朱易事件：要人人善良不现实，有恻隐之心不过分

【一位年轻人被冰刀严重刺伤而顽强坚持，却换来莫须有罪名的心灵创伤。不能要求人人都善良，但是，人能够没有恻隐之心吗？

朱易不是自己争取回国的。因为中国冰雪运动较弱，中国体育总局想方设法物色海外有华人血统的运动员，请了多位回国，朱易是第一位。

当时体育部门根本不知道其父亲的重要性，家庭对朱易回国也有很大的犹豫，最后决定顺其自然、让孩子追求她对花滑运动的那份热爱。

朱易2018年回国在先，北大清华联系其父在两年之后。科学家允许孩子耽误学业而参赛主要是不阻碍其兴趣和特长，而不是一定要参赛、一定要获奖。对父母来说，早不参赛可以早上大学。有人猜测朱易参加奥运是为了入美国高校。这是不懂美国大学的误解。朱易的父亲与我和我的朋友一样是美国教授，知道录取的常识。我们的孩子都参与体育，但只需要一般中学的校队、最多一些地区性小型比赛就上哈佛、耶鲁绰绰有余。为了有说服力，我在此第一次公布女儿的隐私，她是校排球队，足够申请美国所有名牌大学，实际上每一所她申请的大学都录取了她，轮到她拒绝哈佛、普林斯顿等。朱松纯教授不可能为女儿上大学而冒冰刀伤害的危险。那是不懂的人以小人之心 度君子之腹。

朱松纯是中国农村长大，靠自己读书在美国成为科学家，在中国不过是一位专家。就是北京的出租汽车司机，也知道北大教授不可能影响体育总局在奥运选拔这么重要的决定。把他当成权贵批评，不仅误解，而且是伤害依靠自己而成功的穷孩子。

就是在北大，朱松纯也不能独断专行，他的提议也经常被反对，包括我的反对票。我们不是以关系而演绎事情，而是以事实和逻辑进行判断】

从美国国籍转为中国国籍（“归化”），代表中国参赛冬季奥运会的朱易（Beverly Zhu），在中国被网暴，美国的CNN也幸灾乐祸把她滑倒的尴尬照片挂在头版头条显著位置，说她归化中国， 却在中国遭受网暴。

从1月17号获选到2月6日参赛，长达20天的时间， 朱易受到大量的攻击， 使得她赛前承受了比其他运动员更多的、无法想象的心理压力。

在她没有做错任何事情的时候，创造了“被网暴”的记录。

而且，网暴在前， 发挥失误在后。

一些人认为：朱易记录不好，为什么成为中国参赛选手。如果她参赛获奖了，可能改变这一看法，如果失败了，网暴就是应该的。

有些人甚至认为：她参赛是因为她的科学家父亲影响了中国体育总局，和所有选拔过程参加评分的众多中国裁判员。

说中国科学家可以影响奥运选拔，那是某些人对中国科学家的幻想，一千年后是否能够成为现实，应该存疑。

中国科学家从来没有这么大的影响力。可能有人忘记了中国知识分子多年受过多少什么待遇，也不知道现在的中国科学家除了在自己圈子里有江湖，离开科学界唯唯诺诺、怕官员的科学家远多于敢发言的。

对奥运选拔的影响，全中国没有（体育之外的）任何一位科学家能够有实质影响。

中国体育部门决策者们对运动员的重视远高于对科学家的重视。

体育总局选拔参赛运动员的过程有5轮比赛，很多裁判员参加评分。据体育部门公布的规则， 5场比赛裁判员都有轮换， 而且还有纪检部门监督。不要说科学家，在近年严格的巡视制度下，能够搞定这个过程的官员可能都没有几个。任何人都可以匿名举报。查下来，没几个人逃得掉。

朱易是我国第一个正式邀请“归化”的运动员。决定邀请她的时候，是按她当时在青年组显示的潜力。那时，我国体育总局不知道她父亲的重要性，不过是国外一位教授而已。

北大清华听说“归化”一事后，才觉得可以试试请朱松纯回国，之后才有她父亲回国一事。

不是朱松纯帮了朱易回国参赛，而是朱易回国，才有后面的朱松纯回国。

质疑的人，从时间到因果关系，都搞反了。

质疑的人，先设定朱易及其家庭有罪，要求自证清白，或者体育总局证明其清白。体育总局可能惊讶的不得了，何时我们听过哪个与体育毫无关系的教授，这也要证明？以后干脆请大众打分，不用专业裁判员打分了。

