#how dare you say we piss on the poor

[brightlotusmoon]

https://twitter.com/deathbybadger/status/1749501813122867396

[wordfather]

nice post you got there. mind if i get unreasonably mad about it and assume things about you and start arguments on your posts? i dont care im gonna do it anyway. also by 'nice' i mean evil. which you are btw

[elljayvee]

Today I'm more than usually annoyed with a pop science article, so I'm going to talk about reading these sorts of articles, why you should always be skeptical of claims in them, and some of the ways you can tell the article's author didn't understand what they were reading and told you the wrong thing.

I clicked on an article in Eating Well about low bone density and dementia, because my mother has both. There's not a lot we can do for her now, but I am a curious person. I know Eating Well isn't great at science interpretation and communication, so I'm anticipating that I'm going to need to read the original study already, going in. (How do I know Eating Well isn't a great source usually? Well, I have read it before, and it has some really clear biases if you read a few articles that aren't science communication, and so you get to know a source over time like that. Regardless of how, I'm already suspicious they're not going to do a great job.)

The article is talking about research that shows low bone density may be predictive of dementia risk. It is written by a journalist and reviewed by a dietician. Now, I don't know what review the dietician did, but she did a bad job, and also, so did the journalist, because THE FIRST red flag that goes up is pretty quick: the math is very, very clearly wrong.

This says there are 3651 participants, and that over 11 years, 688 of them developed dementia. This is 18.8% and the article calls it 19%. That's fair! Not a red flag so far, just rounding. Then it says that of the 1211 people with lowest bone density at the start, 90 people (7.4%) developed dementia, and of the 1211 with highest bone density, only 57 (4.7%) did.

This IS a red flag. It's a GIANT red flag. This red flag can be seen from SPACE by anyone who knows how percentages work.

Here's how: You have 3651 people. 1211 of them are in the low bone density group, 1211 of them are in the high bone density group, leaving 1249 people. You have 688 total dementia cases, but your high and low groups account for only 147 of them, leaving 541 cases for that middle group. That's a LOT of cases. That middle tertile, just eyeballing it, has to have about 40% of its people with dementia -- that makes low bone density look like it predicts LOWER dementia risk relative to the middle group.

I can write out the equations for you two ways:

3651 - 1211 - 1211 = 1249 688 - 90 - 57 = 541 541/1249 = 0.433 0.433(100) = 43.3%

Because I am someone who does a fair amount of stats for a living, though, what I noticed was pretty much this equation:

0.074(1211) + x(1249) + 0.047(1211) = 0.19(3651) and I knew immediately that x had to be MUCH bigger than it should, which indeed the math bears out: x(1249) = 0.19(3651) - 0.074(1211) - 0.047(1211) x(1249) = 694 - 90 - 57 x = 547/1249 = 0.438 0.438(100) = 43.8%

That 694 is because the authors rounded 18.8 to 19 earlier, not because I can't math. So, due to rounding, you get slightly different answers -- but BOTH of them point to something SERIOUSLY WRONG with the reporting. What is actually going on in that middle tertile? Where do these numbers come from? Well, lucky us, they mention the name of an author, a journal, and a date. Always be wary of pop sci articles that don't give you a way to track down the original, but giving you that way to track things down doesn't mean they aren't still doing a crummy job with their reporting, as we see here.

The original paper is Association of Bone Mineral Density and Dementia: The Rotterdam Study, published March 2023 in Neurology. This is a pretty technical article with a fair amount of math and things in parens etc. etc. and tables and lots of measurements. The table captions are often not the greatest, which makes it a bit harder to read and interpret. For example, in Table 1, items are listed as number(number) and this can be any of:

count (percent) -- this one's usually labeled in the table itself

mean (standard deviation)

median (interquartile range) -- these last two are NOT labeled in the table, so we don't know which set of numbers is which.

Great. Thanks guys. Assuming what's called a "normal distribution" mean (SD) and median (IQR) numbers will be similar, but they're not the same and I'm irritated they're conflated but OK. Soldiering on!

