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Probability Science - in medicine and in physics

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Probability is increasingly used in many areas of modern science, and most notably in medicine and in physics, in scientific proof claims. But often probability is used poorly in science and really gives little or no proof of what is claimed.

In medicine, probability is now commonly used in survey data analysis, as where a 10% correlation between peoples illness and peoples behaviour statements is said to prove eg that general behaviour A always has a 10% risk of causing illness B. Often the general behaviour A has no actual effect on the illness B, but has some correlation with the use of some unidentified product C which is the actual cause correlating 100% with illness B. But the incorrect medical claim is pushed.

In physics, probability is now commonly used in experiment data analysis, as where a 95% correlation between photon emissions and some general magnetic event is said to prove eg that general magnetic event A always causes photon emission B. But the general event A may have no actual effect on the emission B, but has some strong correlation with some unidentified specific event C which is the actual cause correlating 100% with emission B. Probability is also used as the basis of Quantum Mechanics and some other physics theory.

Science generally attempts to discover cause-effect laws that work 100% within specified conditions, and a failing in even below 1% of cases can commonly be taken as disproving that science law. But in science today probability is widely used in different aspects of data analysis proof claims that are not reviewed by statisticians. It is used in experiment data analysis and in survey data analysis, and in both areas it is also used in error estimation. But probability is commonly used wrongly in science as noted by some major statisticians like R.A.Fisher. It is commonly used by amateur-statistician 'scientists' who are not good statisticians and consult no statistician, so much that the journal 'Nature' has now started asking statisticians to review some submitted papers.

Probability in Medicine

In medicine, probability is now used both in experiment data analysis and in survey data analysis but here we will consider chiefly the latter (below under Physics we will consider the former). The chief problem with survey data is that it always involves some limited number of selected people being asked some limited number of selected questions. It may be that an illness being studied is caused by ACME soap, but the survey had no question about ACME soap or it did but none of the people surveyed used ACME soap. But still that survey will be probability-tested for that illness, and may well give some correlations for that illness. It will be announced that some behaviours 'are a risk for the illness', while ACME soap passes unmentioned.
(PS. this is NOT a claim that ACME soap causes any illness, we use the name here only as the name of 'some hypothetical product'.)

We can now consider a hypothetical medical survey to be probability-tested regarding a hypothetical disease A ;

In the early 1980s I did for a short time collaborate in a piece of nuclear-medicine related cancer research with Dr.JSM Leung of Hong Kong that looked like disproving part of Doll and Hill's statistics. Since nuclear matters were strongly defended by many governments, that piece of research was ended I believe by Britain's MI5 with myself jailed, as was my wife and our weeks-old first baby, and Dr Leung was also seemingly silenced somehow. I did from prison successfully do two degree applications and was accepted by the two London universities, City and LSE. I got a degree at City University with my mentor there, Andrew Mott, I believe helping somewhat to keep MI5 off my back to an extent at least though I never actually discussed that matter with him. This may seem just one minor and temporary bit of science history, but that piece of medical research has still not been completed to date that I know by anybody. Hong Kong in the early 1980s was unusual in having a high incidence of lung cancer but with a history of a relatively low incidence of tobacco smoking, so being the place to look for any other causes of lung cancer. Of course if you did not collect evidence from those dying then, then you generally could not do so later with them dead - history can make some medical science not repeatable though that particular problem rarely if ever applies to physics or chemistry. But it seems that whitewashing nuclear weapons and industries then favoured all the most powerful governments backing Doll and Hill evil-tobacco as the only cause of cancer though their statistics certainly did not prove that and later there did emerge some real evidence of some other causes also. Strong governments all acting to restrict some cancer research has maybe not helped science in studying the causes and possibly cures, with the massive amounts spent on it ending maybe somewhat wasted ?

In medical causation some illness may require both of two causes, as when two medicines are fine separately but cause some illness taken together. Then separately they may show 50% correlations for the illness and together show 100% correlation, but separately they involve 0% risk for the illness. Generally illness correlations below 100% do NOT indicate risks for the illness but only indicate possibilities that they might or might not contribute to causing the illness and so indicate that further research is needed to clarify its actual causation.

