Skeptico

Chopra - as bad as ever

Deepak Chopra doesn’t seem capable of expressing anything in a simple, straightforward manner.  And after reading (and trying to unravel) his latest piece of drivel, Only Spirituality Can Solve The Problems Of The World, I think I know why – it’s only with excessive flowery verbosity that he can hope to disguise the fact that he has absolutely nothing of value to say.  See if you can fathom what he’s getting at here:

Before addressing the importance of spirituality in modern times, we should first define it. Spirituality is the experience of that domain of awareness where we experience our universality.

Unfortunately, he doesn’t define universality, so his definition of spirituality is pretty empty.  I’ll have a go.  Merriam-Webster defines universality as “the quality of being universal” – the quality of occurring everywhere (among several definitions of “universal” – see if you can find a better one.)  Which rather begs the question – since Chopra hasn’t shown that we are everywhere.  In fact, I’m pretty sure we’re not.

He does wax more on the “domain of awareness” bit though:

This domain of awareness is a core consciousness that is beyond our mind, intellect, and ego.

Really?  Where is it then?  And, again, does it even exist?  (And how does Chopra know?)  But OK, I’ll play: the domain of awareness is a core consciousness.  And the core consciousness:

In religious traditions this core consciousness is referred to as the soul which is part of a collective soul or collective consciousness, which in turn is part of a more universal domain of consciousness referred to in religions as God.

Jesus, why didn’t he just say that at the start?  Let’s break down what (I think – but who really knows?) he’s saying:

1. Spirituality is the experience of that domain of awareness where we experience our universality
2. The domain of awareness is a core consciousness.
3. So spirituality is the experience of a core consciousness.
4. This core consciousness is referred to as […] God.
5. So spirituality is the experience of God.

As Chopra apparently had to put it:

Spirituality is the experience of that domain of awareness where we experience our universality. This domain of awareness is a core consciousness that is beyond our mind, intellect, and ego. In religious traditions this core consciousness is referred to as the soul which is part of a collective soul or collective consciousness, which in turn is part of a more universal domain of consciousness referred to in religions as God.

Which breaks down to “spirituality is the experience of God.”  Six words.  It took Chopra 70.

When we have even a partial glimpse of this level of awareness we experience joy, insight, intuition, creativity, and freedom of choice. In addition, there is the awakening of love, kindness, compassion, happiness at the success of others, and equanimity. As the turbulence of our mind settles down, our body also begins to heal itself because it also quiets down. The body's self-repair mechanisms are activated when the mind is at peace because the mind and body are at the deepest level inseparably one.

Pure assertion backed up by nothing.  Even by Chopra’s standards, this is weak.  I have to say, I think he’s phoning it in.  Probably PZ had the right idea – he asked Chopra one question: how?

Just to name a few problems of the world: overpopulation, famine, resource depletion, water scarcity, war, and disease. Deepak Chopra, quick, 30 seconds: how will you solve any one of those problems with spirituality?

But if he even knew (and of course, he doesn’t), would he be able to explain it?  Clearly not.  Why does anyone still think this bozo has anything of value to add? 

The Two J.B. Handleys

Seems there are several people with the same name all promoting the notion that vaccines cause autism.  A couple of weeks ago I wrote that there were at least two people with the name “David Kirby” – one from 2005 who thought that decreasing autism rates meant that autism was caused by vaccines, and another in 2010 who believes that increasing autism rates meant that autism was caused by vaccines.  Now it looks like there are two J.B. Handleys too.  For example, read what someone called J.B. Handley from last week, wrote about how autism is first noticed by parents:

It is exceptionally rare that I hear the story, “my son was 100% fine, and at 2 years old after one vaccine appointment he lost everything.” I have heard that story, but very rarely.

A rarely heard story.  Fair enough, but then I found this story from 2005, entitled A child's return from autism Couple eager to share their conviction that mercury poisoning was the culprit:

Jamie Handley was a happy, healthy baby who reached all his developmental milestones until he turned 18 months, his parents said. Then, he started spinning in circles and standing on his toes and no longer responded to his name. They were eventually told he was autistic

[My bold.]

Hum.  An autistic child called Jamie Handley?  Handley?  Surely not the son of J.B. Handley?  Nah – couldn’t be.  Until I clicked on the more images link and got this picture:

 

Caption: J.B. Handley plays with his son, Jamie, who is receiving chelation therapy to reduce mercury in his body and treat his autism.

J.B. Handley?  Oh I get it - this is a different J.B. Handley.  This J.B. Handley’s son met all his developmental milestones until he turned 18 months – then he started spinning in circles, etc.  Clearly, as with David Kirby 2005, this is a different J.B. Handley from 2005, who (unlike J.B. Handley from 2010) doesn’t know what the hell he is talking about.  You see, as J.B. Handley 2010 knows, children just don’t regress all at one time just after a vaccination like the parents of this Jamie Handley from 2005 said.  What douche bags they must be, this J.B. Handley from 2005 and his wife:

But the Handleys and other parents say they noticed symptoms in their children after they got booster shots

And it’s not just J.B. Handley from 2005 who’s got this wrong.  Jenny McCarthy didn’t get the script either.  For example, from Jenny: Evan's Story

Jenny says even before Evan received his vaccines, she tried to talk to her pediatrician about it. "Right before his MMR shot, I said to the doctor, 'I have a very bad feeling about this shot. This is the autism shot, isn't it?' And he said, 'No, that is ridiculous. It is a mother's desperate attempt to blame something,' and he swore at me, and then the nurse gave [Evan] the shot," she says. "And I remember going, 'Oh, God, I hope he's right.' And soon thereafter -- boom -- the soul's gone from his eyes.

[My bold.]

So, right after the MMR shot (which to me sounds like “one vaccine appointment”) - “boom.”  I don’t know how you interpret that, but to me “boom” means something happening pretty quickly – all in one go.  And that quote was on the Generation Rescue web site.  Generation Rescue.  The organization founded by J.B. and Lisa Handley.  I guess that website must have been set up by the J.B. Handley from 2005, not the one from 2010.

So let’s recap.  J.B. Handley from 2005 thinks autism occurs quickly – you have a happy, healthy baby who reached all his developmental milestones right up until the point where he starts spinning in circles, etc.  You see, that’s how J.B. Handley 2005 knows the vaccines caused his son’s autism – the child was fine up until the point where he suddenly shows autistic tendencies after being vaccinated.  Also, that J.B. Handley (the one from 2005), reports on his organization’s website about someone called Jenny McCarthy who knows her son’s autism was caused by the MMR shot.  And she knows her son’s autism was caused by the MMR shot because “boom” he became autistic right after the MMR shot.  So J.B. Handley 2005 knows that autism is caused by vaccines because the autism starts right after the child gets the vaccine. 

Then we have the other J.B. Handley (the one from 2010), who knows that autism doesn’t suddenly appear “after one vaccine appointment” (or at least, very rarely does), but rather is a chronic slide over a period of time, and so he knows that vaccines cause autism because…  er wait a minute, if autism doesn’t occur just after the vaccinations are given, why exactly does J.B. Handley 2010 thinks vaccines cause autism? 

One more thing just occurred to me.  J.B. Handley 2005 thinks autism is a misdiagnosis for mercury poisoning, and is chelating his son to remove the mercury, while Jenny McCarthy thinks the live MMR vaccine, that never had any mercury in it, is what gave her son autism.  So which is it – is it mercury or is it MMR?  Because they’re different things.  Hey, you don’t suppose there are really three J.B. Handleys do you?  Because, you know, that would be weird.

Andreas Moritz Cancer Cures Quack

Here we go again.  Another quack responds to criticism by threatening legal action.  And yet again, a craven ISP (Wordpress) caves and suspends a blogger’s account.  This time, the quack is someone called Andreas Moritz.  Check out his website.  He thinks cancer doesn’t kill people, rather it’s the patient’s “conflicts, guilt and shame” that “paralyze the body’s most basic functions” and allow the tumors to grow.  That’s right – it’s the patient’s fault for allowing the cancer to grow.  So obvious.

But not to fear, because Moritz has the cures.  Or rather, he can sell you the cures.  Seriously.  Just check out the woo he has for sale.  My favorite?  A tough choice, but high on the list would have to be the Mongolian Holy Stones:

Mongolian Holy Stones are proactive healing stones that are mined in Inner Mongolia where most of the world's Rare Earth compounds are mined. The locals call it "holy" because it heals on contact. Years of testing by six recognized International Research Institutes provides us with the information on how the Mongolian Holy Stone produces its miracles. Some of this information is included later in this section.

Here’s a picture of them - $40 for one 4” x 3” stone:

And what of the “Years of testing by six [six!] recognized International Research Institutes” that will be “included later in this section”?  Clearly, he must have details of these years of tests, as he claims?  Well, not so much.  All we actually have, is this:

What is "Holy"?

Infrared energy at .98(+/-) microns is "holy." It is invisible and it heals.

Well, that’s OK then.  It’s invisible and it heals.  Phew, I’m glad we’re not dealing with just some inert stone that does absolutely nothing.

Not convinced by holy stones?  Want to try something more tangible?  Something that will produce a definite measurable result?  Well, you’re in luck because Moritz also sells The Colema Boards Home Enema Kit – just $278 (plus $45 shipping) to “simplify self-administration of an enema in the privacy of your own home.”  Here’s a picture of what you get (toilet, chair and bucket not included):

But that’s not the best part.  If you want a really good laugh, click on the enema board “how to” video for how to set up and use it.  Seriously.  Funniest thing I’ve seen all week.  Trust me - the sound effects are especially hilarious.

I think that’ll do.  If you still think Moritz has something worthwhile to offer, you’re probably beyond help.  Read Orac’s post Andreas Moritz and trying to shut down valid scientific criticism: A sine qua non of a quack for the detailed explanation of all that is wrong with Moritz’s numerous claims.  Also in that post you’ll read the full text of Moritz’s threatening email to the original blogger – the threat that includes this gem:

My investigations show me where you live and where you study (Augusta, Amine)...

Because, “I know where you live” has always been a compelling scientific argument.

Additional Information

Here are some links to additional articles about Andreas Moritz:

Orac on Andreas Moritz, Cancer Cures Quack.

Steven Novella on Christopher Maloney naturopath quack and Andreas Moritz, Cancer Cures Quack.

PZ on Andreas Moritz, Cancer Cures Quack.

Orac’s earlier post on Andreas Moritz, Cancer Cures Quack.

And from the original threatened blogger himself (on what is apparently a different blog that has not been pulled), Michael Hawkins on Andreas Moritz, Cancer Cures Quack.

Oh, and if I had my blog with Wordpress, right now I’d be doing all I could to move it elsewhere, pronto.

Mike Adams Fails Again

Since signing up for Mike Adams’s newsletter the other week (to get this full post from him), I’ve been getting a daily load of “Health Ranger” woo in my mailbox.  I’ve been ignoring most of it, but I thought it worth deconstructing Wednesday’s rather dangerous piece of Adams misinformation (some redundancy there, admittedly).  Adams thinks he has found something that shows vaccination against the mumps means you are more likely to get the mumps than if you forego the vaccine.  He’s wrong,of course (as I will show below).  All it shows is that Adams doesn't understand his own numbers.

First, check out Adams’s post, Mumps outbreak spreads among people who got vaccinated against mumps:

To hear the vaccine pushers say it, all the recent outbreaks of mumps and measles are caused by too few people seeking out vaccinations. It's all those "non-vaccinated people" who are a danger to society, they say, because they can spread disease.

Reality tells a different story, however: It is the vaccinated people who are causing these outbreaks and spreading disease!

Just this week, an outbreak of mumps among more than 1,000 people in New Jersey and New York has raised alarm among infectious disease authorities. The outbreak itself is not unusual, though. What's unusual is that the health authorities slipped up and admitted that most of the people infected with mumps had already been vaccinated against mumps.

In Ocean County, New Jersey, county spokeswoman Leslie Terjesen told CNN that 77 percent of those who caught mumps had already been vaccinated against mumps.

[Bold in original.]

What he is saying is that more vaccinated kids (77%) than non vaccinated, got the mumps, therefore you are more likely to get the mumps if you are vaccinated.  He is wrong, because he is asking the wrong question.  He is asking, “did more vaccinated kids get the mumps than non-vaccinated?”  (Answer – yes.  77% v 23%.)  The question he should be asking is, “if you are vaccinated, are you more or less likely to get the mumps?”  A subtly different question.  The answer to that question is “less” – you are less likely to get the mumps if you are vaccinated.  In fact, if you are vaccinated you are one seventh as likely to get the disease, compared with the unvaccinated.  As I will now demonstrate.

Adams is quoting this CNN report as the source for his “77%” New Jersey figure, so that’s what I will go with.  From this CNN report, we know that:

The mumps outbreak also spread to Ocean County, New Jersey, where 159 confirmed cases have been diagnosed since September, county spokeswoman Leslie Terjesen told CNN.

[...]

Of the New Jersey cases, 77 percent were vaccinated, Terjesen said.