The original study looked at several different measures of bone density, and found only ONE of them to show predictive ability for dementia: the density of the femoral neck. This means that for their article, Eating Well should have looked at the results for femoral neck bone density, which we find in Table 2:

You have the actual numbers for 5 years, 10 years, and study end, as well as the hazard risk (HR) for each bone density tertile, with the highest tertile set as the standard. Numbers in the HR column have 1 as a reference point -- lower than 1 is lower risk than the highest tertile, and higher than 1 is higher risk.

The first thing I noticed is that neither 57 nor 90 occur in the femoral neck section at ALL. Those numbers from the Eating Well article are just not there. I also notice that the other numbers don't align even one little bit -- the number of total cases of dementia is different, for example. I do notice that the column with the 10 year followup has numbers in it close to 57 and 90 (49, 67, 86, totaled to 202) and that the overall numbers for the total study are much higher -- 201, 236, 229. Interesting.

At this point, I just straight-up search the paper for "90", and I find it in Table 2....in the total bone density section, which the paper's authors have said is NOT the section that showed possible predictive results. I search for "57", and also find that in total bone density, and also....wow the EW author straight up failed to read. This is actually worse than I thought.

Read across, these are the 5 year followup numbers (first 2 columns - count and HR), 10 year (middle 2 columns), and total followup numbers (last 2 columns).

We see our friends 57 and 90 in the 10 year columns. 90 is, as described in the EW article, in the lowest bone density tertile, but 57 is NOT in the highest bone density tertile. It's in the middle tertile. The actual number for the highest tertile is 68. Additionally, the total cases for 10 years is nowhere near that 688 number -- it's 215. We only get total case numbers close to 688 when we look at the study end numbers: it's 686, in this particular group. If we look at the study end case numbers for highest, middle, and lowest tertiles, we see WHY this particular measure can't be used to predict anything: they are 227 (highest), 227 (middle), and 232 (lowest) -- not significantly different from each other.

We can also see here that this group of people -- people who had total bone density measurements -- is not 3651, but 3633, which is listed across the bottom row. The overall STUDY had 3651, but not all of them had total bone density recorded.

Now we know that the author of the EW article did all of the following:

read the wrong part of Table 2

mixed up middle and high tertile results

reported 10 year results mixed with total followup results (this resulted in the weird math that alerted me something was very very wrong in the first place).

and the person who was supposed to review the article didn't have even the basic math skills to catch the problem -- which she absolutely should have, as a registered dietician. For giggles, I looked up program requirements for a BS in Dietetics. Programs require things like statistics and precalc -- not math heavy, but the math that alerted me to this problem is VERY basic statistical knowledge, like the kind they teach in 6th grade level statistics, which I know because it was literally in my 6th grader's curriculum this past school year. So a registered dietician DEFINITELY had enough math to catch this problem, and should have, and Eating Well should be ashamed of itself.

SO. What can we learn from this?

Well, science communication is a skill set. Some people have worked very hard to develop that skill set and are excellent at it -- but lots of people do not have it, and even those who do can make mistakes. Many, many pop sci articles are not written by trained science communicators, or people with any education in how to read scientific articles, or people with good reading comprehension, even. It's very common for pop sci articles to have these sorts of errors in them. Therefore:

Always read pop sci articles with a skeptical eye. Ask yourself:

Do these numbers line up? Usually the math in pop sci articles is not very complex -- you can often do some basic arithmetic to make sure it even makes sense, as was the case here.

Does one part of the article seem to contradict another part of the article?

Do I feel confused about what exactly I'm being told? What's not clear about it?

Am I being told about HOW something works or WHY it works or both? Are those two things being conflated somehow?

Is there a link or way to find the original research? If not, my advice is to throw the whole article away. If yes, you can go check it out -- often just looking at the abstract or results section will be enough, and abstracts usually aren't paywalled even if the rest of the article is. You would be surprised how many times the abstract says "we found X" and the pop sci article says "the researchers found Y".

Could I explain this article to someone and have it make sense? If not, why not?

Is the article confusing correlation (these things happen together) with causation (one of these things causes the other)?