朱松纯是北大、清华竞争的教授。但被如此重视的主力教授，对其工作，北大清华也同样有规则和程序。朱松纯的研究所，聘任一部分研究员同时担任北京大学教授、副教授、助理教授。我一直在北大理工科聘任委员会，就曾投票反对朱松纯提议名单中的部分人选。

另外，我上一篇短文里面客气的解释，这里更直白一些：

到朱松纯这样程度的真正科学家（区别于国内有各类头衔但不爱科学、对科学理解不深刻的科技工作者），认为科学是人类文明的结晶，不可能高看体育比赛成绩，而是尊重孩子的特长与爱好。

科学家对于自己孩子的爱好愿意支持一段时间，看看孩子能够到什么程度就什么程度。绝大多数奥运金牌，不仅不会被科学家认为与科学一样重要，而且都难以管吃饭。在美国，不少奥运金牌得主，以后的工作不过是在儿童青少年的体育课外班。我有位同学的儿子，游泳教练就是奥运金牌得主。那孩子跟着学游泳，得一些地区性的小奖牌，就足够上哈佛大学。出现孩子的体育与学业冲突，大部分科学家家长会要求孩子适可而止，不可能把奖牌、包括奥运奖牌看的那么重。好玩、尊重而已，而并非需要想方设法参赛、想方设法获奖。

体育运动的奖，在白左教育下，是好事、但不是需要牺牲个人品德而获得的荣誉。不惜一切代价–—包括开后门、放弃人格–—获得的奖牌，不是荣誉，是耻辱。

朱易在2018年被中国花滑界认为很有潜力之时，不可能预计后来会冰刀插进右脚，严重受伤，需要较长时间恢复。最初选拔她的时候，也没人能够预计后来会出现疫情而影响参与国际赛事。

从来不是她自己主动要加入中国队，而是中国出于国家需要争取一些人归化。中国冰上运动部门也不可能百分之百看准确，运动员成绩的变化也有一定无法预计。何况，中国冰雪运动部门在朱易之后邀请归化的谷爱凌，看的挺准，说明中国冰雪运动部门发现、邀请这些人，本身挺合理。

朱易在负伤之后，继续努力。中国有关人士也都知道她的伤情。中国其他人没有入选，只是说明我国冰上运动有待发展，其他人不如她，才只能选她的结果。

对一个负过重伤、热爱花滑运动、愿意为国效力的孩子，尽其努力，大家应该有恻隐之心。

知识分子家庭支持孩子体育运动，迄今都不是非常多。北大化学系校友谷燕的孩子谷爱凌、北大清华现任教授朱松纯的孩子朱易，都属于比较少见。

她们如果成功了，我们为之高兴。

她们如果失败了，我们应该支持其运动员精神。

——————–———— 

这并非我第一次对体育发表个人看法。2012年8月，我为叶诗文事件致信英国学术刊物《自然》，同样是路见不平。

致《自然》杂志总编的信：有关叶诗文的新闻报道

英文原信附后，大意如下：

斐尔,

​你可能因Ewen Callaway对叶诗文的报道而被email狂炸，过去二十小时，给你email的人里面小部分也给我来信。

​如果你奇怪《自然》非本质部分一篇报道为何带来这么大的反应，你应该高兴中文读者比世界其他读者更看重你们的新闻报道，与科学相关的（即使关系很小）也可能重于《纽约时报》，中文媒体报道用你们的新闻也远多于一般西方媒体用你们的新闻。

​Callaway报道说的好听是草率、说的难听是种族偏见：1)最初的副标题暗示叶可能舞弊; 2)Callaway用了两件事实说明叶惊人地异常，而两件都错了; 3)Callaway没咨询意见不同的专家，导致报道不平衡，低于公平报道的最低标准。所以，Callaway至少不负责任，可能太快就暗示中国运动员容易舞弊。他肯定没有达到新闻报道的通常标准。