Now, if you look at this CDC table you will see that 96.1% of New Jersey kindergarten pupils are fully vaccinated against the mumps.  I’ll round this down to 96%.  That means, the number of vaccinated children is 24 times (96 divided by 4) the number of unvaccinated.  Remember that figure.

Now consider this: if in New Jersey, 159 children got the mumps, and 77% of those were vaccinated, then that means that 122 (159 x 77%) vaccinated children got the mumps, while 37 unvaccinated children got the mumps.  Hold those numbers too.

Suppose 1,270* children were exposed to the mumps.  We know that 96% of these (on average) were vaccinated – that’s 1219 vaccinated children.  51 children (4%) were unvaccinated. 

I’ll remind you again that 159 children in New Jersey were infected, and that 122 of these (the infamous 77%) were vaccinated.  So, what is the answer to my question, if you are vaccinated, are you more or less likely to get the mumps?  Some elementary arithmetic:

Vaccinated and got the mumps

122 / 1219 = 10%

Unvaccinated and got the mumps

37 / 51 = 73%

Answer – if your child is unvaccinated, he or she is seven times more likely to get the mumps.

So how do we explain the 77% figure?  Easy: more vaccinated children got the mumps because there were more vaccinated children to start with.  24 times more as many, to be precise.  If the vaccine was completely useless and offered zero protection against the mumps, we would expect 24 times the number of infected children to be vaccinated, compared with unvaccinated. (Since both groups would be infected equally, but the vaccinated group is 24 times larger.)  The fact that we only get about three times (77/23) the number of vaccinated children with the disease, demonstrates how effective the vaccine actually is.

Ironically, the higher the vaccination rates, the higher is the proportion of vaccinated children out of the total who will get the disease.  For example, suppose we have 100% vaccination rates.  Obviously this would never happen in reality, but just suppose for argument's sake that the vaccination rate is 100%.  Also suppose the vaccine is not 100% effective (which does reflect reality - the mumps vaccine is only about 90% effective).  What percentage of infected children will be vaccinated?  Obviously 100%, since there are zero unvaccinated children in our hypothetical.  Now imagine instead that 0% of children are vaccinated.  What percentage of infected children now will be vaccinated?  Obviously 0%.  So the higher the vaccination rates, the higher the proportion of vaccinated children out of the total who get the disease.  Which is, of course irrelevant.  The relevant fact is that with higher vaccination rates, fewer children overall will get the disease.

I’ve tried to show this in a table:

Group	Total	% of Total	Infected	Group % of Infected	Infected % of Group
Vaccinated	1,219	96%	122	77%	10%
Un-vaccinated	51	4%	37	23%	73%
Total	1,270	100%	159	100%

Adams is looking at the percentage of each group (vaccinated v. unvaccinated) that are infected.  This error is what causes him to write nonsense like this:

Vaccines may actually increase your risk of disease. Notice that far more vaccinated children were stricken with mumps than non-vaccinated children?

But, as I’ve shown, that’s irrelevant.  The relevant information is the percentage in each group that will become infected.  And seven times the number of unvaccinated children, compared with unvaccinated, get the mumps.  While I understand that this 77% figure can be confusing for people who aren't used to thinking about these things, Mike Adams does this for a living and so he has no excuse.  And it's not as if this is a new phenomenon - I remember discussing this exact same thing eight or nine years ago on the JREF forum.  The answers have been out there for a while, so why does Mike Adams still promote these kinds of false conclusions?

(* I chose the 1,270 figure because according to the CDC the effectiveness of MMR against mumps is approximately 90% after two doses – which matches the calculated 10% infection rate with 1,270 children.  The ratio (1:7) works out exactly the same though, no matter what number of children you assume.)

David Kirby, King Of Denial

Since I posted my second annual Golden Woo Awards winners, it seems to me as though every woo in the world has been making their best efforts to get nominated for an award in 2010.  Case in point – David Kirby just wrote a startling un-self-aware piece in (where else), entitled The Lancet Retraction Changes Nothing.  (Yeah, I knew you’d say that David.  Over two years ago you wrote a similar thing – see Results Are In / Debate’s Not Over.)  It seems Kirby is trying hard for a “most persistent refusal to face reality” honor – and I have to tell you, he’s the front runner so far.  He starts off with an assertion that I partially agree with, although not in quite the way he means:

I believe that the public lynching and shaming of Dr. Wakefield is unwarranted and overwrought, and that history will ultimately judge who was right and who was wrong about proposing a possible association between vaccination and regressive autistic spectrum disorder (ASD).

Well yes, history probably will be the judge about who was right and who was wrong on this.  And I’m pretty sure it will show David Kirby to be wrong.

That was just for starters.  Barely worth a rebuttal, but fun to do anyway.  Here’s where it got me re-reading what Kirby had written before:

The evidence that autism is increasing at alarming rates, and that some thing (or things) in our environment is wreaking havoc on a vulnerable one-percent of all US children is now so irrefutable that, finally, the federal government is climbing aboard the environmental research bandwagon - way late, but better than never.

Kirby is reacting to the claim that autism may not really be increasing, or may not be increasing as much as people think, and that the reported increase may really (or mainly) be a result of the widening of diagnostic criteria, and more attention being paid to the issue.  Kirby is saying this is not true, and the increase is real.  If the increase is real, he says, then environmental factors must be to blame, and that includes vaccines.  (Actually, when you break down the weasel wording, he’s really saying it is vaccines.  More on that later.)

Get that?  If autism is really increasing, then vaccines must be to blame.

But, and here’s a funny story, in 2005 someone called David Kirby posted (same place) Autism, Mercury and the California Numbers, where he wrote:

For months now, a mantra of the thimerosal defenders has been as follows: “Mercury was removed from vaccines years ago, and we have not seen a drop in autism rates.”

It looks like they might have to find a new slogan.

Freshly reported numbers out of California show that new cases entering that state’s disability system (children who are three-to-four years old and newly diagnosed with autism) have indeed dropped since 2002, marking the first decline in new autism cases since California began tracking the mysterious disorder.

See, this David Kirby guy from 1995 thought that decreasing autism rates meant that autism was caused by vaccines.  Of course, that David Kirby was “author of “Evidence of Harm: Mercury in Vaccines and the Autism Epidemic” (St. Martin’s Press 2005)” – unlike the David Kirby from yesterday, whose post mentions nothing about that book.  Different guy.  I’ll bet that David Kirby, the one writing yesterday, thinks that David Kirby from 2005 is a real douche.  Hey, want to know something else that David Kirby from 2005 wrote?  See this in the New York Times in June of that year:

Because autism is usually diagnosed sometime between a child's third and fourth birthdays and thimerosal was largely removed from childhood vaccines in 2001, the incidence of autism should fall this year

That David Kirby (in 2005) believed that falling rates of autism would prove that vaccines caused autism.  David Kirby from yesterday believes that rising autism rates prove that vaccines caused autism.  How to explain this seeming contradiction?  The only sensible conclusion is that these are two different people, both of whom just happen to be called David Kirby and who both believe vaccines cause autism.  That’s the only explanation.  Because if they were actually the same person, then that person would be saying that whatever happens to autism rates – going up or going down – they both prove vaccines cause autism.  Nothing could ever, even theoretically, get that person to change his mind.  What an idiot that guy would be.  If he were one and the same person.

Back to current day David Kirby:

This long-overdue paradigm shift will leave many in the scientific community with some proverbial but nonetheless uncomfortable egg on their increasingly irrelevant faces: Those who have protested with shrill certainty that autism is almost purely genetic, and not environmental in nature, and therefore not really increasing at all, will hopefully recede from the debate.  [My bold]

Well, I certainly hope that David Kirby guy from 2005 is embarrassed about all that uncomfortable egg on his increasingly irrelevant face.  He was certainly wrong about Thimerosal.  Perhaps he will, now, hopefully recede from the debate.  I’ll bet David Kirby 2010 hopes so too.  But there is one more thing about that paragraph.  See the word “will” that I bolded?  As in “will leave…”  The word “will” expresses the simple future tense – in this case a general prediction about the future.  The paradigm shift Kirby is talking about once his proof is in, will occur in the future.  The future, when vaccines, Kirby claims, will be proven to cause autism.  The future, when (as Kirby tells us) “history will [future tense] ultimately judge who was right and who was wrong.”  Now read what follows:

And that begs a nagging question: If those people were dead wrong about environmental factors in autism, could they also be mistaken in their equally heated denials about a possible vaccine-autism link? More bluntly, why should we heed them any longer?  [My bold.]

Kirby takes speculation of what might be proven in the future, to make a firm assertion about people who he claims were “dead wrong” in the past.  Sheesh – did he not think anyone would notice he just made an unsupported assertion based on speculation about the future?  It wasn’t that hard to spot – the one followed directly after the other.  Either that or Kirby is in possession of a time machine to know for certain what history will tell us.  (Perhaps he could use it to go back to 2005 and talk to that other David Kirby before he makes a complete fool of himself.) 

I mentioned before the weasel wording, to claim it’s not really vaccines.  Here we go:

We need to examine a host of environmental factors (air, water, food, medicine, household products and social factors) and how they might interact with vulnerable genes to create the varying collection of symptoms we call "autism." But these triggers almost have to be found in every town of every county of every state in the land - from Maine to Maui.

Are vaccines the only contributing factors to autism? Of course not. Other pharmaceutical products like thalidomide and valporic acid, as well as live mumps virus, have been associated with increased autism risk in prenatal exposures, so we already know that a variety of drugs and bugs can likely make a child autistic.

So it’s not just vaccines.  “Of course not,” he says.  How could we be so dumb as to think he’s just blaming vaccines?  Oh, I don’t know, but it might have something to do with what directly follows:

• Claims of six cases of autism caused by vaccines
• Hannah Poling – claims autism caused by vaccines
• Bailey banks - claims autism caused by vaccines
• Study in the Journal of Child Neurology – claims autism caused by vaccines
• Another review in PLoS Online - claims autism caused by vaccines
• 1,300 cases of vaccine injuries paid out in vaccine court
• Asks “is it not reasonable to ask if [vaccines] can cause similar injuries that lead to autism?
• Claim that the federal government is interested in “including a few studies that take in vaccines and the mercury-containing preservative thimerosal”
• Kirby asks Thomas Insel if the IACC would ever support direct research into vaccines and autism

(Read Orac today – The martyrdom of St. Andy, part 2: David Kirby rides to the rescue (sort of) - for an explanation of why those claims listed above, the studies, Hannah Poling etc etc – do not show an association of vaccines to autism.)

If it’s not just vaccines David, why did you follow it up with nine points concerning vaccines causing autism and nothing on any non-vaccine causes?

So this is what it’s come to.  Some years ago, Kirby (or was it the other Kirby?) wrote a book saying autism is caused by mercury in vaccines.  It has now been shown beyond any reasonable doubt that it does not.  But Kirby is too invested in this that he just can’t let it go.  If it’s not mercury then it’s something else in the vaccines.  Or  some environmental factors (vaccines, vaccines).  Wakefield has to be supported because he claimed the MMR vaccine caused autism (even though everyone knows MMR never had any mercury in it), and anyone who is against vaccines must be OK.  The science is coming up with nothing to support Kirby’s position so he writes that science is increasingly supporting his position.  Denial truly is not just a river in Egypt, it is where David Kirby lives and breathes.  While ignoring the uncomfortable egg on his increasingly irrelevant faces*. 

* Not a typo.

Andrew Wakefield Unethical so Age of Autism Stands By Him

The British General Medical Council (GMC) has just announced its verdict in their investigation into Andrew Wakefield, ruling that he had acted dishonestly and irresponsibly:

The verdict, read out by panel chairman Dr Surendra Kumar, criticised Dr Wakefield for the invasive tests, such as spinal taps, that were carried out on children and which were found to be against their best clinical interests.

The panel said Dr Wakefield, who was working at London's Royal Free Hospital as a gastroenterologist at the time, did not have the ethical approval or relevant qualifications for such tests.

[…]

Dr Kumar said he had acted with "callous disregard for the distress and pain the children might suffer".

He also said Dr Wakefield should have disclosed the fact that he had been paid to advise solicitors acting for parents who believed their children had been harmed by the MMR.

[My bold.]

In 1998, Wakefield claimed to have found a link between the measles virus in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract of children (following the MMR vaccine), and autism.  Wakefield’s small study, popularized by idiotic news media, led to an MMR-autism scare, a significant drop in vaccine rates and a resurgence of measles in the UK.  Wakefield may claim he didn’t say that MMR causes autism, but he certainly implied it strongly enough (and again, with the help of the press), that many people believed (and still believe) that the MMR vaccine causes GI problems which causes autism.  The evidence though, from a panel of 28 experts, clearly showed that this was not true.  The GMC have now, with this ruling, confirmed that in addition to Wakefield’s conclusions being false, he also acted unethically.  We still have to wait to see what sanctions they hand down.

Various vaccines-cause-autism groups immediately revised their positions, based on the conclusions of this independent expert body, and stated that they were wrong previously to claim that the MMR vaccine causes autism.

