The BO test 25 years on

摘要

In the 1980s, statisticians were advising scientists on the correct use of statistics, and this inspired replies from scientists such as Sinclair [1] and Kitchen [2], the latter article being an entertaining discussion of the "bloody obvious test' (BO test). Today statisticians are again advising pharmacologists, inspiring at least this author to again appeal to reality over idealism in regard to experimentation [3]. A strange feature of the earlier episode is that, although the articles by Sinclair and Kitchen have been rarely cited, some of the points they made are now among the advice that statisticians give to scientists (although in more formal guise).