February 15, 2008

The Cranks Have Broken In!

Posted by Eric at 5:21 pm | Category: Links, Pseudo-science

I was sitting in my lab reading through the PNAS early online publication articles when I come across a letter to the editor with the title: “Going beyond the genetic view of cancer.” (PDF) Intrigued, I read it, and to my horror, I find a letter filled with words like this:

Dynamic protein-based phenomena–for instance, (insulin-driven) “oncoprotein metastasis” explicable by an extension of physical string theory into (sub)cellular biology…

The fact that the author (a one “Razvan Tudor Radulescu”) cites an arXiv “pre-print” that he wrote himself is quite suspicious. His contact information, of course, is with non-institutional, free email address.

To me, this can mean only: HE’S A CRANK.

What is PNAS doing publishing letters from cranks? I get spam in my email from this gentleman in Nicaragua, should I publish those in a journal, too?

Perhaps I’m leaping to conclusions. Let’s take a look at the arXiv pre-print, which would be more fleshed out than a single letter to the editor:

Here, a new scenario is put forward on the spreading of the neoplastic process across cells and tissues that may prove seminal both for our future understanding and treatment of malignancies.

First sign of crank-dom: exceedingly high opinion of one’s own work, describing it as “seminal.”

In this context, my peptide string theory (10-12) is likely to represent a significant addition [to the field]. It rests upon the assumption according to which major biological processes concerning distinct, yet related proteins are the result both of (long-distance) attractive forces in the sense of the physical string theory (13,14) and of “emergent properties” inherent to the same proteins whereby the term “emergent” is to be understood as employed by John Searle in his book entitled “The Mystery of Consciousness.”

The sentence continues, but the point is rather obvious. Crank. What are the citations to? Let’s see…citations 10-12 are self-citations (one to yet another arXiv preprint). Citation 13 is to a popular science book, The Elegant Universe, and citation 14 is to an editorial by Ed Witten.

Now, I’m no expert in string theory, but I doubt that these second two works have much biological insight to offer. String theory, after all, is about understanding how all the various laws of physics might be unified. Sorry, but general relativity? Not all that relevant to what goes on in the body, since biology doesn’t really go near the speed of light. Quantum mechanics is more related, in that it’s the foundations of chemistry and of molecular-level phenomena, but even then, we’re not pushing the boundaries of our knowledge of sub-atomic processes in looking at biology.

Why is this letter being published by PNAS? All I know is, this kind of stuff makes real scientists look bad. Does the National Academy not vet letters to the editor before publishing them?

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13 Responses to “The Cranks Have Broken In!”

  1. George Brickstyn Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 10:09 am

    Eric, I am a grad stud like you, yet down my hall are 2 Nobel laureates, and guess what they taught me on research? All you really know is that you don´t know. Why then should biology NOT be used to solve puzzles in physics (and vice versa)? After all, DNA computation helped unlock at least a major one in math.

    Also, while it´s known that PNAS letters are peer-reviewed, and, moreover, not too few “cranks” turned out to be trailblazers, I wonder why some fellow studs need to dump their cortex before breaking OUT into the web. Maybe their advisors should be tracked down such that they keep these guys busy and digital trash at a minimum…

    And finally Eric, why don´t you chew for a while on your favorite parafilm? Hopefully some insight will surface, especially around 5 pm when you should still be running some gels instead of clogging the web with FUTILE blogs.

    In the meantime, just keep singing loudly:

    “I don’t know much about biology
    Yet a parafilm loves me tenderly”

    It should work.

    Cheers,

    George

    P.S. Eric, you may even wanna start education all over again from scratch: Do NOT cite from arXiv publications when you actually discuss PNAS papers and conversely. Also, the title of a (PNAS) paper is its title, NOT a weblink (to arXiv)… Got it pal?!

  2. Eric Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 12:17 pm

    DNA computation is a far different subject from “peptide string theory”. DNA computation is a perfectly legitimate field of research, and one that is quite fascinating. I’m not saying biology shouldn’t solve problems in physics, either; check out Biocurious in the blogroll for a great example of physics cum biology.

    If PNAS letters are peer-reviewed, then some reviewers are seriously sleeping on the job there. Cranks rarely turn out to be trailblazers.

    And thanks for catching my typo; I’d typed a single quote in place of the double quote.

  3. George Brickstyn Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 2:08 pm

    Eric, frankly, I am worried about both your poor scientific background and mental health. Since when does it qualify as “suspicious ” if someone cites his own arXiv preprints/publications and, moreover, if someone uses a “non-institutional, free email address” in publications?