Ha – just kidding.  Of course they haven’t.  Nothing would ever convince these people that their previously determined conclusion could ever be wrong.  Just take a look at the flurry of activity from the Age of Autism blog in the last three days:

A Sad Day for the Future of Children – where they “unequivocally renounce the GMC’s findings” – no evidence, nothing they can say that is wrong with the GMC’s findings – they just renounce them because, well, because they do, so there.

Then from Mark Blaxill we have Naked Intimidation: The Wakefield Inquisition is Only the Tip of the Autism Censorship Iceberg - where he smears the witnesses in the case, oh and anecdotes, anecdotes I tell you (un-sourced) about anti-vaccination scientists being censored.  And “the only thing for the autism community to do now is stand by Andy Wakefield” – because clearly “the only thing” you can do when a discredited doctor is also found guilty of ethical violations, is to “stand by” him.  That’s “the only thing” you can do.  No other options, obviously.  Their hands are tied, you see.

And if that wasn’t clear enough, we have National Autism Association Supports Dr. Andrew Wakefield – the title says all you need to know.

Celebrity idiot Jenny McCarthy’s charity chimes in with Generation Rescue Supports Dr. Andrew Wakefield - (beginning to see a trend here).

Finally, we have fearless conversation advocate and fearless litigant to anyone who disagrees with her, Barbara Loe Fisher, who writes Vaccines: Doctor Judges & Juries Hanging Their Own – a touching story of the first time she met Wakefield.  (Why?  Who knows.)

And a couple more that I couldn’t be bothered to read.

Nothing could possibly ever convince these people that they might have been wrong.  Nothing.  Ever.  If you want to read some good sources on the GMC’s verdict, see below.

Further Reading

Steven Novella writes Andrew Wakefield “Acted Unethically”.

Investigative reporter Brian Deer (writing a year ago) MMR doctor Andrew Wakefield fixed data on autism – on how Wakefield changed and misreported results in his research:

Although the research paper claimed that problems came on within days of the [MMR shot], in only one case did medical records suggest this was true, and in many of the cases medical concerns had been raised before the children were vaccinated. Hospital pathologists, looking for inflammatory bowel disease, reported in the majority of cases that the gut was normal. This was then reviewed and the Lancet paper showed them as abnormal.

Ben Goldacre The Wakefield MMR verdict.

And finally, there is the GMC’s actual report.

Mike Adams – Pyromaniac in a Strawman Factory

(Unfortunately I didn’t invent that phrase.  I wish I had, but I didn’t.  It seems to fit Adams so well though.)

Mike Adams is going nuts.  (Possibly the word “going” is superfluous there – I’ll let you, gentle reader, decide.)  Following his meltdown after being disqualified from the “Shorty Awards” for cheating, he has just had another meltdown – this time about us evil skeptics - What 'skeptics' really believe about vaccines, medicine, consciousness and the universe.  This is a list he claims he pulled from various skeptic websites, although not one link is provided to show that any skeptic actually holds the positions he says we do.  It’s mostly a list of fairly obviously absurd straw man skeptic positions, plus a few actual skeptic positions that do actually make sense (eg we are opponents of homeopathy – well duh).

Here’s just one example of Adams’s idiocy:

Skeptics believe that ALL vaccines are safe and effective (even if they've never been tested), that ALL people should be vaccinated, even against their will, and that there is NO LIMIT to the number of vaccines a person can be safely given. So injecting all children with, for example, 900 vaccines all at the same time is believed to be perfectly safe and "good for your health."

Well, I don’t think I ever said that all vaccines are necessarily safe if they haven’t been tested, and I’ve certainly never been in favor of forced vaccinations against anyone’s will.  But the puzzling thing is the “900 vaccines all at the same time…” bit.  Why 900?  Where did that come from?  Why not round it up to 1,000 and be done with it?  In a rant that makes no sense, “900 vaccines” isn’t even wrong.

I’d go through the whole thing line by line, but fortunately I don’t have to because Tom Foss already did.  Read Tom’s line by line take down of Mike Adam’s rant on skeptics.  It’s a classic.

Addendum January 25:

We’ve certainly riled Adams up.  Today he has yet another post up about skeptics.  More hilarity ensues, although you should probably shield your irony detectors before reading it.

This article succeeded wildly in infuriating the "skeptics" across the 'net by simply reminding them what they believe.

No, we weren’t infuriated at all.  Astonished by the stupidity and number of blatant straw men, to be sure.  But most of us found it hilarious.

They then resorted to their same old dirty tricks to attack me by doing things like joining our Facebook page then posting a message that says, "That article made me so mad, I'm quitting this forum!"

That’s pretty funny because, as you’ll read in a comment below, Tom Foss tried to leave a comment at Adams’s site, but Adams deleted it.  That’s how confident Adams is in what he’s writing – no one is allowed to criticize Mike Adams.  And if you do it's a dirty trick!

Here’s where you’ll need to shield your irony meter:

They also tend to jump to false conclusions about what people are really saying. In my previous article, for example, I never stated whether I believed in God, or whether I was an athiest (sic), or whether I followed organized religion and yet people read the article and they leaped to conclusions, assuming I was promoting organized religion, for example, or that I was condemning atheism.

Actually I never stated my position on those matters in the article at all, but the skeptics leaped to the conclusion that I did. This speaks to their tendency to warp all incoming information and restructure it to conform to the beliefs they already carry about the subject at hand.

Yes, Adams is annoyed because he thinks skeptics have misrepresented his positions.  Because, you see, misrepresenting an opponent’s position is something Mike Adams would never do.

Steven Novella also responded today: Mike Adams Takes On “Skeptics”

As did Orac: A pyromaniac in a field of straw man or a black hole of burning stupid incinerating every straw man in the universe? Mike Adams attacks skepticism

As Good As Dowsing

For once we have some news of rationality winning – although it took a while.  Jim McCormick (pictured right), maker of the useless ADE-651 “bomb detection” device, was arrested yesterday in the UK on suspicion of “fraud by misrepresentation.”  An export ban on the device will come into force next week.  To which I add – about time!

It’s not as if this is new information.  The ADE-651 is just the latest incarnation of a device that was previously called “The Mole,” and before that the “Quadro Tracker.”  They’re all the exact same device and they have all consistently failed tests designed to see if they work.  Back in October 2008 and again in November 2009, James Randi challenged the makers of the ADE-651 to apply for his million dollar prize to prove that it worked.  Of course, as with all the other charlatans and quacks Randi challenges, they didn’t apply.  Well, now we know why – the makers were selling these pieces of junk to the Iraqi government for $40,000 a pop or a total to date of $85 million!  By my count, that’s over 2,000 not bomb detectors not detecting bombs in Iraq alone.  Randi’s $ million must have seemed like small change. (I have to admit I am still a bit skeptical about this $85 million figure.  It is the figure that is consistently being reported by all media, although they are probably just repeating each other, so we can’t be sure.  Still, we have nothing else to go on right now.  If it is confirmed it is certainly a massive fraud for such a piece of junk.)

The BBC reports that there are concerns that the devices have failed to stop bomb attacks that have killed hundreds of people.  Actually, a little more than just “concerns.”  There have been several successful bomb attacks in Iraq recently in areas where they were apparently relying on this bogus device:

And an attack in December killed over 120 people, prompting Iraqis to ask how the bombs could have got through the city's security.

Attention is increasingly focusing on the ADE-651, the hand-held detector now used at most checkpoints in Baghdad.  [My bold.]

Get that?  This useless device is used at most checkpoints in Baghdad in place of physical inspections of vehicles.  Remember, this is a device that has no memory, no programming, no working electronics, no batteries and no known way it could possibly ever work.  It has consistently failed to work in all controlled tests.  And yet they go for $40,000 each!  Over 2,000 of them.

Strangely, I find I do agree with one thing McCormick has to say about his product:

"the theory behind dowsing and the theory behind how we actually detect explosives is very similar".

Yes, dowsing and the ADE-651 are similar in that they are both complete bullshit. 

Randi’s blog today has a post, Randi Responds to the Arrest of James McCormick, that includes a video of Randi explaining the history of this device and the JREF’s role in exposing it.  (Although I don’t often recommend long video clips, this one with Randi is worth the time.)  Astonishingly, the Quadro Tracker (which, to repeat, is the exact same product as the ADE-651) was tested back in 1995 and was described back then by the FBI as “a fraud.”  Fifteen years later, McCormick gets arrested.

The Iraqi officer who appeared at a press conference with McCormick recently, Major General Jehad al-Jabiri, apparently said he did not care about the failed tests of this device.  I join Randi in hoping the Iraqis investigate this Iraqi officer’s connection to the manufacturers of the device.  Apparently it has been sold for $16,500 (still a rip off for something that does nothing), although it was sold to the Iraqi military for up to $60,000.  Would the Major General’s bank accounts reveal kickbacks received from McCormick’s company?  There would have been enough spare cash from that $85 million to pay off any number of intermediaries.  Perhaps the threat of jail time (Iraqi jail – nice) would motivate the Major General finally to care if the damn thing works or not.  One can only hope.

Praise should go to the JREF for doggedly exposing this fraud for at least the past 15 years, according to Randi.  (Shame on the media and law enforcement for allowing it to continue, without criticism, for so long.)  Don’t forget all the other frauds and charlatans who also refuse to take Randi’s $ million test because they know they would fail.  (And ditto.)

Who Lies?

You’ll remember that Barbara Loe Fisher is suing Amy Wallace et al for (as I understand it, mostly) the following piece that Wallace wrote about Fisher:

Fisher, who has long been the media's go-to interview for what some in the autism arena call "parents rights," makes him particularly nuts, as in "You just want to scream." The reason? "She lies," he says flatly.

You’ll note the “she lies” part, which seems to have been what got Fisher’s goat.  Of course, accusing people of lying can be problematic – unless you can read minds, you don’t really know if the person is actually lying or if they just mistakenly but honesty believe something that is false.  Regardless, that seems to be what Fisher is suing Wallace for.

Well, want to know something funny?  I just spent all of five minutes Googling and I found this piece written only two months ago by anti-vaccine supremo J.B. Handley, in the same Age of Autism blog that Fisher writes in.  The post was about (guess who?) Amy Wallace, and is entitled How Wired Magazine’s Amy Wallace Endangers Our Kids.  Guess what he says:

I know I speak for many when I say that we, as a community, are irate (sic) by the one-sided lies that Wired Magazine allowed Ms. Wallace to put in print.

Amy Wallace’s one-sided lies.

Now, I’m not suggesting that Wired Magazine and Amy Wallace should sue J.B. Handley for calling them liars, oh no.  I never would.  Not at all.  Couldn’t recommend that at all.  No way.  Never.  Absolutely not.  Never crossed my mind.

Casey Luskin Wrong on Tiktaalik

Casey Luskin over at the Disco-Tute’s blog is getting all excited about the recent discovery of fossilized tetrapod (four footed vertebrate) footprints in Poland, dated 395 million years ago.  What?  The Disco-Tute is excited about new scientific discoveries?  Well, yes, but only because they think it disproves evolution, or something.  Luskin’s post is entitled Tiktaalik Blown "Out of the Water" by Earlier Tetrapod Fossil Footprints, which should give you an idea.  Briefly, the transitional (between fish and tetrapod) fossil Tiktaalik was found in rocks 375 million years old, but these new tetrapod fossils are 395 million years old, so this newly discovered tetrapod wasn’t a descendant of Tiktaalik.  Luskin claims this means Tiktaalik isn’t a transitional form, even though it clearly has features of both fish and tetrapods (more on that below).

Here’s Luskin:

The fossil tetrapod footprints indicate Tiktaalik came over 10 million years after the existence of the first known true tetrapod. Tiktaalik, of course, is not a tetrapod but a fish, and these footprints make it very difficult to presently argue that Tiktaalik is a transitional link between fish and tetrapods. It’s not a “snapshot of fish evolving into land animals,” because if this transition ever took place it seems to have occurred millions of years before Tiktaalik.  [My bold.]

Of course, Luskin’s reasoning is wrong – if Tiktaalik is an intermediate between fish and tetrapods, then the discovery that this evolution also occurred earlier doesn’t suddenly magically mean that Tiktaalik isn’t an intermediate between fish and tetrapods anymore.  The evidence that Tiktaalik is an intermediate is still evidence that Tiktaalik is an intermediate.  Luskin doesn’t understand what an “intermediate” is – he thinks it has to be something on a direct line from (in this case) fish to existing land animals; it’s actually just a fossil that shows evolutionary change within lineages.  (It has features of both a fish and a tetrapod, so it shows evolution happening.)  Luskin thinks evolutionary theory says this happened only once.  But evolutionary theory doesn’t say that.  Transitional forms don’t have to be direct descendants of living species, they just have to be transitional between species (“cousins” of our ancestors, if you like) – that is, they just need to demonstrate evolution occurring.

PZ has a good post up, Casey Luskin embarrasses himself again, where he explains that Tiktaalik's status as a transitional form does not depend on us slotting it in a specific chronological time period as a link between two stages in the evolution of a lineage.