If there is some strong evidence for any hypothesis, then additional weak evidence will now commonly be taken as confirming and strengthening that. And even if there is only weak evidence for an hypothesis, then additional weak evidence will now commonly be taken as confirming and strengthening that. But logically only strong evidence should count towards proof, and weak evidence should only ever count as an indicator of a need to look for strong evidence. Generally there are no 20% causes and so no 20% risks, mostly A actually cause B or actually does not cause B. There may commonly be dose effects, and more rarely there may be multiple causes. But much too commonly medicine is reporting, and governments spread concerns about, relatively low illness 'risks' that are not actual scientific truths like 'eating fat causes heart problems' - and scientific journal 'peer review' has tended to create and keep backing such false discipline-prejudices. They might do better having chemists review physics papers, physicists review chemistry papers and astronomers review biological papers because their discipline-peer-review just promotes prejudice science instead of real science.

Medical research in the last 50 years has often centered on the use of statistics as shown clearly in nutrition studies. Hence a couple of published nutrition studies claimed to prove that Antioxidants were very good for peoples health, but then two later studies claimed to prove they were good for younger peoples health but were bad for older peoples health. And statistics-based claims were pushed strongly for a long time that margarine was better for health than butter, so lots of people have taken to using margarine. But new statictical studies now claim that margarine is worse for health. This bad science is likely killing people, yet todays 'scientists' and governments push it regardless. Many other published statististics-based nutrition studies have made doubtful claims due to poor use of statistics and there has been little if any really good nutrition research in recent years. And about the statistical science behind the widespread recent claims that a vegetarian diet is healthier than a meat-eating diet. It seems the best information on vitamin pill takers is that they are especially non-drinker non-smoker exerciser females which happens to be a population that includes many more vegetarians. So if any vegetarians are more healthy then it is probably due to their vitamin pill taking and other healthy living rather than to their vegetarian diet ?

But of course medicine has now long been dominated by big drug companies chiefly concerned with making profits and not with medicine, so that now any real medical research being done is very limited. The drug-makers need people to have illnesses so that they can sell them their profitable 'stuff to help'.

Probability in Experimental Physics

Probability testing in Physics and Astronomy is now commonly used in experiment data analysis or observation data analysis. This can have some of the problems seen in the use of probability testing of survey data. Hence where surveys can have omitted questions, experiment or observation can involve omissions in the factors investigated and this may have great impact in the more contentious areas like Particle Physics and Astronomy as with partial correlations between A and B being claimed as a causal proof when the true cause C was never studied.

Probability is also widely used in accuracy estimation, but often ignoring the probability fact that of several experiments or observations it is often NOT the one with the best accuracy that gives the most reliable evidence. Other significant issues are often also involved.

More recent Physics and Astronomy theories also commonly try to incorporate aspects of probability theory, correctly or incorrectly. Deductive assumptions involving infinities or limits often give false answers. So theory handling the infinitely small and infinitely large can ultimately require that the sum of an infinite set of zero probabilities add to a probability of one, which is plainly false. Physics deductions about the infinitely small or the infinitely large can generally be valid only derived correctly relative to some well proven specified finites. More recent physics theories can often involve error related to this issue.

False probability deductions can be due to a failure in specifying the data involved, or to a failure in specifying the assumed prior information involved. So there often can be no valid probability comparison between two physics theories regarding given data, if both involve assumptions about eg 'mass' but both fail to specify the prior information properties of 'mass' that their theories involve. Or phenomena that seem probabilistic may simply have some unseen or uncomputed non-probabilistic causes that may be currently unseeable or uncomputable.

Statistics based 'experiments' commonly rely on computer analyses or computer 'models' that are not fully specified and so such 'experiments' are not fully replicable to verify them or to challenge them. And replicable experiments generally though involving one set of statistical probabilities are all capable of being interpreted differently in terms of different theory paradigms. But statistics often cannot offer any valid evidence as to correctness between several alternative interpretations of an experiment. When radioactivity was discovered it soon became described as a 'causeless', 'random' or 'probabilistic' physical phenomenum, as no immediate cause could then be identified for such radioactive events. But radioactivity includes nuclear fission which occurs naturally on Earth in Uranium and Thorium ores as 'spontaneous fission' and which was found to be caused by neutrons non-randomly, so other radioactivity may well be caused by eg weak-force effects, simultaneous neutrinos or other as yet unidentified causation and not really be 'probabilistic'. And there is some recent new evidence that at least some other apparently random probabilistic physical events may not be entirely random or probabilistic - see Quantum Events ? Any phenomenon where the cause cannot be easily seen is likely to be claimed by some at least to be causeless or random, but this is a claim that generally cannot actually be proven.

