Fooling the public is easy. But how do you fool the people working on the machines and trying to get actual results out of them? Sure, dividing the work into micro-tasks help, and creating an atmosphere of suspicion/excitement/respect for authority, etc. But still?!?
I think that can create enough plausibility in researchers' minds (along with keeping work divided and some psychological manipulation). They're thinking this looks kind of terrible and doesn't work for A, B, or C situations, but the business folks tell me this is exactly what they need and works on the market. Add in good pay (Theranos paid well above market for biotech for quite a while) and people won't think too hard about it.
> In my meetings with Daniel I found that the discrepancies between our CVs were due to Daniel calculating CV based on the median value of each precision run, while I was calculating CV of the entire data set for each level. When I asked him why we do this, he said that it was a way to average out the noise. I was under the impression that the coefficient of variation was meant to be, at least in part, a measure of how much noise exists in the data. By averaging out this noise before CV is calculated, the CV as a metric of assay performance becomes less meaningful.
“Becomes less meaningful”… this is the most polite way I can imagine telling your CEO, “hey, our results are all BS”. His message is so thorough and measured, and they just tear into him. He’s the only professional in the room.
Tyler.
We saw your email to Elizabeth.
Before I get into specifics, let me share with you that had this email come from anyone else in the company, I would have already held them accountable for the arrogant and patronizing tone and reckless comments. In your case, I am giving you the benefit of doubt that your intentions are in the right place, and am taking the time to respond, even though your tone in this email all the way through the last paragraph is not that of someone seeking to understand, but rather someone standing at higher perch of morality and business wisdom. Perhaps this too was not your intent but this clearly comes across as your mind set.
See my comments in red below.
This is a good reminder that arguments on morality and wisdom are used and abused.
If someone is coming off to you as "all superior" you would only listen if you genuinely agree they are, and it's not an act. Otherwise you'll just see a person trying to make you feel inferior. Nobody listens unless they are truly convinced of that superiority, or else it's just an insult. Sunny of course chose to see this as an insult. But the opposite, taking the superiority at face value and just listening to anyone who sounds superior is no better. There are many more signals to take into consideration before deciding whether someone's opinion is worth listening to or taking into consideration.
... and that doesn't mean one gets to discard the message because its tone is noisy. Especially when the message is warning of jail-time-worthy consequences for one's actions.
If someone says "Hey asshole, stop standing on those tracks, that's how idiots get dead..." Their tone makes it hard to accept their message but one is still standing on the tracks.