Friday, January 24, 2014

Ernst’s Law

By Edzard Ernst

Originally Published Saturday 23 November 2013

Some time ago, Andy Lewis formulated a notion which he called ‘Ernst’s law’. Initially, I felt this was a bit o.t.t., then it made me chuckle, and eventually it got me thinking: could there be some truth in it, and if so, why?

The ‘law’ stipulates that, if a scientist investigating alternative medicine is much liked by the majority of enthusiasts in this field, the scientist is not doing his/her job properly. In any other area of healthcare, such a ‘law’ would be absurd. Why then does it seem to make sense, at least to some degree, in alternative medicine? The differences between any area of conventional and alternative medicine are diverse and profound.

Take neurology, for instance: here we have an organ-system, anatomy, physiology, pathophysiology, etiology and nosology all related more or less specifically to this field and all based on facts, rigorous science and substantial evidence. None of this knowledge, science and evidence is static, but each has evolved and can be predicted to do so in future. What we knew about neurology 50 years ago, for example, was dramatically different from what we know today. Scientific discovery discoveries in neurology link up with the knowledge gathered in other areas of medicine to generate a (more or less) complete bigger picture.

In alternative medicine or any single branch thereof, we have no specific organ-system, anatomy, physiology, pathophysiology, etiology or nosology to speak of. We also have few notions that are transferable from one branch of alternative medicine to another – on the contrary, the assumptions of homeopathy, for example, are in overt contradiction to those of acupuncture which, in turn, are out of sync with those of reflexology, aromatherapy and Reiki.

Instead, each branch of alternative medicine has its own axioms that are largely detached from reality or, indeed, from the axioms of other branches of alternative medicine. In acupuncture, for instance, we have concepts such as yin and yang, qi, meridians and acupuncture points, and there is hardly any development of these concepts. This renders them akin to dogmas, and there is no chance in hell that the combination of all the branches of alternative medicine would add up to provide a sensible ‘bigger picture’.

If a scientist were to instill scientific, critical, progressive thought in a field like neurology, thus overthrowing current concepts and assumptions, they would be greeted with open arms among many like-minded researchers who all pursue the aim of advancing their field and contributing to the knowledge base by overturning wrong assumptions and discovering new truths. If researchers were to spend their time trying to analyse the concepts or treatments of alternative medicine, thus overthrowing current concepts and assumptions, they would not only not be appreciated by the majority of the experts working in this field, they would be castigated for their actions.

If a scientist dedicated decades of hard work to the rigorous assessment of alternative medicine, that person would become a thorn in the flesh of believers. Instead of welcoming him with open arms, some disappointed enthusiasts of alternative treatments might even pay for defaming them.

On the other hand, if a researcher merely misused the tools of science to confirm the implausible assumptions of alternative medicine, he would quickly become the celebrated ‘heroes’ of this field.

This is the bizarre phenomenon that ‘Ernst’s law’ seems to capture quite well – and this is why I believe the ‘law’ is worth more than a laugh and a chuckle. In fact, ‘Ernst’s law’ might even describe the depressing reality of retrograde thinking in alternative medicine more accurately than most of us care to admit.

What do readers feel? Their comments following this blog may well confirm or refute my theory.
_________________________________________________________________________________________

Edzard Ernst MD, PhD, FMedSci, FSB, FRCP, FRCPEd

Emeritus Professor, Exeter University

Dr. Ernst qualified as a physician in Germany in 1978 where he also completed his MD and PhD theses. He received hands-on training in acupuncture, autogenic training, herbalism, homoeopathy, massage therapy and spinal manipulation.

Later, he became Professor in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation (PMR) at Hannover Medical School and Head of the PMR Department at the University of Vienna. In 1993, he moved to the UK and became Chair in Complementary Medicine at the University of Exeter. He is founder/Editor-in-Chief of two medical journals (Perfusion and Focus on Alternative and Complementary Therapies).

He has published 48 books and more than 1000 articles in the peer-reviewed medical literature. His work has been awarded with 14 scientific prizes. In 1999, he took British nationality.

His research focussed on the critical evaluation of all aspects of alternative medicine. Unlike most of his colleagues, he does not aim to promote a particular therapy. His goal is to provide objective evidence and reliable information. It is fair to say that this ambition did not endear him to many quasi-religious believers in alternative medicine.

Healthy Skepticism is republishing selections from Dr. Ernst’s blog with permission. Please visit his website at http://edzardernst.com

You Will Be Assimilated. | Neurotic Physiology

Jan 24 2014 Published by scicurious under Academia, Uncategorized

Blame Bashir for this one.

