From Climate Change to COVID-19: Science takes time, trust the process

A lot of people, when they have an idea about how something works, say, “I have a theory….”

But they don’t.

People who say, “I have a theory…” often just have a hypothesis.

Theories take time. A lot of time. Albert Einstein had a theory. Claude Shannon had a theory. Alfred Wegener had a theory.

Dave Smith, at a bar, talking about why the QB missed a TD pass, has a hypothesis.

The Scientific Method

People over-define and clutter up the Scientific Method. In my opinion, they over-complicate it.

In regular English, The Scientific Method is…. Produce an answer reproducible by another person.

But in order to do that, there are steps to take.

1. Ask a question
2. Form a hypothesis
3. Run an experiment
4. Collect data
5. Analyze the data
6. Report a finding

These six steps are very – VERY! – important. IT makes sure that you covered all the bases. The goal is to remove all bias from the equation. Because, afterall, a hypothesis can be incorrect. It is important to be able to recognize that. But an incorrect hypothesis is still valuable! An incorrect hypothesis eliminates a potential incorrect answer.

A simple example would be:

1. Ask a question: “What is 5+5?”
2. Form a hypothesis: I think 5+5 equals 55
3. Run an experiment Take five pens from one desk and put them in a pile, then take five pens from another desk and put them in the same pile as the other pens
4. Collect data: Count how many pens are in the pile
5. Analyze the data: Count the pens again to make certain
6. Report a finding : There are 10 pens in total. My hypothesis is not confirmed.

In this particular case, an incorrect hypothesis is very cut and dry, but for more abstract situations, a hypothesis that is disproven can still carry value.

Like with COVID.

Disproving a COVID treatment

It is important to note before I go any further that “disproving” something doesn’t mean the beginning goal was to disprove it. There are plenty of hypotheses out there that claimed something worked, only to find that it didn’t.

This is where the argument, by some people, about the efficacy of Hydroxychloroquine hit a snag. When it was “disproven” people cried ‘foul!’ that scientists were biased from the start. But they weren’t! Because the researchers went through the Scientific Method…

1. Ask a question

“Is Hydroxychloroquine a useful treatment for COVID?”

2. Form a hypothesis

“Yes, Hydroxychloroquine is a useful treatment for COVID”

3. Run an experiment

In the case of the paper titled, “Hydroxychloroquine in Nonhospitalized Adults With Early COVID-19”

4. Collect data

“Of 491 patients randomly assigned to a group, 423 contributed primary end point data. Of these, 341 (81%) had laboratory-confirmed infection with severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) or epidemiologically linked exposure to a person with laboratory-confirmed infection; 56% (236 of 423) were enrolled within 1 day of symptoms starting. Change in symptom severity over 14 days did not differ between the hydroxychloroquine and placebo groups.”

5. Analyze the data

“Change in symptom severity over 14 days did not differ between the hydroxychloroquine and placebo groups (difference in symptom severity: relative, 12%; absolute, −0.27 point [95% CI, −0.61 to 0.07 point]; P = 0.117). At 14 days, 24% (49 of 201) of participants receiving hydroxychloroquine had ongoing symptoms compared with 30% (59 of 194) receiving placebo (P = 0.21). Medication adverse effects occurred in 43% (92 of 212) of participants receiving hydroxychloroquine versus 22% (46 of 211) receiving placebo (P < 0.001). With placebo, 10 hospitalizations occurred (2 non–COVID-19–related), including 1 hospitalized death. With hydroxychloroquine, 4 hospitalizations occurred plus 1 nonhospitalized death (P = 0.29).”

6. Report a finding

Hydroxychloroquine did not substantially reduce symptom severity in outpatients with early, mild COVID-19.

So, they tried, and failed.

Some people may look at this and go, “Disproven! One study says it doesn’t work! Let’s move on.”

But that isn’t how science works. The Scientific Method is about producing an answer reproducible by another person. So other teams of researchers need to run their own tests, asking the same question, and running the same experiments.

In this particular case, though, this study was one of the last studies done on hydroxychloroquine. It was one of the final pieces of evidence added to the proverbial ‘pile’ showing lack of general efficacy for Hydroxychloroquine.

It turned out that multiple studies disproved the hypothesis based on the question, “Is Hydroxychloroquine a useful treatment for COVID?”

Was this one study perfect? Probably not. Were all of the studies before this one perfect? Probably not. But no study is perfect. Especially when dealing with humans and medicine.

But when multiple studies continue to come to the same conclusion, researchers and scientists trust the evidence.

And a disproven hypothesis means that researchers can shift their focus to something else to try to prove – or disprove – that other thing. It sharpens the focus of the research. In the case of COVID, it allows researchers to really hone in on the things that actually work.

