Re: Dumb questions and comments on ecological/case studies

[Ted de Castro <tdc@XRAYTED.COM>]

Ok - so its not correlated - but its still a massive background noise

far exceeding the signal we are looking for.  Although not correlated -

still it cannot be ignored - it doesn't just cancel out.  At the very

least it removes subjects from our analyses before their test exposure

can be completed and therefore represent exposures that cannot be used

as part of the analysis.





BERNARD L COHEN wrote:

> 

> On Wed, 5 Jun 2002, Ted de Castro wrote:

> >

> > It is also truly impressive that a small effect can be discerned let

> > alone quantitized or signed in the presence of an overwhelmingly large

> > confounder.

> 

>         --According to LNT, something like 10% of lung cancers are due to

> radon; moreover, variations in radon levels among U.S. counties are very

> much larger than variations in smoking prevalence; moreover, radon levels

> are determined by geology and house construction, and neither of these is

> obviously related to smoking, so correlations between radon and

> smoking cannot be very large. In fact, correlations between radon and any

> socioeconomic variables are not large.

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