/ck/ - Food & Cooking

>>18095512
>why are these studies always so fucking dumb
Easy. These studies cost a lot to do, and extremely few are anonymously funded. Ergo, the funding party ALWAYS has a desired result they're looking for. They may not explicitly tell the researchers they're paying that they are looking for it, but think about it: would Folgers dish out a few hundred thousand or even a million bucks and WANT it to find that caffeine is bad for you? Of course not. Now consider the fact that most researchers, particularly (((independent third parties))) work on a contract basis, if they don't have a job lined up, they ain't eating, essentially. Hence: you are a starving researcher, Folgers comes and says
>hello anon we'd like to give you a million dollars to research if there's any POTENTIAL HEALTH BENEFITS to consuming caffeine. Please use this money as you see fit to conduct your trial ;-)
Now you're sitting there thinking
>hmmmm if they're happy with my results then maybe the mega globo homo corpo that owns Folger will contract my firm for more projects
>BUT I'm a scientist, I care about objectivity and don't want to be outright dishonest, what can I do??
>Of course! I'll purposefully design the sample groups to be as vague as possible and put ridiculous and arbitrary limitations on them to ensure that I will almost certainly find the results this company is looking for!
Many such cases. Obviously this study was not about benefits of caffeine, that was just an example. Always, always, always, before you take a studies finding as fact, first look at who funded that study.