In a previous post, I talked about how I wasn't yet free of academia. How it's still got hooks in me, in the form of papers that need to be published, and that won't get published until I get them out. Bashir noted that it was like Borg.

Borg, for those not familiar, are characters in the Star Trek universe. The most quoted phrase is 'resistance is futile, you will be assimilated.' Borg are partially cybernetic and act as part of a "hive" controlled by a queen. Like metallic, slightly slimy looking bees. But smarter (though I have always wondered why they have to look slimy). If you get assimilated into the Borg, it's very hard to leave, they give you all these cybernetic implants that influence your thoughts and dampen your feelings. Freeing someone from the Borg is a difficult experience, with lots of surgeries to remove the implants (for example your organs have to relearn how to function on their own). Often it's lifelong, and you are never truly free.

In particular, consider the character Seven of Nine, from Star Trek: Voyager. She was integrated into the Borg when she was 6. Grew up and lived her whole life as Borg. She then ends up on the Voyager, and they begin taking away her cybernetic implants. She begins to function on her own and build a life for herself. But some of the implants, esp the cortical node, can't really be removed well. She always has difficulty with some things, especially emotions. But she has some advantages as well, she can always sense Borg activity, for example.

(Seven of Nine. Pity her, she had emotional issues and had to wear a LOT of catsuits. Source)

De-assimilating from the Borg does, in a way, remind me of academia.

Obviously academia does not give you cybernetic implants in grad school (though if they are, they'd BETTER come with the health plan and a decent increase in stipend). But leaving academia and its culture behind can be jarring. I had been in it, in some way, my whole life. I believed that it was the best place. It is, in many ways, great. But it's also very much its own world. Some other careers may be similar, but I've only experienced this one.

There are so many things about academia that I have assimilated, and that, via slow and sometimes painful surgeries, I have to get rid of. Instead of cybernetic implants, maybe I shed them in a different way. Shreds of lab coat here, a nitrile glove there. A few examples:

1. I'm learning the outside way of behaving professionally. Emails in academia could get very passive aggressive or just out and out aggressive. Thankfully, it's a minority of people who do it, but in academia, that kind of behavior (along with other kinds of bad behavior) is often allowed to perpetuate, as long as the science is good. I know you don't do that on the outside. I know people who feel physically sick checking their email sometimes. I still catch myself questioning many emails I receive. Was it meant to be snarky? Is there another way to interpret that? What did I do? At the same time, though, I know I shouldn't need to be handled with kid gloves.
I also don't seem to know how to communicate casually, yet professionally. I alternate between hyper-formal, ultra passive prose, and one-liners. I know there's a happy medium in there somehow, but I'm still learning where it is.

2. I don't know when to quit. If you don't have every spare minute in academia filled (and by spare, I mean til at least 1am every night, a family can count as a hobby), you are not doing enough. Find more things to do. More projects, more grants, more papers. Outside, well, don't overload yourself! Because if you do, you do everything worse. Better to do less, and do it well. This is still a major, major shock to my system. My gut is always telling me to do more and more and more.

3. I don't know how to take criticism. Or rather, I know how I SHOULD take criticism. I know I do not take it well. This is odd, because I remember a time when I took criticism well. I did a lot of theater and music, it was something you HAD to take well. I took it, I improved, worked harder, fixed things, and did better. Sometime during grad school, however, criticism began to paralyze me. Every critique felt like a critique of me, as a scientist. Since a scientist was what I WAS, all criticism began to feel like criticism of me, as a person. Sometimes it was indeed phrased that way. You are careless. You are not smart enough, why don't you get this?! You are not focused.
I remember once, my aunt asked me what peer review was. I explained, and to show what I meant, handed her a review of one of my manuscripts. When she handed it back, she was on the verge of tears. She asked how they could be so mean to me. It was an accept with minor revisions. But it was full of things like "the authors do not grasp...", "the authors fail to state...", "the authors smell..." (ok, no). And I remembered when I first read that review. How my heart sank and my stomach hurt and my PI had to TELL me is was accepted. Because it surely did not say that anywhere on there.
Before academia, I would have taken criticism and said "I can be more careful, I will work on focus. Intelligence will just have to deal." But after academia...criticism still makes me work harder, but I first spend a period completely paralyzed by panic. Panic, gnawing self doubt, and shame. Why couldn't I do better? What's wrong with me? Why am I such a terrible person? Why am I not smart enough? Isn't there a way to make myself more careful, more smart? Outside of academia, I am relearning to take criticism. It is a long process.

