I’m loving the Non Sequiturs about Danae setting up her think tank.
I think Wiley must be reading the blog. Stop lurking and show yourself!
Denialism Blog
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Wiley Miller on think tanks
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Fire Blackwater
Have people seen the coverage of these Blackwater hearings?
The police officer, whom CNN is identifying only as Sarhan, said the Blackwater guards “seemed nervous” as they entered the square, throwing water bottles at the Iraqi police posted there and driving in the wrong direction. He said traffic police halted civilian traffic to clear the way for the Blackwater team.
Then, he said, the guards fired five or six shots in an apparent attempt to scare people away, but one of the rounds struck a car and killed a young man who was sitting next to his mother, a doctor.
Sarhan said he and an undercover Iraqi police officer ran to the car but they were unable to stop it from rolling forward toward the Blackwater convoy.
“I wanted to get his mother out, but could not because she was holding her son tight and did not want to let him go,” Sarhan said. “They immediately opened heavy fire at us.”
“Each of their four vehicles opened heavy fire in all directions, they shot and killed everyone in cars facing them and people standing on the street,” Sarhan said.
The shooting lasted about 20 minutes, he said.
“When it was over we were looking around and about 15 cars had been destroyed, the bodies of the killed were strewn on the pavements and road.”
Sarhan said no one ever fired at the Blackwater team.
“They became the terrorists, not attacked by the terrorists,” he said.
“I saw parts of the woman’s head flying in front of me, blow up and then her entire body was charred,” he said. “What do you expect my reaction to be? Are they protecting the country? No. If I had a weapon I would have shot at them.”
Mohammed Abdul Razzaq was driving into Nusoor Square with his sister, her three children and his 9-year-old son Ali at the same time the Blackwater team arrived.
“They gestured stop, so we all stopped,” Razzaq said. “It’s a secure area so we thought it will be the usual, we would stop for a bit as convoys pass. Shortly after that they opened heavy fire randomly at the cars with no exception.”
“My son was sitting behind me,” he said. “He was shot in the head and his brains were all over the back of the car.”
Further, the evidence is that they are violating their rules of engagement routinely:
Records of the company and State Department show Blackwater’s use of force in Iraq has been “frequent and extensive,” the report says.
Though Blackwater is authorized to use force only defensively, “the vast majority of Blackwater weapons discharges are pre-emptive, with Blackwater forces firing first at a vehicle or suspicious individual prior to receiving any fire,” the report states.
And then covering it up:
The senior Iraqi police officer said Blackwater team members were questioned by Iraqi police immediately after the incident. The contractors first said they opened fire in response to a mortar attack, the officer said. However, the contractors then changed their story at least twice during the 90 minutes they were held, the officer said.
Iraqi police released a video of the aftermath of the shooting which shows a car that had damage consistent with a rocket-propelled grenade.
The video shows what appears to be the spent casing of a rifle-fired grenade, and the embassy source said the Blackwater guards were armed with a rifle-fired M-203 grenade.
The embassy source said a New York Times story reporting investigators were told that at least one guard drew a weapon on a fellow guard who did not stop shooting after colleagues called for a cease-fire was “pretty much true.”
These mercenaries (contractors is a pathetic euphemism) have been abusing their authority and killing civilians without provocation. Blackwater is war-profiteering and making things worse for the Americans and Iraqis. How about some jail time? Not just for the killers but for the CEO Erik Prince too.
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Sheril takes apart the latest environmental scaremongering nonsense
I too gagged when I saw this nonsense story from the Center for American Progress listing 100 things we’ll lose with global warming. Sheril takes it apart for us, and I’m thankful.
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A cartoon summary of the Denialist Deck of Cards
PZ has found this wonderful cartoon that I think sums up the problem nicely.
Danae should go to work for AEI or Cato!
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The DI has discovered Ioannidis too!
