Of Gyms and Germs
ROGUE MICROBES
I awoke yesterday to the startling realisation that some heavy-duty construction work (involving what seemed like a jackhammer and a piling machine) was taking place somewhere deep inside my skull. Today, the goblet cells lining my nose decided once again to increase performance in an attempt to meet this year's mucous quota (and perhaps next year's as well), and effectively clogged up my nose, with the result that today's run was not exactly pleasant, given that said honker was only good for honking, and that the mouth, being an excellent opening for inserting food and exhaling carbon dioxide, was also a highly efficient suction pump for not only oxygen but smoke, small airborne creatures and random suspended debris.
I very much suspect this to be the fault of the maid who, instead of staying home to nurse her cold, has been bringing her viruses to work like highly unruly, destructive children.
WATCHING THE WEIGHTS
Today at the gym, I watched with some amusement as two decidedly overweight guys who knew squat about routines attempted the lat pull machine. Guy 1 (aka the spotter) set the resistance to some arbitrarily high number, and spent yonks adjusting the position of Guy 2(the one sitting down)'s hands on the bar, as Guy 2 visibly sweated from the exertion. Guy 2 tried pulling down the bar. Did two reps very badly. Guy 1 stepped behind and grabbed the bar at the centre. Between the two of them, they managed under a dozen reps before Guy 2 (whose head looked as though it would explode from the first rep) called for a halt.
[It reminded me of this one girl who came *one* time, and who was obviously clueless in the ways of gym machinery. After observing me at the cable crossover machine (I was using only one side) for a spell, she decided that she too would try tricep presses - and set her weights to the same as mine. (I think her line of reasoning was, I'm kind of small, the girl was much taller and somewhat bigger, so - hey, I bet I can manage that). After watching her struggle to force the bar down, subtract 5kg, struggling again, subtract another 5kg, I suggested, "Why don't you try it the other way around? Start at something much lighter, say, 10kg and work your way up." She said, "OH!! okay!" *facepalm*]
Seriously, if you don't know how to operate a machine, you should try locating the trainers, or approach one of the veteran bodybuilders, before you wind up hurting yourself badly. (I mean, hell, we have *four* defending champions who're there almost every day. They're pretty easy to spot, because they're the ones with biceps big and hard enough to drive nails in with). *chuckles*
DATA MISREPRESENTATION
I've been reading these big fat supplementary reports that were included in my research material, and scribbling very rude remarks all over the margin that hopefully boss guy will never see. (I don't even know why I'm reading it, since the project will not include said product). Because, seriously, it's downright hideous how all this data is being misrepresented by the opposing party. Without alluding to what the product in question is, specifically, I shall say this:
1. If there is one case of disease for every 12 million units of Product A consumed, and one case for every 19 million units of Product B consumed, it does NOT mean that you can safely consume an additional 7 million more units of Product B without risk of infection. It's just that for every unit of Product A consumed, there is a 8.33 x 10-6% chance that there's a high enough number of pathogens in it to make a person sick, versus a 5.26 x 10-6% chance per unit with Product B. I mean, if, say, 1 in 1,000 people stupid enough to stand under a tree during a lightning storm get struck by said lightning, does that mean you can safely stand underneath a tree 999 times without getting hit?
2. I love how they keep saying things like, there were only 450 cases of contamination for Product A in [year] as opposed to 1,400 for Product B. Yeah, but what were the production values for Products A and B? How big a market did they cater to? Those numbers aren't reflecting any kind of percentage, yo.
[Back when we did Scientific Writing, our lecturer cited this hilarious example of statistics: "In our studies to test the hazardous effects of [chemical] on laboratory white mice, 33% of the samples died, 33% lived - and the last mouse ran away." AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.]
3. If you're going to study the effects of Product X vs Product Z upon the health of a consumer, you do NOT set it up as follows: you give ONE consumer Product X, ONE consumer Product Y (what has Y to do with the study?) - and give them BOTH additional supplements - and then give ONE consumer your Product Z WITHOUT ANY ADDITIONAL SUPPLEMENTS. That is seriously the stupidest experimental setup I have ever heard.
4. Neither should you, in a coronary disease study involving Product Q vs R, compare the health of people who consume large quantities Product Q (which contains significant proportions of fat) with people who do not consume Product Q. (Where are the people who consume Product R, anyway?).
5. When asserting that cooking destroys Chemical X in Product C, which promotes good health, you should also bear in mind that the majority of the population doesn't even consume significant quantities of said Product C, and that Chemical X is found in other, more common foods anyway, instead of trying to scare the reader into thinking it necessarily leads to DEFICIENCY.
The list goes on and on ad nauseum. Seriously, you could write an entire dissertation on "Data Misrepresentation in a Report on X". ... You know, I don't believe the people who put this together are actually this dumb. I think they knowingly chose to convolute said data to push their case. God, I just want to hit them over the head with this mountain of reading material.
THESE CAN'T POSSIBLY BE CHRISTMAS CARDS...
