Editorial

In support of descriptive studies; relevance to translational research

Francesco M Marincola

Infectious Disease and Immunogenetics Section, Department of Transfusion Medicine, Clinical Center, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD 20892, USA

author email corresponding author email

Journal of Translational Medicine 2007, 5:21doi:10.1186/1479-5876-5-21

Published:	2 May 2007

Abstract

The contemporary scientific establishment equates hypothesis testing to good science. This stance bypasses the preliminary need to identify a worthwhile hypothesis through rigorous observation of natural processes. If alleviation of human suffering is claimed as the goal of a scientific undertaking, it would be unfair to test a hypothesis whose relevance to human disease has not been satisfactorily proven. Here, we argue that descriptive investigations based on direct human observation should be highly valued and regarded essential for the selection of worthwhile hypotheses while the pursuit of costly scientific investigations without such evidence is a desecration of the cause upon which biomedical research is grounded.

There are good things so in the tide pools and interesting thoughts to be generated from the seeing. Every new eye applied to the peephole which looks out at the world may fish in some new beauty and some new pattern, and the world of the human mind must be enriched by such fishing.

John Steinbeck – Foreword to the Third Edition of Ed Ricketts' "Tides".