​我很高兴看到在我草拟此信的过程中，《自然》可能意识到原副标题的偏见，将之由“成绩追踪记录有助于抓体育舞弊者”更正为“成绩追踪记录有助于驱散疑问”。舞弊的前设改为疑问。

​Callaway报道用的两个“事实”让叶诗文看起来比真实的要更“异常”：说她比自己在2012年7月的记录要快7秒，说她在最后五十米比男子冠军Ryan Lochte还要快，而后者是男子第二快的世界纪录。

​第一个“事实”错了，第二个误导。1)叶比自己只快5秒，而此前她的记录创于2011年、不是2012年，这位16岁运动员用了一年而不是少于4周刷新自己。2)叶只在混合泳400米中最后自由泳一段比Lochte快，而非整个400米。Lochte在400米是世界第二快的记录，叶在400米丝毫不能接近他（慢了二十多秒)。叶只是自由泳最强，而在前300米落后于好些女选手。虽然Lochte在400米很快，他在最后50米的自由泳慢于五、六位男选手。叶最后五十米自由泳也慢于那些男子。所以，叶只在她自己的强项而他的弱项快于Lochte。如果Callaway多做的功课，他就难以用这些“事实”来使“问题”醒目。如果Callaway多查询，他就能发现其他游泳运动员也曾在十几岁发育阶段显著提高记录。这些事实更正后，Callaway的报道就没基础。

还有好些事实，可以让一般读者更理解叶诗文的成绩，我不在此赘述。可以参见《附件1》，wikipedia对叶的成绩有一个相当快而公平的描述。署名的《自然》报道应该优于Wikipedia。Callaway报道与Wikipedia条目的差别也显示该记者未采访已经公开提出不同意见的专家。

你应该收到了王立铭博士的一封email。他在发表《自然》和《自然神经科学》的第一作者论文后，获加州理工学院的博士，并因此得到有声誉的奖学金到伯克利加州大学做独立的博士后。万一他给你的email埋在你收到的成百上千邮件中，我将其拷贝为《附件2》。他email给了我、要我看看此事。

Callaway在线报道下面有很多跟帖讨论。有些学生以为有些很有道理（且有实质内容）的讨论被删了，他们寄给了我。我选Lai Jiang的一份为《附件3》，Zhenxi Zhang的为《附件4》。你们可以看到学生和一些更有经历的《自然》读者不高兴是有依据的，而这些为Callaway忽略。

英国人常忘记、而现代华人不易忘记，世界上很多人以为鸦片战争是中国人卖鸦片给英国人。我自己6月份（这确是2012年）又经历一次，我和一位老朋友（麻省理工学院教授）在香港开会时，发现她竟然也是这么认为。

英国人的国际形象好，部分原因是你们的科学和科学家：当全世界中学生都要从教科书学牛顿和达尔文时，英国赢得了世界的尊重。《自然》应该以这些伟大（且客观）的科学家建立的传统和声誉为自豪。他们其中有些曾在《自然》发表过论文，才有《自然》的今天。你们如果采取措施修复你们的新闻记者造成的损害，可以加强你们的声誉。

英国人从来没因鸦片战争对我们道歉，即使在1997年离开香港时也未显示丝毫悔意。而香港是英国在鸦片战争后强迫我们割让的土地。所以，记忆是犹新的，而不仅是1840年代的残余。如果《自然》拒绝承认此报道不公平，可能很难“驱散”英国至上的“疑问”（借用《自然》对叶报道的词汇）。

中国人受形象不佳的牵累。我们也知道我们还有很多感到羞耻的未解决的问题，包括舞弊。越来越多的中国人能接受合理与平衡的批评，我们在伦敦奥运会为我们羽毛球的问题公开道歉就是证据。但我们对缺依据、有偏见的批评还很敏感。叶诗文不过是个16岁的年轻人，本该为自己职业生涯的成就而满心欢喜。当已知她通过了奥运会赛前、赛中多次测试，而毫无证据指责她的时候，还有很多媒体，特别是《自然》这样的刊物，渲染负面舆论多于正面，当然令人深感不平。

我希望你们能澄清记录，发表平衡Callaway报道的意见。

毅

北京大学生命科学学院 神经生物学教授 饶毅

附件1 Wikipedia对叶诗文的总结

附件2 伯克利加州大学王立铭的email

附件3 Lai Jiang在Callaway报道后的意见

附件 4 Zhenxi Zhang在Callaway报道后的意见

原文（2012年8月4日1:57am发送）

Dear Phil,

​You might have been bombarded with emails about Ewen Callaway’s report on the Chinese Olympic gold medalist Ye Shiwen. Over the last 20 hours, I have received emails from a small fraction of those who had emailed you.