Why ID Is Useless

An interesting thing about Tiktaalik, is how Neil Shubin (its discover) managed to find it using a prediction of evolutionary theory.  In his post, Luskin quotes Shubin.  I’ll repost what Luskin quoted, but I’ll add a piece that he missed, from Zimmer and Shubin on Tiktaalik:

What evolution enables us to do is to make specific predictions about what we should find in the fossil record. The prediction in this case is clear-cut. That is, if we go to rocks of the right age, and the rocks of the right type, we should find transitions between two great forms of life, between fish and amphibian.

[…]

What we see when we look at the fossil record, at rocks of just the right age, is a creature like Tiktaalik.  Just like a fish, it has scales on its back, and fins. You can see the fin webbing here. Yet when we look at the head, you see something very different. You see a very amphibian-like thing, with a flat head, with eyes on top. It gets even better when we take the fin apart. When we look inside the fin, as in this cast here, what you’ll see is bones that compare to our shoulder, elbow, even parts of the wrist—bone for bone. So you have a fish, at just the right time in the history of life, that has characteristics of amphibians and primitive fish. It’s a mix. 

[My bold to indicate the bit that Luskin didn’t quote.]

Tiktaalik is undoubtedly transitional.  With gills, scales and fins it is a fish, but its fins, instead of having the many tiny bones normally found in fish, had fewer but sturdier bones in its limbs – bones similar in number and position to those of every land creature that came later.  Also, it had a flat head with eyes on the top like a modern amphibian, and it had a neck (which fish don’t have).  It also had spiracles (breathing holes) on the top of its head, which suggests it had primitive lungs, and it had stronger ribs that allowed it to pump air into these lungs.  Normal fish don’t need these because they breathe through their gills.

Luskin misses the point of all this with his “Tiktaalik, of course, is not a tetrapod but a fish” comment.  Typical creationist – scientist finds a transitional form (fish to tetrapod) and creationist insists it’s not transitional because it’s still either a fish or a tetrapod.  (Fish, in this case.)  Nothing would satisfy Luskin – regardless of what new fossils are found, according to Luskin they’ll either be a fish or a tetrapod but never a transitional.

Also, it is beyond question that Shubin used evolutionary theory to predict where he would find Tiktaalik.  He reasoned that if there were lobe finned fish but no terrestrial vertebrates 390 million years ago, and terrestrial vertebrates 360 million years ago, evolutionary theory would predict that you would find fossils of the transitional form in rocks around 375 million old (ie in between the two).  And you would find them in a freshwater area, since both lobe finned fish and early amphibians lived in freshwater.  So that’s where he looked.  And guess what?  That’s exactly where he found it. So evolutionary theory predicted where the fossil would be found.  Again, this all flies right over Luskin’s head:

The New York Times presaged Shubin's argument, first reporting on Tiktaalik that "the scientists concluded that Tiktaalik was an intermediate between the fishes Eusthenopteron and Panderichthys, which lived 385 million years ago, and early tetrapods. The known early tetrapods are Acanthostega and Ichthyostega, about 365 million years ago." But would neo-Darwinism have predicted true tetrapods from 397 million years ago? Definitely not

No, but then neither would Intelligent Design (ID) have predicted this.  The same way that ID didn’t predict Tiktaalik.  These new fossils were discovered by real scientist doing real science, not by creationists using “Intelligent Design.”  What this demonstrates is that science expands our knowledge while ID is completely vacuous and useless.  ID didn’t predict anything (neither Tiktaalik nor these new fossils) since ID is nothing but a bunch of ignorant whining about evolution.

Where do we go from here?  Well, clearly the creationists at the Disco-Tute will continue to miss the point entirely and claim that this discovery by real scientists somehow invalidates discoveries made by other real scientists.  Meanwhile, actual real scientists will use this new information as a springboard to investigate and learn more.  Philippe Janvier from the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris (reviewer of the paper on the newly found fossil) told CNN:

"The divergence between the tetrapods and their closest fish relatives is much younger than previously thought and it obliges us to find actual evidence -- skeletons or complete fossils -- in much earlier strata that could enlighten us between this divergence."

Real scientists will now do actual research on these new fossils so we can learn more about our past.  The difference between this and creationist poseurs such as Luskin, couldn’t be clearer.

Additional Reading

Jerry Coyne’s excellent book Why Evolution Is True has more on Tiktaalik and on transitional forms in general.

Barbara Loe Fisher wants A Fearless Conversation About Vaccination

Damn!  That’s another irony meter blown.  And it was the industrial version too.

Readers of Orac’s blog will already know that anti vaccinationist and founder of the The National Vaccine Information (sic) Center Barbara Loe Fisher is suing Dr. Paul Offit, Amy Wallace, and Condé Nast for libel, for their very reasonable (and factually correct) article in Wired about the anti-vaccine militia: An Epidemic of Fear: How Panicked Parents Skipping Shots Endangers Us All.  As Orac wrote, suing people who you disagree with, instead of presenting evidence to support your case “sums up the attitude of all too many anti-science activists. They can't win on the science; so they try to suppress criticism through legal action.”  And as Orac wrote, Fisher’s selection of Virginia as the state to file her suit, means that the suit will not be thrown out under a strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP) statute – one designed to prevent lawsuits designed solely to silence debate – because Virginia doesn’t have such a statute.  (Hum.  Funny how she chose Virginia to file the suit when the three defendants live in Pennsylvania, California and New York.)

So why did my industrial strength irony meter blow?  Well, Barbara Loe Fisher just wrote a piece on the Age of Autism blog, entitled 2010 Needs A Fearless Conversation About Vaccination.  Well, yeah, because we’d all love to have a conversation free of the fear of a freaking lawsuit from Barbara Loe Fisher and her anti-vaccination loon friends.  It takes some serious chutzpah to call for a fearless discussion on your pet subject in the same week that you took out a lawsuit to silence the opposition.

Fisher’s post is quite astonishing.  In it she lists all the things she says people were scared about in the last decade – basically it’s just terrorism, but she draws it out by listing weaponized smallpox scares and bioterrorism, but also manages to include her pet project – vaccines.  So does she mean the false scare stories about vaccines – the false claims that they cause autism, or other problems?  You know, all the anti-vaccine scaremongering that has been covered on this blog and elsewhere?  Well, no.  Of course not.  Get a load of this:

The Decade of Fear began on September 11, 2001, a day of indescribable loss that marked the ending of so much. Among the losses was the end of a civil and substantive conversation about vaccine safety that had taken shape during the previous two decades 4 but which - after September 11, 2001 - was hijacked by fear.  [My bold.]

Zing!  Vaccines linked to 9/11 in one step.  (I hope she paid Rudy Giuliani his royalty.)

She ends:

Hopefully, 2010 will be the beginning of a fearless and fierce search for the truth about health and vaccination that will enlighten us all.

Yeah, “hopefully” scientists reporting the facts will be able to do so without fear of intimidation.  Unfortunately the new decade hasn’t started out with that hope, thanks to Fisher and her lawyers.  Of course, what Fisher really means is that she should be free of fear to promote her anti-vaccine nonsense.  People who disagree with her though – that’s another matter.

As a final irony in the “and fierce search for the truth” arena, I tried to leave a comment on Fisher’s blog pointing out quite politely that the conversation about vaccines might be more fearless if people like Barbara Loe Fisher didn't sue people who publicly disagreed with her.  Guess what happened.  (No prizes.)  It never made it through moderation.  I guess Fisher has found a way to deal with her fear of contradictory views – she just ignores them.

It’s only January 7th and we already have our first nomination for a 2010 Golden Woo.  Looks like I picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue.

 

The Golden Woos #2

It’s the first post of the new year, and so time for the second annual Golden Woo Awards for outstanding work in the promotion of Woo in the previous year. These awards have been compared to the Golden Globes, and to Randi’s Pigasus Awards.  Admittedly, I am the only one making this comparison but no matter – the comparison has been made and therefore my statement is true.  So with no further ado, I give you The Golden Woos of 2010.

The scientist or academic who said or did the silliest thing related to Woo

For the second year running the award goes to Michael Egnor.  His article last January, Materialism of the Gaps, would have been enough by itself to win this award outright.  As I explained in my post Egnor's Dualism Of The Gaps, his silly arguments for dualism included:

1. Misuse of the “god of the gaps” argument: for some reason he thinks it applies to people who see no reason to propose dualism.  (As I wrote, it is a fallacy to insist that your explanation must include some unproven entity that you just made up; it is not a fallacy to exclude made up entities)
2. Circular reasoning: the mind must be non-material, because materialism can’t explain the mind because the mind is non-material.  Seriously.
3. Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics.

As I said, enough to win the award by itself.  But then he wrote Climategate: a Word of Advice to the Scientists – in summary, some scientists (may have) lied about global warming, therefore evolution is false.  Just breathtaking in its stupidity.

If Egnor wins this award again next year I’ll have to rename it “The Egnor” in his honor.

The funding organization that supported the most useless Woo study

The award is given to the Australian National Health and Medical Research Council for their $400,000 study on emergency room acupuncture.  This study is useless because it is not randomized, it has no blinding, there is no sham acupuncture and standard medical procedures will be used in addition to acupuncture.  Plus, we also know from numerous studies that have already been done, that acupuncture is nothing more than a placebo.

The media outlet that reported as fact the most outrageous Woo claim (aka the “Larry King” prize)

After some considerable thought, I’ve decided to award The Larry to the entire media for their reporting on Rom Houben, the Belgian man who allegedly was fully conscious during a 23-year long coma.  I realize “the entire media” is a bit of a cop out, but honestly I haven’t been able to find any mainstream media outlet (maybe you can find one) that reported on this rationally. 

The outrageous woo claim here was not that the man had been conscious throughout the 23 years (opinions differ about how conscious he actually was/is); the woo claim is the “facilitated communication” (FC) – where a “facilitator” moves Houben’s hands across a keyboard and types out messages supposedly from him.  See these videos of this on CNN and on MSNBC – clearly the “facilitator” is doing the typing. Her eyes are constantly on the keyboard as she moves his hand from letter to letter; Houben's eyes are staring into the distance.  The best reporting I saw on this story was by Campbell Brown of CNN, but even she just left it that there was “skepticism” or “a controversy” around the FC.  (And she really has no excuse since we know her staff had contacted Hank Schlinger of the JREF, and had the whole FC nonsense explained to her in detail.)  But there is no controversy over whether FC is genuine – it is not.  Big epic FAIL from the entire media.

The Woo responsible for the most drivel containing the most logical fallacies (aka “The Chopra”)

Named for Deepak Chopra, for his achievements supporting woo with nothing but logical fallacies, above and beyond what can reasonably be expected of any human being.  As I wrote last year, Chopra is excluded from winning this award, otherwise no one else would ever stand a chance.  (Although that didn’t stop him from trying.)

The Chopra this year goes to Rabbi Shmuley Boteach and Dinesh D’Souza for their reliance on pure assertion coupled with arguments by analogy (but zero actual evidence) in the debate on the conflict between science and religion, “La Ciudad de las Ideas 2009 Re-Evolution” Festival debate.

Now, you can click that link and watch the actual debate if you want, but it is two hours long (and loads slowly) so probably most people won’t want to bother.  It does have some good arguments put forward by Sam Harris and Chris Hitchens, so take a look if you have the time.  But for those who don’t, I’ve highlighted just one of the poor arguments (from many made) from each of these clowns.

First, we have Rabbi Shmuley Boteach (1 hour 4min in) on why morality does too come from religion:

I know that Daniel Dennett is a very moral man, I know Sam Harris is a very moral man, and I know Christopher Hitchens is a very moral man, but their morality COMES FROM RELIGION.  It comes from the ten commandments” “do not murder, do not steal, do not commit adultery”…

Stunning!  Boteach’s entire argument to support his contention that morality comes from religion, is to state in a loud voice that morality COMES FROM RELIGION.  And it must be so because Boteach says it is.  Case closed then.  Wow, I never knew that debate could be so simple – just assert what you say is true and it’s true and the other person is wrong.  Period.  If only I’d known that when I started this blog, I could have saved myself a lot of effort in constructing valid arguments, reading papers, citing studies, etc.  I could have just asserted that I was right and be done. Wow – is my face red now.

Even better (and by that, I mean even more lame) is Dinesh D’Souza (28 min in), on why agnosticism is the “dumbest position of all” to take.  Get a load of this:

[Agnosticism] is actually the dumbest position of all.  And here’s why.  Imagine if you are dating a woman and trying to consider the question of, should you ask her to marry you.  Now the fact is you could use all the reasonable knowledge at your disposal but if you say “what is life with this woman going to be like for the next 50 years,” you can never know. So you say, “OK, since I cannot know I’ll be an agnostic – I’ll wait for the data to come in.”  But the data will never be in.  If you keep waiting, she will marry someone else or you’ll both be dead.