Just thought I'd share two that went out today:
I awoke yesterday to the startling realisation that some heavy-duty construction work (involving what seemed like a jackhammer and a piling machine) was taking place somewhere deep inside my skull. Today, the goblet cells lining my nose decided once again to increase performance in an attempt to meet this year's mucous quota (and perhaps next year's as well), and effectively clogged up my nose, with the result that today's run was not exactly pleasant, given that said honker was only good for honking, and that the mouth, being an excellent opening for inserting food and exhaling carbon dioxide, was also a highly efficient suction pump for not only oxygen but smoke, small airborne creatures and random suspended debris.
I very much suspect this to be the fault of the maid who, instead of staying home to nurse her cold, has been bringing her viruses to work like highly unruly, destructive children.
WATCHING THE WEIGHTS
Today at the gym, I watched with some amusement as two decidedly overweight guys who knew squat about routines attempted the lat pull machine. Guy 1 (aka the spotter) set the resistance to some arbitrarily high number, and spent yonks adjusting the position of Guy 2(the one sitting down)'s hands on the bar, as Guy 2 visibly sweated from the exertion. Guy 2 tried pulling down the bar. Did two reps very badly. Guy 1 stepped behind and grabbed the bar at the centre. Between the two of them, they managed under a dozen reps before Guy 2 (whose head looked as though it would explode from the first rep) called for a halt.
[It reminded me of this one girl who came *one* time, and who was obviously clueless in the ways of gym machinery. After observing me at the cable crossover machine (I was using only one side) for a spell, she decided that she too would try tricep presses - and set her weights to the same as mine. (I think her line of reasoning was, I'm kind of small, the girl was much taller and somewhat bigger, so - hey, I bet I can manage that). After watching her struggle to force the bar down, subtract 5kg, struggling again, subtract another 5kg, I suggested, "Why don't you try it the other way around? Start at something much lighter, say, 10kg and work your way up." She said, "OH!! okay!" *facepalm*]
Seriously, if you don't know how to operate a machine, you should try locating the trainers, or approach one of the veteran bodybuilders, before you wind up hurting yourself badly. (I mean, hell, we have *four* defending champions who're there almost every day. They're pretty easy to spot, because they're the ones with biceps big and hard enough to drive nails in with). *chuckles*
DATA MISREPRESENTATION
I've been reading these big fat supplementary reports that were included in my research material, and scribbling very rude remarks all over the margin that hopefully boss guy will never see. (I don't even know why I'm reading it, since the project will not include said product). Because, seriously, it's downright hideous how all this data is being misrepresented by the opposing party. Without alluding to what the product in question is, specifically, I shall say this:
1. If there is one case of disease for every 12 million units of Product A consumed, and one case for every 19 million units of Product B consumed, it does NOT mean that you can safely consume an additional 7 million more units of Product B without risk of infection. It's just that for every unit of Product A consumed, there is a 8.33 x 10-6% chance that there's a high enough number of pathogens in it to make a person sick, versus a 5.26 x 10-6% chance per unit with Product B. I mean, if, say, 1 in 1,000 people stupid enough to stand under a tree during a lightning storm get struck by said lightning, does that mean you can safely stand underneath a tree 999 times without getting hit?
2. I love how they keep saying things like, there were only 450 cases of contamination for Product A in [year] as opposed to 1,400 for Product B. Yeah, but what were the production values for Products A and B? How big a market did they cater to? Those numbers aren't reflecting any kind of percentage, yo.
[Back when we did Scientific Writing, our lecturer cited this hilarious example of statistics: "In our studies to test the hazardous effects of [chemical] on laboratory white mice, 33% of the samples died, 33% lived - and the last mouse ran away." AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.]
3. If you're going to study the effects of Product X vs Product Z upon the health of a consumer, you do NOT set it up as follows: you give ONE consumer Product X, ONE consumer Product Y (what has Y to do with the study?) - and give them BOTH additional supplements - and then give ONE consumer your Product Z WITHOUT ANY ADDITIONAL SUPPLEMENTS. That is seriously the stupidest experimental setup I have ever heard.
4. Neither should you, in a coronary disease study involving Product Q vs R, compare the health of people who consume large quantities Product Q (which contains significant proportions of fat) with people who do not consume Product Q. (Where are the people who consume Product R, anyway?).
5. When asserting that cooking destroys Chemical X in Product C, which promotes good health, you should also bear in mind that the majority of the population doesn't even consume significant quantities of said Product C, and that Chemical X is found in other, more common foods anyway, instead of trying to scare the reader into thinking it necessarily leads to DEFICIENCY.
The list goes on and on ad nauseum. Seriously, you could write an entire dissertation on "Data Misrepresentation in a Report on X". ... You know, I don't believe the people who put this together are actually this dumb. I think they knowingly chose to convolute said data to push their case. God, I just want to hit them over the head with this mountain of reading material.
THESE CAN'T POSSIBLY BE CHRISTMAS CARDS...
Just thought I'd share two that went out today: