Archive for the 'Pseudoscience' Category

Oct 04 2018

Evolution Under Attack

As an American it’s very easy to look at issues from a narrow American-centric view (we have a well-earned reputation for this). I am often reminded of this by my many international SGU listeners, and I have had to discipline myself to keep this in mind.

For example, when it comes to teaching science in public schools, I do, of course, feel the most responsibility for my own backyard, but this is an important issue everywhere. But this is an issue in many countries, not just the US. Recent reports indicate that the teaching of evolution is under attack in Israel and Turkey. The Guardian also reports:

This news follows the astonishing statements made by India’s minister for higher education earlier this year. Satyapal Singh claimed Darwin was “scientifically wrong”, and is demanding that the theory of evolution be removed from school curriculums because no one “ever saw an ape turning into a human being”.

India has 1.35 billion people, which is 17.7% of the world population. (China is 1.4 billion, 18.5% – so India and China combined have 36.2% of the world population). I think it’s reasonable to say that it matters what happens in these countries, especially with our increasingly globalized world. Our efforts to curb climate change depend on cooperation from China and India, and having a scientifically literate population will help these efforts.

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Aug 13 2018

Dunning Kruger Effect and Anti-Vaccine Attitudes

One of the persistent themes of this blog is that expertise matters. This is not to say the experts are always right (sometimes they disagree with each-other), and there is also a range of expertise, and different kinds of experts can have different biases and blind spots. But all things considered, someone who has formal expertise on a specific topic is likely to know much more about that topic than someone who has read about it on the internet.

Further, most people underestimate the amount of knowledge that exists on a topic, and therefore the vast gulf of knowledge that exists between them and the experts. In fact, the more someone knows about a topic the more they understand how much is known, and the more humble they tend to be with respect to their own knowledge. The flip side of this – people who know little tend to overestimate their relative knowledge – is an established psychological phenomenon known as the Dunning-Kruger effect.

Operationally Dunning and Kruger found in their study that the lower someone performed on a test of knowledge, the greater the gap between their perceived knowledge and performance and their actual performance. At around the 80th percentile and above, people tend to underestimate their relative knowledge. Below that point they tend to increasingly overestimate it, and everyone thinks they are above 50%.

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Jul 05 2018

Quantum Woo in Parapsychology

Published by under Pseudoscience

Etzel Cardeña has published an extensive review of parapsychology concluding that it is both plausible and supported by evidence. It stands, in my opinion, as an excellent example of everything that is wrong with psi research. There is a lot of meat to go through, but I want to focus in this article on his use of quantum mechanics to justify the plausibility of ESP and psi phenomena.

Psi, or anomalous cognition, is a group of alleged phenomena that include sensing what other people are thinking, viewing remote locations not accessible to the normal senses, and predicting the future in some way. These claims are inherently implausible because there is no way to account for them with known phenomena. They appear, therefore, to violate well-established laws of physics. Therefore, any reasonable scientists would argue, the threshold of evidence needed before concluding that a psi phenomenon is real should be very high. What we have is very low-grade evidence at best, therefore it is reasonable to reject claims for psi.

Psi proponents, therefore, attack the two pillars of this rejection – that psi is implausible, and that the evidence is low-grade. Cardeña is no exception, and that is precisely what he is trying to do in his paper. He fails on both counts, producing only a string of cherry-picked evidence, selected quotes that can be made to seem as if they support his position, and very strained logic.

What do we mean by plausibility? This is actually a deceptively complex question. Plausibility essentially means, if we had to guess, based on everything we know so far about the universe, is a specific claim likely to be true? There is a very broad range of plausibility, and unfortunately often people refer to plausibility as a false dichotomy, that a claim is either plausible or not. This dichotomy obscures a vast spectrum, which matters because we deal with different locations on that spectrum very differently.

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Jun 19 2018

New York Times and the Return of Astrology

A recent opinion piece in the New York Times by Krista Burton is perhaps one sign of recent social trends – increasing belief in things like astrology, especially among millennials. Burton provides some insight into this phenomenon, but then also makes some horrible justifications for it.

Belief in astrology, the notion that the relative positions of planets and start affect our personality and perhaps our destiny, has been measured at about 25% in the UK, Canada and US in recent decades. However, as researchers, Nicholas Campion, points out, the number depends greatly on what exactly you ask:

In one of my groups – of mostly male students aged 18 to 21 – I found that 70% read a horoscope column once a month and 51% valued its advice. Other questions produced a huge variation: 98% knew their sun sign, 45% thought it described their personalities, 25% said it can make accurate forecasts, and 20% think the stars influence life on Earth. The higher figures are close to previous research which showed that 73% of British adults believe in astrology, while the lowest figures are similar to those found by Gallup’s polls.

It’s difficult to know how to parse all of that, but it seems like about half of people take astrology seriously to some extent, and 20-25% very seriously. That is a significant percentage of the population to believe in something which is 100% superstitious nonsense. Let’s get this out of the way now – there is no plausible mechanism by which astrology could work, there is no evidence that any form of astrology does work, and it is structured and functions like a classic pseudoscience. A moderate amount of scientific literacy, and a trace of critical thinking skills, should be enough to purge any belief in astrology.

