Bristol - New Network - Prof Munafo

Amw66 said:
The question is what effect will it have?
Will this be just another example of concerns raised by PWME being given no more than lip service as it is they who have raised them?

Can this be made wider ?
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Well, once Graham's letter is sent and presumably met with indifference then perhaps it can be forwarded to the Bristol Cable and the chap from The Canary, Steve Whipple(?).
 
Esther12 said:
I get the impression most academics would prefer to just get three sentences on 1) who I am 2) here's what I want 3) here's why it would be good if you did it. It's hard to do that well.
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I think that anyone wants that from anyone who wants them to do something. If I had a stranger write to me wanting me to do something, I'd want exactly that. I don't think it's weird or unreasonable. We only take action if someone gives us good reason.
 
Jonathan Edwards said:
Nice idea Graham but I agree you need to tell him the punch line at the start.

Something like:

I am pleased to see you are setting up an organisation for 'co-ordinating shared training and best practice across research-intensive universities' but are you aware that your own BRTC at Bristol is supporting some of the most flawed trials in history - and in the field of psychology?
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Yes, exactly something like this - grab him with the key issue and scare the pants off him at the same time. Big motivation to take action.
 
I guess one thing is true: I may be rubbish at writing letters, but I'm very good at stirring people up and causing trouble. Mind you, that has always been my reputation!

Our local ME group is meeting this afternoon, with short talks on POTS and EDR (some of our members have been re-diagnosed). I'm hoping that both my brain cells will be up to a rewrite this evening.

Thanks everyone for your utterly valid and important comments.
 
Peter Trewhitt said:
However he has no necessary obligation to even consider the research that is not directly linked to the BRTC.
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This is where I would disagree with you. If his reasoning is that he despairs of the current low standards and wants to set up a group of folk who do things properly, then he has a moral obligation to stand up and say where things are wrong.
 
I just would like to add some thoughts about the "Reproducibility Network" announced by Munafò, and his "manifesto for reproducible science".

I find the University of Bristol's press release announcing the network very strange: It's almost content-free. The only content and names referred to are Munafò and the manifesto. (Another co-author is John Ioannidis by the way: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ioannidis. The other authors may also be interesting, just didn't sound familiar to me.)

I could not find a further press release reporting how the "event" that had been announced for September 12th actually went.

Regarding the manifesto, see: https://www.s4me.info/threads/bristol-randomised-trials-collaboration.5731/page-2#post-105379

So perhaps it might be reasonable as a first step just to request more information about the network?

(Apart from everything said above, I find "Munafò's manifesto" a quite poetic phrase )
 
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Graham said:
This is where I would disagree with you. If his reasoning is that he despairs of the current low standards and wants to set up a group of folk who do things properly, then he has a moral obligation to stand up and say where things are wrong.
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In which case that might be worth dropping into the letter; something along the lines of (I'm sure my wording needs tidying):

"Setting up an organisation to significantly raise research standards is something I enthusiastically endorse, but of course in doing so you have an obligation to ensure your own house is in order, or at least call out any issues where that is not the case. Otherwise, in endeavouring to do what is right, you will end up endorsing some things that are very wrong. I am confident you have no wish to do this."
 
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Barry said:
"Setting up an organisation to significantly raise research standards is something I enthusiastically endorse, but of course in doing so you have an obligation to ensure your own house is in order, or at least call out any issues where that is not the case. Otherwise, in endeavouring to do what is right, you will end up endorsing some things that are very wrong. I am confident you have no wish to do this."
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I have left a comment much to this effect on Munafo's page on Wonkhe about the manifesto. It is not clear that these comments will be posted up.In fact i doubt they would want to post mine, since it is in a sense a personal message.
 
Graham said:
Here is a copy of my first draft. Feel free to be as critical as you wish: I really do not get upset! I take it as a compliment that you are sufficiently interested to sort me out.

It is a personal rant. It might be better to create a more neutral one in parallel: let me rant away, and let you create a constructive dialogue.

(edit for background info.)

There is a proposal to create a new network of "good, rigorous" researchers - http://www.bristol.ac.uk/news/2018/september/reproducibility-network-.html

At the same time Bristol claims to be a wonderful centre, but includes MAGENTA and FITNET. http://www.bristol.ac.uk/population-health-sciences/centres/brtc/ and http://www.bristol.ac.uk/population-health-sciences/centres/brtc/current-trials/
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Good for you - well done.