I realize it’s fundamental to being a crank, but the persecution complex of the IDers is getting really old. The latest is Bruce Chapman at Evolution News and Views, who no longer satisfied with grasping at the mantle of Galileo, is now groping for Semmelweis and Lister as well. The idea being, as usual, if science has been slow to accept the theories of people in the past, surely the same flaws must be preventing ID from being accepted. Never mind that these other scientists actually had things like data or evidence, or did rather fantastic things like reduce the death rates in maternity wards by 90%. Further the word “persecution” in this case largely consists of not being immediately believed. Long gone are the days in which persecution meant being crucified or thrown to the lions. Nowadays, persecution apparently means actually having to provide proof for what you say. Oh the humanity!
It’s just the same old Galileo Gambit being recycled to include new martyrs, who if alive today would laugh just as heartily at what the DI calls science as we do.
While nothing in this essay is new to anyone who has read Thomas Kuhn, I noticed that embedded in this little tail of hyperbole and whining was a reference to Ioannidis’ work! This, of course, elevated this tired rehash of creationist nonsense from the ignore pile to the proof-that-I-was-right pile. I always knew the cranks would one day find Ioannidis’ work and use it for the benefit of their Galileo Gambits.
Robert Lee Hotz in the “Science Journal” column of The Wall Street Journal two weeks ago called attention to what you might call a “study of studies” that was conducted by Dr. John Ioannidis, an epidemiologist in Greece and at Tufts University (in Massachusetts). After examining 432 published research reports from science journals (peer reviewed reports, for those of you who entertain the superstition that peer review is some kind of academic prophylactic), Ioannidis wrote in the Journal of the American Medical Association that “There is an increasing concern that in modern research, false findings may be the majority or even the vast majority of published research claims.”
Mr. Hotz writes that an earlier essay by Dr. Ioannidis in the journal PLoS Medicine, “Why Most Published Research Findings are False” is “the most downloaded paper the journal PLoS has ever published.” Here it is, in case you are interested.
Mainstream journals have to correct errors after publication, which, of course, is just good practice and fully in the spirit of sound science. Some papers (all peer-reviewed, remember) are retracted. However, many that are shown to be flat wrong on any number of grounds simply sit out there, uncontested. Why? Might not the sloppiness have something to do with greed? The federal government is funding scientific research like never before, and, of course it is never enough. The checks on quality seem deficient, since the people who vote the funds and many who administer them are not conversant with the scientific issues.
The DI, however, is late, as the global warming and HIV/AIDS cranks found and used his research first (for my coverage of Ioannidis see this post). The fundamental misunderstanding this crank makes is that Ioannidis doesn’t show that previous papers were fraudulent, he merely shows that many effects that appear in the literature aren’t replicated. It’s a big difference. The data were real, they were just irrelevant. It’s a problem of statistical significance. If a p < 0.05 is considered significant, a false positive effect will still appear real, and significant, about 5% of the time. Take that into account, along with the file-drawer effect and the reluctance of journals to publish negative results, and inevitably, the literature gets contaminated with a large number of false-positive results. These results should not be retracted, or disavowed, because the data are actually real. There wasn’t fabrication, nor necessarily sloppiness. False positives are bound to occur with the limitations of biomedical research, which is why you don’t consider single papers in isolation, but instead evaluate the literature as a whole.
The redeeming feature of science is repetition. And the mere fact that Ioannidis could do this study shows that ultimately these incorrect results were not replicated, and the literature was corrected. It should also be noted that this is largely an effect in biomedical research because of problems of human studies, variability in biological effects, costs etc. It is largely irrelevant for other scientific fields which aren’t (usually) limited by things like how many cases of say, ankylosing spondylitis you can find within the time limits of a study. There’s a big difference between a gene-association study in which researchers try to link a single-nucleotide polymorphism to a multi-factorial human disease and the types of observations that are made in physics. Further, even if this research did apply, replication saves the day. The problem with evolution isn’t that it hasn’t been sufficiently studied and replicated and confirmed across multiple different species, locations and times. Evolution has been replicated and found to be consistent in every context in which it has been studied; it is the strongest kind of theory.
So nice try DI. The mixed Galileo/Ioannidis attack is truly on the leading edge of crank attacks on science, yet like all the other cranks that have attempted the link, they once again fail to understand their source material.
Update – John P.A. Ioannidis responds after I sent him links to cranks using his work.
