Revhtree doesn't know it all!!!

Saveafish · Apr 25, 2019

Why orange why orange. I wanna know the story behind the color and designe. Ohh boy story time. I love story time. Tell me tell me I wanna know @revhtree

mfinn · Apr 25, 2019

Bring back seller/buyer feedback ratings that are visible.

MnFish1 · Apr 25, 2019

rushbattle said:
Edit: Read a few comments about valid scientific studies. What BRS does is not valid scientific studies. They might or might not provide some useful practical information, but you can't run statistics on a sample size of one. Even just making one change on a system and seeing what happens doesn't provide anything close to conclusive. Myriad variables are unaccounted if they are not multiple systems in the same environment at the same time.

The financial burden of even doing some simple comparisons or just setting up tanks and seeing if they work like BRS would be too large for Rev to fund. If you want to advocate for further scientific studies to be done look to the academic world, there are tons of ways to contribute to the scientific community as it relates to reefing topics.

This is partly true - Some of the videos are 'anecdotal' Others are more science based (the lighting examples, etc). The value is they go through things step by step - as compared to something I might post about my tank i.e. 'My goniopora is doing fine with high flow, so high flow is ok'.

Just to be clear - my suggestion was not that hobbyists should necessarily be doing experiments - but that there be a section where the scientific articles that some of us look up - can be in a central location - indexed the same way the other written articles are - the benefit being - a person can read the actual article and determine for example why people say immunity to CI only lasts 6 months, etc. etc etc. It would be a good reference center. What I'm not sure about - with this is copyright issues. I think at best unless the article is in the public domain - that only a link to the article could be posted (or quotations from the article).

A couple people (at least) - HAVE done experiments - that were relatively science based - at least they had the input of several scientists when they designed the studies (Bacteria in a bottle being one of them). I think it might be nice to have a central place where lets say @Dr. Reef wants to do another study on xxxx - he could Post this - and people that want to donate can do so - but it would be in a central location. I think that was the main idea?

littlebigreef · Apr 25, 2019

The thing about r2r is that you have to come here unlike FB where people will cruise through to kill time. In that sense r2r is really more of a community that holds people to higher standards (troublemakers get the boot). The quality of the advice on r2r is better, admins are more direct, screwballs and bad info are called out by the community. I find the opposite is true of FB and for that reason I try to avoid FB groups as much as possible. Of course this will change now that FB is going through killing all the groups selling live animals... so we'll have to see how this goes.

Things I'd like to see:
1) more opportunities for local meet ups/ open houses/ grow out contests
2) separate page for zoa ID
3) some ability for retailers (non-sponsors) with unique 1-off or hard corals permitted to post in the selling forum.

rushbattle · Apr 25, 2019

MnFish1 said:
This is partly true - Some of the videos are 'anecdotal' Others are more science based (the lighting examples, etc). The value is they go through things step by step - as compared to something I might post about my tank i.e. 'My goniopora is doing fine with high flow, so high flow is ok'.

Just to be clear - my suggestion was not that hobbyists should necessarily be doing experiments - but that there be a section where the scientific articles that some of us look up - can be in a central location - indexed the same way the other written articles are - the benefit being - a person can read the actual article and determine for example why people say immunity to CI only lasts 6 months, etc. etc etc. It would be a good reference center. What I'm not sure about - with this is copyright issues. I think at best unless the article is in the public domain - that only a link to the article could be posted (or quotations from the article).

A couple people (at least) - HAVE done experiments - that were relatively science based - at least they had the input of several scientists when they designed the studies (Bacteria in a bottle being one of them). I think it might be nice to have a central place where lets say @Dr. Reef wants to do another study on xxxx - he could Post this - and people that want to donate can do so - but it would be in a central location. I think that was the main idea?

Ok, none of the above is science. PAR mapping is a characterization under a described set of circumstances. There is no hypothesis. There is no replication. Nothing that @Dr. Reef did was science because there was no replication, unless I missed a study somewhere. No journal anywhere would publish any of this. I am only pointing this out because there is an important distinction between a scientific study, which has a hypothesis that can either be supported or not supported by the experiment, and all of these other things. Anecdote is important, but they are not conclusive about even what they are studying. I advocate an attitude of skepticism ala skeptical reefkeeping.
http://packedhead.net/2010/skeptica...g-is-true-or-did-someone-just-tell-it-to-you/

