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On Handling the Data

M. I. Mayfield



  ... ON ... HANDLING THE DATA

  by

  M. I. MAYFIELD

  Illustrated by Freas

  _Sometimes a story is best told by omission--!_

  September 16, 1957

  Dr. Robert Von Engen, EditorJournal of the National Academy of Sciences,Constitution Avenue, N. W.,Washington, D. C.

  Dear Sir:

  I am taking the liberty of writing you this letter since I read yourpublished volume, "Logical Control: The Computer vs. Brain" (SillimanMemorial Lecture Series, 1957), with the hope that you can perhaps offerme some advice and also publish this letter in the editorial section.Your mathematical viewpoint on the analysis between computing machinesand the living human brain, especially the conclusion that the brainoperates in part digitally and in part analogically, using its ownstatistical language involving selection, conditional transfer orders,branching, and control sequence points, et cetera, makes me feel thatonly you can offer me some information with logical _arithmetic depth_.

  The questions raised in this letter are designed principally to reachthe embryonic and juvenile scientists ... the _scientists-elect_, so tospeak. (I think the "mature scientists" are irretrievably lost.) Formany reasons, some of which will be explained in the followingparagraphs, I think that it is of the greatest importance that somestimulatable audience be reached. As yet, the beginners have no rigidscientific biases and thus may have sufficient curiosity and flexibilityabout the world in which they live to approach experimentation with amind devoid of "the hierarchy of memory registers which have programmedin erroneous data."

  What I have to say will not surprise nor shock _you_, or those who areat present engaged in scientific investigation. In fact, I have readmany science-fiction stories that deal with the same problem. Perhapsthat is the only way that it can be approached, through the medium of astory? Yet why not present it for what it may be? Let me tell it my ownway, and then, please, let me have your _coldly logical_ opinion.

  As to my background, I am a graduate student in the Zoology Departmentof a midwestern university working toward a Master's degree, or actuallya doctorate--we can bypass the M.S. if we choose--in the field ofCellular Physiology. My sponsor is an internationally known man in thefield. The area of research that I have selected is concerned with theeffects of physical and chemical agents on the synthesis of nucleicacids of the cell. Obviously, this is a big field, and I hope to selectfrom among the different agents, one or two that will give "positiveresults." I have been doing active research for about half a yeartesting the different agents. As for the _fundamental_ questions raised,I am positive that it would make _no_ difference in what field ofscience I were to work.

  By now I have had enough course work to realize that when performing anyassigned laboratory exercise--they should not be calledexperiments--even of a cook-book type, little or even majordiscrepancies arise, and _always on the initial trials_, no matter howcarefully one works! As you are probably aware, the teaching assistantin charge of the lab or the instructor, generally runs through theexercise before the class does in order to get the "bugs" out of it--Iam deliberately generalizing, since the above holds for all of thelaboratory sciences--so when the student gets confusing or rathercontradictory results, the instructor can deftly point out the error inthe setup or calculations, or _what have you_. He may _even_ indicatewhat results may be expected. _The last is critical._ Similarly otherstudents in the laboratory usually have friends who have had the coursebefore and know what results are expected--_this technique is frownedupon_. Or one may consult textbooks and published papers. (This, by theway, is known as _library research_, and is generally conceded to beindicative of the superior student, especially if he points out the factthat he is _so interested_ that he just had to delve into theliterature.) By any technique, _the expected results are alwaysobtained_. _Always. And by everyone._ The initial confusions--that some_honest_ students perpetuate--are easily brushed aside as errors due toinexperience, sloppiness, lack of initiative, stupidity of congenitalsort, et cetera, et cetera.

  Since being a teaching fellow, even simple cook-book experiments don'tseem as cook-bookish. Some pretty weird things have happened when Itried out an exercise prior to the class. Fortunately, I was taught tokeep data--in duplicate: indelible purple Hexostick original and carboncopy. These, _vide infra_, are a few of such happenings.

