Heande: Difference between revisions

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(Completely rewritten to reflect the fact that Heande is now the non-public part of Opasnet)
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==Purpose==
[[Category:Open assessment]]
[[Category:Glossary term]]
[[Category:Projects]]
{{encyclopedia|moderator = Jouni}}


The purpose of '''[[Main Page|Heande]]''' is to understand complex environmental and health issues, find solutions to them, and offer guidance to societal decision-making related to these issues. It is especially designed to handle very complex issues such as climate change, outdoor air pollution, or global environmental taxation. To really understand these issues, a large group of experts and other people must work together to bring in all information necessary for such an effort. Heande is not only a website for reading about these issues. Heande is also a place for openly working together, collecting the information necessary, and synthesising it into a useful form. Indeed, Heande is a description of a huge model (well, not so huge yet, but hopefully in the future) that helps to quantitatively estimate important parts of these issues and analyse the relationships between different parts. The collaborative work is directed to developing this model.
<section begin=glossary />
:'''[[Heande]]''' is a password-protected website for scientific [[mass collaboration]]. Technically, it is a wiki workspace that consists of descriptive pages about scientific questions, attempts to answer the questions, and current hypotheses about the answers. The current answers are also stored in a quantitative form into a database called [[Opasnet base]]. The methods and information structures in [[Heande]] are identical to those in [[Opasnet]]. The main difference is that while the participation and usage of information in [[Opasnet]] is free, the users of [[Heande]] must accept its basic rule: the usage of information ''within'' [[Heande]] is free, but if you want to publish anything that is found in [[Heande]] ''outside'' [[Heande]], you must make an explicit agreement about publishing with the original producers of that information. [[Heande]] is maintained and developed by the [[National Institute for Health and Welfare]] (the Department of Environmental Health, located in Kuopio, Finland).
<section end=glossary />


In addition to this wiki site, Heande contains parts of the actual model as computer code that can be run on different platforms. The summaries of these results can then be brought back to the wiki pages for others to read and utilise. And third, Heande also has a [[Result database|database]] that contains the actual, detailed results from different parts of the model. These results can be utilised as inputs for other parts of the model.
==Description==
 
The work is based on the method of [[open assessment]], where the research is divided into distinct research questions. Each research question is presented as an information [[object]] (typically a [[variable]] or [[method]]) on its own web page. All information objects have a uniform structure ([[name]]=identifier, [[scope]]=research question, [[definition]]=information for finding an answer, [[result]]=current hypothesis about the true answer). In principle, any scientific information can be presented in this form. [http://heande.opasnet.org The Heande website] is a protected website for collaboration related to unpublished material. After publishing, the material is moved to the [[Opasnet]] website, which is open for everyone. However, original data that is not published together with articles, may remain on the [[Heande]] website.
 
Major functionalities of [[Heande]] include a method for formal argumentation about scientific disputes; flexible page-level read and write protection by the owner of a project or piece of data; a large [[file management system]] for material that is not formatted according to the [[open assessment]] method (e.g. PDF publications and CSV data files); and a [[Opasnet base|result database]] for quantitative [[result]]s, which can then be used to derive results for other variables.
 
==Terms of use==
 
The users of [[Heande]] must accept one basic rule:
 
:<big>The usage of information ''within'' [[Heande]] is free, but if you want to publish anything that is found in [[Heande]] ''outside'' [[Heande]], you must make an explicit agreement about publishing with the original producers of that information. </big>


==Description==
Such agreements are warmly encouraged, as they are believed to result in new fruitful collaboration and more and better publications than what the original owner could have achieved alone.
 
It should be understood that this rule applies also to information that you have received from elsewhere but that is found within Heande. This means that before publishing new things, you should make sure that nobody is working on the same thing in Heande. Only this way we can make sure that if an unfortunate information theft occurs, we can show that the information was possessed by another person in Heande at the time of publishing, and that the person who published it was aware of this information in Heande.
 
The ownership of a piece of information remains with the person who originally brought the information into the [[Heande]] system. Therefore, there is a strict rule that people are only allowed to bring in information that is owned by them, unless it is publicly available (in which case, it should be stored in [[Opasnet]]).
 
There is also new information that is created directly from collaboration on the website. There should be a fair way to determine the ownership (and thus scientific merit and authorships in subsequent articles) of this kind of information. Established procedures do not yet exist, but one of the tasks the Erac community is to develop these procedures.


===Input format===


The format of information that is brought into this system is very flexible. Basically, the information can be anything in any format that is relevant for the issue and is either a) scientific information about the issue or b) information about value judgements about the issue.
==History==


===Procedure===
The Heande website and community was launched separately in several research projects, notably in the [[Environmental Risk Assessment Centre (ERAC)]] (under that name) in November, 2006. The first project in the Erac website was [[Finmerac]] about metal health and ecological risks around Harjavalta industrial park. The different projects gradually shifted from project-specific, separate wiki systems to a common workspace. [[Heande]] is maintained and developed by the [[National Institute for Health and Welfare]] (the Department of Environmental Health, located in Kuopio, Finland).