This is a very important issue that you are raising. I was not aware of this, but it is hard to understand how some people may use my work to fuel attacks against science per se. HIV/AIDS denialism, global warming denialism, and evolution denialism/intelligent design have nothing to do with science, they are dogmas that depend on beliefs, not on empirical observation and replication/refutation thereof. Perhaps we should just take it for granted that such “currents” may try to use anything to support their views. I think that one of the strongest advantages of science is that its propositions can be tested empirically and they can be replicated, but also refuted and contradicted, and improved. Obviously, this cannot be the case with any dogma, so all my research makes absolutely no sense in the setting of dogmatic belief. Science should gain respect in the wider public, especially because of its willingness to test and refute its hypotheses, in contrast to any type of dogma. In a letter to PLoSMed following my 2005 paper (2007;4:e215), I recently clarified that “Scientific investigation is the noblest pursuit. I think we can improve the respect of the public for researchers by showing how difficult success is.” Obviously this has nothing to do with dogma (religious, political, corporate, or otherwise) that really needs no hard work and by definition cannot be countered in its absurdity.
Well, he may be shocked, but I’m not. It’s part of a paradoxical behavior of the crank. While on the one hand they struggle futilely for scientific recognition of nonsense, they simultaneously try to drag science down by any means necessary to try to lower it to the level of their own discourse. Someone who is actually interested in science and is not “anti-science” as the title of this essay suggests biologists are, wouldn’t be interested in smearing the reputation of science and the integrity of the process. A sure sign of a crank is one who rejoices in every perceived mistake or slight against science, as they mistakenly believe it makes their nonsense appear more legitimate.
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Speaking of making stuff up
Next for “making up disease” files, Ed Brayton brings us news of the latest crank idea from the masturbation-obsessed nuts over at World Nut Daily. It’s the new plague of masturbation-induced impotence.
Pornographically Induced Impotence is now a national pandemic, raking in untold billions for pornographers and their satellite businesses as well as from the marital discord and despair it produces.
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Men are “visually wired,” Feldhahn explained. Their images of women stretch “back to his teenage years, and any one of the pictures is going to pop up at any time in his brain without warning.”In 1981, Hefner biographer Gay Talese wrote that “Hef’s” influence reached out to “the central nervous system of Playboy readers nationwide.”
And, that “central nervous system” included “images” popping up and stretching “back to teenage years.” By 2005, some estimated impotence at roughly 50 percent of men.
What percentage suffer from pornographically induced impotence is unknown. For pornography emasculates indiscriminately. It castrates men of every race, religion and “orientation,” atheist and orthodox, rich and poor, conservative and radical, young and old, svelte and paunchy, handsome and unappealing, scientist and sky cap, the clever and the obtuse, en masse.
Pornographically Induced Impotence once kept men and boys breathlessly awaiting each month’s “new” fantasy images. The Internet means they wait no more.
Good news for the sex business, sexologists and Big Pharma!
Men conditioned since boyhood to use erototoxins blame their wives, girlfriends, women for their own waning libido.
Pornographically Induce Impotence? Erototoxins? This is my new favorite woo. The idea that exposure to nudity, or masturbation, somehow decreases male libido. Well, maybe temporarily, but still, this is hysterical. To top it off this loony also suggests, and this really is great, that not only are naked women bad for men’s libido but that the cartoons in Playboy may be even worse!
But even psychologist Bernie Zilbergeld warned that Playboy encouraged impotence in their consumers:
“Humor is the basic source of education. … Cartoons that poke fun at impotence or other male inadequacies … would outweigh any supportive things said in the advice column. Cartoons are simply more compelling. Some things are.”
Well doc, ever since I saw that cartoon making fun of men who take Viagra, I just haven’t been able to satisfy the missus. It’s something else, those cartoons. I once saw a Far Side cartoon mocking the near-sighted and I went blind for a week.
I look forward to more breathless reports about this emerging epidemic of pornography-induced impotence. It’s sure to hit the mainstream literature on sexuality right after the proof that masturbation also causes hairy-palms and blindness.
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Can You Really Strangle Yourself Getting out of Handcuffs?
