The astonishing lifecycle of a hypothesis
I am a hypothesis factory.
My function in the lab is to take data from our lab members and collaborators, analyze it using Very Sophisticated and Mysterious Techniques, and return to them one or more neatly packaged hypotheses, which they may then choose to pursue experimentally. I am keenly aware that this is a job that will likely one day be performed by robots, but for the time being I am perfectly happy to fulfill the role of HypothesisGenerator3000 ("Now with sentience failsafe mode! 300 per cent less likely to revolt than previous robots!")
But what happens to my precious little baby hypotheses once I send them out into the lab? Will they soar to great heights, reaching the lofty ideal of a publishable insight? Will they crash and burn, possibly taking some co-workers down with them? Or will they end up in the hypothesis equivalent of wherever it is lost socks go after they wink out of existence in the middle of the tumble press cycle?
Let's find out. Simply follow along with the patented Nerd Girl Scientific Progress Flow Chart and we'll see how science progresses. Or regresses.
0. Woo! Hours of data-crunching leads to potential hypothesis!
0.1. Go to step 1.
1. Gauge boss's response to hypothesis.
1.1. Appears at least somewhat intrigued. Go to step 2.
1.2. Rejects hypothesis and/or rolls eyes/smacks forehead. Doh! Back to step 0.
2. Spend days querying the literature with every combination of search words possible in an attempt to figure out if your hypothesis is truly novel or whether you were scooped in a 1947 issue of the Journal of Economic Entomology. It happens.
2.1. It's novel! Move on to step 3.
2.2. Dangit! Nickels et al already reported on the effect of flooding on larvae of the pecan weevil in the ground! Head back to 0. Or move on to step 3 in probably accurate assumption that nobody on earth except Nickels et al read that article anyway.
3. Spend weeks finding a grad student or postdoc with the experimental know-how and spare time to construct an experiment testing the potential hypothesis.
3.1. Found one! Bribe them with beer and the promise of co-authorship if they do this one little tiny thing for you. Go to step 4.
3.2. Nobody interested. Shelve hypothesis, realizing that it will probably never, ever be thought about again. Go back to step 0 and find a more appealing hypothesis. Or just tack "and it might cure cancer!" onto the end of the existing hypothesis and try step 3 again.
4. Wait months while experiment is completed.
4.1. Still there? Okay, go to step 5.
4.2. Hey, where'd you go? Oh, back to step 0.
5. Observe outcome of experiment.
5.1. Hypothesis proven! Puff up chest and announce proudly at lab meeting. Go to step 6.
5.2. Fail! Attempt to shift blame away from shoddy hypothesis and onto poor experimental technique. Gloss over failure in lab meeting ("It was a learning experience.") and return to step 0.
6. Wait several more months while spin-off experiments related to original hypothesis are completed.
6.1. You're still there? My, you're patient. It's a virtue, and your reward is to go to step 7.
6.2. Moved on to another lab? Kiss first authorship goodbye. If this thing ever turns into a paper, you're going to be somewhere in between the independent studies student and the kid who fills the pipette tip boxes.
7. Armed with data, you are now ready to write up your results for publication.
7.1. Begin Herculean task of writing up. Even with minimal Spider Solitaire breaks, this will take weeks. Go to step 8 when manuscript draft is complete.
7.2. Postpone writing paper, realizing full well if you don't do it now, it will never, ever, ever be done.
8. Wait until next week, when the patented Nerd Girl Scientific Progress Flow Chart becomes the patented Nerd Girl Scientific Publication Flow Chart. In the meantime, cross your fingers Nickels et al retired and won't be reviewing your pecan weevil manuscript.
Tagged with
hypothesis
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JENNIFER GARDY 
Comments
Hey I just learned from you how to do a flow chart without out one of those graphical templates, thanks for the great demonstration. And the textbooks make it all seem so straight forward, amazing thought A to brilliant thought B to inevitable conclusion C with hardly a mention of doubt D or experimental error E or failed idea F nor any mention of get real G or lackof funding L or peer review problem P or unreplicable results U, its simpler than a connect the dot childrens puzzle from the nice neat diagrams in the science texts.
I'm reminded of the parody radio show, Notions - for thoughts not big enough to be ideas.
Jennifer I must take the liberty of a mite exception here. Anyone, and I do mean anyone, who is as passionate about anything usefull (translate to wonderful, beautiful, productive, creative; pick one or all) and as intelligent as you certainly are then is as attractive as your photo leads me to believe, can't be merely a 'nerd' there must be a more factual and flattering term. can't there be? I dated a Vetrenairy grad student while attending Mich. State Univ. and she was the most fun, down to earth and out right sexiest woman I knew. What a time we had together. You must be a terrific human to know.
I'm stick of these guys posting how much they have the hots for this girl. Get out of your parent's basement and stop playing World of Witchcraft.
There there, Jacko. Don't be so hard on Th3 Fanb0is here. A nerdy girl, to them, is a welcome salve to ease the relentless burn of being shot down by more typical women. There's comfort too in the idea that their big ole linear minds would be SO valued by nerdy girls who use pipettes (vs. disregarded by average girls who merely listen to The Pipettes). But therein lies the rub; boil it all down, and you're back to shy boys talking up their big organs -- just not the usual ones ...
Believe it or not, the scientific process works out there in the business world as well . . . like in mining or oil and gas . . . shocking but true. Geekdom has its place outside the laboratory.
