Anecdotes that provide definitive evidence

Anecdotes

The well-known Arpanet was the first operational packet-switching network. 1 Almost completely unknown is what we claim was the second operational packet-switching network, the LFK Network—although, admittedly , it was a fairly minimal network. Work on the LFK Network began in fall 1970, and it was installed and accepted by fall 1972. It was used as part of a logistics system relating to the No...

Anecdotes

Percutaneous aspiration of hepatic cysts does not provide definitive therapy.

Follow-up of 13 patients who underwent radiologically guided percutaneous needle aspiration of simple liver cysts revealed cyst recurrence in all patients within 2 years. While still effective as a primary diagnostic maneuver, percutaneous aspiration seems to lack permanent therapeutic benefit. However, it may be used as a therapeutic trial to confirm the origin of the patient's symptoms. The p...

Pseudohomophone Effects Provide Evidence

Previous research using event-related brain potentials (ERPs) suggested tha t phonological processing in visual word recognition occurs rather la te, typically after seman tic or syntactic processing. Here, we show that phonological activation in visual word recognition can be observed much earlier. Using a lexical d ecision task, we show that ERPs to pseudohomophones (PsHs) (e.g., ROZE) differ...

Evaluating anecdotes and case reports.

Stories are more memorable than statistics. Newspaper or magazine articles about some new chemotherapy for cancer typically will include an interview with a patient who is doing well on it. Websites of alternative practitioners and clinics sometimes feature stories by or about patients describing their successful treatment. These stories can be very persuasive to readers, but some scientists di...