Media Watch - Science, pseudoscience and nonsense in the media

Myksyk

Didn't hear the Joe Duffy Show today but apparently there was a woman on who had some problem, and during her conversation with Joe she said that she had gone to 'that woman on the Late Late Show' (Maureen Mulligan of whom we spoke on previous threads). She said that she could not get to see her as she had taken on (or had requests from) something like 2,500 new clients since the LLS.

SIGH:dunno:

williamgrogan

The IT has an interesting article today that is evidence that simply giving poor people money is not a solution to their problems.

German report finds huge aid to east a failure
By Derek Scally in Berlin


GERMANY: The reconstruction of eastern Germany has been a €1.25 trillion failure that is dragging down the rest of the country with it, according to a government report.

The report, ....., says that yearly transfers to eastern states worth €90 billion - twice what Germany spends on education - are largely squandered.

......, reached the conclusion that the cash transfers may be actually doing more harm than good for the region, and for Germany as a whole.

.....

"The ongoing internal west-east transfer of cash and other consequences of German unification are directly or indirectly responsible for about two-thirds of the country's economic weakness," according to extracts from the report in Der Spiegel. "Western cities like Gelsenkirchen, itself plagued by unemployment, ......"

etc...

williamgrogan

Penn & Teller on Fx Channel.

Last night they went for the environmental movement and had extensive interviews with Dr Patrick Moore the founder of Greenpeace. He said that the movement had been hijacked by those with a political agenda and that they were grossly exaggerating the damage being done to the environment and as a consequence losing creditability. He said that the movement was now essentially a pro-socialist and anti business movement.

They tried (and to an extent succeeded) in portraying the environmental movement in the USA as middle class whites who liked to bang drums, dress up in colorful clothes and dance around the place but without any idea of what they were talking about. These activists bandied figures around and when pressed admitted that they didn’t actually know whether or not the figures were accurate.

I didn’t agree with their pov that Global Warming (even if it exists they said) may have nothing to do with mankind. They claimed that the evidence was not strong enough to prove this.

robindch

In the nonstop fight against terrorism -- now, there's a topic worth a skeptical moment -- the latest doses of collateral damage were found in Florida:

http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/West/03/27/psychic.plane.ap/index.html

<sigh>

- robin.

williamgrogan

You know what they say, the best way to ensure there isn't a bomb on your plane is to bring one on yourself. The chances that there will be two bombs on the same plane are extremely remote.

Isn't it funny, if you rang up and said there was a bomb on a plane but didn't mention that you were a psychic, you'd get jailed.

sextusempiricus

Originally posted by williamgrogan
The IT has an interesting article today that is evidence that simply giving poor people money is not a solution to their problems.

This is a very important point as more than 50% of the population support Overseas Development Aid and support Bertie Ahern's aspiration that such aid will reach the UN target of 0.7% of GNP by 2007. It is undoubtedly politically incorrect to question whether such aid actually helps poor people but sceptics should take up the challenge. After all the question of whether foreign aid generates growth in less developed countries is an empirical one. There is much evidence that it does positive harm. See for example the testimony of the Cato Institute, a free-market pressure group,to the U.S House of Representatives Committee on International Relations.
http://www.cato.org/testimony/ct-tc031397.html
or John Majewski's essay
http://www.theadvocates.org/freeman/8707maje.html
Strange that I had to look for criticism of aid in US websites. Are there any dissenting voices in this country?

williamgrogan

I have started a new thread on this. Because some people will see even questioning this as sacrilegious I would ask that those posting stick strictly to the points made.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?postid=1559642#post1559642

sextusempiricus

Michael Shermer in the most recent copy of 'Scientific American' (April, 2004) approvingly quotes H.L.Menken,

No one in this world, so far as I know ... has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the masses of plain people.

He then goes on to give two web sites to amuse skeptics and fool the gullible.

http://luminanti.com/goldenc.html

http://tachyon-energy-products.com

davros

Business & Finance April 8 - April 21 has a glowing profile of the BIOlamp, on sale from €220.

watty

This "biolamp" http://www.medicom.cz/medical/en/mbiolampa.htm seems to be more or less a traditional threputic Heat Lamp. Useful for some kinds of muscular pain and deep heat to underlying tissue.

Dangerous for untrained staff to use due to risk of burn.

The claims generally made by some makers / importers of devices called "biolamps" are simply daft.

Myksyk

I see in today's IT Health Supplement that the CEO of the Irish Heart Foundation has tried some alternative medical practices and thinks homeopathy has the most promise! Sigh.

davros

Top scientist gives backing to astrology

(Sunday Times)

sextusempiricus

With the Hollywood disaster movie, The Day After Tomorrow , about to hit our cinema screens at the end of the month, Bjorn Lomborg , author of 'The Skeptical Environmentalist' , takes a critical look at the underlying science (in the Sunday Telegraph of 9th May). The film as many will probably be aware shows the effects of global warming and the melting of the polar ice-cap with a consequent tidal-wave and new Ice-Age. The bad guy of the film is the vice-president who rejects the Kyoto Protocol as too expensive. The article by Lomborg can be seen at
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?ml=%2Fopinion%2F2004%2F05%2F09%2Fdo0903.xml
Just enter 'bjorn lomborg' on the search engine.
The film's assumptions, according to their web-site, seem to be based on a secret Pentagon report warning that climate change would

lead to global catastrophe costing millions of lives

However, as Lomborg writes, this is a worst-case scenario, that has been bebunked in the magazine Science (Vol 304, Issue 5669, 400-402 16th April 2004). He susequently argues that

Implementing the Kyoto agreement on climate change would cost at least $150 billion each year, yet would do no more than postpone global warming for six years by 2100.

