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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. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on the use of biological data from various Web sites and databases to help researchers plan and execute experiments more intelligently. Need to understand the capabilities and limitations of the biological data being used; Importance of the biological data; Necessity to cross-check computational results in the laboratory against the biological literature.