What is it about?
An analytical review of a book by the astronomer and meteorologist David Brunt. The book was first published in 1917 and covers what would nowadays be called meta-analysis.
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Why is it important?
The term meta-analysis was coined in 1976 but the theory of how scientific observations should be combined is much older than this. Brunt's book, which is described, analysed and reviewed in the article is an early textbook on the subject, which, at the time it was published would have been regarded as part of the theory of least squares. Quite apart from its historical interest, it serves as a reminder that our scientific forebears were often much wiser than we suppose and that the past can be studied with profit.
Perspectives
My attention was drawn to the book by Anthony Edwards, a distinguished geneticist and statistician who did his PhD with RA Fisher. Edwards had long known of this book and had a double interest in its author despite their belonging to very different generations. Not only were he and David Brunt interested in scientific evidence as a topic in its own right but they were both keen amateur glider pilots.
Professor Stephen J Senn
Consultant Statistician
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: An early 20th century handbook on ‘meta-analysis’: David Brunt’s The Combination of Observations, Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, May 2024, SAGE Publications,
DOI: 10.1177/01410768241249314.
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