Directions (1-10): Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words are given bold to help you to locate them while answering some of the questions.
Until now, discovery was often considered the main goal of medical science. But nowadays discovery is almost too easy. Anyone with a little funding and a few biological specimens in a refrigerator can make thousands of postulated "discoveries."
Indeed, the number of research questions that we can pose is increasing exponentially. Medical kits the size of a thumbnail can measure a million different biological factors on an individual with an infinitesimal amount of blood. A million research questions can be asked on the spot. But even with proper statistical testing, many tens of thousands of these biological factors may seem to be important due to mere chance. Only a handful of them really will be. The vast majority of these initial research claims would yield only spurious findings.
So the main issue nowadays is to validate "discoveries" by replicating them under different settings. Several different teams of researchers need to see them "work" again and again using common rules. Moreover, all the teams should agree not to select and report only the data that seem most impressive. With selective reporting we would end up with a long list of all the false discoveries made across all research teams, with only a few true findings buried among this pile of non-replicated waste.
In fact, empirical data suggest the significance of this danger. In a paper in the Journal of the American Medical Association published in July 2005, I showed that refutation is very common, even for the most prestigious research findings. I examined the 45 clinical research findings that had received the greatest recognition in the scientific world, as documented by the number of times other scientists had cited them over the last 15 years.
Even with the most robust types of research—for example, randomized clinical trials—one of four of these results had already been found to be wrong or potentially exaggerated within a few years after publication. For epidemiology (e.g., studies on vitamins, diet, or hormones in terms of their association with health outcomes in the general population), four-fifths of the most prestigious findings were rapidly contradicted. For molecular research, in the absence of extensive replication, the refutation rate may occasionally exceed 99%.
But we should not panic. It is to be expected that the majority of research findings are rapidly contradicted and refuted; indeed, it is part of how progress of science occurs. However, we need to adapt to this situation. Instead of taking scientific evidence as dogma, we should consider it as tentative information that should be ascribed a level of credibility.
There is nothing wrong with disseminating scientific information that has a credibility of 10%, or even 1%. Sometimes, this will be the best evidence we have. But we should get used to understanding that some research findings have very low credibility, while others may be more likely to stand the test of time. Scientists themselves may be able to ascribe these levels of credibility to their own work in fairness, if they describe in detail what they set out to do, and how they did it.
Science is a noble pursuit, but genuine progress in scientific research is not easy to achieve. It requires a lot of time, continuous effort, uncompromising integrity, appropriate funding and material support, and unwavering commitment. Proposed scientific advances require careful validation and replication by independent scientists. Scientific knowledge is never final, but it evolves continuously. This is part of the great fascination of science, and it fosters liberty of thought.
While these principles are probably well known to serious scientists, they are often forgotten when scientific information is disseminated. Our society is awash with inflated information, which is inherent to efforts in many human activities—entertainment, law courts, stock markets, politics, and sports, to name but a few—to gain greater public attention in the framework of mass civilization.
But it would be a damaging to expect science to "show off' in this way. Exaggeration contradicts the key hallmarks of scientific' reasoning: critical thinking and careful appraisal of the evidence.
Q1. Which of the following is most nearly similar in meaning of the word postulated as used in the passage?
(a) postpone
(b) deny
(c) hypothesize
(d) belie
(e) disavow
Q2. Which of the following is most nearly similar in meaning of the word spurious as used in the passage?
(a) supports
(b) authentic
(c) start
(d) genuine
(e) fake
Q3. Which of the following is most nearly opposite in meaning of the word dogma as used in the passage?
(a) unbelief
(b) doctrine
(c) rule
(d) tenet
(e) gospel
Q4. Which of the following is most nearly similar in meaning of the word ascribe as used in the passage?
(a) describe
(b) attribute
(c) arrive
(d) fortune
(e) crucial
Q5. Which of the following is most nearly opposite in meaning of the word disseminated as used in the passage?
(a) disagree
(b) angle
(c) conceal
(d) publish
(e) annunciate
Q6. According to the writer, which of the following are the problems in medical research today?
A. Tens of thousands of important biological factors are dismissed as unimportant.
B. The majority of initial research claims yield spurious results.
C. There is too much replication of scientific discoveries.
D. True findings are highlighted through selective reporting.
(a) All of the above
(b) A and B
(c) C and D
(d) A, C, and D
(e) B and D
Q7. The writer quotes the refutation rates of various research findings most probably in order to...
(a) Point out the lack of replication of clinical research findings.
(b) Show that most of the research taking place today is meant to misguide.
(c) Highlight the dangers of selective reporting.
(d) Highlight how easy scientific 'discovery' is today.
(e) a and b.
Q8. It can be inferred from the passage that the credibility of scientific evidence can be ascertained by...
(a) Realizing the fact that all scientific evidence is tentative.
(b) Trying to understand the purpose and methods used to get the evidence.
(c) Ascertaining how well they can stand the test of time.
(d) Finding out how rapidly such evidence is contradicted and refuted.
(e) Trying to find out the refutation rate.
Q9. The main purpose of the passage is to...
(a) Describe how the vast majority of research today has become spurious and how science has moved
away from its primary objectives of analysis and appraisal of evidence.
(b) Argue the need for better awareness on the part of the scientists the tendency to invite attention to
themselves rather than to objectively disseminate scientific information.
(c) Describe the functions of scientific enquiry as critical thinking and appraisal of evidence and to exhort
the scientists to not forget the noble pursuit of science.
(d) To point out the contemporary problems plaguing medical research and to explain the evolving nature
of knowledge in the field of medical science.
(e) Describe the pitfalls in medical research and to exhort scientists to understand the spirit of science as enquiry and not renown.
Q10. The writer is most likely to treat which of the following as true and new scientific evidence?
(a) Findings that are tentative but are convincingly true because of lack of evidence to the contrary.
(b) Findings that are uncertain but not merely chance; independents scientists have been unable refute it.
(c) Findings that have become final after careful validation and replication by several independent scientists.
(d) Findings that are tentative but credible because the purpose for which the evidence is gathered and the methodology of gathering evidence are spelt out.
(e) Findings that are tentative but have a very high credibility and have not been reported selectively.
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