wrote in message
...
Franz Heymann wrote:

"dave @ stejonda" wrote in message
...
There's a news story at

http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994051

which reports that laboratory studies have suggested that glyphosate
increases the risk of fungal infections.

I have read the URL. The item is interesting, but it was quite
incorrect to
publish it in New Scientist at this stage, since the work is quite
inconclusive so far, and the article contains zero quantitative
information
to help the reader decide whether the effect is statistically
significant or
not.. The folk involved are not making any claims yet, they are only
making
suggestions.

New Scientist isn't a 'learned journal' where scientists publish
papers, it's a magazine that tries to popularise science and publishes
news to that end. This sounds like science news of a sort so it seems
reasonable for New Scentist to publish it. It is a news item rather
than an article so doesn't imply much regarding the truth of the
claims.

That the matter is discussed in New Scientist is in fact my main objection.
The results have not been subjected to peer review and are therefore to be
regarded purely as gossip from publicity-seeking scientists.

The fact that it is gossip does not detract from ite interest. The problem,
however, is that some readers might be misled by it.

Franz