never been overweight, never smoked, am healthy otherwise and yet I have experienced these “rare” percentage other issues - everyone of them??? Probability speaks against this) The data input will always be missing very important information that can never really be extracted on a large scale. We must listen to our own bodies as everyone is different and if we pay attention, what we can’t heal through life changes as we attempt to understand the broken pathways, we can try to mitigate. And really, feeling like you are doing something helps mentally which helps physically as well.
while its nice to have a lay translation... how can we know if its reliable in the first place?reading cliff notes on a false narrative doesnt help.. great idea tho
Thank you for creating this tool. It's much needed in this war for truth and for our freedom from those who would lord over conclusions.
I wonder if we could work together. I have built an evidence sharing platform in which summaries like these are organized into a tree of empirical inquiry with a yes/no question at the root. Our first debate was about whether masks mitigate the risk of COVID-19, and contains an amalgamation of evidence on both sides sorted by user-weighed strength, each open to rebuttal. My goal is to create a space where controversial questions can be examined and where all the evidence is visible, understandable, and tested, with no suppression of either side.
I've hired writers to help me summarize evidence and this has been fruitful both for creating new content and for shaping how the inquiries are organized. However, this is slow and expensive, eating into my savings, and probably won't scale. AI like yours can provide an enormous benefit by allowing even my end-users to request summaries of evidence they themselves submit. This puts the power of knowledge and argument back into the hands of society at large and away from the 'speakers of science.'
Would you like me to share a link to this project?
Outstanding idea, Phil. Even having a postgraduate science degree it is difficult for me at times getting through a lot of advanced science papers.
😱 I did ask ChatGPT, in one session with it, to write a 200 word essay on George Washington at a 7th grade level. It complied very well. AI, like so many advances in science and technology will be used for good and evil. I suspect homework assignments of the future will not be as educational for the student as they once were.
I had found all the evidence of corruption you mention in the beginning of your article and more, it's sooo bad. As a retired RN/RM I can understand the gist of some papers but cannot understand the intricacies. Your tool will be invaluable to many. The interest in looking at scientific papers has grown over the last 3 crazy years. I think your tool will be popular.
Well done, Phil, add this to your references? Keep safe and free.
Episode 353 - The Crisis of Science Corbett Report 02/23/2019
In recent years, the public has gradually discovered that there is a crisis in science. But what is the problem? And how bad is it, really? Today on The Corbett Report we shine a spotlight on the series of interrelated crises that are exposing the way institutional science is practiced today, and what it means for an increasingly science-dependent society.
9:30 pm Eastern Standard Time when I tried to register got an error message. I’ll be patient. 😁 Looking forward to it. I live in the medical literature in my “day job.” I’d like to believe that most of my last 20+ years of research has had honest and transparent findings (some of which have been in those 2 big name journals you referenced). Journals don’t like to publish lots of clinical trials that failed. But with requirements to post all study findings within 12 months of completion, you should have more data for AI to learn.
Hi Phil, very excited about your work, I just tried to register for openpaper.science, and it is not letting me register, wondering if this problem will be fixed soon.
I like your idea of making difficult to read literature more accessible to the public. It seems like a step in the right direction.
As for the problem "It's no longer possible to believe clinical research" the fundamental problem is that clinical research experiments are not repeated. Edison repeated experiments frequently. Science is not based on trust. Almost all published papers are basically just "Trust me bro this is what I did and this is what it means". Anonymous peer review is simply "these smart guys you don't know say the author is being straight up". That is not science. You describe your experiment in detail so others can repeat it and verify the results for themselves. That is science.
Medical experiments cannot be repeated for two reasons. First they are too expensive. They cost tens of millions of dollars. No one has the resources to repeat a drug trial and verify the results. Secondly, even if you were somehow to gather up the tens of millions of dollars, the ethics committee will forbid you from repeating the experiment. Why? They will argue that you are denying the placebo group a drug of known efficacy and that is immoral. So not only are drug experiment not science, they can never be science under the current constraints.
Since we cannot repeat the experiments we are stuck with "Trust me bro, this is what I did and this is what it means". I think we can all see the problem with that now.
I have been in the pharm and medical device development field for over 50 years. I have gone from the most basic positon of medical writer to director of clinical research, quality assurance and regulatory affairs. I read your article and it appears you missed your own point...that the data and pubs are tainted. That is absolutely true. But your solution does not address that issue. It is good for the 'average' reader to get a good abstract of a publication or series of publications, but that does not solve the problem you identified.
This is incredible. Literally the best Substack post I've read in 3yrs. THANK YOU, Phil! You're doing God's work for sure.