To start with, this is just argument by analogy (the weakest form of argument), with absolutely no evidence presented (as Sam Harris pointed out at least twice).  But even by argument by analogy standards, it’s weak.  In fact, it’s not even a valid analogy because D’Souza is making a category error – comparing two things that are actually not comparable because they are in different categories.  The question “does God exist” is a truth claim – either God exists or he doesn’t.  The question “should you ask a woman to marry you” is a plan of action – you’re trying to decide what to do in the future, what plan of action to take.  D’Souza’s muddled mind is comparing a truth claim to a plan - two things that are not comparable and so obviously can’t be analogs.  What D’Souza probably meant was to compare belief in God with whether I believe the woman will say yes if I ask her to marry me.  (I could be wrong – but I’m trying my hardest to construct a coherent argument from what D’Souza actually said.)  This is so obviously a false analogy, because if I want to know if the woman will marry me, I just have to ask her and presumably she’ll tell me and then I’ll know.  But if I want to know if God exists, there is no one I can ask – well, plenty of people I can ask, but no one who actually knows the answer.  (OK, D’Souza and Boteach think they know the answer, but they don’t, any more than I do.)  So even by D’Souza’s usual standards, this is a really bad argument.  And that’s saying something.

For these and the numerous other “arguments” put forward in that debate, Shmuley Boteach and Dinesh D’Souza are worthy recipients of this year’s Chopra.

Irony Award, for being completely oblivious to the hypocrisy of their own actions or words in defense of Woo

To Bill Maher for his piece in the woo journal of choice, The Huffingtom Post, entitled Vaccination: A Conversation Worth Having.  Some snippets:

…its just that mainstream media rarely interviews doctors and scientists who present an alternative point of view. There is a movement to stop people from asking any questions about vaccines…

He’s complaining that the “alternative point of view” is not considered.

I feel its unnecessary and counterproductive to try and silence people with condescension.

Silencing with condescension is bad.

It may be the case that the vaccine should have been used anyway to finish polio off, but there are some interesting facts on the other side.

Should report “the other side.”  More in a similar vein, at the link.

So why is all this hypocritical?  Well, read what Bill had to say about the teaching of intelligent design, in his New Rules segment in August 2005:

And finally New Rule: You don't have to teach both sides of a debate, if one side is a load of crap.

[…]

…There aren't necessarily two sides to every issue. If there were, the Republicans would have an opposition party.

And an opposition party would point out that even though there's a debate, in schools, and government, about this, there is no debate among scientists.

[My Bold.]

Hey Bill Maher from 2005, go and tell that to Bill Maher in 2009 because that dude doesn’t have a clue!

Note, the award isn’t given to Maher because he doubts the value of vaccines.  It’s given because his argument is that we should consider the anti-vaccine point of view just because “the other side” should be heard.  If he gave real arguments against vaccines, his position wouldn't necessarily be hypocritical (it’d still be wrong, but not hypocritical).  But he doesn’t.  He just argues that both sides should be heard because, well, because they should. Except when they shouldn’t.

Maher shares his award with the Atheist Alliance International for awarding Maher the 2009 Richard Dawkins Award which is for (inter alia) increasing scientific knowledge.  Because what could be more ironic than presenting an award for increasing scientific knowledge to an anti-science kook like Maher?

Hitler Zombie Award (aka “The Godwin”) for appropriating Hitler to make the most outrageous Woo claim

The Godwin goes to The American “Tea Party” groups for their response to Obama’s (supposed) tax and health policies.  Examples are numerous, but I’ll choose the one below from the Huffington Post’s (yeah I know – they’re not necessarily wrong on everything) 10 Most Offensive Tea Party Signs:

Personally I don’t find it offensive, just stupid.

I’m not, in giving this award, commenting on whether I think they are right or wrong on these issues, and perhaps opposition to higher taxes / health reform isn’t technically woo.  But their repeated comparisons of Obama to Hitler in place of any valid arguments to support their case, means in my view that they are woos.  They are getting the award for their ridiculous and repeated arguing their case by making comparisons of Obama to Hitler. 

The most persistent refusal to face reality

The award goes to homeopath Thomas Sam, the who watched his daughter die of a curable disease while he repeatedly ignored what he was told by real doctors, to treat her only with magic water.

Of course, allowing his daughter to die that was was terrible, but understandable if you really believe in homeopathy, right?  We all make mistakes, yes?  Well maybe.  But Sam’s persistent refusal to face reality can be seen in his words, spoken just after he had been found guilty of his daughter’s manslaughter:

Conventional medicine would have prolonged her life ... with more misery. It's not going to cure her and that's what I strongly believe.

Yeah, because conventional medicine (you know, stuff that works) would have been even worse.  Sure.  Moron. 

The most ridiculous or bigoted act using religion as its justification

The award goes to Pope Ratzinger for arguing against condom use to prevent the spread of AIDS, as reported in Pope claims condoms could make African Aids crisis worse:

The pontiff said condoms were not the answer to the continent's fight against HIV and Aids and could make the problem worse.

[…]

The timing of his remarks outraged health agencies trying to halt the spread of HIV and Aids in sub-Saharan Africa, where an estimated 22 million people are infected.

Rebecca Hodes, of the Treatment Action Campaign in South Africa, sums up why Ratzinger deserves this award:

[Ratzinger’s] opposition to condoms conveys that religious dogma is more important to him than the lives of Africans."

… Or anything else.

Finally, a new category this year:

The Occam

For the woo responsible for the most egregious violation of Occam’s Razor.

An argument that violates Occam’s Razor is not necessarily wrong, since Occam’s Razor can’t prove something right or wrong.  But it is a principle that should not be violated without a very good reason.  If you do, it means you have invented some unnecessary entity or assumption that does not add anything to the explanation.  That is, your additional assumption does not explain anything any better, nor does it make any additional predictions, compared with the explanation that did not have the additional assumption. Consequently, your additional assumption is not useful in any way (so why make it?).

The inaugural Occam goes to (who else) Deepak Chopra, for his insistence that the brain does not create the mind.  Discussed here, also speaking at an Indian Astrology Conference Western science is frozen in the superstition of materialism: Deepak Chopra (the last link via PZ).  Chopra’s “everything that we call reality is in consciousness” (etc etc) does not add anything to our understanding of consciousness, and does not make one single additional testable prediction compared with the hypothesis that does not include a non-material mind.  We may not (yet) fully understand consciousness, but Chopra’s made up drivel doesn’t help us understand anything.

That’s it for this year.  Please link to any other woos you think deserve an honorable mention, in the comments.

Chopra - Gets Snippy but Still Misses

Deepak Chopra has a surprisingly antagonistic article up (at the usual place) entitled Woo Woo Is a Step Ahead of (Bad) Science.  In it he calls out Michael Shermer for… well take a look.  Chopra is referring to a recent Larry King Live show where the two clashed:

Afterwards, however, I had an unpredictable reaction. I realized that I would much rather expound woo woo than the kind of bad science Shermer stands behind. He has made skepticism his personal brand, more or less, sitting by the side of the road to denigrate "those people who believe in spirituality, ghosts, and so on," as he says on a YouTube video. No matter that this broad brush would tar not just the Pope, Mahatma Gandhi, St. Teresa of Avila, Buddha, and countless scientists who happen to recognize a reality that transcends space and time. All are deemed irrational by the skeptical crowd. You would think that skeptics as a class have made significant contributions to science or the quality of life in their own right. Uh oh. No, they haven't. Their principal job is to reinforce the great ideas of yesterday while suppressing the great ideas of tomorrow.

At least he admits he expounds woo – by definition, extraordinary beliefs for which there is insufficient extraordinary evidence.  He also claims Shermer stands behind bad science, except he gives no evidence that Shermer supports bad science.  (In reality, he just doesn’t support Chopra’s pseudoscience.)  Chopra follows with a lame appeal to authority (the Pope, Mahatma Gandhi, St. Teresa of Avila, Buddha, etc), and the claim that skeptics, by rejecting false ideas, are somehow suppressing great ideas.  Seriously.  Chopra’s grasp of logic clearly hasn’t improved any.

For we have reached the state where Shermer's tired, out-of-date, utterly mediocre science is far in arrears of the best, most open scientific thinkers -- actually, we reached that point 60 years ago when eminent physicists like Einstein, Wolfgang Pauli, Werner Heisenberg and Erwin Schrodinger applied quantum theory to deep spiritual questions. The arrogance of skeptics is both high-handed and rusty. It is high-handed because they lump brilliant speculative thinkers into one black box known as woo woo. It is rusty because Shermer doesn't even bother to keep up with the latest findings in neuroscience, medicine, genetics, physics, and evolutionary biology. All of these fields have opened fascinating new ground for speculation and imagination.

[My Bold.]

Yes – speculation.  Chopra gets close, but then misses completely.  Speculation is great for forming hypotheses to test.  Chopra, though, treats these speculations as though they were already successfully tested and were now proven facts.  They’re not.

Skeptics feel that they have won the high ground in matters concerning consciousness, mind, the origins of life, evolutionary theory, and brain science. This is far from the case. What they cling to is 19th Century materialism, packaged with a screeching hysteria about God and religion that is so passé it has become quaint. To suggest that Darwinian theory is incomplete and full of unproven hypotheses causes Shermer, who takes Darwin as purely as a fundamentalist takes scripture, to see God everywhere in the enemy camp.

I don’t think that any evolutionary scientist would argue that the the theory of evolution is complete – if it were, there would be no need for anyone do do evolutionary science any more because we'd already know everything.  (So that’s a straw man, for those who are counting.)  But “full of unproven hypotheses”?  Really?  “Full” of them?  If there are so many, why doesn’t Chopra list a couple?  Talk about “screeching hysteria.” 

Anyway, this shrill screed made me want to see what he was talking about – so I looked up the transcript of the Larry King show in question (which also included Dinesh D’Souza – so you know it’s going to be good.  And by “good,” you know I mean “bad”).  Here are some examples:

CHOPRA: First of all, there's a lot of interesting science now that is suggesting -- and by no means is this clear. There's a lot of controversy of -- about this. There's a lot of interesting science that our consciousness, which is the place where we perceive, think, emote, imagine, have insight, intuition, choice-making -- that this part of us is not a product of our brain.

Chopra admits the science just “suggests” this, and that the evidence “by no means is this clear.”  You wouldn’t believe this though from what follows, or from his HuffPo article.  Note how all the “not clear” and only “suggesting” references disappear in what follows:

Yes. The -- the -- the mind, that consciousness, the one I'm talking to right now is not a product of the brain, but is localizing itself through the brain, just like people who are seeing us right now on their screens, you know, we're not in their television boxes. We are coming through these airwaves and they are perceiving us. But if they open the box, they wouldn't find Deepak or Jeff or anyone there.

So if I look inside you, I won't find your soul because it's not there. In fact, your body is experienced in your consciousness. Your mind is experienced in your consciousness. And the evidence is pointing out that this consciousness is non-local, which means it exists outside of space-time and therefore, mathematically, it's impossible to destroy this consciousness.

Typical Chopra bait and switch.  The doubt from the bait section is gone, and the switch is in to “…is not a product of the brain.”  No doubts, no suggestions, no unclearedness – the mind just isn’t a product of the brain any more.  Period.  It is now also “impossible” to destroy consciousness.  Note – impossible.  No doubt any more, no mere “suggesting.”  And it must be so because Chopra tells us it is.  Even though (also according to Chopra) the science is by no means this clear and is only suggesting of these things. 

Also note another favorite argument of the woo – argument by analogy.  I’ve heard this analogy to the TV set before – our brain is like the TV set but our mind is somewhere else (by analogy, the TV signal).  But the analogy fails.  In fact, it’s more than that, if anything the analogy demonstrates the mind is not like the TV signal.  We know that if you damage part of the brain, the functions associated with the damaged sections of the brain will be reduced or disappear altogether. This is not like a TV at all.  If you damage part of your TV set you won’t find that you now only get the commercials but not the programs, or that you get game shows but not documentaries.  That would be a true analog of what happens when the brain is damaged.  No.  If you damage your TV set, either it still works (you didn’t damage anything significant) or it stops working altogether. 
(For the most part, anyway.)  And if you disrupt the signal, by disconnecting the cable box, or by shielding the aerial, again the TV again stops working completely.  You don’t find that you now get the programs but the remote doesn’t work any more.

Chopra follows this with an old chestnut you will recognize if you have ever tried to debate idealists or dualists:

But if I ask you to imagine the color red or look at the color red, there's no red in your brain. There's just electrical firings.

True but irrelevant.  Yes, your brain interprets certain visible light wavelengths as “red” and yes I don’t know if what you see as “red” is what I see as “red.”  But show me a red card and (in a separate room) show Chopra a red card and we’ll both say it’s “red” (assuming neither of us is color blind), and we’ll do that because there is a real external phenomenon in the physical world that our brains see and interpret as “red”; it doesn’t mean there is a non-material mind signaling the brain.

Well, I have to say of Michael that he is very superstitious. He's addicted to the superstition of materialism. The first thing he said about the brain, you know, that you destroy a certain part of the brain and that function will not come back -- he hasn't kept up with the literature. There's a whole phenomenon called neural plasticity. There's gene regulation.

