It has been years since Tim Allen starred in the sitcom Home Improvement.  It’s been even longer since he first started his stand-up comedy act that provided superlative insight into the mind of a wanna-be handyman.  In both his stand-up act and the sitcom, we learned that, according to Tim, the most important factor in choosing anything from autos to cordless drills to vacuum cleaners was power; the more the better.

While I would like to think of myself as highly evolved, when push comes to shove, I fear I am a “more power”, “go hard or go home”, “drive it like you stole it”, “get a bigger hammer” kind of girl.  

Every car I have ever owned has had a manual transmission, and, while I am happy to cruise along most days and get as many miles to the gallon as possible, I like being able to downshift and accelerate when I need to.  In my sailing days, I would grow impatient with days spent on the water carefully trimming the boat to get the best speed in light winds.  I greatly prefer a day where the crew has to batten down the hatches, put a third reef in the mainsail and hang on for dear, friggin’ life.

I am the same way with work stuff, too.  I can appreciate finesse and subtle persuasion.  I am all for careful planning and thoughtful discussion.  I am even capable of employing those techniques when appropriate, but, it must be said, I am more likely to work harder, stay longer or argue more vehemently when faced with unforeseen challenges. 

I’m definitely not saying that I do all the work myself.  I am saying that when circumstances have changed, and the plan you started with no longer is going to work, and you are 700 miles out to sea, keeping the 400 people in my department all motivated and pulling in the same direction is hard work.

Some situations simply require you to lower your center of gravity and push.  More power!  ErrrHHH.  ErrrHHH. Errrh.

I am a “more power” girl with data analysis as well.

Power studies in statistics are used to determine the size of the sample needed to get the degree of clarity required for certain studies.  Because sample size can drive the cost of the study, frequently power studies are used to determine the minimum possible number of test subjects required.  Where cost is not an issue, though, I always say more data is better. 

Although I grumble about the one dataset that I have with 680,000 tests, I cannot argue that it has “powerrRRR” (enough to crash my computer periodically).

In today’s NYTimes, Gina Kolata’s article, Vast Gene Study Yields Insight on Alzheimer’s previews medical news being published today outlining the discovery of 5 additional genes common to Alzheimer’s sufferers.  There is hope that greater understanding of the genetic components of the disease will shed light on the biology of the disease as well.

What I found more interesting than the identification of genes, was the reference, once again, to the revolution in research that has fueled many of the latest developments.  A number of year ago, Dr. Gerard Schellenberg of the University of Pennsylvania argued that the medical world’s fundamental approach to genome research needed to stop.  With support from the National Institutes of Health and the National Institute on Aging, small genome studies were curtailed in favor of a massive collaborative effort.  Researches around the world were convinced to conform their data collection to required information and share their data across institutions.

Recent gains are the result of a dataset of more than 50,000 subjects.

More power!!