Interesting that this Tweet is trending on HN, because it’s rather empty of actual details.
There have been a lot of more thoughtful analyses of the scanner circulating on Twitter that have actually highlighted the real problems with what they’re claiming.
An example of an important point brought up by someone with actual domain expertise is to point out that ultrasound doesn’t travel well through bone or air. Once you realize this, you understand why they chose the slices they picked for their marketing images. Get up toward the rib cage and lungs and ultrasound isn’t going to be doing the magical things they claim.
Even this post hedges with “if it’s high resolution” claims, but we already know what the resolution looks like. You can see the images they’re producing and they’re pretty rough. They’re using sensors from another ultrasound company so it’s not like they made a breakthrough. The concern now is that they’re going to start trying to make up for the limitations of ultrasound by having AI process the images into something that looks more impressive and hides the limitations of the technology.
I don’t know why this particular Tweet is trending, because it doesn’t seem to add anything at all to the conversation. If you spend any time on Twitter this feels like template engagement bait designed to ride a popular topic without adding anything to the conversation.
Another thing that had me sort of scratching my head about this tweet were these sections (emphasis mine):
> If the Midjourney ultrasound is high resolution, harmless, inexpensive and convenient, people can get an initial scan...
> If the MIdjourney device can be repeated frequently, like weekly, at a low cost and is harmless..
This particular author is backtracking on his original idea that lots of frequent scans are bad, as long as they are cheap and accurate. But that's a pretty irrelevant side issue IMO when the vast majority of objections I've seen to Midjourney's announcement have been that qualified folks just don't believe the tech is medically feasible - it won't have the necessary resolution to discriminate findings.
I'm not faulting the author, who was quite clear where he did a rethink, but I do fault people who somehow think this is evidence that Midjourney's scanner will be viable.
TBH, while I don't think the Midjourney announcement is the same level of malevolence as Theranos, I don't think it was quite far off. I'm baffled that people think science and medicine should be done by a flashy website and PR-speak instead of the sober language of research reports, but I guess that's just a (sad, IMO) sign of the times.
the vast majority of objections I've seen to Midjourney's announcement have been that qualified folks just don't believe the tech is medically feasible
The original Midjourney Medical thread here on HN was loaded with people confidently declaring that these kinds of scans are a bad idea and net negative because of the risk of false positives.
> The original Midjourney Medical thread here on HN was loaded with people confidently declaring that these kinds of scans are a bad idea and net negative because of the risk of false positives.
Conditional on low base rates, and the need for invasive follow-up testing, they are likely to cause more problems than they solve.
But personally, I love all this stuff and have an emotional belief that more data is always better, which is weird in cases like this where it turns out that's not the case.