Climate Change is just a theory

Climate Change has been through the ringor.

As I said at the beginning of all of this: Theories takes time. A hypothesis is quick.

The steps to test the hypothesis take a while. And then doing those steps over, and over, and over, and over again takes even longer. And in order to become a theory something needs to be tested dozens, then hundreds, perhaps thousands of times. With slightly different variables to make sure that the answer is truly the answer.

That is why when people say “Climate Change is just a theory” or “Evolution is just a theory” they may be misunderstanding or, perhaps, misrepresenting the importance of the word theory.

Examples of other theories? Gravity is also a theory. Relativity is also a theory. Heliocentrism is also a theory.

Theories carry a lot of weight in the scientific community. Because it isn’t like anyone is debunking that gravity works, relativity isn’t real or that the Sun revolves around the Earth. These concepts have been tested so many times that they are simply accepted as factual given the mountain of evidence for their existence.

Theories explain the world, giving someone a predictive value. Things like, “If I throw this apple up in the air, it will come back down” are testable and repeatable.

In weather, we have the Quasigeostrophic Theory.

Climate Change as a theory means that there is a repository of data that allows us to make predictions and those predictions are verifiable – repeatedly – through experiments done by different people.

It also means when people ask, “Do you believe in Climate Change?” it is an odd question. Because no one asks, “Do you believe in Gravity?”

‘Believing in’ a theory doesn’t make sense

It is that line from Neil DeGrasse Tyson, “The great thing about science is, it is true whether you believe it or not.” Theories are based on repeated evidence. So much so that we don’t need to “believe in” a theory, because we have so much evidence of it.

You just get to trust the evidence.

For example, saying, “I believe the sun will rise tomorrow” sounds like an odd statement. Because for your whole life, the sun has risen. And given the evidence collected by scientists that the earth revolves around the sun, and rotates on its axis, there is enough data to support you simply saying, “the sun will rise tomorrow.”

Whether you believe in Gravitational Theory or not, you are stuck on Earth (unless you can jump up at 25,000mph). And whether you believe in Climate Change, the Earth is getting warmer due to greenhouse gas emissions put into the air by human activity.

A person doesn’t need to be a climatologist to know that as much as a person doesn’t need to be a quantum physicist to know that gravity is a thing.

Science is cool like that.

All of this work takes time

Just a quick note that science can take time. I know we all live in an “instant gratification” world now, but we need to try our best to have patience. I’m just as guilty as anyone else. I have Netflix, watch youtube, and listen to Pandora Radio. I download papers, get emails daily, and have a cell phone to google things.

But science takes time. We have to do the studies, have the evidence-based debates, survey people, experiment, experiment again, and then for good measure experiment one more time. Then have another debate. Then experiment some more.

This is how scientists make sure things are accurate.

This is also why when people say, “They said butter was bad, eat margarine. Now they say margarine is bad, eat butter! They don’t know anything!” it is sadly under-informed about how science works.

The movement from one to another and then back again was because of the available evidence. In the 1930, it was an alternative to dairy. Margarine had Vitamin E! But a 1994 study showed that the LDL from trans fats was responsible for cardiovascular problems. And, at the time, Margarine was using trans fats. So, the concern wasn’t even about Butter versus Margarine. It was about trans fats.

But it took time.

In order for science to get things right, it has to make sure that it goes through the necessary steps to clear out all of the failures. And even the “failures” are good. It means we are making absolutely sure we have the right answer.

Getting back to COVID and Climate Change, they are two things at similar and opposite ends of the scientific spectrum. Simultaneously.

With COVID, scientists are working every day to collect more and more evidence, since six months ago the science on COVID-19 was nearly an unknown. And the decision-makers were having to make new rules, laws, and ordinances based off an unknown – rather than a known – to help save people from becoming sick and dying.

With Climate Change, scientists have a lot of evidence. And decision-makers are slow to enact rules and regulations to protect people from becoming sick and dying.

The difference in action is – in my opinion, at least – probably because there is no perceivable imminentness to Climate Change. If that makes sense?

The “Doom” of Climate change is not a palpable or seeable thing by most people on a day-to-day basis. Where with COVID, perhaps a co-worker was out for two weeks under quarantine, or a neighbor had it. Maybe someone you know has died from it.

But they are very similar in different ways. Both are silent and invisible threats. Both work slowly, sometimes in the background, before you even know there is a problem. And both, when not taken seriously, can have dire consequences. Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. But eventually.

And we should trust the scientists. Trust the evidence. And, since this is an election season, encourage lawmakers to make decisions based on the best available data.

Then again, that is just my hypothesis…