​If you wonder why a piece in a non-essential section of Nature has brought you so much response, you should be happy to know that Chinese readers place much more weight in Naturenews reports than the rest of the world does. If an event is related to science (even tangentially) and Nature publishes a news report, many Chinese readers treat the Nature report more seriously than New York Times. Chinese news media also useNature news pieces much more than the regular Western news media would.

​The Callaway report was sloppy at the best and racially biased at the worst: 1) the original subtitle implied cheating on Ye’s part, setting a negative tone for the report; 2) Callaway presented two facts to establish that Ye was strikingly anomalous, but both “facts” were wrong; 3) Callaway did not check with experts whose opinions did not support the doping explanation, and thus did not provide a balance report that is the minimal standard of fair reporting. Therefore, Callaway is at least irresponsible, and could have jumped too quickly to imply that Chinese athletes were prone to cheating. He has certainly not held onto the usual standard of news reporting. 

​I am glad that, while I was drafting this letter, Nature may have already noticed the bias in the original subtitle andcorrected it by changing it from “Performance profiling could help to catch cheaters in sports” to “Performance profiling could help to dispel doubts”. A presumption of cheating has changed to doubts.

​The Callaway report presented two “facts” which made Ye Shiwen seem more “anomalous” than she really was by stating: that she was 7 seconds faster than herself in the same event in July 2012, and that, in the last 50 meters, she was faster than Ryan Lochte, the gold medalist of the same event for men, with the second fastest record.

​The first “fact” was wrong, while the second was misleading. 1) Ye was only ~5 seconds faster than her own record in July, 2011, giving the 16 year old a full year rather than less than 4 weeks to improve her own record. 2) Ye was faster than Lochte only in the freestyle, not for the entire 400 meters. Lochte’s time was the second fastest for the entire 400 meters, for which Ye was not even close (she was more than 20 seconds slower than Lochte in 400 meters). Ye was only at her best in freestyle and trailed behind other women in the same event in the first 300 meters of the individual medley. While Lochte was the fastest in 400 meters, he was slower than 5 or 6 men in the last 50 meters of freestyle. Ye was slower than thoseother men. Thus, Ye was only faster than Lochte in a style that was her strength and his weakness. Had Callaway done a bit more home work, then he would have had a hard time to use these “facts” to highlight the “problem”. Had Callaway done double-checking, he would have found that other swimmers hadsignificantly improved their own records when they were in the teens. Corrections of these facts would have changed the basis for the Callaway report.

There are more facts that would have made the performance of Ye Shiwen more understandable to the general readership, which I will not go into details here. See Attachment 1 for an amazingly quick and well-balanced description of Ye’sperformance by Wikipedia. Signed reports in Nature should have been better than Wikipedia. The contrast between the Callaway report and the Wikipedia item shows that the reporter did not interview experts who had publicly voiced different opinions.

You should have received an email from Dr. Liming Wang, who obtained a PhD from Caltech after publishing first author papers in Nature and Nature Neuroscience. He was awarded a prestigious fellowship for an independent postdoc at Berkeley. In case his email has been buried among the hundreds you havereceived, I am copying it here as Attachment 2. He had sent a copy of his email to me and asked me to look at the issue.

There are many online posts below the Callaway report. Some students think that a few very reasonable (and substantive) posts have been deleted. They have sent these to me and I am including one authored by Lai Jiang as Attachment 3 and another by Zhenxi Zhang as Attachment 4. You can see that the anger of students and more established scientists who read Nature was supported by facts neglected by Callaway.