Heande is about collecting, manipulating, and synthesising scientific information and value judgements. This is done in practice by building standardised blocks for the model. (These blocks are also called ''formally structured objects''.) Each block has the same basic structure. Each block describes a particular part of reality<ref>Examples: [[The mortality due to PM 2.5 from buses]]</ref>. The blocks are usually but not always described quantitatively as probability distributions. The blocks are connected to each other based on their causal relations. The causalities are described as conditional probabilities such as P(C|A,B) where A, B, and C are blocks (random variables) and A and B are causes of C. Together all these blocks form a causal network which is also called a [[:en:Bayesian network|Bayesian belief network]]. [[Value judgement]]s can be connected to these blocks for describing, which outcomes are good or more preferable than others. When value judgements are added to a Bayesian belief network, we have an extended causal diagram. In brief, the work done on Heande is about developing extended causal diagrams by utilising open participation. The aim (as mentioned above) is to help societal decision-making about environmental and health issues.
==How to join?==


===Output format===
If you are interested in collaborating with other scientists on topics that have not yet been published, Heande might be the right place for you.


The outputs of the procedure are formally structured objects that can directly be used as building blocks for models. These are called [[variable]]s<ref>[[:Category:Variables]]</ref>. In addition, some outputs are actual assessments for a specified decision need. These are called [[assessment]]s, and they consist of a set of variables relevant for that particular decision<ref>Example: [[Gasbus - health impacts of Helsinki bus traffic]]</ref>. One variable can be used in several assessments.
Most researchers in the Erac community are working on the fields of environment or health. However, this is not a limitation, and we encourage people from other disciplines to join. If you are interested, please contact [[User:Jouni|Jouni Tuomisto]].


==Rationale==
==Practical advice for working in Heande==


Heande is based on several scientific theories. The idea of Heande is to borrow and apply the best and most efficient methods and techniques in combination. Some of the most important ones are briefly mentioned here. There are more extensive pages describing these theories elsewhere.
To make the work run smoothly, the following practical rules are recommended:
* [[Falsification]]: Science consists of statements (theories) that can be falsified. Science is an evolutionary process where poor theories are falsified. The current knowledge consists of those theories that have not (yet) been falsified
* When some piece of information has become public, it should be removed from Heande and located into [[Opasnet]] instead. This reduces possible conflicts by clarifying what information is public and what is not.
* [[Bayes' theorem]]: A posterior probability given new data can be calculated from a prior and the likelihood of the data
* The users of Heande should keep themselves informed about the contents about their own field in Heande. This is especially important before publishing anything.
* [[Decision theory]]: Decision analysis is a rational method for making decisions.  
* To make it easy to follow the development in Heande, all work to improve the structure of the information and add useful links between pieces of information is highly appreciated.
* Quality of an estimate: The quality of a quantitative estimate (probability distribution) can be evaluated against a golden standard using informativeness and calibration
* The users of Heande are encouraged to form groups of people that are interested in similar topics. This enhances the information flow and natural collaboration, and also reduces the risk of conflicts when disputes arise.
* [[:en:Bayesian network|Bayesian belief network]]s: They describe the reality by using conditional probabilities.
* Vines in Bayesian belief network: Probability distributions can have any form and they can still be solved analytically, if vines are used.
* [[:en:Pragma-dialectics|Argumentation]]: Disputes can be solved by using formal argumentation that consists of attacks and defends of a specified statement
* [[PSSP]]: A system can effectively be described using two kinds of objects: processes and products that are produced by these processes. Each object has attributes purpose, structure, state, and performance.
* [[:en:Wisdom of crowds|Wisdom of crowds]]: A group of people is likely to outperform an individual expert in many situations, if they can use individual knowledge, act independently and in a decentralized way, and their opinions are effectively aggregated.
* [[Mass collaboration]]: A large group of unorganised people are able to produce complex artefacts, if the product is information or culture, the work can be chopped into bite-size pieces, and the pieces can be effectively synthesised.


==References==
==Current projects==


<references/>
There are several projects that are partly or fully collaborating in [[Opasnet]] and Heande.
* [[Beneris]]: benefit-risk assessment of food (2005-2009)
* [[Intarese]]: environmental health impact assessments in Europe: method development (2005-2010).
* [[Heimtsa]]: environmental health impact assessment: European policy assessments (2006-2011).
* [[Finmerac]]: health and ecological risks of metal emissions from metal industry (2006-2008).
* [[Hiwate]]: microbial and chemical risks of drinking water (2007-2010).
* [[Bioher]]: health impacts of small-scale biofuel use in municipalities in Finland (2008-2011).
* [[Claih]]: health impacts of air pollution and climate change in Finland (2009-2012).
* [[Bepraribean]]: benefit-risk assessment of foods: learning from other disciplines (2009-2011).