He queries whether such huge amounts spent on an effort to delay the effects of global warming by such a small amount is cost-effective.

For the cost of implementing Kyoto in just one year, we could permanently provide drinking water and sanitation to everyone on the planet.

He argues that the world needs a rational basis for making the right policy choices with limited resources. His article is really by way of introducing us to his new project the Copenhagen Consensus which brings together nine economists, 4 Nobel prize winners, to look at 10 great challenges facing the world and perhaps come up with the facts that help us make the wisest choices.
http://www.Copenhagenconsensus.com
Any views?

davros

The Irish Times Health Supplement on Tuesday always has a little Q&A with some figure from the health world. This question always features:

Do you use alternative medicine/therapies?

Until last week, the answer has usually been along the lines of "I haven't needed to" or "No, but I'm open to it".

Last week, Harry Kennedy, a forensic psychiatrist, gave the answer I've been waiting for:

Fools and their money... I am a paid-up member of quack-busters.

Contrast that with this week's response from Seamus Feely, Secretary General of the Irish Pharmaceutical Union (:eek:):

I have tried yoga, reiki and reflexology.

williamgrogan

Regarding the IPU, why does that surprise you? Many of his members make mega bucks selling quack medicine.

In fact that leads me to think, what group of people make most money from Homeopathy, Herbal, Supplementary & Vitamin sales in Ireland?

IPU members by any chance?

Barnowl

William Grogan is on the ball. Pharmacies are major offenders in the marketing of all kinds of snakeoil. The proprieters become very agitated when challenged. I had some fun recently raising queries as to the effectiveness of magnets on sale in one shop at exhorbitant prices.

With regard to Davros's comments on the Irish Times "on the couch" articles that pose the question on alternative medicine use, the answers from the earlier pieces are reprinted in the latest Irish Skeptics Society newsletter, Skeptical Times, which is available from today. Check the website at www.irishskeptics.net if you are interested in obtaining a copy.

davros

Originally posted by Barnowl
Pharmacies are major offenders in the marketing of all kinds of snakeoil.

Wouldn't it be terrible if they were deregulated? Imagine, unqualified people selling who knows what to the general public.

Barnowl

The mind boggles. Maybe the impending registration of alternative practitioners will precipitate a mass evacuation from registers of current mainstream professionals! Think how free they will feel away from all those nasty threats of sanctions etc.

williamgrogan

Now lets not exaggerate, charging people with cancer €20,000 to shine light on them can't do any harm can it? I mean it's a free world, isn't it?



PS

Maybe it might turn out that shining light on your skin causes a chemical reaction on certain areas that have more skin than others that might release a hormone that makes your hair grow back?

Myksyk

Just back from hols but kept an eye on The IT and saw psychiatrist Dr. Michael Corry's article on depression followed by a series of letters to the editor including two from Paul O'Donoghue. Corry came across with anti-psychiatry statements which is all fine and well but only lightly alluded to some of the nonsensical ideas he himself propounds. For example, in a case study in his book 'GOING MAD: understanding mental illness' he suggests that the person's problems (depression as I recall) are because she lost a child in a previous life. A host of other problems are related to imbalances etc in people's chakras.

He paints psychiatrists in a very one-dimensional light ... straw men, suggesting they take positions which in my experience they rarely if ever do. He suggests that the idea that depression might be contributed to by life experiences or psychosocial factors etc comes as a seismic shock to the medics ... what rubbish. I know of no medic who take that position. IMHO, his black and white arguments with hints of big-industry conspiracy are of virtually no use in discussions about the complex area of deprerssion, its cause and treatments.

janitor

I'm glad someone else noticed that Dr Corry's article was suspect to say the least. His suggestions that depression is caused by bad experiences alone; that winning the lottery can cure depression; and that antidepressant drugs are 'pyschic enegizers' surprised me. How can the Irish Times print this stuff? I would very much like to know what the gist of the letters in reply were.

Poisonwood

I see that Paul O'Donoghue had another letter in the Times yesterday about yet another article in the Health Supplement by Dr. Corry. I have to get a look at that 'Going Mad' book (won't buy it tho'!:)). It sounds pretty off-the-wall!

Myksyk

Yeah ... good letter in the Times. And yes, the Corry book is a bizarre collection of ideas about mental illness.

janitor

In an otherwise laudable book,'When Panic Attacks', Dr Aine Tubridy - Corry's co-author- says that people who suffer from anxiety disorder may have had a bad experience in a past life, and that this could be the trigger for the attacks.
She also propounds the chakra system but at least has the good sense to say you can skip that chapter if it's not for you.
Can't help but feel that this sort of nonsense undermines everything else she has to say- not a good thing for someone looking for help with their condition.

Myksyk

Heard the briefest bit of some programme on 2fm this morning with some medium talking to the dead for people. Anyone hear the whole thing?