One point the British often forget, but the modern Chinese do not, is that many in the world wrongly think that the Opium Wars occurred because the Chinese sold opium to the British. I personally experienced this in June (2012) when a long timefriend of mine at MIT thought that way while she and I were in Hong Kong attending a meeting. 

The British have a good international image, partly because of your science and your scientists: when every middle school student has to know Newton and Darwin in textbooks, the entire Britain wins the respect of the world. Nature should be proud of the tradition and prestige built by the great (and objective) scientists, some of whom have published in Nature to make Nature what it is today. Your prestige will be strengthened when you take steps to repair the damage caused by your news reporters.

The British have never apologized to us about the Opium Wars and did not show slight remorse when leaving Hong Kong in 1997 which the British forced us to cede after the British won the Opium Wars. So the memory is rather fresh, not just lingering from the 1840s. If Nature refuses to admit that this report was not balanced, it will be difficult to “dispel doubts”about British supremacy.

The Chinese suffer from a poor image. We also know that we have many unsolved problems that we are ashamed of, including cheating. More and more Chinese are receptive to legitimate and balanced criticism, as evidenced by our public apology for our faults at the badminton games during the London Olympic. But we are sensitive to ill-founded criticism with apparent biases. Ye Shiwen is only a 16 year old and should have enjoyed her moment of professional achievement. When she is known to have passed multiple tests before and during the London Olympic and there is no evidence to accuse her, it is certainly unjustified when the negative opinions were highly publicized but the positive ones were not, especially in a journal like Nature.

I hope that you will set record straight and publish opinions that balance the Callaway report.

Yi

Yi Rao, Ph.D.

Professor of Neurobiology, Peking University School of Life Sciences

Beijing, China

Attachment 1 Wikipedia summary of the Ye Shiwenperformance

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ye_Shiwen

2012 Summer Olympics

At the 2012 Summer Olympics, in the third heat of the Women’s 400m Individual Medley she swam 4:31.73, an improvement of 2 seconds over her 2010 Asian Games time. In the final she won the gold medal and broke the world record (held by Stephanie Rice since the 2008 Summer Olympics) with a time of 4:28.43, an improvement of a further 3 seconds, swimming the last 50m in 28.93 seconds.[7][8]

Ye’s time over the final 50m was compared to that of Ryan Lochte, the winner of the corresponding men’s event, who swam it just under a fifth of a second slower in 29.10. However, commentators pointed out that these two times were misleading outside of their proper contexts. Lochte’s overall time was 23.25 seconds faster, 4:05.18, than Ye’s, as were the times of three other competitors in the men’s 400m IM. Equally, as Chinese team officials also pointed out, Ye’s race was a very different one to Lochte’s. Lochte, when he had hit the freestyle leg of the race, had a comfortable lead over his opponents, whereas Ye was still a body length behind U.S. swimmer Elizabeth Beisel at that point in her race.[6][9] Phil Lutton, sports editor of the Brisbane Times, observed that Ye, in that position, “had to hit the burners to motor past Beisel“.[6] Freelance sports journalist Jens Weinreich described it as Ye having “lit the Turbo” at that point in the race.[8] Australia’s Rice, a fellow competitor in the race, described Ye’s performance as “insanely fast”, and commented on Ye’s past racing form: “I was next to her at worlds in the 200m IM last year and she came home over the top of me in that freestyle leg and I’m not exactly a bad freestyler. So she’s a gun freestyler.”[10][11][12]

Phil Lutton pointed out that Ye had grown from 160cm at the time of the 2010 Games to 172cm at the 2012 Olympics, and that “[t]hat sort of difference in height, length of stroke and size of hand leads to warp-speed improvement”.[6] In support of the same point Ian Thorpe pointed out that he improved his own personal best in the 400m freestyle by several seconds between the ages of 15 and 16.[13] Adrian Moorhouse similarly observed that he made a personal best improvement of four seconds at age 17 as the result of a growth spurt.[13]

In the 200m IM, three days later, Ye again was behind, in third place, at the start of the final leg of the race, having been in fourth place at the end of the first leg.[14][15] But she again overtook her competitors in the freestyle leg, finishing with the time 2:07.57.[14][15] In preliminary heats she had swum 2:08.90, the same time that she achieved in the 2011 World Championships and her tenth best time of all time, with splits of 28.16, 1:00.54, and 1:38.17.[16]