CMO · Apr 25, 2019

rushbattle said:
Ok, none of the above is science. PAR mapping is a characterization under a described set of circumstances. There is no hypothesis. There is no replication. Nothing that @Dr. Reef did was science because there was no replication, unless I missed a study somewhere. No journal anywhere would publish any of this. I am only pointing this out because there is an important distinction between a scientific study, which has a hypothesis that can either be supported or not supported by the experiment, and all of these other things. Anecdote is important, but they are not conclusive about even what they are studying. I advocate an attitude of skepticism ala skeptical reefkeeping.
http://packedhead.net/2010/skeptica...g-is-true-or-did-someone-just-tell-it-to-you/

I won't argue that what BRS does is not technically science but it has certainly helped me learn about reefing topics while providing some confidence in their conclusions based on reasonable levels of controls and planned studies. I'm advocating for simple studies like taking the same coral in the same tank and light half with LED and the other half with T5 at equal Par - what are the resulting color differences and growth rates presented clearly and professionally. Not looking for true academic level science here as that is almost certainly unrealistic.

Mrs. Herbert · Apr 25, 2019

I love Reef 2 Reef. It has helped me out ALOT!!

Brew12 · Apr 25, 2019

Not to drift off subject on this but I do want to address this comment

rushbattle said:
Nothing that @Dr. Reef did was science because there was no replication, unless I missed a study somewhere.

I am assuming you haven't followed his work on testing the performance of bottled bacteria. He established a control tank and multiple test tanks so he could eliminate as many variables as possible. He replicated each test multiple times. He would also make adjustment to his testing methods as he learned from previous test runs. It was about as scientific as it gets outside of a laboratory imo. He did great work. To say what he did was anecdotal would not be accurate in the least.

rushbattle said:
No journal anywhere would publish any of this.

I would agree that a journal wouldn't publish his work but that doesn't mean what he did wasn't following scientific principles. I would also point out that science published in journals has been proven wrong. Using this as a measuring stick is problematic.

Edit: oops.. I seem to have left off this link.
http://packedhead.net/2016/skeptical-reefkeeping-xiv-everyone-can-do-science/

MnFish1 · Apr 25, 2019

rushbattle said:
Ok, none of the above is science. PAR mapping is a characterization under a described set of circumstances. There is no hypothesis. There is no replication. Nothing that @Dr. Reef did was science because there was no replication, unless I missed a study somewhere. No journal anywhere would publish any of this. I am only pointing this out because there is an important distinction between a scientific study, which has a hypothesis that can either be supported or not supported by the experiment, and all of these other things. Anecdote is important, but they are not conclusive about even what they are studying. I advocate an attitude of skepticism ala skeptical reefkeeping.
http://packedhead.net/2010/skeptica...g-is-true-or-did-someone-just-tell-it-to-you/

I disagree - but thats not the topic of this thread. I will just say that you haven't read the experiments on bacteria in a bottle by @Dr. Reef. There was a hypothesis - ie that bacteria in a bottle did not work. Each experiment was replicated. There were adequate controls. A major company is supplying ammonia monitors for the next round of studies - so I Humbly disagree (except for the fact that its not 'published'. BTW where would you publish something like this? This isn't anecdote. Anecdote is what was out there before "Bacteria in a bottle doesnt work" - or "Bacteria in a bottle works". In fact - the interesting thing is that the person starting the study felt that it wouldn't work. So there's that. Sorry for the repetition - I didnt realize that @Brew12 had posted while I was typing - but I couldn't agree more with his point

Frtdrmrose7 · Apr 25, 2019

revhtree said:
Revhtree doesn't know it all!!!

YES I will be the first to admit it! I've made mistakes and will make more but in order to be a good leader I need to be open to change and the ideas of others. Some of the best implementation of change has come from the voice of our members!

So as we move towards our site refresh and the launch of our enhanced market tools I would like to hear from you on what you think Reef2Reef needs and what we could do better.

So what do you think?

Amazing site but maybe let sellers close out their ads?

vetteguy53081 · Apr 25, 2019

Good fellowship, conversation, humor and respect- HARD TO BEAT !!!

Jamo7 · Apr 25, 2019

Wheres the swag at? Maybe it is out there somewhere? Not sure [emoji848] I would rock a R2R hoodie (it’s cold in the PNW) that has nothing to do with the website.

Your welcome....

rushbattle · Apr 25, 2019

CMO said:
I won't argue that what BRS does is not technically science but it has certainly helped me learn about reefing topics while providing some confidence in their conclusions based on reasonable levels of controls and planned studies. I'm advocating for simple studies like taking the same coral in the same tank and light half with LED and the other half with T5 at equal Par - what are the resulting color differences and growth rates presented clearly and professionally. Not looking for true academic level science here as that is almost certainly unrealistic.