Probability in Physics Theory

For some physicists the two-slit light experiment was taken as supporting a Heisenberg probabilistic quantum mechanics, as where there is some probability that an object actually at a specified time occupies one space location and actually at the same specified time in contradiction occupies some other space location. In such a probabilistic physics universe, the universe actually behaves probabilistically whereas in a determinate physics the universe actually involves fully specifiable causes giving fully determinate effects though that may not always appear to be the case. Probabilistic physics claims to be also backed by other supporting evidence, with claims of microscopic quantum processes such as 'superposition', 'entanglement' and 'virtual particle exchange' being involved. But that some two particles having a common origion should retain some common properties is nothing surprising and continuing related probabilities does not at all prove continuing connection or 'entanglement' as claimed by some. Statictical correlation alone is not proof of causation or of simultaneous linkage and the latter is spooky nonsense anyway.

Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle basically assumes that all possible ways of determining an objects motion and position at some instant must involve changing the objects motion or position. But the Rudolphine Tables of Kepler allow determining the position and motion of a planet at some instant by calculation alone (which has no impact on the planets position or motion), and the position and motion of a body continuously emitting light can be determined for some instant from its emitted light signals (having no impact on body position or motion but maybe limited by light having a quantal nature). It seems that there will be some cases where such determinations in principle cannot be done accurately, but also that there will be some cases where such determinations in principle can be done accurately.

Some physicists do not support probabilistic physics including Einstein who rejected probability physics "because God does not play dice" (though that is maybe no scientific disproof and Einstein still accepted duality contradiction physics). Probabilistic physics is rejected also by others like Schrodinger who reject all contradiction physics, including Einstein dualism, as in his Schrodinger's Cat probability-exposing 'thought experiment' which is perversely often quoted to help 'explain' probabilistic quantum physics. But for those who reject contradiction in science, it exposes probability physics as contradiction nonsense. Yet for those who accept contradiction in science, it helps explain probability physics !? And randomness in physics has long existed in Rene Descartes physics and all push-physics, and is only really absent in William Gilbert style action-at-distance signal-response physics which offers a completeness and consistency that Einstein physics sadly lacks. Of course it can be said that any claimed evidence for a contradiction must be contradictory evidence, and contradictory evidence may reasonably be taken as not being valid factual evidence - eg evidence that Jane is in Paris now AND that Jane is in Tokyo now or evidence that Jane is alive now AND that Jane is dead now ?! Logically it would seem that 'evidence' for a contradiction must be data being misinterpreted. It may be more scientific to say that nature itself is NOT probabilistic, but that human consideration of nature IS probabilistic and so can make nature APPEAR to be probabilistic. But nature showing apparent statistical associations will often allow of multiple alternative causal explanations or Image Theories, and in some cases necessarily do. See http://psych-networks.com/theoretically-distinct-mechanisms-can-generate-identical-observations/?utm_content=buffercae71&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer and /general-image-theory-1.php And of course A having a 10% chance of causing B, is also A having a generally or often ignored 90% chance of not causing B !

Probability methods generally are widely used in particle and quantum physics and have some use in almost all areas of physics today, even by physicists who reject actual probability physics. But where it is claimed that it has been proved that some physics is probabilistic, it is maybe best taken as meaning that it has really at most been proved that it is either probabilistic OR involves some as yet unidentified non-probabilistic causation. 2014 sees Christopher Ferrie and Joshua Combes, supported by Rainer Kaltenbaek and Franco Nori, throwing major doubt on Quantum Mechanics and especially its 'weak measurement' as being based on bad statistics. (see http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/2014/oct/09/are-weak-values-quantum-after-all)

While arguing for one-theory-only science, E.T.Jaynes concluded that probability theory has 'been fooled by a subtle mathematical correspondence between stochastic and dynamical phenomena'. But that rather supports multiple-theory science like Newton blackbox-theory science or perhaps preferably our General Image Theory science. See http://bayes.wustl.edu/etj/articles/prob.in.qm.pdf

Some of these physics probability issues were considered at the CERN 2007 conference 'Statistical Issues for LHC Physics', see http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/indepth/43309 Many suggest replacing the long-standing use of a probability value (p-value) of below 0.05 for 'significant' results with a stiffer p-value threshold of maybe 0.005, which should help to improve the use of probability in some areas of science though this does not affect the other issues with probability science. The probability of the Sun tomorrow not rising in the East and setting in the West is below 0.00000000001 but even that does not prove that the Sun orbits Earth daily, as observation strongly suggests and as used to be commonly believed though now we know that these observations are correctly explained by the fact that Earth is a sphere that revolves daily. Probabilities are probably often best used just to help identify specific issues where further real experiment are more likely to be useful. But even very good experimental science like Gregor Mendel's in genetics can have significant statistical problems as R.A.Fisher and others showed. Probabilities can be assigned to things that are not real, so probabilities can be assigned to numbers of angels sitting on a pin but that does not make that real. While there are still today some scientific physicists supporting a variety of scientific physics around different laws of nature, today increasingly there are many 'theoretical physicists' pushing various terrible lawless probability physics that are really supported by little or no experimental evidence as claimed 'science'. Of course misuse of statistics is far from the only problem with science but hard-science Physics is the leading edge of science, unfortunately long leading in bad science and only worsened by bad use of probability mathematics.

