SCIENTIFIC INTEGRITY, CONFLICT OF INTEREST AND MYTHOLOGY RELATED TO ANALYSIS OF TREPONEMATOSES: THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING ERNEST

Bruce Rothschild, Professor of Medicine, Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine,Youngstown, Ohio USAI will cite the 1904 words of my ancestor,Walter Rothschild (1983, p. 133): ‘I am alwayswilling to accept every criticism so long as I amallowed to defend my own standpoint in return. Itherefore venture to ask you to receive this replyto’ Gary Heathcote.The important thing in any debate is that it is adebate and neither side should be permitted to sup-press the other, no matter how much it might wantto. Manipulation of the publication process to in-terfere with dissemination of conflicting ideas iscontrary to acceptable science.Criteria based on empirical observation with avalidated methodology forms the basis of scientificmethod and indeed, for the Rothschild criteria fordistinguishing among the treponematoses (Roths-child and Rothschild 1995). Objective physicalchemistry-based measurements confirm not justprecision of periostitis recognition by the authors ’technique, but also its accuracy (Rothschild andRothschild 2003). This is the only non-destructivetechnique documented for distinguishing periostealreaction. Mike Schultz’ (1995) beautiful histologicsections clearly document the vaguarities revealedby Mary Powell (1995), when she reported inter-observer variation from 0-100 % frequencies onthe same skeletal sample! The abstract did not re-flect her presentation. I was fortunate to attend andwitnessed her documentation of the lack of repro-ducibility of previous work on periosteal reaction,something I had only previously suspected. Whyare anthropologists apparently not appalled by thenon-reproducibility of their techniques? Why workso hard to discredit a technique that they have noteven tried - a technique validated for recognitionof periosteal reaction and of distinguishing amongthe treponematoses? When taphonomy and in vivoperiosteal reaction cannot be distinguished, therecan be no progress.As there has been resistance to use of validat-ed standardized criteria for recognition of periostealreaction, there should be no surprise that great ef-forts have been exerted to denigrate diagnostic cri-teria for recognition of groups of diseases knownas treponematoses. Does the level of discomfortthat scientific methods seem to elicit simply relateto failure to understand its precepts?While those attempting to repudiate validatedempirical criteria decry being perceived as mythol-ogistis that does not change the fact of lack of sci-entific evidence for their opinion-based pronounce-ments. Lets there be any confusion, let us be clearthat this is what is at the basis of comments byHeathcote, Stodder and Powell (Heathcote et al.1996; Powell and Cook 2005; Rothschild and Roth-schild 1999).Could this problem of apparent antipathy toscientific method be responsible for exclusion ofanthropology by the National Academy of Scienc-es? Would not adhering to scientific methodologyand open debate be helpful in establishing the cred-ibility of anthropology as a ‘hard’ science, or isfear of scientific scrutiny the driving force?A second tenet of science is reproducibility offindings in a separate sample. This can be per-formed by dividing a sample according to a pa-rameter unrelated to the testing technique or byexamining different populations. One must be clear:Scientific scrutiny requires separate samples, notdifferent investigators.Accuracy in citations is always important.Thus, it is ironic when apparently inaccurate cita-tions are misattributed by one of the original au-thors of those citations (Rothschild and Heathcote1993).Given documentation of yaws on Guam byStewart and Spoehr (1952) and regional popula-tion characterization, the only meaningful questionis if there is evidence for pre-Columbian existenceof any treponematosis other than yaws in the SouthPacific. There is not!The value of any criteria is what you can learnfrom their application. Simply expressing belief ina diagnosis does not present a testable hypothesisand therefore allows no advancement in the stateof knowledge! Untested assumptions become a