Pop sci articles, like other journalistic articles, are extremely subject to bias issues from the publication they're in. A lot of people tend to read pop sci articles as neutral, factual reporting, but they aren't! I mentioned EW's biases earlier -- the one I think is most relevant to how their article is written is a pervasive belief that if you just eat the right things in the right amounts you will be thin and healthy and stave off all kinds of problems. They close their article by mentioning that, although the study's authors are clear that this connection is unlikely to be causative, and that risk factors for low bone density and dementia have substantial overlap, readers should act like it might be causitive with diet and exercise choices that promote bone health. They were so excited to get to their point about fixing your diet that they didn't pay attention to the actual science they were reporting on. (Sidenote: actual scientific journal articles are supposed to be neutral, factual reporting. They also aren't actually that, but there are some measures in place around this to try to prevent the worst effects of bias.)

It's worth brushing up some basic math skills. You don't need to know a lot! Very basic information will help you better understand a lot of articles -- both ones that are accurate and well-written, and ones that are shoddy and should not have been published. I really like Larry Gonick's The Cartoon Guide to Statistics but if your grasp of percentages is shaky, it will be too advanced. A good option might be something like The I Hate Mathematics! Book, which is pretty old but really accessible, but there's probably some newer great ones out there that I just don't know about.

[lazywitchling]

Why do I keep looking at my dash and seeing

“THEYRE FORCING ALGORITHM ON US”

followed by staff being like

“We’re not switching to an algorithm”

followed again by users being like

“HOW DARE THEY FORCE THE ALGORITHM”

[literallyautistic]

jjk fans who saw sukuna lose and admit he was wrong to mahito and calling it disney kaisen just forgot about the entire rest of the story huh.

[tributary]

ask people what they mean instead of assuming you already know

[bringinghometherain]

Not thrilled to see that "piss on the poor" reading comprehension is becoming a nationwide issue

[pensivelyplayfulme]

Your text post got notes simulator

���you Follow

Really like the sun. I'm like a plant in that way

🪻gardens-and-fandoms Follow

omg I love this. Now I'm thinking of naming my plants after my Naruto: Reborn OCs based on how much they like the sun haha jk unless? someone tell me not to

⚰️gothanddying69 Follow

why do you all keep putting this shit on my dash. i'll kms if i have to see one more post about the sun

🤬unproblematic-and-beloved Follow

I just want to point out OP is not the only one who likes the sun! And neither are plants! You can like the sun even if you're a different person who is not a plant (like me)

#also does anyone else think its weird OP is lowkey anthropromorphizing plants? #idk I don't want to start anything #I just hope nobody takes this to mean plants should ever be kept indoors like people #sun #sunny posting

( 23,879 notes )

[giantkillerjack]

the average person doesn't expect you to be a perfect ethical consumer, that's not possible for the vast majority of us. but what youre saying is it's better to do nothing at all and choose the worst possible options (sweat shops, overseas shipping waste, idea/product theft, all wrapped up in SHEIN) than to put even the tiniest effort in where you can.

[they are referring to this post]

What I said was "some people are doing literally everything they can to survive and have no extra bandwidth to spend extra time and money on their purchases, and it is cruel and therefore un-punk to gatekeep punkness and add additional shame to these people's lives based on that fact."

I think it's still a good thing to try to ethically consume; I literally never said it wasn't. I had never even heard of SHEIN before. Rather, I am much more concerned about what I saw as arbitrary gatekeeping based on ability and income.

And frankly how dare you claim that I am supporting sweatshops and abuse by saying that this additional work you are demanding (in this case, presumably, vetting every clothing company you buy from) is not always possible for people. It is not a light accusation to accuse me of supporting abuse.

"How dare you say we piss on the poor", Etc. 🙄 this isn't Twitter. You are determined to enforce moral purity, but you are failing to see the nuance.

Because when I say "no extra bandwidth," I mean no extra bandwidth. This is not the "car shows it's on E but actually secretly it has a lot of gas left" situation that abled people constantly assume disabled people mean when they say they are at their limit.

