[grzm]

You're right with respect to reading the paper critically. What I'm looking for in particular is how 'wastra arrived at "there is a very weak chain of experiments, poorly reported, with borderline statistical significance. Poor charts, no tabulated results, just terrible."

[wallace_f]

I thought I'd just mention that it appears the issue here is there is a need to rephrase your request for substantiation. The burden of proof is rightly on the claim of new discovery, and user wastra should not be burdened with proving or providing work that the above claim is false, even when the user is being critical.

Asking wastra to expand or show why he/she claims what they claim is fine. However, what I think people are taking issue with is the need for the aforementioned distinction in burden of evidence--it appears your comment on 'work and results' may be unintentionally misinterpreted in this way.

[grzm]

Thanks for the feedback. Agreed on all points.

[kazinator]

Going out on a limb:

HN user wastra read a paper which is obviously rife with reports from weak chains of experiments, poorly reported and with borderline statistical significance.

Then, HN user wastra commented accordingly.

[grzm]

Too late to edit: it looks like people are reading my comments as obliquely questioning 'waster's credentials. I can see how one could read my comments that way and given how conversations on the internet can go, how one may believe that to be the case; but that's really not my intent. If I took issue with their findings, I'd come out and say so. I'm just interested in finding out more where their coming from.

[selectodude]

You're welcome to just go "I don't trust wastra's self-identified credentials" and keep scrolling.