Just keep in mind what you are concluding. In your example, you take frags of the same coral (hopefully very close to the same size, and fragged at the same time, etc., etc.) and place them in the same body of water and place them under different lights. Then observe the results. You can conclude that the corals look/grow differently under the different lights, if they are any different, but you don't know if that would happen if you did the same thing again. Without replication you cannot control for a number of important testing variables that are necessary for high confidence in the results. I have conducted studies with larval fish, and had really good results with a certain protocol for a few systems (replicates), and one of the systems under that protocol did really poorly leading there to be no difference from the control. Another example would be folks that get frags of the same exact coral at different times (like the same coral from battlecorals that is the same colony from the same system), and see different growth rates and coloration even after months in their system.

Again, anecdote is an important part of science. I find anecdote quite useful, and I am not advocating against simple experiments without replication. I also appreciate those folks like @Dr. Reef and @Ryanbrs and the work they do, I find it helpful and informative. But I do think drawing conclusions from anecdote is perilous. You risk post hoc ergo propter hoc, and the biggest risk is extrapolating from that one observation. What light, NO3 level, PO4 level, alkalinity level colors up a coral in another tank might not work the same in your tank.

A simple way to say it is assign confidence linearly with the amount and confidence in the evidence. In practical terms, would you want a drug company to test a drug on one person with cancer, observe that they were cancer free, and then start treating you with that drug instead of a more well studied alternative? Probably not, you would probably want more evidence than that one person to take the risk. What about the same scenario with the family pet, your siblings beloved dog? Your favorite fish?

Final example: BRS found that higher alkalinity resulted in higher growth rates and benefited coloration of some corals, but not others in their study. Many folks say that alkalinity levels as such kill corals. Was BRS wrong? Are the other people wrong?

Ok, enough rambling.

TLDR; Be careful with how you (everyone) uses anecdote, I care about the living organisms in your tank and I think you probably do too.

drstardust · Apr 25, 2019

My only issue is that the app doesn't seem to be sync'd with the website as far as notifications. Notifications I've viewed on the app don't show up as having been viewed on the site, and vice-versa.

rushbattle · Apr 25, 2019

Brew12 said:
I am assuming you haven't followed his work on testing the performance of bottled bacteria. He established a control tank and multiple test tanks so he could eliminate as many variables as possible. He replicated each test multiple times. He would also make adjustment to his testing methods as he learned from previous test runs. It was about as scientific as it gets outside of a laboratory imo. He did great work. To say what he did was anecdotal would not be accurate in the least.

I would agree that a journal wouldn't publish his work but that doesn't mean what he did wasn't following scientific principles. I would also point out that science published in journals has been proven wrong. Using this as a measuring stick is problematic.

Edit: oops.. I seem to have left off this link.
http://packedhead.net/2016/skeptical-reefkeeping-xiv-everyone-can-do-science/

Brew, I like you and think you are a nice and helpful person. The above post, however, seems to be written to be frustrating. I haven't seen you engaging in straw men before. In order to refrain from looking like I am being similarly argumentative in response, I am not going to respond, other than to say that what I call science is what RR calls "real science" in the article you cited. It's not that anecdote (anecdotal science) isn't helpful, it's that it is different than "real science."

rushbattle · Apr 25, 2019

Edit: Not worth it. Hope everyone has a nice evening. Thanks @revhtree for hosting this nice site.

Doctorgori · Apr 26, 2019

CMO said:
Probably too much to ask but hey I'll throw it out there. Maybe a forum that conducts controlled studies similar to BRS investigates. Much of peoples opinions here (mine included) are anecdotal and the result of spurious correlations vs. proven factual causal relations. It'd be pretty cool to see this site really become a source for tested factual information.

Yes, and addition to and support of those experiments; I'd like to see a member supported data tracking archive/collection thing as there is some really valuable universally beneficial sets of data that could be gleaned from a forum this large and diverse. I'm not sure of the exact architecture per se, as I can see we already have the surveys, but maybe a place to strategically collect and discuss data. To me the possibilities are endless, for instance: brand choices, failure rates, species mortality rates. I'd love to know not just what you purchased but what had to be replaced and why (livestock and products). Some data could have statistical meaning if the samples are large enough...

ScottR · Apr 26, 2019

revhtree said:
Revhtree doesn't know it all!!!

YES I will be the first to admit it! I've made mistakes and will make more but in order to be a good leader I need to be open to change and the ideas of others. Some of the best implementation of change has come from the voice of our members!

So as we move towards our site refresh and the launch of our enhanced market tools I would like to hear from you on what you think Reef2Reef needs and what we could do better.

So what do you think?

I have the r2r app (iPhone) and it sucks. Sucks bad. I use the browser on my phone. Love r2r however. It’s the community above all else.