Editing 2012: Thorough Analysis
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This comic remarks on how obsessively some scientific papers investigate some insignificant, obscure things. It gives the example of an investigation into whether an {{w|1811β12 New Madrid earthquakes|earthquake in 1811}} caused church bells 600 miles away in Charleston, South Carolina to ring, which, although mildly interesting, is of minimal scientific importance. The earthquake itself is of enormous scientific interest, as an earthquake of the same magnitude in the same area today could cause enormous damage, but Charleston is not in the area considered at significant risk. | This comic remarks on how obsessively some scientific papers investigate some insignificant, obscure things. It gives the example of an investigation into whether an {{w|1811β12 New Madrid earthquakes|earthquake in 1811}} caused church bells 600 miles away in Charleston, South Carolina to ring, which, although mildly interesting, is of minimal scientific importance. The earthquake itself is of enormous scientific interest, as an earthquake of the same magnitude in the same area today could cause enormous damage, but Charleston is not in the area considered at significant risk. | ||
| β | An explicit comparison is made to the {{w|9/11 Commission Report}}, a study that was undertaken to, broadly, answer the question of how the | + | An explicit comparison is made to the {{w|9/11 Commission Report}}, a study that was undertaken to, broadly, answer the question of how the 9/11 attacks were able to occur (and by extension, what errors in security and communication needed to be addressed to improve detection of and response to other terrorist acts). |
This paper describes the researchers going as far as to genetically test local trees, likely to find those most closely related to the trees used for construction, so as to measure their structural properties and extrapolate the likely structural properties of the original building. Such extrapolation might require its own study to back its validity. It is likely in real life that the small differences such research would reveal would end up being too unsubstantial to have actually warranted any searching. | This paper describes the researchers going as far as to genetically test local trees, likely to find those most closely related to the trees used for construction, so as to measure their structural properties and extrapolate the likely structural properties of the original building. Such extrapolation might require its own study to back its validity. It is likely in real life that the small differences such research would reveal would end up being too unsubstantial to have actually warranted any searching. | ||