4. When the professional is often personal. Not that there weren't professional standards in academia of course. But when all your colleagues are all your friends (and often your only friends) and are often also your significant others, well, things get mixed up. There were colleagues you couldn't work with because your friend had divorced them and it got ugly. And of course, you're all talking about work outside of work. Often, you feel like you don't know HOW to talk anything else but shop. Academia was my life. Soon you just become wrapped up in it, and everything else begins to lose importance. Outside, I've been relearning perspective.

5. You can be positive. So much of academia is based in criticism. It's important criticism. Science would not advance if we just said things looked nice and sent it along. You have to probe, you have to say "that's unacceptable with an n=3," you have to say "that explanation isn't adequate." It's incredibly important. But it also, over time, can make people really negative. Things you screw up become "how could you!?" and things you did right...well they were what you should be doing and deserve no praise. I've observed before that only academia could turn successes into mere not-failures. If you DIDN'T see something wrong with that talk you were just at, well obviously you don't know anything about the field! Too gullible! Cynicism makes you look smart.
This isn't the case outside. I love that I can be enthusiastic about my ideas...and that's ok! Other people are too! We work with ideas and refine them, rather than ripping them apart before building them again. The net result may end up the same. But the process is so much sunnier. Even when people don't like your idea, they say "well, I don't think we're interested in that," as opposed to "how could you attempt something so stupid." People are congratulated on their achievements...and you feel they HAVE done something good. Sure, it's your job, it's what you are supposed to be doing, but you're good at it, and that deserves praise. This, above everything else, has made me happy to be where I am.

I'm sure there are others, pieces of academia that I will shed over time. But I hope I keep the positive things. Seven of Nine could sense Borg. She could also act without panic in a crisis. I hope I will keep my academic remnants, my training, my questioning, my background and my ability to do research. I hope I will keep some of my cynicism, so I remember to look for the flaws and stick to careful interpretations. There are advantages to assimilation, after all.

The psychology of political parties: Why conservatives fall in line and liberals don’t

Thursday, Jan 23, 2014 08:15 AM EST

Research suggests liberals suffer from a sense of false uniqueness -- and they strive to maintain their difference

Sarah Estes and Jesse Graham, Scientific American

(Credit: istockphoto \ Iqoncept)

This article was originally published by Scientific American.

When he was President, Bill Clinton famously (and perhaps apocryphally) complained that getting Democrats to agree on a course of action was like herding cats, while the Republicans didn’t seem to have this problem. All political parties are large coalitions of people with varied interests and beliefs, but is it possible that ideological differences between the parties could play a decisive role here?

A new paper by researchers at New York University, in press at Psychological Science, suggests that the answer is yes. A large body of psychological research has shown that people tend to overestimate how much others share their beliefs, feelings, and practices. But this new research suggests that this is not the case for those on the left end of the political spectrum – in fact, it’s quite the opposite.
Conservatives and moderates overestimated the degree to which other conservatives and moderates were like them, while liberals assumed they were more unique among party peers than they actually were. This “liberal uniqueness” perceptive bias could help to explain why it’s harder to get Democrats to fall in line than it is for Republicans.

Led by Chadly Stern, the scientists begin by contrasting the conservative Tea Party movement, which has successfully organized its own congressional caucus, with the liberal Occupy Wall Street movement, which was hobbled by its inability to reach consensus on issues both large (what’s our agenda?) and small (how should we respond to the NYPD’s request to take down signs?). While group member similarities (in goals, beliefs, preferences, and personalities) are crucial for organizational success, the authors wondered whether perceptions of in-group similarities were just as important. In other words, maybe if group members only thought they were the same, the group would function better.

In the first study, hundreds of people online answered forty questions about preferences and beliefs, half of them political (“America should strive to strengthen its military”) and half non-political (“I like poetry”). They then estimated what percentage of study participants who share their political beliefs (political in-group members) would agree with them on each item – in other words, if you’re a conservative, and you indicated that you liked poetry, you then estimated what percentage of other conservatives in the study liked poetry as well. Stern and colleagues then compared those estimateswith the actual figues to determine whether each participant overestimated their similarity to their political in-group (false consensus) or underestimated it (false uniqueness).

Conservatives overestimated how similar their preferences were to those of other conservatives (false consensus), while liberals underestimated how similar their preferences were to those of other liberals (false uniqueness). Political moderates also overestimated their similarity to other moderates, in line with previous findings that people in general overestimate how much other people share their preferences and beliefs. This was the case for both political (e.g., military spending) and non-political (e.g., poetry) preferences.