I'm not happy about the use of the term “animal activists”. Most such people are perfectly law-abiding, and many are highly educated - I count myself as one! Animal 'activists' are, I believe, as law-abiding as ME 'activists'.
 
Graham said:
I guess one thing is true: I may be rubbish at writing letters, but I'm very good at stirring people up and causing trouble. Mind you, that has always been my reputation!.
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By the way, @Graham , my "like" referred to your self-irony and the hope you expressed concerning your brain cells, but was not meant to endorse your factual statement about the alleged quality of your letter writing or other alleged skills. [I don't think your letter writing skills were rubbish or you were particular good at causing trouble.]

[Edited for clarity. I tried at least] :unsure:
 
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Good comment, as usual, but I fear it will be all for nothing. The problem is too big to be acknowledged.

What are the therapists wanting to treat health conditions with CBT going to do, pack up and go home? I doubt that they can obtain good results in studies that rigorously control for nonspecific effects. Maybe for a few conditions, but not for most. Nobody is going to say to a colleague that what they're doing is worthless. The university will prefer to look away and pretend everything is in order. The system in place resembles a criminal organization. Of course the people in it don't think they're making a living by lying to others.
 
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Jonathan Edwards said:
:oops:
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posting here incase it 'gets lost'
"
Jonathan Edwards MD FRCP says:
Sep 19 2018 at 12:47 pm
The objective here is very laudable. The question is whether this network is really taking its task seriously. One thing that concerns me is that the University of Bristol itself has a unit called Bristol Randomised Trials Collaboration that supports trials in the field of psychology in adolescence that suffer from some of the worst flaws you are discussing (MAGENTA and FITNET for instance). How come this unit has not been taken to task? And why did Dorothy Bishop come to the defence of the investigator when approached by Science Media Centre? One has to ask whether this is all window dressing.

Many of the points made in the manifesto are cogent. The pressure of commercial isation is dominant. So maybe this is not an issue of 19th century ways of working. In my experience standards were much tighter 30 years ago. I think this may be a new 21st century problem. Everybody knew about all these issues long ago. It is just that now people are allowed to get away with ignoring them – by overseeing committees and editors who no longer oversee."
 
strategist said:
Good comment, as usual, but I fear it will be all for nothing. The problem is too big to be acknowledged.

What are the therapists wanting to treat health conditions with CBT going to do, pack up and go home? I doubt that they can obtain good results in studies that rigorously control for nonspecific effects. Maybe for a few conditions, but not for most. Nobody is going to say to a colleague that what they're doing is worthless. The university will prefer to look away and pretend everything is in order. The system in place resembles a criminal organization. Of course the people in it don't think they're making a living by lying to others.
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I agree but I also I wonder how they explain it to themselves. They are after all members of the “ helping professions”. Can they even allow themselves to know that they are damaging patients?

When I reattended the Sutton hospital nhs clinic 2 years ago and was offered GET by the nurse, I thought she looked embarrassed when I refused saying that GET could damage some patients. She didn’t try to engage in disputing this. It was the only thing offered apart from a sheet with a list of supplements.

Am trying to recall my social psychology from over 50 years ago. They must be living in a state of extreme cognitive dissonance?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance

Don’t the ancillary organisations sit on the GDG for Nice? They will never vote to get rid of themselves. Has Nice considered this? I do hope we have some strong lay members but I can’t remember the numbers of each category nor do I know how it works.
 
MSEsperanza said:
By the way, @Graham , my "like" referred to your self-irony and the hope you expressed concerning your brain cells, but was not meant to endorse your factual statement about the alleged quality of your letter writing or other alleged skills. [I don't think your letter writing skills were rubbish or you were particular good at causing trouble.]
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Thank you for that, @Esperanza , but the truth is that, at school, my role in the senior management meetings was to stir things up – as Head of Maths, I was in a pretty strong position to do that. It's why I was voted to be a teacher governor.

I also needed to have much of what I wrote rewritten. I have a habit of writing like a maths proof: a sequence of logical sentences leading to a conclusion, and I totally miss all the undertones, biases and prior assumptions of my audience.
 
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