title: Towards sound epistemological foundations of statistical methods for high-dimensional biology.
abstract: A sound epistemological foundation for biological inquiry comes, in part, from application of valid statistical procedures. This tenet is widely appreciated by scientists studying the new realm of high-dimensional biology, or 'omic' research, which involves multiplicity at unprecedented scales. Many papers aimed at the high-dimensional biology community describe the development or application of statistical techniques. The validity of many of these is questionable, and a shared understanding about the epistemological foundations of the statistical methods themselves seems to be lacking. Here we offer a framework in which the epistemological foundation of proposed statistical methods can be evaluated.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biostatistics, Section on Statistical Genetics, Ryals Public Health Building, Suite 327, University of Alabama at Birmingham, 1665 University Boulevard, Birmingham, Alabama 35294, USA.
authors.forename: Tapan
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Mehta
authors.forename: Murat
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Tanik
authors.forename: David B
authors.initials: DB
authors.lastname: Allison
mesh_terms: D005821:Genetic Techniques / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D017408:Guidelines as Topic; D019359:Knowledge; D008128:Logic; D008967:Molecular Biology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013223:Statistics as Topic / Q000379:methods*