The second study replicated the design of the first, with one twist: everyone also filled out the Need for Uniqueness scale, with questions like “If I must die let it be an unusual death rather than an ordinary death in bed.” Again, conservatives and moderates overestimated how similar they were to their political in-group, while liberals underestimated their similarity to their political in-group.
Further, these ideological differences were in part accounted for by people’s need for uniqueness – the more you expressed the desire to be different from those around you, the more you underestimated how similar you were. This suggests that liberals think they’re unique among liberals in part because they want to be unique.

Anyone who’s ever been part of a liberal counter-cultural clique will recognize this pressure to be unique, which can easily turn into an arms race. You’ve got a tattoo? Well, my skin is nothing but tattoos. You make artisanal pickles? Well, I make artisanal horseradish. You have a pet ferret? Well, I have a pet camel. And so on. But it’s this motivation to be unique – even among other liberals – that makes liberals alike. It’s a bit like the scene from Monty Python’s Life of Brian where a crowd of hundreds chants in unison: “Yes, we are all individuals! Yes, we are all different!”

While the findings make sense in light of ideological stereotypes like the gotta-be-different liberal hipster, or the conformist conservative soldier, they might not apply as well to contemporary American politics. These days you’re more likely to hear the “herding cats” phrase in reference to John Boehner’s attempts to reconcile the Tea Party faction with the rest of the Republicans in the House. It remains to be seen whether the conservative false consensus effect can lead to any real consensus in the GOP.

Scientists build ion-selective membrane for ultra-stable lithium sulfur batteries#nRlv

Scientists build ion-selective membrane for ultra-stable lithium sulfur batteries

Dec 24, 2013

IceCube neutrino detector is running hot

Now that we know how to find high energy neutrinos, we're seeing lots.

by Chris Lee - Jan 23 2014, 7:00am EST

The building that houses the IceCube servers.

USAP.gov

With the IceCube detector now in operation at the South Pole, the first results are starting to come in, and boy are they interesting. IceCube monitors a volume of one cubic kilometer of ice for muons, the byproduct of neutrinos colliding with the ice. What makes IceCube different is that it is looking especially for very high energy neutrinos. In the lower energy range, neutrinos are products of things generated very locally (in astronomical terms). Although these events are interesting, they swamp those that are produced at great distances, making it difficult to use neutrinos as a window into the Universe.

However, very distant and highly energetic events should produce neutrinos with a correspondingly high energy. If we can detect them, maybe they can tell us about those high-energy events. This idea is more than 30 years old—until now, the technology has simply not been up to the task.
IceCube consists of some 8000 photomultiplier tubes (light detectors), strung out on strings, buried under the ice of the Antarctic. Each photomultiplier tube contains its own data processing computer that provides some preliminary filtering and enables event signals to be synchronized to within 2ns.
These signals are then sent to a local computing center that sits at the center of the array (yes, in Antarctica), which does more processing before sending it out to the world.
Both the instrument and neutrino physics are exquisitely well understood, so the scientists working with the detector have just a single percent uncertainty in their models and another ten percent uncertainty in the instrumentation. Considering everything, that is a fine piece of hardware. However, even buried deeply in the ice, IceCube has a devil of a time finding the neutrinos it is looking for. The instrument records 2700 cosmic rays per second, and a locally produced neutrino turns up every six minutes. The cosmic signal, in contrast is ten neutrinos... per year.
After a fairly long run and a particular type of analysis, the collaboration running IceCube was rather confused; they hadn't found any neutrinos of interest yet. So they took a look inside their processing and found a particular type of event that was being incorrectly filtered out. The problem was an assumption about the energy range they were after.
At high energies (but not too high), a neutrino will tend to collide with an atom outside the volume occupied by the detectors. The resulting high energy muon streaks off like a meteor through the ice, losing energy through radiation, production of electrons and positrons, and other things. IceCube looks for these tracks and figures out where the neutrino came from. (It should be noted that some of these neutrinos have traveled through the entire Earth before being detected.)
Once you go to even higher energies, however, neutrinos that are detected are a result of collisions from within the detector. Again the muon motors off, causing havoc, but the event track began from within the detector volume—a pattern that the researchers initially excluded. They are now actually spotting neutrinos in the 1000TeV range (The LHC operates around 14TeV).
At these energies, the particles have quite a high probability of interacting with atoms, so they don't make it through the Earth; instead, they're detected quite close to the surface of the ice. Even better, because the tracks begin within the detector volume, the energy of the neutrinos can be calculated with high accuracy
After recognizing the problem, a reanalysis produced around 30 neutrinos, and many more are expected to be reported in May. The big question is whether these neutrinos are evenly distributed across the sky (as low energy neutrinos are), or if they have specific sources. At present, there is not enough data to say. As with any small data set, it has a few blobs that look like they may be specific sources, but we should expect those to disappear as more neutrinos are detected.