This is "the car has stopped moving, and to move it I'd have to break my body pushing it." This is "at a certain point, people will hit a wall in terms of money and time and energy, and any energy spent after that comes directly out of their life force."

So the argument "okay but just spend a little more time money and energy actually" is not a valid one.

And the argument "if you are not able to do this specific task, then it means you're not doing anything else to make the world a better place" doesn't exactly impress me either. You said yourself that it is impossible to be a perfectly ethical consumer for most people.

How do you know what else people are doing to resist oppression? How many hours per week until your standards are met?What if someone works 3 jobs? Does that mean it's harder to be a good person if you're poor?? Why do you get to decide what specific avenue of bettering the world is the most morally repugnant or acceptable? What kind of proof of goodness and effort would make you satisfied enough to lay off on the shame?? Who are you helping??

Clothing is a fundamental human need, and some of us have to buy cheap fucking clothes quickly. Billionaires are buying their seventh yacht this month. The people who own fast fashion companies are abusing their workers and putting local affordable clothing stores out of business - and this applies for basically every company with price points that low because governments are failing to regulate corporations to enforce basic human rights.

I have $300 to spend on a new wardrobe as my old clothes have fallen apart or become too small. Do you have a way for me to get a new winter coat, 3 flannels, 10 shirts, 3 dress shirts, new sandals, 10 pairs of pants, 5 bras, 12 pairs of socks, and 10 pairs of underwear within that budget and also definitely 100% ethically sourced, with free returns in case it doesn't fit? Or will I simply have to use the cheap stores?

I have about an hour to spend on this per week. Many mainstream stores doesn't make clothes in my size, and I am now in *year 5* of needing an electric wheelchair and being unable to get one; plus I live up a flight of stairs, so I can't even bring my walker out with me - so thrift shopping is not gonna cover this. Should I continue to wear small and tattered clothing until I have the time, money, and energy to meet your standards?

Did you know there are more empty homes in this country than homeless people? If I decide to splurge on only 100% ethically-produced products, and I can't make rent, and I become homeless, are YOU going to be there for me?? Or are you too busy litigating the endless tiny shames of poverty in your own community?

So I ask you again, are you SURE this is where you want to direct your punk energy?

Because there are a whole lot of rich people relying on people like us punching down and to the side instead of looking up to see where the money is going.

Because energy and time, as it turns out, are limited resources. And I would never expect you to secretly have more than you claim to have.

[mfred]

On election day, I published a "go vote" post to my cat blog and people are still liking it, which ok, whatever, but they are also still reblogging it. Still! The election is super over. What is going on? I mean, it's a cute picture of my cat but it's still just weird to reblog a plea to vote a whole lifetime after the election. Like, we voted. That is a thing that happened. It's over. We're in the trumpocalypse now. It is the worst timeline. This was a post with a clear time limit and frankly, it's sus to reblog it.

[dinosaurcharcuterie]

We sent out notice of an update in social security to our clients, and how this affects their insurance. (Spoiler: either not at all, or they get more money.) It's legally mandated and morally correct that we do so.

The problem is that we insure a lot of people who have or make time to read every last letter of an official document with the same razor sharp reading comprehension as your average tumblrian and then call about stuff that they think they've read.

[irusanw4]

Tumblr users every time they log on

[grayintogreen]

“I don’t hate this character/ship/trope and in fact probably love and enjoy it on my own terms, but it’s prevalence to the detriment of anything else makes me tired” is a fandom opinion that should not be controversial.

[cakesandfail]

Me, in a thread about periods: yeah I started at 15 which is super late in my family, usually people start at 11 or 12

Someone who can't read: this is INCORRECT, people can start at 9!!!

...did I say they couldn't? No. I said that in my family it's usually 11. Jesus christ.

[iceeericeee]

I had a dream I made a post that said “Using AI to draw deez nuts lol” and people were coming at me in the tags saying how I shouldn’t be using AI at all and I was disgraceful. So I deleted Tumblr. I woke up super panicked and checked my phone to see if it was true.