Specificity = sensitivity?

[Leah]

Even though I am using the ratings to hopefully become very accurate, when you lose those extra points for an apparent change in the rating system it bothers me.


Went to bed with 100/96 and woke up with 95.67/95.67 .......?

Like someone else said "Something new for them to figure out."

I don't envy them trying to get this together and work right.

[tjligocki]

How can we trust the scientific results of the project when the software has so many bugs (cf sensitivity plus other that appear randomly)?

Because their results will be subject to the same scientific method applied to all science. Their results will have to be verified and reproducible. In addition, the software is only helping them identify movies (and gels) for further examination.

All in all, I think they are doing a great job and have let us all be part of a wonderful adventure/experiment - of course, true adventures are unpredictable and risky!

Terry J.

[Leah]

I also think they are doing a great job and I am grateful for the opportunity to participate, I hope I am contributing to the process as well.

[jclerman]

How can we trust the scientific results of the project when the software has so many bugs (cf sensitivity plus other that appear randomly)?

Because their results will be subject to the same scientific method applied to all science. Their results will have to be verified and reproducible. In addition, the software is only helping them identify movies (and gels) for further examination.

All in all, I think they are doing a great job and have let us all be part of a wonderful adventure/experiment - of course, true adventures are unpredictable and risky!

Terry J.

Sorry, I expected, erroneously, that from my question it would be inferred, e.g., that if they don't perform the trivial QA/QC to check that a re-coding doesn't result in such a blunder as discussed in this thread I don't find trustable their data handling. Plainly said, if one of my students would have made such a blunder in a collective research project, I would have paused the project until the deficiencies were corrected. Moreover, I had observed many other "arithmetic" errors which were eventually corrected... after making some of us believe that we might have not been attentive when reading the numbers off the screen... Notice that the reference to my policies vis-a-vis my students might be dated since it was established in the "good old times" when the standards of quality and the procedures for collective endeavours were not those of the "wikis" and the peer-reviewed journals didn't have to retract articles as frequently as now.

[ToSeek]

I don't see that this is a big deal: it's a simple cut-and-paste error in the web code, nothing to do with the actual science. Yes, someone probably should have caught it, but they probably didn't check it very carefully since it only matters to us, not to the project and what they're trying to accomplish.

[heumpje]

I agree. These people are probably making many overhours at the moment and then somehting like this just slips through. Since all the data coming in from us is stored somewhere it will be easily rechecked and corrected when it is discovered that something is wrong. These are just technical details unrelated to the actual science. What we are looking for is cosmic dust and eventually somebody will go in and actually take a piece of aerogel to extract a possible particle that will then be scrutinized. That is the important bit where they should NOT make simple mistakes. I don't see what retracting papers has to do with wrong arithmetic in this part of the project.

[tjligocki]

Sorry, I expected, erroneously, that from my question it would be inferred, e.g., that if they don't perform the trivial QA/QC to check that a re-coding doesn't result in such a blunder as discussed in this thread I don't find trustable their data handling.

There are a lot of assumptions that go into this conclusion (which may be completely valid). I have worked extensively with scientists that are also trying to do computing. Their expertise in their area of science is not always reflected in their coding and software releases. In addition, even prudent software practices can lead to embarassing situations in endeavors such as Stardust-at-home. No doubt they are operating with limited resources - people, time, and money - and are trying to do something fairly ambitious.

Plainly said, if one of my students would have made such a blunder in a collective research project, I would have paused the project until the deficiencies were corrected.

I can understand this and the Stardust-at-home team will have to make their own calls and live with the consequences (such as this dialog and shaken confidence in their eventual conclusions).

Notice that the reference to my policies vis-a-vis my students might be dated since it was established in the "good old times" when the standards of quality and the procedures for collective endeavours were not those of the "wikis" and the peer-reviewed journals didn't have to retract articles as frequently as now.

I also was trained in the "good old times" (and agree with the quotation marks you chose to use) and I look forward to seeing the peer reviewed publications of the Stardust-at-home effort. At that point I will be able to judge the entire process, the specific results they claim, their methods, and their justification of their results.

Until then, I'm enjoying helping the effort (as an individual and as a scientist) and seeing the fallout (including this discussion!)...

Terry J.

[Mighty Pete]

I didn't realize there was a thread for this exact topic. I posted this on a related FAQ thread reposted below:

Ok I'm at home plugging away got 100 % and 97.5% fine go to work log on Hmm demoted to 95.64 % on both.. Problem is I never did any between those times.. None.

The math don't even make sence.. 660 - 16 wrong

Should be 100% and 97.57% like I had...

To get 95.64% on both I would have had to have 28.776 wrong on both catagories...

Don't need to be a rocket scientist to do the math....

Not like anyone used my computer,,,

Went to bed with 100/96 and woke up with 95.67/95.67 .......?

Bad Dream ?

[Roy Ezell]

I also went from 99%/97% to 96.99%/96.99%?
It seems you get back points as follows , for every two correct movies you point out you get .01 added to your score?
This would have been a good thing to start out at zero and build up points from the start to know if the person is doing there dust collecting right and to see the best at doing it the right way also.
These are just numbers and do not mean alot right now to the project and I'm glad it does not,I hope everyone understands this project is to find dust and not to win a contest.
Myself I'm on stone age dail up and I will never get to the scores others have gotten to already,So the scores do not mean alot to me but it would be nice to have them stay the same for awhile so I can judge my own progress as I search the gel.
Thanks , Team for doing all the things you do to keep the project going!

Roy Ezell

[albutterworth]

Sorry everyone.

This sensitivity = specificity bug was a little mix-up in the VM this morning.
It's been fixed and will push through to the servers in a few minutes.
Your scores should return to normal very soon.


Thanks for the rapid feedback!


-Anna

[peliROJO]

Argh! I clicked on a subsurface speck and took my first hit. Drop from 100% to 95%. Back to viewing movies...

[minkiemink]

Hey albutterworth....Please convey to whom it applies: Thanks for fixing the glitch!

Cheers,

Minkiemink