Chopra massively overreaches.  Yes, neural plasticity means the brain can re-wire itself, given time, to perform some of the functions it lost when it was damaged. But it takes time, and while it’s doing so the brain doesn’t have the functions it lost.  This is not evidence for a non-material mind; it is evidence that the physical brain can eventually repair itself to some limited extent.  I’m not sure what gene regulation has to do with this, but that also has a material explanation and doesn’t require a non-material mind to function.  As Steven Novella wrote:

…all the evidence we have suggests that the mind is a product of the brain. There is no mind without the brain (despite the unsubstantiated claims of paranormalists). If the brain is not biologically active, there is no consciousness. If the brain is damaged, the mind is altered. As brain function changes through drugs, lack of sleep, fever, or some metabolic derangement – so changes the mind. No reliable observation or experiment has been able to separate the mind as a phenomenon from the brain.

Throughout this whole thing, Chopra keeps asking Shermer what he clearly thinks is a killer question:

CHOPRA: ...are we talking to you, Michael, or to your networks right now?

CHOPRA: OK. When you said you'd like to believe in an after- death, was that your synaptic network speaking or was it you?

CHOPRA: OK. So what -- you know, when you say I'm skeptical about this, who's the "I" that's skeptical?

CHOPRA: I know it doesn't work for you. Who's the you that's talking to me right now?

CHOPRA: You are saying that's the way our synaptic networks should -- who's you?

I could ask Chopra the same question, and Chopra wouldn’t know the answer either.  Although that wouldn’t stop him making one up.  Of course, the sensible answer is that as far as we know, the “I” that we all feel we are is an emergent property of the neurons firing in our extremely complex brains.  Or as Steven Novella wrote:

I would describe the subjective sense of self, of existence, as the real-time processing of the brain that is constantly taking in external stimuli while engaging in an internal conversation – generating thoughts and feelings and comparing those processes to memory and sensory input. We know that in order to be awake the brain needs to be constantly activated (a process of the brainstem activating system), which suggests that this constant brain activity is necessary for consciousness, probably because it is consciousness.

Admittedly, Chopra’s brain might not be complex enough to accomplish that task, but that’s no reason to suppose the rest of us need a non-material mind to get the same feeling.

The host (who despite the name of the show, was not Larry King) asked one sensible question (although he also tried to answer it himself in a less sensible way):

PROBST: Why not believe?

Why -- why are you focusing so much -- because if you're wrong...

The answer is, that we should reject ideas that are wrong, because it is only by rejecting ideas that are wrong that correct ideas will flourish.  I was reminded here of the words of Antony Hoare (senior researcher at Microsoft Corporation), who explained what he though was the one thing everyone should learn about science:

…scientists start by trying very hard to disprove what they hope is true. When they fail, they have a good reason for believing what they hope is true, and can even convince others of its truth.

Do you imagine that Chopra has ever tried (very hard or even not so hard) to prove that the mind is not a separate entity from the brain?  Would he even consider doing that?  He gave us the TV set analogy – the brain is like the TV set but the mind is like the signal.  Do you think he has ever thought of testing this to see if he could prove it false – by shutting off the signal (analogous to disconnecting the cable box) or disrupting it (by analogy, putting the TV aerial inside a Faraday cage), to see if the brain stops providing consciousness when the signal from the mind is disrupted?  Has he even thought of doing this?  You know the answer – of course he hasn’t.  He never would.  He isn’t interested in trying to prove his pet theory wrong; he’s only interested in posturing on the Larry King Show and on the pages of the Huffington Post.

Chopra called for a formal debate with Shermer, a debate he claims Shermer has avoided.  Funny, I seem to remember they already had a debate, and that Chopra’s arguments were the usual weak logical fallacies that he always trots out.  (Click that link and you’ll see that Chopra’s arguments haven’t improved any.)  Should Shermer agree to debate him?  Well, that’s up to Shermer, but science isn’t decided by debates, even among scientists (which Chopra isn't), and we know from debating creationists that the woo side has the advantage in that they don’t have to restrict themselves to facts, good scientific evidence or valid logic.  Still, if he does, Chopra’s side of the debate is sure to give me material for some more blog posts.

Climategate or Deniergate?

In June 2005, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. published an article in Salon and Rolling Stone where he claimed that a an ethyl mercury compound called Thimerosal, used as a preservative in vaccines, was the cause of an autism epidemic.  As his proof, he pulled several quotes from the minutes of a conference of government scientists at the Simpsonwood center, as well as from an Institute of Medicine (IOM) report.  Kennedy’s article caused quite a stir at the time, with proponents of the Thimerosal-autism link essentially claiming a conspiracy of scientists to cover up the “truth” about childhood vaccines.  I decided to read both the full minutes of the conference, and the IOM report, and I discovered that the quotes Kennedy was relying on were taken completely out of context, and that the quotes in context (and in fact the full reports) showed the exact opposite of what Kennedy was claiming.  The quotes, and the full reports, were in reality just indications of the uncertain business of science, some careless wording and (mostly) dishonesty in the way the quotes were manipulated and misrepresented by Kennedy.  My two posts back then, Robert F. Kennedy Junior’s completely dishonest thimerosal article and Lies, damn lies, and quote mining showed the true meaning of (respectively) the Simpsonwood minutes and the IOM report.  Science isn’t decided by taking quotes from scientists (in or out of context), it is decided through experiment and publication, so even if the quotes had not been out of context it still wouldn’t have “proved” that Thimerosal causes autism (although it would have raised some serious questions). In actuality, all the article showed was that someone with a preconceived conclusion can dishonestly manipulate small pieces of out of context data to prove whatever they want, and that gullible people (many also with preconceived views) are likely to believe them.  Unfortunately, many still do.

I was reminded of the Kennedy/Thimerosal fiasco when I looked at the recent Climategate hacked emails. You know the ones. The leaked emails that proves, just proves I tell you, that global warming is a hoax, a conspiracy of lefty scientists, environmentalists and Al Gore.  I’m not going to repeat the whole story.  If you’re not familiar with the details read Climategate: the final nail in the coffin of 'Anthropogenic Global Warming'?  It’s written by proud libertarian James Delingpole, who (according to him) “writes brilliant books and brilliant articles” and “is right about everything,” so you know you can trust him.  Go read his article if you haven’t already read the quotes the Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGM) dissidents are so thrilled about.  He’s got them all.

The first thing I thought when I originally read those quotes was, “is that it?”  I mean, seriously.  The hacked emails are said to consist of 1073 emails, or about 1 million words in total.  Delingpole quotes more of these emails than most, and yet by my count only 506 words.  That’s 0.05% of the total. I can’t help wondering what’s in the other 99.95% of the words they don’t quote.  They’re ignoring 99.95%!  Presumably they aren’t as damming (if at all) as the 500 words Delingpole and many others have quoted (since presumably he pulled the “best” ones).  And these 500 words aren’t really all that damming anyway.  For example, much has been made of the phrase “I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick […] to hide the decline…”  Of course we all know that the word “trick” can often mean a shortcut, or a clever method of doing something, and doesn’t have to mean anything improper.  And even if that were not true, a cherry picked 0.05% of some hacked emails doesn’t magically change everything so that the planet isn’t warming anymore and glaciers aren’t melting now like they were before the emails were leaked.

And that would be true even if the phrase "hide the decline" actually meant hide a decline in temperatures, when in fact it referred to a decline in tree-ring density – yes, the anomaly was that temperatures had increased (global warming) while tree ring density had decreased. So not only was this quote out of context (a trick is not necessarily something wrong), and irrelevant (since the world is still warming, regardless), it’s also factually incorrect (in that it doesn’t refer to a decrease in temperatures) too.  To be wrong so many different ways takes some talent. (Actually, come to think of it, no it doesn’t.)

Back in June 2005, I decided to read the long Simpsonwood minutes and IOM report to determine for myself what they really meant.  It took, as I recall, a couple of weekends of my time. I’m not going to that much trouble this time, and instead I’m going to wait for the results of the independent investigation.  In the mean time, The Associated Press just got five reporters to examine the emails, as is reported in AP IMPACT: Science not faked, but not pretty.  In summary, they say the leaked emails don't undercut the vast body of evidence showing the world is warming because of human activity.

In looking at how the so-called AGW “skeptics” have reacted to these emails, I’m reminded of a post of mine from February, Global Warming Denial.  In it I referenced Denialism Blog’s What is Denialism.  Of the five general denier tactics, I see two being used here, namely conspiracy and cherry picking:

Conspiracy:

But how could it be possible, for instance, for every nearly every scientist in a field be working together to promote a falsehood? People who believe this is possible simply have no practical understanding of how science works as a discipline.

Nothing more need be added there, I think.

Selectivity (Cherry Picking)

Quote mining is also an example of "selective" argument, by using a statement out of context, just like using papers or data out of context, they are able to sow confusion.

Given the way these emails have been reported by the so-called skeptics, that paragraph is quite prescient. 

It’s clear that the AGW “skeptics” are in full AGW denier mode over this.  No science, no evidence that global warming isn’t happening; instead they cherry pick quotes out of context to claim a conspiracy of climate scientists to hide the “truth” about global warming.  Again, I refer you to my opening paragraph about how Robert F. Kennedy Jr. quote mined scientists to claim a conspiracy to hide the “truth”.  And in that case the scientists knew their words were being transcribed and would be published.  Imagine if Kennedy had been able to get his hands on some emails they thought would remain private.  In reality, all this shows that kooks of the right (AGW deniers) are no different in the way they behave from kooks of the left (Kennedy, et al). The ever reasonable Steven Novella calls for calm and a cautious approach from the AGW “skeptics”:

For global warming dissidents I recommend that you put your rhetoric in check. The witch-hunt frenzy so far in evidence cannot possibly serve you well. If it turns out there was real fraud at the CRU, you will still be criticized for being prematurely shrill and you will lose credibility. Also, the more extravagant your condemnations, the more likely it is that the reality will not be as bad as you are stating – and therefore even if some indiscretions come to light, you will have actually softened the blow because they will not be as bad as the worst hysterical claims. And of course, if it comes to light that no real fraud occurred, the credibility of AGW dissidents will have been dealt a severe blow.

Yeah, well good luck with that idea.  In my experience with AGW deniers, putting their rhetoric in check does not come naturally.  Or at all.  Furthermore, regardless of what the independent review reveals, I fully expect the AGW deniers (just like the mercury causes autism militia) to ignore any results that contradict their preconceived certainty that AGW is a fraud, and to smear anyone who does not agree with them.  In fact, it’s already happening: the smears are already in on the authors of the AP review I referenced above.  (Took less than a day.)  Pretty funny – the so called “skeptics,” who have in the past criticized me for not being skeptical enough about AGW, have showed absolutely zero skepticism before launching into full blown “AGW is dead” mode.  And for that, I call them “deniers” and make no apology for doing so.  It’s not ad hominem (as they will undoubtedly claim); it is a simple statement that describes the way they are behaving.

I’ll reserve my final opinion on the leaked emails until the independent review is in.  If it concludes that there was serious wrongdoing then I will certainly modify my opinion and comments to fit the new facts. But in the meantime, it isn’t clear if this is really Climategate or Deniergate (ie deniers overreaching).  I suspect the latter.  Unfortunately, although the scientists involved are going to be held to the highest standards (as they should be), the AGW deniers will get away with the usual logical fallacies, smears, lies and half truths.  Whatever the results of any independent review, you can bet that there will be no one calling for an investigation into any dishonesty or fraudulent activities of the AGW deniers over this story.  Whatever the result, they will get away with “Deniergate” (see if any news media outlet even uses that term, although they were quick to add a “gate” to “climate”).  And, of course, that's what they are relying on.

More Reading

The New Scientist: Why there's no sign of a climate conspiracy in hacked emails

Harry_read_me.txt: the climategate gun that does not smoke

RealClimate on The CRU hack

And finally, for some light relief, read Carbon Fixated’s Newtongate: the final nail in the coffin of Renaissance and Enlightenment ‘thinking’.  Gravity – what a hoax that was.

Where’s Skeptico?

Several people have emailed me to ask if I’m still here, if I’ve given up blogging, or what.  Of course, I’m touched that you all noticed.  The truth is, I’ve just been having trouble recently finding the motivation to write anything new.  I seem to have covered all the major topics I wanted to cover when I started this blog, plus many more (What The Bleep!? / The Secret) that I never even envisioned back in February 2005.  And now, when I see some more nonsense by, say, Bill Maher or Deepak Chopra, it looks like the same old crap I’ve debunked before, and that others (I’m looking at you Orac) have already done an excellent job of taking down already.  So I decided to take a break for a while. I’ve not gone away (as you can tell from the comments) and in fact I do have another brief post planned on astrology, as well as year 2 of The Golden Woos to consider. But it is true that I won’t be posting as often as before, at least for a while.

In the mean time I’ve decided to catch up on some reading, notably Why Evolution Is True and The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution – both excellent by the way. And I also have a book by Chris Hallquist - UFOs, Ghosts, and a Rising God: Debunking the Resurrection of Jesus - to read (and review Chris.  I know).

I’ve also been reading a lot of blogs.  For example, TechSkeptic just posted the latest Skeptics’ Circle. Here are a couple of others I found interesting recently – some of which you have probably read but a couple perhaps you haven’t.