Attachment 2 Email by Dr. Liming Wang, UC Berkeley

From: Liming Wang  
Date: Thu, Aug 2, 2012 at 11:26 AM
Subject: Protest to a Nature article “Why great Olympic feats raise suspicions”
To: exec@nature.com

Philip Campbell, Ph.D. and Editor-in-Chief of Nature,

I am a neurobiologist in University of California, Berkeley, USA. I (as well as many of my colleagues) found an article that appeared in Nature yesterday, titled “Why great Olympic feats raise suspicions”, completely groundless and extremely disturbing. 

In that article, Mr. Callaway questioned China’s 16-year-old swimmer Ye Shiwen, who won two gold medals in women’s 200-meter and 400-meter individual medley (400 IM) in London Olympics, and said her record-breaking performance “anomalous”. However, the evidence he used to support his reckless statement is simply groundless. 

As many have pointed out in the major media, it is not uncommon for an elite and young swimmer to increase his/her performance in a relatively short time window. An Australian swimmer and Olympics gold medalist, Ian Thorpe, said that he improved his 400-meter performance by 5 seconds around same age as Ye. UK’s Adrian Moorhouse, a Seoul Olympics gold medalist, also testified openly that he “improved four seconds” at the age of 17.  He also called the suspicions around Ye’sperformance “sour grape”.

The other point that Ewen Callaway used to support his accusation, that Ye swam faster than US swimmer Ryan Lochte in the last 50 meters when he won gold in the men’s 400 IM, is unfortunately also unprovoked.  First of all, Ryan Lochte did not perform the best in the final 50 meters. He only ranked 5th in the last 50 meters, at 29’’10, which was significantly slower than Japan’s Yuya Horihata (27”87) and three other swimmers competing in the same event. (Ye’s performance was 28”93). It could be that Lochte was away ahead of his competitors in the first three splits so he did not have to strike too hard in the final 50 meters, or that he had used up all his strength. So one cannot only look at the final 50 meters of Ye and Lochte and conclude that Ye swam faster than a men’s champion. In fact, Ye’s record-breaking performance in women’s 400 IM (4’28”43) was significantly slower than Lochte’s (4’5”18). Secondly, even if one only looks at the performance of the final 50 meters, women can certainly surpass men and Ye’s performance shouldn’t be accused as “anomalous”. For example, in last year’s World Championships in Shanghai, UK’s swimmer Rebecca Adlington won a gold medal in women’s 800-meter freestyle. In that event her performance in her final 50 meters (28”91) was faster than both Ye and Lochte in London. 

It is worth pointing out that all the facts I listed above can be easily tracked in major media and from the Internet. With just a little effort Ewen Callaway could have avoided raising groundless and disturbing charges against China’s young athlete in a professional scientific journal. 

Even worse, Ewen Callaway further argued that Ye’s clean drug test in Olympics ”doesn’t rule out the possibility of doping”, implying that Ye might dope “during training” and escape the more rigorous tests during Olympics. Such a statement is disrespectful to Ye and all professional athletes. Following this logic, Mr. Callaway can easily accuse any athlete “doping” without having any evidence; and ironically, according to him, those being accused have no way to prove themselves innocent: even if they pass all rigorous drug test, they can still be doping at a different time, or even be dope some unidentified drugs! I cannot help wondering if presumption of innocence (innocent until proven guilty) still has people’s belief nowadays, or it is considered outdated in Nature, or in UK? 

Last but not least, although Mr. Callaway claimed that he was attempting to discuss science, instead of “racial and political undertones”. Readers can easily smell the hidden (yet clearly implied) racism and discrimination. Yes, we may all agree that better methodology for drug test (such as “biological passport”) is needed for the anti-doping effort. But why the stunning performance from this 16-year-old gifted swimmer can lead to such a proposal?  Was Mr. Callaway suggesting that Ye was found drug-clean simply because the drug detection method was not advanced enough? At the end of the article, Mr. Callaway even quoted “When we look at this young swimmer from China who breaks a world record, that’s not proof of anything. It asks a question or two.” So athletes from China, despite their talent and training, are supposed to perform bad and never break world records, otherwise they deserve to be questioned, suspected, and accused? Backed up by technological progress and better training/supporting systems, athletes worldwide are maximizing their potentials. World records are being refreshed every year. USA’s Michael Phelps just won a record 19th medals in Olympics and he has broken numerous swimming world records. Shall we also “ask a question or two” about his “anomalous” performance?

