Mashing as efficient as circles?

Phil Holman wrote:

There was a study a while back that showed significant
increases in gross efficiency although the study was criticized on a
technicality (its hypothesis statement or some such).

Uh, no, that's exactly opposite. It wasn't being criticized on a
technicality, it was being criticized on substantive grounds. It was
being defended on a technicality.

"Robert Chung" wrote in message
ups.com...
Phil Holman wrote:

There was a study a while back that showed significant
increases in gross efficiency although the study was criticized on a
technicality (its hypothesis statement or some such).

Uh, no, that's exactly opposite. It wasn't being criticized on a
technicality, it was being criticized on substantive grounds. It was
being defended on a technicality.

I forget the exact details, only that the experts were less than
impressed (Andy Coggan and Jim Martin). However, if the results were
purely chance where 6 subjects showed no change and 6 subjects showed a
~2% gain, the probability of dividing the group this way is 1:924.

Phil H

"Robert Chung" wrote in message
ups.com...
Phil Holman wrote:

There was a study a while back that showed significant
increases in gross efficiency although the study was criticized on a
technicality (its hypothesis statement or some such).

Uh, no, that's exactly opposite. It wasn't being criticized on a
technicality, it was being criticized on substantive grounds. It was
being defended on a technicality.


I found Jim Martin's original critique.

"Jim Martin" wrote in message
...
If I recall correctly there were a three major concerns.

1) The study was not hypothesis driven. That is to say, the authors
had no
reason, based on existing scientific literature, to hypothesize that
training with the power cranks would change efficiency. Cyclists may
wish to
think that pedaling biomechanics will be improved and that the change
in
biomechanics will improve efficiency. That is wishful thinking. No one
has
ever reported a link between pedaling technique and efficiency.
Indeed,
there is little to improve because almost no one produces substantial
negative power during the flexion phase at pedaling rates of under
100rpm.


2) If they had tried to express a hypothesis it could only be centered
on a
notion that pulling up is inherently more metabolically efficient than
pushing down: that muscle that flex the leg are more efficient than
those
that extend the leg. No one has ever reported such a difference and
there is
no reason to hypothesize one.


3) The procedures for calibrating the metabolic system were not well
explained.


In my opinion the most reasonable explanation for their findings is
that
something happened to their metabolic system between pre and post
testing.


Cheers,


Jim


Phil H

On 23 Jul 2006 00:52:36 -0700, "Robert Chung"
wrote:

Phil Holman wrote:

There was a study a while back that showed significant
increases in gross efficiency although the study was criticized on a
technicality (its hypothesis statement or some such).

Uh, no, that's exactly opposite. It wasn't being criticized on a
technicality, it was being criticized on substantive grounds. It was
being defended on a technicality.

Dear Robert,

There were several threads, some of them enormous, so can you give us
a brief summary or a link to what you have in mind?

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

wrote in message
...
On 23 Jul 2006 00:52:36 -0700, "Robert Chung"
wrote:

Phil Holman wrote:

There was a study a while back that showed significant
increases in gross efficiency although the study was criticized on a
technicality (its hypothesis statement or some such).

Uh, no, that's exactly opposite. It wasn't being criticized on a
technicality, it was being criticized on substantive grounds. It was
being defended on a technicality.

Dear Robert,

There were several threads, some of them enormous, so can you give us
a brief summary or a link to what you have in mind?

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

http://groups.google.com/group/rec.b...cc1680a9768594

You'll have to click on the "show quoted text" but it was basically Jim
Martin's response. BTW, Racer X probably got an F in his statistics
class.

Phil H

Phil Holman wrote:
I found Jim Martin's original critique.

[snip]

Yeah. Actually, I remember it, and the thread, pretty well. Frank was
defending it on the technical grounds that a difference in gross
efficiency was statistically significant beyond a 5% critical value. Jim
Martin was criticizing it on substantive grounds that no link between
gross efficiency and pulling up had ever been hypothesized prior to the
experiment.

BTW, my livelihood depends on how well I make or teach others to make
technical arguments so I wasn't saying that any argument based on a
technicality is necessarily flawed. I was simply pointing out that you had
your terminology switched.

Phil Holman wrote:
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.b...cc1680a9768594

You'll have to click on the "show quoted text" but it was basically Jim
Martin's response. BTW, Racer X probably got an F in his statistics
class.

It distresses me to say this, but he probably got pretty good grades. It
distresses me because the first thing I generally have to do in my classes
is un-teach all the bad stuff "A" students think they know.

"Robert Chung" wrote in message
...
Phil Holman wrote:
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.b...cc1680a9768594

You'll have to click on the "show quoted text" but it was basically
Jim
Martin's response. BTW, Racer X probably got an F in his statistics
class.

It distresses me to say this, but he probably got pretty good grades.
It distresses me because the first thing I generally have to do in my
classes is un-teach all the bad stuff "A" students think they know.

The meaning of statistically significant and the effect of sampe size no
doubt. I'm intrigued, what do you teach exactly?

Phil H

Phil Holman wrote:
what do you teach exactly?

I teach a couple of different courses but the one I was referring to was
modern (i.e., nonlinear and nonparametric) multivariate data analysis.