First, check out Whirled Musings on the sweat lodge deaths at James Arthur Ray’s Sedona retreat: Sweat lodge deaths: is the heat on Secret star?  I’ve had differences with Whirled Musings’ Connie before, but I have to say that few are more persistent than she in debunking New Wage cults such as The Secret and its fellow travelers. This post is very long, with many additions as new information came in, but it is really worth a read.  A couple of snippets:

While investigators are still sorting out all of the factors that led to the deaths of two participants [now three; see Oct. 18 addendum below ~CLS], and the injuries of numerous others, at James Ray's recent Sedona disaster, it seems abundantly clear by now (at least to me) that the very nature of the retreat – and the manipulative techniques James Ray used – were factors in those deaths and injuries. Numerous accounts I have read said that even though participants were told they could leave whenever they wanted, those who recognized their limitations and tried to exit the sweat lodge were, in some cases, chided by James (he called one guy a "wimp") and they were encouraged to stay and experience the event "full-on."

Also, quoting the San Francisco Examiner:

People are flailing in seizures; others are vomiting violently, or foaming at the mouth. Bodies are lined up unconscious, some are blue from lack of oxygen, but for some it is too late, they are already dead. Survivors that are barely able to stand struggle to help the others, they have had almost no food or water for nearly three days, even longer without sleep. It looks like a war zone, but for the incongruent figure of James Arthur Ray (a contributing author to The Secret) who exits the sweat lodge and stands tall with a big smile, the only one able to stand on his own volition. He is not concerned with the medical emergency going on full swing around him. He is not worried about the health and well-being of his followers who have paid $10,000.00 (tack on an additional 5,000.00 or so if you include flights, room and board, and camping supplies) to attend his retreat. In fact, he and his team urge people to stop taking care of others and focus on their own journey, assuring them they are fine and only “purging”. Someone finally realizes James Ray is not in control of the situation and calls 911.

A new blog about genetic engineering that I have been reading is Biofortified.  There is certainly a lot of nonsense talked about genetic engineering, but the writers of Biofortified are refreshingly evidence based.  Check out Terminator 2: My Mission is to Protect You – on the subject of “terminator” technology and why it is not the evil bogeyman that the anti-GE people like to claim it is. In fact, although terminator technology is not actually in any commercially available GE crops, it is a part of some non GE crops including some organics:

There is a very widely used and accepted conventional analog of Terminator GURTs that most of us have eaten – they’re called Seedless Watermelons. These are generated by manipulating the number of chromosomes in watermelon cells to give them three copies of each chromosome instead of two. (For more on how this works, you can watch a video I made about it here.) The resulting “Triploid” Watermelons sponteneously abort their seeds, leaving a juicy, seedless fruit. The seeds have to be regenerated year after year from other plants, and farmers and consumers obviously cannot replant seeds that don’t even exist!

Ironically, while genetic engineering is not allowed in organic agriculture, Seedless watermelons are. Nevermind the fact that the chromosome numbers are artificially manipulated using chemicals – it appears that this early form of direct genetic manipulation has been grandfathered in.

My point in bringing up the seedless watermelon is this: It results in exactly the same thing as genetically engineered GURTs – and that is it effectively prevents the plant from generating fertile seeds. The argument is often made, most vociferously by Shiva, that GURTs are immoral because they interrupt the traditional practice of seed saving. Shiva and others must therefore agree that seedless watermelons are also immoral for the same reason. Why is there no call for a moratorium on seedless watermelons? Well, that would be the pits.

Keeping with the GE theme, Scienceblogs recently added Tomorrow’s Table, written by Pamela Ronald, Professor of Plant Pathology at the University of California, Davis.

And just so as you know I haven’t gone soft, I’ll link to Orac’s takedown of two wooful posts in (where else) The Huffington Post.  First, Bill Maher’s attempt to distance himself from the criticisms that he’s anti vaccine (where on Earth could we have ever gotten that idea?): Vaccination: A Conversation Worth Having. I’m not going into that post paragraph by paragraph (Orac has already done it – see Bill Maher flames out in a pyre of stupidity over vaccines—again), but I just wanted to highlight one line:

In addition, my audience is bright, they wouldn't refuse a flu shot because they heard me talk about it…

Oh no – the Oprah defense: I may be talking crap or I may not – it doesn’t matter because my readers will decide.  Come on Bill. Man up – either engage your critics with evidence and facts or shut the hell up, but quit hiding behind the skirts of your readers with this lame argument.

Finally, trust Deepak Chopra to chime in with more drivel just when we need it.  Orac responds with Deepak Chopra and his Choprawoo translated: "Skeptics, take my ill-informed speculations seriously!"  Sheesh, I may have to break my rule and award Chopra a Golden Woo after all.

Skeptico - A "Top Resource" in Astrology

Talk about missing the point.

I received this email from the email address of Ryan Flaherty, although confusingly it was signed Mark Cutler.  The subject was “love your site” – well, who could resist that?  Here’s the email:

Our website Sunlightfoundation.org is a Professional Database that is used by over 100,000 users in the astrological/psychic world monthly to seek  psychic or astrological advice. We make this possible by updating the information daily and keeping up to date on recent astrological news. We take pride in being one of the largest websites in the industry and take what our users and affiliates say into account to make this website much more user friendly. We recently ran a poll asking the users that are most familiar with the site what types of informational resources they use to keep up to date or even to simply find great information. Our users primarily are interested in blogs and websites Such as yours. I have reviewed your information and must say, I absolutely love the content you have made available to the public and would like to make your site a link on ours. I would like to offer you our Featured Resource badge that can be posted on your site, which recognizes you as a top resource in the psychic/astrology field or simply a text link within your site (Psychic Reading). I would also like to post your site in our resources page with a FULL banner to make your site  available to my thousands of users. Thanks again for the great information and I look forward to the great responses your site will receive from my users!

As you can imagine I was thrilled, not to say a little proud that I was being recognized as a top resource in astrology!  I figured that all my work in this area had finally paid off.  Excitedly, I replied:

Ryan:

I'm glad you like my blog.  Please feel free to link my site on yours.  You can use my blog url, or perhaps the url to just my astrology articles would be better:

http://skeptico.blogs.com/skeptico/astrology/

Please send me your Featured Resource badge, that you described in your email. It would be great to be recognized as a top resource in the psychic/astrology field, as you mention.

Several days have passed and yet I haven’t received my Featured Resource badge, as Ryan/Mark promised. I hope he hasn’t had second thoughts.  Nah – I’m sure it’s on its way.

Roseneau Is Projecting Again

He’s at it again.  Josh Rosenau has another post up On accommodationism.  He ends with:

…I've occasionally used the term "enabler" to describe the folks who oppose whatever accommodationism might be.

(Sigh.)

I called Josh on this piece of projection before.

Think about this.  Considering a drug addict, say - which is the enabler:

1. The one who helps the addict get drugs, lends him money to get drugs, who tells him drug addiction is not that bad, tells him you can do drugs and live a normal life, would never tell him to give up, or
2. The one who tells the addict to stop doing drugs, says doing drugs is stupid, hides his drugs, hides his drug money, points to studies saying drugs are bad, gets angry at the addict when he’s high.

Clearly the enabler is #1.

Now, question for the class, which one (# 1 or # 2 above), by analogy, is the accommodationist, and which the new atheist?

As I wrote in a comment on Josh’s blog:

“You (the accomodationists) tell the addict (religious believer) that their religious delusions are OK and totally not inconsistent with science at all.  You (the accomodationists) are the ones who actually do enable the addicts (religious believers) by providing them with their drugs (reasons why religion and science are compatible).  I realize you are acting out of love for the religious people you come into contact with, but in reality, you’re making the problem worse.  That’s up to you, but you really should stop this dishonest labeling of the non-accomodationists with what you are actually doing yourself. It’s called projection.”

Of course, Josh is under no obligation to respond to what I wrote, to justify his use of the word.  But, if he’s not going to respond, then he should at least have the intellectual honesty to stop parroting this nonsense.

Buffy and the Enablers of the NCSE

Scienceblogger Josh Rosenau has a post up where he claims that there are other valid ways of knowing, apart from science.  Regular readers will know that woos make this claim all the time, which is why I think this subject is pretty important.  So much so that I wrote about the fallacy that is The appeal to other ways of knowing - the claim that the tools of critical thinking and science are not sufficient to evaluate the believer’s claim; therefore the believer's claim has validity despite the lack of evidence for it.  It’s generally not worth making a new post about this every time someone mentions it, but Josh, as well as being a blogger with the generally awesome Scienceblogs, is also Public Information Project Director at the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), the organization that works to keep evolution in US public school science education.  So when Josh suggests that religion might provide one valid way of knowing, it’s relevant.   

Josh’s (first) post on this subject is On vampires and ways of knowing.  It was written in response to Jerry Coyne’s post How many “ways of knowing” are there? (which is how I found it).  You have to scroll down a few pages in Josh’s post before you get to where he starts to support his “other ways of knowing” argument.  If you read those two posts (especially Jerry’s), you’ll realize that what’s behind this discussion is the recent argument about so called “accommodationism” – the idea that science and religion need not conflict.  Accommodationists think that the “new atheists” with their harsh criticisms of religion, are making it harder to get people to accept evolution.  (I’m simplifying the discussion.  If you’re been reading PZ, Larry, Jason or Jerry Coyne, you’ll know what I’m talking about.)  The accomodationist stance does appear to be the NCSE’s position, although Josh’s post is not an official NCSE statement.

The reason for that preamble, is that before Josh gets to his “other ways of knowing” arguments, he takes a dig at the people who don’t approve of accommodation, or as Josh refers to them, “enablers”:

This is all part of the long and tedious battle between a clique of atheists who seem intent on enabling creationists in their muddling of the nature of science (enablers) and people who think it's possible for science and religion to exist without meaningful conflict (so-called accommodationists).  [My bold.]

He repeats this “enablers” wording later, and in comments.

First of all, you’ll note that Josh in no way demonstrates that the new atheists are “enabling creationists,” (he even says that they only “seem intent on…”) and yet he immediately follows by assuming his point is proven and henceforth labels the people he disagrees with as “enablers” – which is ad hominem, since he didn’t justify the wording.  As a further sign of his dishonesty, he doesn’t even use the much less pejorative (and more accurate) description of his own side, which would be “accommodationists.”  Instead he uses “so-called accommodationists.”  Weasel wording at best, and hardly a positive sign. 

More to the point, “enablers” seemed like a strange label to apply to the anti-accommodationist people.  It’s a specific term used by psychotherapists and the like, and has a specific meaning.  I looked up “enabler” in several places.  This one is fairly typical, where it defines enablers as people who:

…allow loved ones to behave in ways that are destructive. For example, an enabler wife of an alcoholic might continue to provide the husband with alcohol. A person might be an enabler of a gambler or compulsive spender by lending them money to get out of debt.

In this fashion, though the enabler may be acting out of love and trying to help or protect a person, he or she is actually making a chronic problem like an addiction worse. By continuing to lend money to the gambler, for example, the gambler doesn’t have to face the consequences of his actions. Someone is there to bail him out of trouble and continue to enable his behavior.

Looking at that explanation, it seems to me that if anything, the real enablers are the accommodationists.  Think about it.  They (the accommodationists) tell the addict (religious believer) that their religious delusions are OK and totally not inconsistent with science at all.  They (the accommodationists) are the ones who actually do enable the addicts (religious believers) by providing them with their drugs (rationalizations for belief in both religion and evolution).  They are certainly protecting religious believers from having to face the consequences of their beliefs.  I’ll leave you to decide which side is actually making a chronic problem worse.  Regardless of what you think, it’s pretty clear that Josh has made no attempt to justify calling his opponents enablers.  His argument by label is lazy and not a little sleazy.  And since he’s really describing what his side does, it’s actually also projection.  (Hey, I can do psycho-babble too.)

OK, so what are Josh’s other ways of knowing?  Essentially, it’s what we get from fiction:

…telling stories about vampires is a great way to convey certain truths about the world we all live in. These aren't truths that science can independently verify, but they are still true in a meaningful way.

No one should watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer they (sic) way they would watch a documentary, but they should certainly watch the show. It's brilliant, and it uses this exact sort of literary truth to tackle tricky subjects like drug addiction, spousal abuse, peer pressure, bullying, and the challenges of adolescence in late 20th century America with a sophistication and humor that would be impossible in any other form.

Oh dear.  It’s hard to believe a smart person could make such a bad argument.  He’s saying (and he further clarified this is the comments and in subsequent posts) that works of fiction tell us truths, make us think of things, or in a way, that perhaps we wouldn’t be able to otherwise.  Maybe, but he’s confusing a way of knowing something with a way of having it explained.  Reading fiction may be a way of understanding something – but it’s just an explanation of what is already known by some other means.  It’s not a way to determine what is true in the first place.