Nature is considered one of the most prestigious scientific journals in the world; many scientists, including myself, chose Nature to publish their best work (I myself have co-authored three papers published in Nature and Nature sister journals). However, Mr. Callaway’s article, which is not only misleading, but also full of racial and political bias, has tainted Nature’s reputation in the scientific community, and among the general audience. Unless Nature takes further actions (e.g. publicly retract this article and apologize to Ye and all athletes), I hereby decide not to send my work to Nature any more-and believe me I will not be the last one to protest.

 ​Liming Wang, PhD

Bowes Research Fellow

Department of Molecular and Cell Biology

University of California, Berkeley

CA 94720 USA

Attachment 3 Post by Lai Jiang following the Callaway report

It is a shame to see Nature, which nearly all scientists, including myself, regard as the one of the most prestigious and influential physical science magazines to publish a thinly-veiled biased article like this. Granted, this is not a peer-reviewed scientific article and did not go through the scrutiny of picking referees. But to serve as a channel for the general populous to be in touch with and appreciate sciences, the authors and editors should at least present the readers with facts within proper context, which they failed to do blatantly.

Second, as previously pointed out, Ye is only 16 years old and her body is still developing. Bettering oneself by 5 sec over two years may seem impossible for an adult swimmer, but certainly happens among youngsters. Ian Thorpe’s interview revealed that his 400m freestyle time increased 5 sec between the age of 15 and 162. For regular people including the author it may be hard to imagine what an elite swimmer can achieve as he or she matures, combined with scientific and persistent training. But jumping to a conclusion that it is “anomalous” based on “Oh that’s so tough I can not imagine it is real” is hardly sound.

Third, to compare Ryan Lochte’s last 50m to Ye’s is a textbook example of what we call to cherry pick your data. Yes, Lochte is slower than Ye in the last 50m, but (as pointed out by Zhenxi) Lochte has a huge lead in the first 300m so that he chose to not push himself too hard to conserve energy for latter events (whether this conforms to the Olympic spirit and the “use one’s best efforts to win a match” requirement that the BWF has recently invoked to disqualify four badminton pairs is another topic worth discussing, probably not in Nature, though). On the contrary, Ye is trailing behind after the first 300m and relies on freestyle, which she has an edge, to win the game. Failing to mention this strategic difference, as well as the fact that Lochte is 23.25 sec faster (4:05.18) over all than Ye creates the illusion that a woman swam faster than the best man in the same sport, which sounds impossible. Put aside the gender argument, I believe this is still a leading question that implies the reader that something fishy is going on.

Fourth, another example of cherry picking. In the same event there are four male swimmers that swam faster than both Lochter (29.10 sec)3 and Ye (28.93 sec)4: Hagino (28.52 sec), Phelps (28.44 sec), Horihata (27.87 sec) and Fraser-Holmes (28.35 sec). As it turns out if we are just talking about the last 50m in a 400m IM, Lochter would not have been the example to use if I were the author. What kind of scientific rigorousness that author is trying to demonstrate here? Is it logical that if Lochter is the champion, we should assume he leads in every split? That would be a terrible way to teach the public how science works. 