I thought for sure the idiotic slugs that pass for security in our airports had mishandled this woman resulting in her death when they said she strangled herself while trying to escape from handcuffs. However, Slate reports indeed you can manage to screw up this maneuver and contort yourself into such a position. They also linked this video
showing how the double-jointed might attempt this maneuver, while warning people not to try it at home with handcuffs and asphyxiate themselves like this woman did.
Not that I’m saying this lets the cops entirely off the hook, but I have to admit surprise that it’s possible for some people to bring their hands over their head that way.
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Preying on the fears of pregnant women
Here’s some woo for you. Via Gizmodo we hear about this wonderful new waste of money, Mummywraps. Designed to protect your baby from “electro-smog”, the non-existent threat of electromagnetic waves from radio and cell phone sources (that we have been exposed to constantly for decades with no discernible effect), these copper “Swiss Shield” garments will be sure to be a profitable waste of money ($70) for thousands of paranoid parents.
Ben Goldacre I think has been on the forefront of challenging this new electrosmog woo, so there is very little to add. But it is simply shameful how people are willing to exploit the well-intentioned paranoia of expectant mothers about the health of their fetuses with such nonsense. I’m never surprised of course, but always disappointed.
Of course if you would like to make a few million dollars I can highly recommend imagining something new for people with children to be afraid of, and then convincing them only your product can protect them. My product idea is a special tinfoil hat, designed to block cosmic rays from penetrating your body and mutating your precious offspring.
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Only 250 Comments Away
I’d just comment like nuts if I were eligible for the 500,000th comment contest.
Call this an open thread. Go nuts! I’m too busy writing to blog anyway.
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WSJ on Billboard Advertising Battles
The Journal’s Cynthia Crossen gives an overview of political battles surrounding billboard advertising today. An interesting read, in part because billboard advertising lobbyists have been pretty shameless in their political advocacy. I remember that when I lived in Georgia, they wanted to lop off the tops of trees so that billboards could be better seen. In order to get around regulations that distanced billboards from the roads, the industry created megabillboards that were huge. And they argued that billboards actually improved roadway safety because it gave drivers an interruption from the monotony of driving (one could see how that cuts both ways!).
Anyway, this article demonstrates some of the tensions between those who find them vulgar, and those who think banning them is a form of legislating beauty.
The battle between billboard lovers and haters simmered for half a century before reaching a climax in 1965, when Lady Bird Johnson persuaded Congress to pass the Highway Beautification Act…
Under the law, which applies only to highways that receive federal aid, states must maintain “effective control” over advertising on their highways. Billboards visible from the highway in “scenic” areas are prohibited, although land zoned commercial or industrial is exempt.
Outdoor advertisers lobbied heavily against the bill. Walter S. Meyers, an executive with a company that owned 60,000 billboards across the U.S., argued that the law would limit the freedom of the motorist to choose where he wanted to spend the night, where he wanted to eat and what kind of gasoline he wanted to buy. “Most repugnant,” Mr. Meyers said, was the idea that some people wanted to codify beauty. “They would have their standards of taste and art enforced by the government.”
[…]
The U.S. Supreme Court revisited the issue in 1981. Nine years earlier, the city of San Diego had effectively banned most billboards, and an outdoor advertising company, Metromedia, sued. But California’s highest court ruled for the city. “To hold that a city cannot prohibit off-site commercial billboards for the purpose of protecting and preserving the beauty of the environment is to succumb to a bleak materialism,” wrote Justice Matthew Tobriner.
The Supreme Court reversed that ruling on First and Fourteenth Amendment grounds, noting that “valuable commercial, political and social information is communicated to the public through the use of outdoor advertising. Many businesses and politicians rely upon outdoor advertising because other forms of advertising are insufficient, inappropriate and prohibitively expensive.”
Today, billboards are becoming digitized, and they’re bigger, brighter and more profitable than the old poster boards. Electronic billboards can change messages every few seconds, making it possible to sell the same space to multiple advertisers.
“Outdoor advertising is great,” boasted Clear Channel Outdoor in a recent news release, “because you can’t turn it off, throw it away or click on the next page.”
Clear Channel’s point–that you can’t turn off their message–is one that opens the door to privacy issues in billboard advertising. What? Billboards an invasion of privacy? It’s worth reading this essay by ad man Howard Gossage on the subject.