Self-presentation(DA2205 only)
Write a short self-presentation that you would
give orally when you give a significant seminar, if the chairman forgot to
present you but asked you to do it yourself (he actually forgot who you are..).
Imagine you are applying for a job at the place.
If you have not got a researcher home page, you can optionally produce that
instead.
(Here cooperation would mean that the result is one item for each co-author)
Press release(DA2205 only)
Select a research result that you have achieved, one that you hope to achieve,
or a recent important result you are familiar with. Write the text you
would produce if your boss asked you to produce a press release for it
and you found it a good idea.
Press releases are sent to popular science/technology and local newspapers,
and should contain material that catches the eyes of journalists and allows
them to write a short notice. It can also encourage them to contact you.
Typically
relatively few lead to coverage, so it is important to make it interesting
and easy to catch. State the (possibly future) date and author(s) of the result,
and the publication reference, if any.
If you have already done this, submit the release you made, with an analysis
for possible improvements.
Comment: Press releases were required but not enforced for PhD defenses
until the late 1980:s. However, since candidates were given little guidance
in writing them, very few if any lead to media coverage. Today, some but
not all financers of commissioned research have their own experts and do
not want researchers to make press releases without their assistance
or at least approval.
However, these specialists tend to put more emphasis on the professional
way the agency runs the researchers than you may like, since they do not
really know or care about what you are doing.
Remember also the social rules around media contacts, as examplified in the
AMC research code.
Short application
Write a short application for research funding in your area.
The text should only include:
Project title (a one-liner),
project member(s), cost (in person months), research question,
relevance of it, and a CARS-style motivation as described in
Paul, Charney, Kendall:
Reception Studies in the Rhetoric of Science
(you need KTH library access to get it).
If you have already written an application, you can submit that one with an
analysis of possible improvements. Similar text may be required when you
apply for an academic job. In industry, things are more oral or social,
usually.
Paper Analysis
Analyze
Pediatrics 2005;116;1506-1512. Which are the assumptions and
conclusions of the paper? Is there some type of conclusion hinted at that
is implicit?
Have authors followed controlled trial rules as far as feasible?
Are their conclusions statistically correct? (Do your own check and report
the details-there are many ways to assess the significance of the outcome).
The paper starts out with the statement that between 44000 and 98000 deaths
occur annually caused by medical errors in US health care. How was this
estimate produced and how reliable is it? What does (might) it mean?
Does it seem to be 'common knowledge'?
In what way is it relevant for this paper?
There is a discussion area on the article's web space that you should check
(library access required).
Do not just reproduce the discussion there, but try to add something of
interest, and restructure it.
You can, if you want, instead analyze the questions raised in
Johan Hoffman's seminar
or take
some other controversial but interesting paper in your own area.
Analysis of fraud investigation (Data in
Swedish)
Analyze the report 'Granskning av Professor Eva Lundgrens forskning ...',
Dec 9 2005. Among others, the following questions seem relevant,
but you can base the analysis on the parts you are comfortable with
(e.g., if you do not like statistics you can make a qualitative analysis):
Which is the main conclusion of Lundgren criticized in the report?
Is it qualitative or quantitative?
How was it translated to a problem in statistical inference, and is
this translation reasonable and/or inevitable?
Do the investigators seem to understand statistical inference?
Which is the main statistical assumption in standard regression, and does
it seem to be discussed by the investigators or fulfilled in the data?
Is the production of input to the regression analysis 'scientifically
correct'? How reliable are the raw data?
Note: You have even less access to the raw data than the
investigators, so the analysis will probably consist of a careful
reading of the literal statements involved and their ambiguities.
The English version of the survey based report is
Here . All Uppsala University research was seriously evaluated
in 2008. You could also see what came out of this, and use other material
published since the investigation was made.
(Oakley's book contains enough methodological observations for this homework)
It is not appropriate for this homework to parrot judgments found in media,
because not all of them are based on knowledge of the case.
If you know of or find another fraud investigation,
you could also use that one. But do not take a closed one, were the accused
has been unanimously acquitted or sentenced.
Media event
Science got some controversial publicity when Watson enlightened the world
about a problem that he thinks science has some answers to.
What is his conclusion, and what is the basis of his conclusion?
Does the basis seem to be solid,
and does the conclusion seem to follow
from this basis?
You may also
compare this event with Ben-David's analysis of Jensen and Herrnstein
in the course compendium.
Another interesting episode is the discussion going on between the
Curia
of the Catholic church and the medical journal
Lancet
.
Find out exactly what the two sides have claimed, analyze where they
consciously choose to misunderstand each other and find correct and
incorrect statements among the claims of the two parties. Note: It is
easy to claim that one side is right and the other wrong, but this is
not the task in this assignment. A key to understanding the discussion
can lie in different interpretations of the concept of causality.
The 'bestseller' Disaster Capitalism by Naomi Klein seems to make short work
of current mainstream economic theory. Which are the key questions raised by
this criticism, and how can the questions be settled? Are they settled in the
book? Note here that I am not interested in whether or not there are small
formal errors in the presentation:
The main issue is much more important than so.
I am also not after a moral verdict on Milton Friedman. It can be assumed that
he followed research practice in his discipline, unless you find convincing
arguments for the opposite.
Science or Pseudoscience?
Analyze a controversial scientific line of inquiry, and discuss arguments for
placing it in the bin of science or pseudoscience.
Some examples: Bibliometry, Homeopathy,
Steiner pedagogy. NOT dowsing, astrology or phrenology, please!
Scientific Results in Commercials (Swedish)
KTH released a report on the carreers of its alumni,
here . Which are the conclusions of the report, and how reliable are they?
(Oakley's book contains enough methodological observations for this homework)
Proposal Review
Review a project proposal in your area, and present your written statement
to me with an oral panel review.
I will supply a proposal (with the call text), if I can find
a suitable one for you, but if you have access to one, that one
can also be used.
Elective
If you would like to do some other type of homework, please suggest it to me
before starting work on it.
Good Luck!, Stefan