Fifth, which is the one I oppose the most. The author quotes Tucks and implies that a drug test can not rule out the possibility of doping. Is this kind of agnosticism what Nature really wants to educate its readers? By that standard I estimate that at least half of the peer-reviewed scientific papers in Nature should be retracted. How can one convince the editors and reviewers that their proposed theory works for every possible case? One cannot. One chooses to apply the theory to typical examples and demonstrate that in (hopefully) all scenarios considered the theory works to a degree, and that should warrant a publication, until a counterexample is found. I could imagine that the author has a skeptical mind which is critical to scientific thinking, but that would be put into better use if he can write a real peer-reviewed paper that discusses the odds of Ye doping on a highly advanced non-detectable drug that the Chinese has come up within the last 4 years (they obviously did not have it in Beijing, otherwise why not to use it and woo the audience at home?), based on data and rational derivation. This paper, however, can be interpreted as saying that all athletes are doping, and the authorities are just not good enough to catch them. That may be true, logically, but definitely will not make the case if there is ever a hearing by FINA to determine if Ye has doped. To ask the question that if it is possible to false negative in a drug test looks like a rigged question to me. Of course it is, other than the drug that the test is not designed to detect, anyone who has taken Quantum 101 will tell you that everything is probabilistic in nature, and there is a probability for the drug in an athlete’s system to tunnel out right at the moment of the test. A slight change as it may be, should we disregard all test results because of it? Let’s be practical and reasonable. And accept WADA is competent at its job. Her urine sample is stored for 8 years following the contest for future testing as technology advances. Innocent until proven guilty, shouldn’t it be?

Sixth, and the last point I would like to make, is that the out-of-competition drug test is already in effect, which the author failed to mention. Per WADA president’spress release5, drug testing for olympians began at least 6 months prior to the opening of the London Olympic. Furthermore there are 107 athletes who are banned from this Olympic for doping. That maybe the reason that Ã¢â‚¬Å“everyone will pass at the Olympic games. Hardly anyone fails in competition testing”? Because those who did dope are already sanctioned? The author is free to suggest that a player could have doped beforehand and fool the test at the game, but this possibility certainly is ruled out for Ye.

Over all, even though the author did not falsify any data, he did (intentionally or not) cherry pick data that is far too suggestive to be fair and unbiased, in my view. If you want to cover a story of a suspected doping from a scientific point of view, be impartial and provide all the facts for the reader to judge. You are entitled to your interpretation of the facts, and the expression thereof in your piece, explicitly or otherwise, but only showing evidences which favor your argument is hardly good science or journalism. Such an article in a journal like Nature is not an appropriate example of how scientific research or report should be done.

1http://www.fina.org/H2O/index.php?option=com_wrapper&view=wrapper&Itemid=1241
2http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ETPUKlOwV4
3http://www.london2012.com/swimming/event/men-400m-individual-medley/phase=swm054100/index.html
4http://www.london2012.com/swimming/event/women-400m-individual-medley/phase=sww054100/index.html
5http://playtrue.wada-ama.org/news/wada-presidents-addresses-london-2012-press-conference/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=wada-presidents-addresses-london-2012-press-conference

Attachment 4 Post by Zhenxi Zhang following the Callaway report

I just want to add this: Phelps improved 4+ seconds in his 200 fly between 14-15 years old. Ian Thorpe also had a similar performance improvement. Ye is now 16. She was 160 cm in height and now 170 cm. Human biology also play a role – shegets stronger and bigger naturally. Yes she can make up 5 seconds (NOT 7 seconds in the article) in a 400 IM that has more room for improvement, with good training she got in Australia.

In both the 400 IM and 200 IM finals, Ye were behind until freestyle. Well I guess there is “drug” that just enhances freestyle, but not the backstroke, breast, and fly. Does that make sense? Also, it is not professional to only mention that ‘her showing in the last 50 metres, which she swam faster than US swimmer Ryan Lochte did when he won gold in the men’s 400 IM’. The whole fact is that Ye is more than 23 second slower than Lochte in 400 IM. Plus, Freestyle isn’t Lochte’s best leg, but it is Shiwen’s best leg. Lochte had a huge lead on the field, and almost coasted to the finish. He wasn’t pressured by the field to go all out that last few meters. 

And before we get into the fact there’s no way a woman should be able to come close to man’s time for a final leg of 50m. May I present the following: Kate Ziegler set a WR in the 1500m freestyle. In the last 50m of her race she had a split of 29.27, which is ONLY 0.17s slower than Lochte final 50m. This was after she swam for 1100m longer than Lochte! 

I feel the author would probably not write such a piece if Ye is an American or British. Neither country is clean from athletes caught by doping (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use_of_performance-enhancing_drugs_in_the_Olympic_Games). Let’s try not to use double standards on the great performance from countries other than US and European countries.

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