    The first is probably more common among physicists currently, yet this may become more frequent among biologists as even more biology papers will appear on arXiv.

    The latter e-mail stuff you are talking about is also pure nonsense since there are enough people in academia who use, for instance, AOL e-mail addresses. Briefly, there is no way that this preference defines a “crank”.

    By the way, most geniuses (whether Barbara McClintock in biology or Grigori Perelman in math to name just a few) were considered as “cranks” until they were honored with a big award in their fields.

    So, why don´t you start reading some relevant biographies in between some more gel pouring and running while chewing on your favorite parafilm, as I advised you?

    I´d be happy to hear that it helped you get some better insight.

    George

    P.S. I almost forgot to alert you to this great classical saying: If you do NOT understand the concept of a scientist, you should NOT blame him/her for your lack of understanding. Hic ego barbarus sum quia non intelligur illis.

    And as a final point: That guy whose PNAS letter you “reviewed” post-publication may in fact be a genius. If you were simply ready to make some mental progress, you would realize that his emphasis on combining “emergent properties” residing in peptide interactions with string theory parallels and even moves ahead of the call by Physics Nobel Laureate Robert B. Laughlin to introduce the concept of “emergence” into modern physics in order to make the big leap forward (cf. Laughlin´s book “A Different Universe- Reinventing Physics from the Bottom Down”).

  4. The Real Ben Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 2:19 pm

    So, let me get this straight. Eric makes a reasonable, skeptical comment on the nature of the field of “peptide string theory” (much more charitably, I think, than is warranted) and points out how a guy who cites himself and then proceeds to call his own work “seminal” has what I can only term ‘crank-like’ attributes.

    Then, George responds with some mumbo-jumbo about how students don’t know everything, makes a bizarre argument about how Eric is somehow sniffing parafilm or something, and then lashes out at Eric for some PNAS/arXiv citation thing.

    It seems almost unfair for me to make any comment on the quality of this debate…

  5. Eric Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 4:41 pm

    Barbara McClintock was in no way considered a crank. If you read an early paper from molecular biology (say, the 1958 paper by Jacob and Wollman on the circular nature of the chromosome), her transposon theories were cited and taken quite seriously, though few people understood them at the time due to their immensely complicated phenotypes and experimental details. One should note that this was before the understanding of the structure of DNA, and so even in bacteria, things such as transposition or circular linkage maps were difficult to understand, let alone in maize.

    Her theories were also completely based on the standard cytogenetic analytical methods of the times, and didn’t invoke pseudo-scientific concepts to justify her statements. She clearly understood her model organism.

    Alas, it seems that cranks have some sort of alarm response, where exposing one will make others jump out and defend each other. Seems I should stop feeding the troll now.

  6. Melissa Seriamo Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 7:14 pm

    Hi!
    I just came across this forum by chance. I almost feel like with my brothers when I had and still have to settle their quarrels. They trusted my sense of justice and it worked out quite well this way most of the times. Look guys, I have been in science for many years now, specifically in genetics, and what Eric stated in his last posting is simply NOT true.
    It is common knowledge in genetics circles that Barbara McClintock was ridiculed and kept in the dissentient corner for DECADES, briefly she was considered a lonely “crank” (which, by the way, means nothing else than being an eccentric) until…well, until the first “hard” data came in (from bacteria developing resistance to antibiotics by changing the positions of their genes on the chromosome, yet not from her own beloved maize!) to support her unusual concepts. That her work was cited by Jacob and colleagues in the late 1950s is an honorable exception to the rule of that time, the rule being that McClintock´s ideas were “out” of the mainstream for long.
    The lesson from all this? Read even more on the real facts in history and let TIME judge on seemingly new eccentrics.
    But George is certainly right on one account: if some do NOT quite understand the peptide string theory, this is no reason for them to call it “pseudo-science”, as Eric did. Using this latter term unnecessarily disqualifies oneself.
    We simply have to accept that there are a few individuals with this “feeling for the organism” like McClintock called it, yet they can often not present sufficient supporting data to convince the majority immediately. Ultimately, if the above theory should prove true, it will probably once again conform to Schopenhauer´s insight:

    “All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as self-evident.”

    Have a nice day,

    Melissa

    P.S. If an investigator sees “seminal” potential in his own work, that may be considered as self-confident, no more. After all, this term boils down to something providing a basis for future development. That´s it. Therefore, just by considering the mere facts, there is nothing illegitimate for an author to ascertain this potential for his insights and data. Because otherwise there would be no real drive to proceed. I can only repeat myself: before beginning to “trash” on others, let TIME be the judge. Otherwise, we will have the McClintock story over and over again, with decades of wasted time and resources while (counterproductively) scoffing at creative, yet eccentric minds.