Mathematics is helpful to science chiefly insofar as it can help to increase exactitude in both experiment and reasoning proofs, but probability mathematics is basicly the mathematics of inexactitudes and so really can only help show the extent to which science proofs may be uncertain. Probabilities cannot themselves be causes of anything nor alone be proofs of any causations. So it is maybe sad to see Engand's 2020 Royal Society, David Spiegelhalter and Brian Cox pushing the false view that eminent statisticians Thomas Bayes and Sir Ronald Fisher helped build current probability science and probability physics, when Fisher chiefly concluded that probability can infer false causal effects and so can promote false science (See Brian Cox). And, without accepting Einstein's physics, the preponderance of science evidence does support laws of nature concerning nature not being probabilistic or playing dice - despite some apparent evidence for some seemingly contrary phenomena. Maybe 'uncertainty' is just 'ignorance'. Maybe even coin-tossing will become predictable with more scientific knowledge of it, and give us Superdeterminism ? There certainly was a time when predicting the motions of planetary bodies was beyond the ability of mankind, though that is routine science now. Basically all experimental science is based on statistics, with good experimental science being based on good statistics, but there is certainly too much unacceptably bad statistics giving too much bad science especially in medicine and in physics. Information is now commonly wrongly defined in relation to only uncertaimties or probabilities but signal science shows many cases of information signals causing effects, and not lack of information uncertainties or probalities, as was perhaps well demonstrated in William Gilbert's 1600 Latin 'De Magnete' as my English translation 'On The Magnet'. (That is a must-read that should be available in German, French, Russian, Chinese etc but is not unfortunately.)

Medicine and Ageing

As a 1942-born child I did have just a few vaccines including for Polio aged 14 and vaccines have certainly done good for many people. But as an adult I have had no vaccines yet and somehow am still going strong at 81 in 2024 and still keeping slim and fairly fit and smart and, and my worst virus in the last 50+ years has been a 1-hour runny nose and I did not get a Covid virus despite its prevalence, but my eyes now have cataracts and maybe other ageing issues. I did about 6 years ago have a one-off seeming blood-clot event that disabled my left leg for a few hours, requiring some short-term medication and a low dose 5mg Amlodipine for high blood pressure that I am still on, but my recent home blood pressure was 138/76 and OK for my age. Hospital duplex ultrasound checks of my blood vessels for cholesterol plaques and for blood flow then showed that I had 'exceptionally clear vessels' that rightly or wrongly I took as indicating 'no cholesterol issue' then more maybe than just a test of blood cholesterol-level could. My doctor has given me regular 6-monthly blood-tests since for maybe the last 8 years which he lets me read and they have all been generally OK to date despite my ageing though indicating some kidney weakness which should mean urine content not reflecting blood content or maybe if more otherwise just reflecting my odd high protein low liquid diet. I hope my genes and lifestyle might see me still fit and working well to 100 though few manage that and some of my present lifestyle I have been very late in starting. My recent general good health and slimness, though I have never been overweight, is maybe helped by my own basic older-person daily diet I have had for at least the last 10 years ;
Breakfast = 1 medium Banana + 1 square of Milk Chocolate
Lunch = a 120g tin of Sardines (with bones) + 7 Oat biscuits + 1 multivitamins&minerals pill
Dinner = 1 150g Meat & Vegetable pasty + 1 square of Milk Chocolate + 1 Magnesium 375mg pill
Supper = 1 Half 'Sandwich' of White bread with low-fat Flora Light margarine only.
But my Lunch on Sunday would replace sardines and biscuits with 4 small roast potatoes and a little braised steak with gravy.
My only drinking has been 2 x 500ml bottled waters daily, with a bit more in summer and then having some salt added, but I have recently added an extra 250ml flavoured still water.
Of course this diet does somewhat ignore the nutrition studies included in a 1960s Biology and Chemistry degree that I did, when many promoted milk, cheese and eggs as wonder-foods and vegetarian as being bad nutrition unlike views now. But I have done well with this my own older-person stay-slim-and-fit mixed diet to my present age 81. In June 2022 I changed my multivitamins&minerals pill from Asda brand to Lifeplan Extravits brand as maybe more suiting my age and eye issue as having eg more Zinc, Copper, B7 and B9 with less B12 and K.