Pope Francis explains why the Internet is a 'gift from God'

Keith Wagstaff NBC News

21 hours ago

Twitter

Not as many followers as Justin Bieber, but not bad.

This pope has wasted no time in embracing the Internet.
A week after Jorge Mario Bergoglio was declared pope in a puff of white smoke in March, he sent out his first tweet as Pope Francis, which was retweeted 36,457 times. His account, @Pontifex, now has more than 3.5 million followers.

His predecessor, Pope Benedict XVI , also embraced social media, calling it "a great opportunity" for users to establish a "Christian-style presence" online. He started the papal Twitter account, launched a Vatican YouTube channel and even released a Facebook application called Pope2You.
Francis, despite not having a Twitter account as a cardinal, has praised the Internet as well, calling it a "gift from God" in a statement on Thursday. Still, the pope, like most people, has some reservations about our new digital age.

This pretty much sums up Twitter: "The speed with which information is communicated exceeds our capacity for reflection and judgement, and this does not make for more balanced and proper forms of self-expression."
On the Internet "filter bubble": "The variety of opinions being aired can be seen as helpful, but it also enables people to barricade themselves behind sources of information which only confirm their own wishes and ideas, or political and economic interests."
Beware, World of Warcraft players: "The desire for digital connectivity can have the effect of isolating us from our neighbours, from those closest to us."

Overall, however, the pope seemed bullish on the Internet. He certainly hasn't been shy in utilizing it, occasionally angering both conservatives and liberals with his 140-character messages. He angered the free-market crowd with tweets like this.
Some liberals, on the other hand, took offense on Wednesday when he tweeted this in support of an anti-abortion rally.
"While these drawbacks are real, they do not justify rejecting social media; rather, they remind us that communication is ultimately a human rather than technological achievement," he wrote. "It is not enough to be passersby on the digital highways, simply 'connected'; connections need to grow into true encounters."

Keith Wagstaff writes about technology for NBC News. He previously covered the tech beat for TIME's Techland and wrote about politics as a staff writer at TheWeek.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @kwagstaff and reach him by email at: Keith.Wagstaff@nbcuni.com

La. Teacher Tells Buddhist Student He's 'Stupid' And Bible is '100 Percent True'

By Allison Geller, Thu, January 23, 2014

The American Civil Liberties Union of Louisiana is suing the Sabine Parish School Board on behalf of a family who alleges that their son, a Buddhist, suffered from racial discrimination at his school. His teacher told students that Buddhists were “stupid” and led the class to laugh at him. The school regularly proselytized the Christian faith.

According to the ACLU complaint filed in the U.S. District Court in Louisiana, the main offender, science teacher Rita Roark at Negreet High School, teaches students that evolution is “impossible” while the Bible is “100 percent true.”

Roark’s science tests include questions like “"ISN'T IT AMAZING WHAT THE _____________ HAS MADE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" According to Scott Lane, the stepfather of “C.C.,” Roark marked his test wrong when he wrote “Lord Buddha” and “belittled him in front of the entire class” when he wrote nothing.

A student stated in class that "people are stupid if they think God is not real." Roark responded, "Yes! That is right! I had a student miss that on his test," to which the whole class laughed.

C.C, who is of Thai descent, has been a Buddhist his whole life. Yet he was subject to regular Christian prayer in class, religious iconography, Bible versus scrolling on the electronic marquee in front of the building, and a large picture of Jesus over the school’s main doors.

C.C.’s parents tried to bring up their complaints with school board superintendent Sarah Ebarb. Ebarb responded, “this is the Bible belt,” and advised C.C. to “change” his religion. She also suggested that the Lanes transfer C.C. to a school where “there are more Asians.” They did, in fact, transfer him—C.C. was having such bad anxiety at that it made him physically ill—but they encountered discrimination there, too.

"The treatment this child and his family have endured is not only disgraceful, it's unconstitutional," said Heather L. Weaver, senior staff attorney for the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief.

The U.S. Department of Education and U.S. Department of Justice will also investigate the school board at the ACLU’s request.

Sources: ACLU (2)

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