Revision as of 08:15, 3 June 2009



<section begin=glossary />

Heande is a password-protected website for scientific mass collaboration. Technically, it is a wiki workspace that consists of descriptive pages about scientific questions, attempts to answer the questions, and current hypotheses about the answers. The current answers are also stored in a quantitative form into a database called Opasnet base. The methods and information structures in Heande are identical to those in Opasnet. The main difference is that while the participation and usage of information in Opasnet is free, the users of Heande must accept its basic rule: the usage of information within Heande is free, but if you want to publish anything that is found in Heande outside Heande, you must make an explicit agreement about publishing with the original producers of that information. Heande is maintained and developed by the National Institute for Health and Welfare (the Department of Environmental Health, located in Kuopio, Finland).

<section end=glossary />

Description

The work is based on the method of open assessment, where the research is divided into distinct research questions. Each research question is presented as an information object (typically a variable or method) on its own web page. All information objects have a uniform structure (name=identifier, scope=research question, definition=information for finding an answer, result=current hypothesis about the true answer). In principle, any scientific information can be presented in this form. The Heande website is a protected website for collaboration related to unpublished material. After publishing, the material is moved to the Opasnet website, which is open for everyone. However, original data that is not published together with articles, may remain on the Heande website.

Major functionalities of Heande include a method for formal argumentation about scientific disputes; flexible page-level read and write protection by the owner of a project or piece of data; a large file management system for material that is not formatted according to the open assessment method (e.g. PDF publications and CSV data files); and a result database for quantitative results, which can then be used to derive results for other variables.

Terms of use

The users of Heande must accept one basic rule:

The usage of information within Heande is free, but if you want to publish anything that is found in Heande outside Heande, you must make an explicit agreement about publishing with the original producers of that information.

Such agreements are warmly encouraged, as they are believed to result in new fruitful collaboration and more and better publications than what the original owner could have achieved alone.

It should be understood that this rule applies also to information that you have received from elsewhere but that is found within Heande. This means that before publishing new things, you should make sure that nobody is working on the same thing in Heande. Only this way we can make sure that if an unfortunate information theft occurs, we can show that the information was possessed by another person in Heande at the time of publishing, and that the person who published it was aware of this information in Heande.

The ownership of a piece of information remains with the person who originally brought the information into the Heande system. Therefore, there is a strict rule that people are only allowed to bring in information that is owned by them, unless it is publicly available (in which case, it should be stored in Opasnet).

There is also new information that is created directly from collaboration on the website. There should be a fair way to determine the ownership (and thus scientific merit and authorships in subsequent articles) of this kind of information. Established procedures do not yet exist, but one of the tasks the Erac community is to develop these procedures.


History

The Heande website and community was launched separately in several research projects, notably in the Environmental Risk Assessment Centre (ERAC) (under that name) in November, 2006. The first project in the Erac website was Finmerac about metal health and ecological risks around Harjavalta industrial park. The different projects gradually shifted from project-specific, separate wiki systems to a common workspace. Heande is maintained and developed by the National Institute for Health and Welfare (the Department of Environmental Health, located in Kuopio, Finland).

How to join?

If you are interested in collaborating with other scientists on topics that have not yet been published, Heande might be the right place for you.

Most researchers in the Erac community are working on the fields of environment or health. However, this is not a limitation, and we encourage people from other disciplines to join. If you are interested, please contact Jouni Tuomisto.

Practical advice for working in Heande

To make the work run smoothly, the following practical rules are recommended:

  • When some piece of information has become public, it should be removed from Heande and located into Opasnet instead. This reduces possible conflicts by clarifying what information is public and what is not.
  • The users of Heande should keep themselves informed about the contents about their own field in Heande. This is especially important before publishing anything.
  • To make it easy to follow the development in Heande, all work to improve the structure of the information and add useful links between pieces of information is highly appreciated.
  • The users of Heande are encouraged to form groups of people that are interested in similar topics. This enhances the information flow and natural collaboration, and also reduces the risk of conflicts when disputes arise.

Current projects

There are several projects that are partly or fully collaborating in Opasnet and Heande.

  • Beneris: benefit-risk assessment of food (2005-2009)
  • Intarese: environmental health impact assessments in Europe: method development (2005-2010).
  • Heimtsa: environmental health impact assessment: European policy assessments (2006-2011).
  • Finmerac: health and ecological risks of metal emissions from metal industry (2006-2008).
  • Hiwate: microbial and chemical risks of drinking water (2007-2010).
  • Bioher: health impacts of small-scale biofuel use in municipalities in Finland (2008-2011).
  • Claih: health impacts of air pollution and climate change in Finland (2009-2012).
  • Bepraribean: benefit-risk assessment of foods: learning from other disciplines (2009-2011).
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