For example, in Buffy the Vampire Slayer, one of the characters gets so heavily into magic that it messes up her life.  Nothing else has meaning for her anymore, she lies to her friends, she puts herself and her friends in danger, nearly gets someone killed, damages her own physical and mental health.  This is obviously an allegory about drug addiction.  From this we learn that drug addiction is bad.  But we don’t know that drug addiction is bad from this episode of Buffy.  We know that drug addiction is bad from stories about drug addiction, from people we have known who were addicts, from reports on addiction etc.  We already knew this from some other way of knowing – one based on observation, verification and replication (aka “science”).  The fictional Buffy the Vampire Slayer just explains this – gets us to remember and understand these facts that were already known before by some other means.  But we only get the allegory, and register the fact that addiction is bad, because we already know addition addiction is bad.  If we didn’t already know addition addiction was bad, the allegory wouldn’t make sense.

Buffy also tells us things that are not true.  For example, that vampires exist.  And yet we don’t learn from Buffy that vampires exist - we already know they don’t.

Josh must know this, but he digs himself in deeper in one of his follow up posts, Defining terms:

To return, then, to ways of knowing, I'll define them as systematic methods of evaluating truth claims against new sources of knowledge

For once I agree.  But how do you use Buffy to evaluate the truth or otherwise of the statements:

1. Drug addiction is bad
2. Vampires exist.

You can’t do that from watching Buffy – you have to go outside of the fictional TV program, and check what they’re telling you against the real world.  That is, you must do some form of science (informally defined), to check what Buffy is telling you – to “know” what is true, if you like.  Therefore Buffy is not a way of knowing, by Josh’s own definition.

The peculiar irony here is that the talk Jerry is complaining about was delivered at DragonCon, a science fiction/fantasy convention filled with people celebrating the truth of unreal things. I didn't see Genie's talk because I was manning NCSE's booth, watching a parade of costumed fans wait in line to get autographs from William Shatner (James T. Kirk), Leonard Nimoy (Spock), Kate Mulgrew (Star Trek Voyager's Capt. Janeway), and Patrick Stewart (Jean-Luc Picard). These fans are devoted to the various incarnations of Star Trek, and were willing to spend $40-75 for just one signature from one of the Star Trek captains. And they don't all want the same signature. Some think Picard is the greatest captain in the Star Trek Universe, some think Kirk is the better captain, and a few prefer Janeway.

These, again, are truth claims…

Again, oh dear.  No, these are not truth claims.  These are opinions. 

In any event, science as a "way of knowing" does not produce truth. People have known that since the failure of logical positivism in the early 20th century; science can lead us away from untruths, and lets us narrow in on the truth, but science can only approach truth asymptotically, and rarely as any sort of smooth function. Furthermore, the truths that other "ways of knowing" aim to provide are of a different sort than scientific claims. As a scientific claim, "vampires fear crosses" is as meaningless as "Picard is a better captain than Kirk" or "The Cubs are the greatest team in baseball's history," and none of those is any more scientifically meaningful than "Jesus is my personal savior."  [My bold.]

Tell that to people who believe, literally, that Jesus is their personal savior.

"Picard is a better captain than Kirk" is an opinion only, not a scientific claim as Josh proposes.  "The Cubs are the greatest team in baseball's history," might be just an opinion, or perhaps it could be verified empirically by tabulating numbers of games won or lost, numbers of home runs scored or whatever.  Then it would be a scientific claim.  If it were, then it would clearly be more meaningful, scientifically, than the Jesus statement.  Either way, Josh is wrong again.

I like novels. I like TV. I like art. I like baseball. I think there is truth to be found in such endeavors, and I think any brush that sweeps away the enterprise of religion as a "way of knowing" must also sweep away art and a host of other human activities. I've tossed out the comparison before, and have yet to get any useful reply to it.

OK, here’s a reply.  Novels and art are not ways of knowing – they can be ways of explaining what is already known, ways to make us think, or pure entertainment only, but they are not ways of knowing.  So when we say religion is not a way of knowing, we clearly do not need to sweep away novels or art as a way of knowing, because they were not ways of knowing in the first place.

Novels and art do not usually make empirical claims.  In the rare cases where they do (for example, many people believe The Da Vinci Code is based on fact), those claims can be tested.  Where they are false, the claim can be dismissed, but that doesn’t require us to “sweep away” the rest of fiction that is just fiction. 

I hope those replies were useful.

Josh continued to defend his idea in comments, and in further posts.  (You should read the comments – most disagree with Josh.)  In one comment, Josh writes

How do we decide that some non-empirical ways of knowing are OK, while others are incompatible with science?

The only basis Coyne offers, and the only one I can recall being offered by other enablers, is that religion and science are incompatible because religions can make false empirical claims.

No, that’s not it.  The problem with religious ways of knowing are:

1. There is no basis for making most religious claims.  They were essentially made up, usually by ignorant ancient peoples with no idea of how the world actually works.  Some of these claims are actually known to be wrong, and
2. There is no mechanism to change religious claims when new information is discovered that shows they were wrong.  On the contrary, religious believers go to great lengths to cherry pick the things that they think supports their position, while ignoring what contradicts it.  And then they lie about the whole thing.

Obviously, science works in the exact opposite way from points 1 and 2 above.  It’s disturbing that someone who works for the NCSE (and blogs at Scienceblogs) doesn’t know this.

Jerry Coyne ends his post with:

As for “ways of knowing,” my response is always, “What do you find out? What do you “know”?  And how would you know if you were wrong? Was Jesus the son of God?  Christians’ “way of knowing” tells them, “Yes, of course!” But Islamic “ways of knowing” say, “No, of course not, and you’ll burn in hell if you believe that.”  Revelation, dogma, and scripture are not in fact ways of knowing; they are ways of believing.  There are no “truths” that religion can produce which are independent of truths derived from secular reason.

Precisely.  Josh’s piece is a totally muddled post relying on little more than equivocation between different things that can appear in fiction, compared to things you can find in religious texts.  He just took a blog post from someone he says is an evangelical Christian, and repeated that blogger’s points uncritically (and at great length).  It was such a poorly thought out piece that Josh wrote four more posts in the three days following the original one, to try to reply to criticisms raised in the comments and rescue the jumble of the original post.  Which wouldn’t matter if Josh were a regular blogger, but he’s Public Information Project Director at the National Center for Science Education!  While he does state that his blog is not official NCSE policy, it gives a worrying insight into the way they may be thinking.

In my view, the only interesting thing to come from Josh’s piece was the insight that the NCSE and other “so-called accommodationists” are enablers – that is, they’re enabling religious people to continue with their destructive delusions.  Apparently it’s a part of being codependent.  (I didn’t “know” that from Josh’s post, by the way.  I had to check external sources.)

Other bloggers on Josh’s post:

Jason Rosenhouse - Ways of Knowing

Ophelia Benson - Ways of whatting?

Blair Waffle Project

Via Ophelia I was unfortunate enough to find this piece of drivel written by British ex-PM Tony Blair, entitled Without God's Truth at its centre, no community can fulfil its potential.  Really?  “No community can fulfil its potential”?  None?  I guess the Danes and the Swedes must be pretty unfulfilled, then.  Oh wait, no they’re not!

But Blair doesn’t need facts, or even a valid argument.  See how he starts by invoking something he thinks we can all agree on - the recent financial crisis:

The limits to individualism are in one sense plain. We only need to contemplate the financial crisis to understand that the pursuit of maximum short-term profit, without proper regard to the communal good, is a mistake and leads to neither profit nor good.

A reasonable point to make.  Arguments could be made for this point or against it, and we could certainly compare their merits and decide if the pursuit of maximum short-term profit was to blame or not.  But Blair isn’t going this route.  Instead, the waffle starts:

Yet, at a deeper level, the case against a purely individualistic or materialistic philosophy has to be made. Young people today have access to technology, to opportunity, to experiences good and bad on a scale my generation never knew and my father's generation would find fantastical, like something out of science fiction.

“Yet, at a deeper level…”?  What does that even mean?  What “level” is he talking about?  Deeper than what?  Measured how?  Why does this case have to be made?  What does modern technology have to do with it?  Will Blair tell us?  Of course not.  His argument has no explanation (nor logic or evidence), just assertion:

The danger is clear: that pursuit of pleasure becomes an end in itself. It is here that faith can step in, can show us a proper sense of duty to others, responsibility for the world around us, and can lead us to, as the Holy Father calls it, caritas in veritate.

Of course – this is where faith can step in.  Obviously.  Because what we need is obviously to believe in more things that are not backed by evidence. That’s the ticket.  Accepting more things without a shred of evidence, or even in the teeth of evidence, is just what we need now.  After all, it worked so well in the past.  Note that Blair has shown absolutely no connection between this and the financial crisis he started his article with.

After the experience of fascism, Soviet Communism or viewing life in North Korea or the cultural revolution in China, it is easier for us to grasp the dangers of a too-powerful state.

Agreed.  Also, religiously controlled Iran, Saudi Arabia, The Taliban, Sudan...  And don’t forget, Hitler was religiously inspired.  No dangers of a too-powerful state there, no siree.  Phew, good job that faith “stepped in” to prevent the dangers of a too-powerful state.  Caritas in Veritate (Charity in Truth) my ass.

Of course, the regimes of Soviet Communism, China or North Korea were/are not exactly bastions of rationality and critical thinking either.  They were/are quasi religious regimes based largely on faith (no evidence their systems worked). They just required faith in something else, not the things Tony Blair has faith in, so that was the bad faith, not the good faith, right Tony?  Right.

But I would argue that even the concept of community has its limitations. We use the word in two senses: one to distinguish it from government, to emphasise civic society if you like; the other sense is just to describe the general community of public opinion. In politics, of course, especially in a democracy, "the people" are the boss; public opinion is to be courted and if not surrendered to, as (sic) least managed.

“The people" are the boss”?  Funny, I didn’t think the people of Britain supported the war in Iraq.  In what sense were the people “the boss” when that decision was being made?  But at least Blair admits that the only thing politicians have to do is manage public opinion, not actually, you know, listen to it in any way.  Otherwise known as spin.

Of course, Blair is saving up for his big finish, where faith and belief in god is the only thing that can save us:

It is here that Faith enlarges and enriches the idea of community. The recent Papal Encyclical is a remarkable document in many respects. It repays reading and re-reading. But one strand throughout it is a strong rejoinder to the notion of relativism, to the description of the human condition in society as just some amoral negotiation or set of compromises with modernity; or even just obedience to the majority opinion. Not that it is anti-technology or anti-modern; or indeed anti-democratic. But it widens and deepens the relationship between individuals and the community in which they live. It puts God's Truth at the centre of it. In one passage, it describes humanism devoid of faith as "inhuman humanism": "Without God, man neither knows which way to go, nor even understands who he is."

Blair’s catholic church had such a strong moral compass that it allowed multiple serial pedophiles to prey on innocent children in church while protecting the predators from the law, and the rape and molestation of thousands of children in over 250 catholic schools for decades.  Hey Tony, do those articles I just linked repay reading and re-reading too?  Caritas in Veritate.

Faith is such a good moral guidance that one in every 33 women who attend worship services regularly has been the target of sexual advances by a religious leader.  In what sense did faith enlarge and enrich the idea of community for those women?  Do tell.

Of course, I see it now.  The 9/11 hijackers were motivated only by “a purely individualistic or materialistic philosophy” and “pursuit of pleasure.”  If only they had had some religious faith instead, all that horror could have been avoided.  Yeah, what we need is more faith in the world.  How could I possibly have missed this obvious conclusion?

And this twit was Prime Minister? 

One Giant Embarrassment

Trust The Onion.  Two Bangladeshi newspapers recently took that statement quite literally, which was a big mistake.

The Onion recently ran a Moon landing conspiracy piece - Conspiracy Theorist Convinces Neil Armstrong Moon Landing Was Faked, featuring a spoof interview with Neil Armstrong, who supposedly only now realizes he had been fooled into thinking he had actually walked on the Moon:

According to Armstrong, he was forced to reconsider every single detail of the monumental journey after watching a few persuasive YouTube videos, and reading several blog posts on conspiracy theorist Ralph Coleman's website, OmissionControl.org.

"It only took a few hastily written paragraphs published by this passionate denier of mankind's so-called 'greatest technological achievement' for me to realize I had been living a lie, " said a visibly emotional Armstrong, addressing reporters at his home. "It has become painfully clear to me that on July 20, 1969, the Lunar Module under the control of my crew did not in fact travel 250,000 miles over eight days, touch down on the moon, and perform various experiments, ushering in a new era for humanity. Instead, the entire thing was filmed on a soundstage, most likely in New Mexico."

"This is the only logical interpretation of the numerous inconsistencies in the grainy, 40-year-old footage," Armstrong added.

More at the link.

Pretty funny.  Except that journalists and editors at a couple of Bangladeshi newspapers thought The Onion was a real news site, and the Armstrong interview was real. They re-published the story as though it were fact:

"We thought it was true so we printed it without checking," associate editor Hasanuzzuman Khan told the AFP news agency.

"We didn't know the Onion was not a real news site."

Hey, I’ve got a couple of other real news sites these newspapers could use as a source for their articles.  For example:

The Landover Baptist Church

The Society for DNA Free Food

Dihydrogen Monoxide Research

The British Veterinary Voodoo Society

I guess the moral is always check your sources.  And yes, I did check a couple of other sources before I wrote this post.