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Previous Volume 330:861-862 March 24, 1994 Number 12 Next

	Since this article has no abstract, we have provided an extract of the first 100 words of the full text and any section headings.

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To the Editor: We enjoyed Mills's recent Sounding Board article (Oct. 14 issue)¹ deploring the torture of data and would like to add a few points. Multiple-hypothesis testing (data torturing) by a desperate or inexperienced investigator is analogous to the indiscriminate ordering of diagnostic tests by a floundering clinician -- they both waste time, money, and energy as red herrings are pursued. But occasionally an unexpected yet valid result emerges from the tortured data, like a lungfish from a puddle of Devonian mud. The finding is no less important if the investigator muddled through numerous puddles before stumbling upon it . . . [Full Text of this Article]

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