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Noise in the World

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2022

Jim Bogen
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Abstract

This essay uses Györgi Buzsáki's use of EEG data to draw conclusions about brain function as an example to show that investigators sometimes draw conclusions from noisy data by analyzing the noise rather than by extracting a signal from it. The example makes vivid some important differences between McAllister's, Woodward's, and my ideas about how data are interpreted.

Type
Research Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 77 , Issue 5 , December 2010 , pp. 778 - 791
Copyright
Copyright © The Philosophy of Science Association

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Footnotes

‡

Thanks to James McAllister, Jim Woodward, Katherine Braden, Paul Teller, Judy Grabiner, Edouard Machery, György Busáki, symposium audience members, Anjan Chakravartty, and an anonymous referee.

References

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