  Elementary General Physiology Laboratory:

  1. Initial maximal vagal stimulation:

  _Expected results_: inhibition of heart beat.

  _Obtained results_: one series of increased heart beats. (Possible explanation: I missed the vagus nerve)????

  2. _Frog nerve-muscle preparation_:

  _Expected results_: a single muscle twitch.

  _Obtained results_: a beautiful nerve twitch.

  (Explanation: Eyesight? How can _nerves_ twitch?)??

  3. _Hypotonic hemolysis_:

  _Expected results_: red blood cell destruction.

  _Obtained results_: crenation.

  (Explanation: switched salt solutions _unconsciously_)?????

  4. _Curarized muscle preparation_:

  _Expected results_: a synaptic block with no response of nerve when stimulated.

  _Observed results_: a typical strychnine response, violent _tetanus_, et cetera.

  (Explanation: again, I switched bottles)????

  5. I shall avoid the obvious mention of mishaps with mechanical or electrical pieces of equipment. I assure you there were similar deviations in initial attempts.

  Since I realize that you are preparing a paper on _Memory Registers:Stimulation Criteria_, for the VIth Annual International Meeting of theSociety of Theoretical Biomathematicians in London, and are short oftime, I shall avoid going into the same kind of detail as the above forother Biology Labs, and get into the real heart of the thing ... theresearch problem. (After all that is what both of us are interested in.)By the way, please send me a reprint of the paper when it comes out.

  I guess I am really hepped up on this, because I've just got to pointout for emphasis other incidences usually of a type that involvedmissing a whole organ in dissections or a tissue structure in histologyonly on the _first_ study, and then re-reading the assignment--afterknowing what to look for--and _subsequently finding it exactly where itis said to be_. (Ever hunt for an unknown quality--or quantity?) _So itwas there all the time_, sloppy technique? Or is this branching at acontrol point? _cf._ LC: C. vs. B. p. 251.

  To get back to my thesis research, the pieces of equipment that I havebeen using in the research are fairly standard in physiologicalresearch: a Beckman spectrophotometer, a Coleman photometer, a van Slykeamino nitrogen apparatus, a Warburg respirometer, pH meters, Kjeldahls,Thunbergs, et cetera. Mostly, I'm in the process of getting used tothem. Also there is a high voltage X-ray generator, U. V. source andother equipment for irradiation purposes. We also have an A. E. C.license so that we can get at least microcurie amounts of the usualisotopes for radioautographic work.

  Now the literature in my area is pretty controversial. (You canappreciate _that_, especially since Bergbottom at the Kaiser WilhelmInstitute bombarded you with criticisms of your theories.) Different andactually contradictory results have been obtained for the same substancein the same organism, _e. g._ alkaline phosphatase in the frog livercell (Monnenblick, '55, Tripp, '56, and Stone, '57). To give an example,when I start a run for respiration effects using a Warburg I don't knowwhat results to expect. Whenever this has been the case, my results havebeen confusing ... to say the least.

  On nitrogen-mustard treated cells, in some instances the controlsrespi
red significantly _more_--even with a statistical analysis ofvariance--in some instances the _experimentals_ respired significantlymore; and in other cases the respiration for both was _exactly_ thesame--even _closer_ than the expected deviations that should be found inany random population. One run, the blank run, _containing no cells_ ...and grease-free ... consumed the greatest amount of oxygen. To cut thisletter short, the same inconstancies apply to other trials that I havemade. Whenever I didn't know what to expect, and particularly where theliterature was controversial, my results have been completely haywire.

  Needless to say, I was not happy with this so I discussed it with othergraduate students. They have all encountered the _same thing_! But mostprofessors won't admit this to be true and merely tell me that mytechnique is lousy. If anything, I am an overly careful worker. Why isit when I _know_ what results are expected, I get comparable resultseven on the _first_ trial?

  Remember, _I obtained the expected results_ when the literature wasn'tconfused or when my sponsor--a