  7. Eric Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 9:53 pm

    I do agree that Barbara McClintock was working quite isolated; no one understood what she was doing with transposons. But in no way was she considered a crank; she had some great experiements on recombination using cytogenetics in maize that everyone recognized as being great work. She was attacked for her transposon work, yes, and ridiculed, yes, and her being a woman had something to do with it, undoubtedly. But everyone was aware of her work, even if some thought it was just weird experimental errors, of which there were so many that one more was just dust in the wind.

    Anyway, invoking the “poor, unaccepted-by-the-mainstream theorist” is often the first sign of crackpot-dom.

    As for not understanding peptide string theory, I don’t think it’s a matter of my “not understanding” it; there’s nothing of substance to understand. The author invokes absolutely nothing that actually has anything to do with string theory, uses no mathematics to substantiate his work in any accessible publication, and what he does publish on arXiv (and cites in his article in PNAS) is pretty much meaningless drivel. I see no predictions for his models. i see no experimental confirmation of his results.

    Just try actually reading his stuff; because I’m a scientist, I can read papers critically. Can you?

  8. Danny Wilderspoon Says:
    February 19th, 2008 at 11:18 pm

    Now, I just wanted to have a laid back West Coast browsing session (after a great beach scroll), and what do I spot?! A nurd (from the East Coast??) called “Eric” blogging nonsense on McClintock, since let me quote Eric, “no one understood what she was doing”, but “everyone recognized as being great work” and “no way was she considered a crank”, yet she was “ridiculed, yes”. Boy, have you gone totally NUTS ?!

    Since I was nevertheless curious to see what this is actually all about, I just checked out the work of this PNAS/arXiv guy Eric is obviously either too stupid or too jealous to understand. And I MUST say Radulescu has done great original work linking protein interactions with both emergent properties and the string theory.

    I do not know of anyone who has made such synthesis before, and actually many of the observed, yet poorly understood phenomena in oncogenesis fit neatly into it, with additionally quite surprising consequences as to its future treatment in terms of involving also the normal-appearing cells. He has charted a new way, that´s for sure, and I don´t care who will work out the (mathematical and biological) details ultimately.

    Oh, and I should say I´m faculty in an interdisciplinary department. So, no such talk as “I´m no expert for…” this or that, yet I keep blogging… Before someone tracks you down, Eric, I advise you to stop spreading nonsense on the web, otherwise some people above you might start not liking this waste of time of yours, as you admitted. Show the crowd that you can be self-critical, not just trashy, and then there is hope.

    Danny

  9. Rick Says:
    February 20th, 2008 at 9:30 am

    Some of my students told me I should be dropping some lines in this debate. Eric said he is no expert in string theory. I am though. A string theory in 4 dimensions (instead of the usual 10 or more) plus its application to biological molecules and cancer disease and its treatment, as outlined by Radulescu, is by all means great stuff.

    Rick

  10. Eric Says:
    February 20th, 2008 at 10:05 am

    You’re bonkers, but ok.

    “String theory in 4D” is meaningless. We already have theories for four dimensions; they’re called Newtonian and Quantum Mechanics. Work well enough for things larger than a proton.

    Now, I don’t know why you keep changing your name and posting under different personas, but sorry, Mr. Rick-Danny-Melissa-George. If you can’t recognize crap when you see it, I have low hopes for your future scientific success. Good luck.

  11. George Brickstyn Says:
    February 20th, 2008 at 11:36 am

    Eric, as I said before (but you seem to also have some major attention deficit): do NOT blame many others if you´re the one to be desperately lost.

    Never mind, it´s all too known that some underachievers crack once they see trailblazers and deflate even more when there is recognition for such pioneers.

    Just a final remark for “parafilm Eric”: The real experts in string theory like Warren Siegel know too well that string theory must be made inherently 4D and thus predictive. So, don´t spread physical bogus on the web ever again.

    George

  12. Suicyte Says:
    February 26th, 2008 at 8:22 pm

    Eric,

    I really admire you patience, discussing with these cranks. Or, more likely, one crank using different names.

  13. Eric Says:
    February 26th, 2008 at 9:33 pm

    Thanks. And you’re right, it is actually one crank using different names; alas, he doesn’t seem to realize that his IP address is recorded with every comment.

    My girlfriend, on the other hand, teases me by referring to this xkcd strip…

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