Nick Maclaren wrote or quoted:
In article , Tim Tyler wrote:

Notice that in the case cited above, the claim in quesition was whether
your are under-estimating the attention which gardeners with aphid
problems give to ants.

No, you introduced that irrelevance into a serious debate about
whether ants cause or enhance aphid infestations.

The subject of whether gardners paid attention to ants was raised
by you, with:

``I know that aphid infestations are a major agricultural problem,
and I knew people working on defences, but not one was even
considering attacking the ants. This indicates that they knew
it was an irrelevance.''

Lots of gardners with aphid problems *do* pay attention to ants -
as I've mentioned - since the idea that ants protect aphids is
a commonplace one - and is supported by expert UK gardening bodies
in their factsheets.

Perhaps the subset you contacted represent a biased sample.
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