Am reposting and will highlight your work on an upcoming Substack post of my own, about moving forward with a solution oriented focus.
Bringing a scientific paper down to understandable levels (for your "average" person) is a great goal. My questions are-- will AI be able to objectively tell the reader if the study has any basic inbred flaws in its methodology, are the conclusion drawn in sync with the facts in the study body and are any of the authors influenced (financially or otherwise) by Big Pharma, government agencies, etc. Reading, interpreting, understanding these papers are no small feat. Ask somebody as knowledgeable as Pierre Kory.
This is a great idea. I just hope it will work as advertised. The ability to get these studies out to average people at an understandable level is very important to allowing people to protect and guide their own medical treatments. Thanks for your efforts, Phil.
As someone with one of those pesky autoimmune problems for which no one can identify the culprit, I have been studying “medical studies, journals, etc...” for at least 15 years and the biggest problem I always encounter is that none of us live in a bubble. I completely understand that we need to do studies for the larger population, but until we admit there are just so many other factors many are bringing to the study, nothing will really be helpful. In my case the research and understanding on the ankylosing spondylitis I have had for 40+ years is ever evolving and at the same time quite stagnant. (As an example, so many of the “other symptoms” of AS which happen in less than 20% of those of us with the disease have happened to me while I have no family history, I have never been overweight, never smoked, am healthy otherwise and yet I have experienced these “rare” percentage other issues - everyone of them??? Probability speaks against this) The data input will always be missing very important information that can never really be extracted on a large scale. We must listen to our own bodies as everyone is different and if we pay attention, what we can’t heal through life changes as we attempt to understand the broken pathways, we can try to mitigate. And really, feeling like you are doing something helps mentally which helps physically as well.
while its nice to have a lay translation... how can we know if its reliable in the first place?reading cliff notes on a false narrative doesnt help.. great idea tho
Not inject any "vaccine" into our body, sounds good.
Thank you for creating this tool. It's much needed in this war for truth and for our freedom from those who would lord over conclusions.
I wonder if we could work together. I have built an evidence sharing platform in which summaries like these are organized into a tree of empirical inquiry with a yes/no question at the root. Our first debate was about whether masks mitigate the risk of COVID-19, and contains an amalgamation of evidence on both sides sorted by user-weighed strength, each open to rebuttal. My goal is to create a space where controversial questions can be examined and where all the evidence is visible, understandable, and tested, with no suppression of either side.
I've hired writers to help me summarize evidence and this has been fruitful both for creating new content and for shaping how the inquiries are organized. However, this is slow and expensive, eating into my savings, and probably won't scale. AI like yours can provide an enormous benefit by allowing even my end-users to request summaries of evidence they themselves submit. This puts the power of knowledge and argument back into the hands of society at large and away from the 'speakers of science.'
Would you like me to share a link to this project?
Outstanding idea, Phil. Even having a postgraduate science degree it is difficult for me at times getting through a lot of advanced science papers.
😱 I did ask ChatGPT, in one session with it, to write a 200 word essay on George Washington at a 7th grade level. It complied very well. AI, like so many advances in science and technology will be used for good and evil. I suspect homework assignments of the future will not be as educational for the student as they once were.
Oh, welcome back Phil!
Love it, keep digging, keep writing :)
Stellar, as always! Excited to see where this goes.
Bravo! Great idea!
Thankyou, love this approach.
I had found all the evidence of corruption you mention in the beginning of your article and more, it's sooo bad. As a retired RN/RM I can understand the gist of some papers but cannot understand the intricacies. Your tool will be invaluable to many. The interest in looking at scientific papers has grown over the last 3 crazy years. I think your tool will be popular.
Well done, Phil, add this to your references? Keep safe and free.
Episode 353 - The Crisis of Science Corbett Report 02/23/2019
In recent years, the public has gradually discovered that there is a crisis in science. But what is the problem? And how bad is it, really? Today on The Corbett Report we shine a spotlight on the series of interrelated crises that are exposing the way institutional science is practiced today, and what it means for an increasingly science-dependent society.
https://www.corbettreport.com/sciencecrisis/
9:30 pm Eastern Standard Time when I tried to register got an error message. I’ll be patient. 😁 Looking forward to it. I live in the medical literature in my “day job.” I’d like to believe that most of my last 20+ years of research has had honest and transparent findings (some of which have been in those 2 big name journals you referenced). Journals don’t like to publish lots of clinical trials that failed. But with requirements to post all study findings within 12 months of completion, you should have more data for AI to learn.
Hi Phil, very excited about your work, I just tried to register for openpaper.science, and it is not letting me register, wondering if this problem will be fixed soon.