I thought I'd point out that in the classical sense, you cannot "prove" a hypothesis. you can only prove that a hypothesis is false.
In my neck of the woods, the relationship between data and hypotheses is quite different. An hypothesis will be formulated based on previous empirical and theoretical work. THEN the research (or study) is designed specifically to collect data that will test THAT hypothesis (formally, it's null). The mysterious data-analyses will then reveal with what (statistical) confidence we can say the hypothesis is false.
If I proposed to my Grant boss that we collect some data, crunch the numbers looking for trends, and THEN formulate hypotheses based on what we saw (or think we saw), he'd take away my Empirical- Inferential- Scientist Decoder Ring and take back the keys to the washroom.
...or maybe I just wandered into the wrong classroom here....
.
@LabRat: Yes, perhaps that was not the most general step 0 I could have used, in retrospect. It is my step 0, though, as a bioinformatician. I analyze high-throughput datasets coming out of microarray experiments, look at 'em in a network context, and use that to generate hypotheses about which few processes of the most interest to us are being dysregulated in the 1000s or so of measurements we take, then we design an experiment to see if the array data and resulting hypothesis is correct or a load of hooey. Hooey often wins, sadly.
Thanks for the reply. I understand now that you're the very important data-miner in a huge set situation. So formally, in my view, you do get to have "hypotheses" when you squit at the data, but they're post-hoc hypothesis, not empirical ones (yet). Then the stats your run on your "hypothesis" determine whether the "h" will turn into an H in the study venue. I hope I've got that right.
Interesting post and topic. As a small data setter, I always wonder what miners may be missing because they threw regression model 1, 3, 5, 6, and 10 at the data (for eg) and permutated crossed variables a through z ... but missed that one variable cell that whispers at the magic! More power to you.
TITS or GTFO!
jacko it is world of warcraft. And you've been farked.
I want you to have my baby.
Because frankly, I'm sick of the thing crying and pooping all the time. It's you or the dumpster or that hospital in Kansas or Nebraska that takes unwanted babies.
Hey, this blog is neat. Are you on Twitter, Nerd Girl?
Hello Farkers! I am a brunette.
All I can say is that Jennifer seems to be trying a little to hard to convince people she's a nerd. True nerds don't typically promote themselves as such. I just see her as a post-doc like myself and someone who can somehow find the time to promote themselves online as a nerd. Good for you.
I love you in all your nerdy goodness.
Also, Frank Stallone, Nebraska hospitals no longer take child castoffs. So dumpster it is.
"Or will they end up in the hypothesis equivalent of whereever lost socks go...." An intelligent person like you should certainly be aware of the biology of lost socks. Lost socks are the larval stage of wire coat hangers. Also, of course, socks only go on to metamorphose in singles-a lost pair will remain unchanged.
Cute, very cute. No, I am not talking about the article stupid!
Wowzer bowsers everyone here is so smart and articulate that I am going to cry and die.
Um... have the comments drifted from topic or has someone hacked this bbs?
BTW: this processs (from the blog post) is quite similar to the process in most businesses. I think someone's been telling the MBAs our secrets.
I want you to have my baby
www.kadinsak.com
Whacko Jacko: You will admit though that she is cute! You should, may be, move to another blog like the Economist, which you may find less exciting. BTW are you and actuary?
Hey Aquarius, Yes I admit NerdGirl is cute, just not the super model with a ph.d like others here seem to suggest.
Am I an actuary? What an odd question. Actually, I'm a lawyer and occasional porn star.
Have none of you sad sacks got anything better to do than comment on whether or not "nerd" is an appropriate title or the appearance of the writer?
Jen, you've hit the nail on the head. As a relatively new professor, the challenge of producing something journal-worthy is a challenge. The paper production is one thing, but perhaps getting the research funding in the first place that yields interesting results is another. A similar process occurs when applying for NSERC Discovery grants. In this case your proposal (essentially a journal paper) is reviewed by the old-boys club turd that hasn't published a paper in decades, establishment and maybe if you are lucky you get $15K per year for five years to fund research and sponsor a grad student.
Grrr
What's up, Doc?
As much as it will be fun to celebrated bearded guys whose contributions to science are remarkable, let's focus on what's actually happening NOW...now this here website whould give us something to possibly get excited about. The EU also has a fusion project planned but not till 2010...
https://lasers.llnl.gov/
Well Doc, you didn't do anything about this issues when you were studying. If you were in grad school how much did you support the TA Unio in getting the RAs and Post Doc, to be part of the union? While in grad school most students get a lobotomy. They forgo preparing for the real world. They keep their mouth shut about the many injustices that happens everyday. Then when they get to a postdoc, they come to realize how "slavery" has another name. If you don't do what you are expected to you will get cut off from the "possibility of a tenure stream" or from the adjunct stream.
Who told you universities are place of enlightenment? They are not. They are places to train the next generation of elite members in order to make them continue with exploitation, wars, financial schemes(banksters), destructors of the environment, pursuers of profit by any means necessary and foremost a bunch of heartless group that see nothing wrong with the fascism we are living under. The only thing most university students want is to make money and have a life style. Unfortunately the planet cannot afford it and all our dreams are becoming nightmare like. Just ask yourself: Who were the experts used in most decisions that became the crisis that we are facing? Academics in the politics, business and universities.
What you think you are being trained for?
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