In June 2022 my optician referred me for specialist eye tests and this prompted me to do some study of ageing including eye-ageing, and it has got me to boost my nutrition somewhat further. Firstly I added an extra 200mg vitamin C and 200iu vitamin E, more recently doubling both but later not the vitamin C, and started taking Lutein at 15mg (likely safe for an average adult to at least 20mg/day) in line with AREDS2 studies, and I also started on 650mg NMN for 6 weeks to settle on 500mg of NMN, firstly by NMNBio then by Vitamatic and now by YouthandEarth, as tests showed NMN at least helped some ageing issues in mice and more limited human tests showed at least that it was safe for humans to take up to 500mg/day though maybe of little benefit for heavier-build people at that dose. Effective mice NMN ageing tests of 100 to 300 mg NMN per kg of mouse weight suggest to some an optimum human dose about 8.13 mg per kg of human body weight with 3 times that as likely a maximum (for me, at my 55kg, 445mg to 1350mg). But some more wary of over-dosing suggest an optimum human dose about 6.7 mg per kg of human body weight with 10 mg as maybe a maximum (for me 370mg to 550mg). Since there seems little prospect of much funding for human ageing research, we must for now at least rely on mice studies for this. Typically mice genes seem around 92% similar to human genes and 8% different, so what works for mice often works for humans but not always. And there are those suggesting 250mg to 1000mg for any adult human, though 250mg may be too little for heavy-build adults and 1000mg may be too much for light-build adults.
(See http://www.jbclinpharm.org/articles/a-simple-practice-guide-for-dose-conversion-between-animals-and-human.pdf )

Since these recent nutrition changes I myself have noticed no obvious health or fitness changes but hope for maybe some longer-term benefits. June 2023 saw drug agencies saying they want to promote drug-maker study of the use of NMN by halting its general use and others research by banning its sale, so I will have to see how that goes. In 2022 I had 4 eye tests giving Lva 6/12 to 6/7.5 and Rva 6/24 to 6/13 and my vision certainly seemed to vary as in being weaker in the morning than evening as due to blood sugar or hydration or maybe blood pressure until I added 4 more oat biscuits to lunch and a Flavoured Water to my dinner seemingly somewhat boosting my blood glucose and fluid intake and maybe my daytime vision slightly. It seems there is evidence that high blood sugar can worsen sight so it may not be that, but I do read lots by day and not evenings. And from 23.6.2023 I added a healthymood.co.uk 1g L-Taurine pill to my daily diet, which does seem to maybe somewhat improve my vision unlike D-Taurine, though again this is unfortunately based only on a few limited animal studies but from 1.12.2023 am trying also a 100mg CoQ10 pipingrock.com capsule with their increased 20mg Lutein + 1mgZa and cut extra Vitamin C from 400 to 200mg and E from 400 to 200iu. My latest 14.12.23 blood test seemed to show a maybe 10% boost or repair of kidney function that may be due to some of these dietary supplements or to a small increase in liquid intake in my high-protein low-liquid diet. I last had another hospital eye-testing 25.7.2023 and the eye-doctor said my vision had not worsened in the last year, but may in future so offered another hospital eye-testing in a year and I agreed. And having worn glasses for the last 40+ years, now I have adopted UV-blocking Asda prescription glasses, confirmed by the UV-torch I bought, as maybe I should have done sooner. I have for about the last 18 years also sucked sugarfree Xylitol+Aspartame mints, begun as a successful replacement for smoking cigarettes which I have not touched since. But I do at 81 remain still quite reasonably fit and healthy, with a sharp mind and still not-grey hair a bit more like a 51 maybe, and can walk at a reasonable pace for an hour or so. And my brain is still working well enough for writing this. I have long used a face-and-hands moisturiser as of some good and for a time replaced it with a sunscreen but soon dropped that and wore a cap to improve my sun-avoidance somewhat instead. And as well as still working and keeping active, I also still live with my two adult sons and a cat or two.
(PS.This website is by Vincent Wilmot and you can read a brief biography at Vincent Wilmot.)

Governments generally as well as funding physics in the most unscientific way possible also fail to fund nutrition research or ageing research so the many specialist foods and 'food supplements' widely consumed are really of unknown effect and they can often include fakes so I have at times had to swithch brand. And it should maybe be noted that the nuclear industry is strongly defended by many government security forces, so it may be very unsafe to get involved in any aspect of nuclear medicine.

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