Posted by Jack Boyd on May 25, 1999 at 20:06:19:
In Reply to: Re: Spin Doctoring posted by lc bob on May 25, 1999 at 19:02:04:
My point is rather simple - we probably need to leave our agendas in check when we look at survey results - I never implied that smoking or drinking is either a root cause of clusters or a trigger - I am also more than willing to concede that a slightly statistical higher incidence of smoking and drinking among cluster sufferers might just as well be a cause rather than an effect. I also think that we can assume that the smoking/drinking questions were put in the survey to refute the old conventional wisdom that clusterheads were heavy smokers and drinkers.
I also found your response to my posting kind of interesting - who exactly are you ranting against -me, Doctors, statisticians, logic, non-smokers, self-righteous health nuts, the government, the moon, - I do not mean that facetiously - I mean it sincerely.
Examining smoking and drinking in a survey could also serve to confirm or refute the medical claim that these lifestyle choices cold make clusters worse in either intensity or duration - rather than a root cause - I think we all agree that they are not root causes.