I am reluctant to wade in on a discussion such as this, but
as most of you know, the methodology of doing these types of
correlations is very prone to error.
And as proof, I offer one quick story. My late partner was
program director for Aeronomy (upper atmospheric physics)
at the National Science Foundation and he told me the following
story. NSF funded a study to look at the increased incidence
of cancer around nuclear power plants and saw a small but
significant increase. To better benchmark their results they
then studied cancer around PROPOSED nuclear power plants
and also found a significant increase. It would appear that
just THINKING about installing a nuclear power plant will
increase the incidence of cancer in the area under consideration.
Obviously that is not correct--but rather the methodology was
flawed.
So I am reluctant to believe ANY tests that show any of these
types of issues without being able to review the actual experiment
and understand the methodology. People often find what they
want to find, even without "fudging" the data. Unconscious biases
or poorly designed experiments, looking at effects that are extremely
small, are prone to questionable results.
And to tie this into the amp reflector, I feel that there are similar
sorts of questions about parasitics, gold balls, etc. I just don't
believe everything I read. And I take my sources into account.
John W0UN
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