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Jun 12 2018

Anti-GMO Lying

Published by under Pseudoscience

The anti-GMO site, Independent Science News, declares in a June 3rd headline: “GMO Golden Rice Offers No Nutritional Benefits Says FDA.” The problem with that headline is that it’s a lie. The FDA was forced to write a response stating that the claim is “misleading.”

Yeah – it’s deliberately misleading by distorting the facts and presenting them out of context so that they lead to a conclusion which is untrue. That is a form of lying.

Often I am asked how to sort science from fiction when there are many sides all loudly proclaiming opposing claims and citing their own evidence. (Gratuitous plug – for a thorough answer to this question, you can preorder my upcoming book.) One good way is to take any specific argument and follow the evidence as far as you can. Try to get back to primary sources, and see what they actually say. Follow the arguments back and forth, and see which side tends to have the final word.

Typically the side with the weaker position, or the one that is more ideological and less science-based, will display common characteristic behaviors. They will misrepresent primary sources – say, by citing a study to support a claim, when it doesn’t, or blatantly misrepresenting what the study shows. They will also cherry pick evidence, ignoring solid evidence that seems to contradict their position. When firmly challenged on one point, they may simply shift over to a separate point, without ever responding to or acknowledging the challenge. And – they will lie.

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May 31 2018

Panspermia Pseudoscience

Last week I wrote about a recent article claiming evidence for panspermia (the idea that life had limited origins and then seeded itself throughout the galaxy), and the underlying idea of panspermia itself. I concluded that the new paper provided no compelling evidence, and panspermia, while not impossible, is a fringe hypothesis with no credible supporting evidence.

In response one of the co-authors of the paper (Ted Steele) wrote me an e-mail, attempting to defend the paper. I welcome the opportunity to engage in a dialogue about any topic I blog about, and so here is my response. Here is the e-mail in full:

Dear Steven:

I can see you have got quite emotional (attached) – and I am sure you are therefore not thinking straight. I tried posting this reply to your Blog comment but for technical reasons( I think ) I was excluded. So I decided to email you directly and share my response with some of your academic colleagues.

I suggest you re-read our paper carefully as you read this note. See https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pbiomolbio.2018.03.004

I am a molecular immunologist and evolutionist of 50 years standing. I am also the lead author of this paper on the “Cause of the Cambrian Explosion – Terrestrial or Cosmic? ” I do not publish scientific trivia, and apart from key books the main body of my work is published in peer reviewed journals – check me on PubMed searching “Steele EJ”. Many of my PDFs are also at my academia.edu site (below). My main field is the study of the RNA and DNA editing mechanisms in the somatic hypermutation and germline evolution of antibody variable genes – however I am very interested in pragmatically evaluating the evidence consistent with or predicted by the Hoyle-Wickramasinghe Panspermia explanatory paradigm.

I have spent 10 years or more poring over and thinking about all the multifactorial evidence and all the explanations and criticisms. I expect serious critics to do what I have done – confront all the “extraordinary ” evidence in conflict with the terrestrial paradigm. Most of my co-authors have done that. Skeptics must do this – confront and evaluate the evidence and the primary literature. Here some examples from our paper, which are paradigm shifting (that is, pure nonsense under the terrestrial neo-Darwinism paradigm).

We now have a set of extraordinary facts to explain. The usual skeptical response in these situations is that “Extraordinary Explanations require Extraordinary Evidence’. The situation now is the reverse. Extraordinary, and multifactorial evidence exists now on Earth and its immediate environs. So now we must provide an “Extraordinary” explanation that fits all these facts and makes sense of them – this has been the aim of Science since time immemorial.

Four extraordinary set of biological facts are speaking for themselves:

• Eukaryotic fossils in meteorites > 4.5 billion years old ( e.g. Murchison)

• Interstellar dust Infra red extinction spectrum = infra red extinction spectrum of freeze dried E. coli (this is the most incredible scientific result I have ever seen, see Fig 1 in our paper)

• Bacteria in the cosmic dust on the external surface of the International Space Station

• Tardigrades

I have not added a list of other data, including space hardy biological data, Mars data, nor the Octopus RNA editing data, because I do not need to – four , quite unrelated, data sets are enough for biological significance. ( Statistical significance does not enter the picture). The skeptic and traditional Astrophysicist now needs to provide a convincing explanation of these data sets that avoids Panspermia.

I am a pragmatic Popperian – I deal in hard facts that require a unifying explanation.

Yours

Ted Steele

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May 22 2018

Alien Cephalopods and Panspermia

A recent paper in Progress in Biophysics and Molecular Biology, Cause of Cambrian Explosion – Terrestrial or Cosmic?, has caused quite a stir. I think that was the intention, and the majority of journalists ate it up, either not caring if the science was good, or not able to tell.

One main point of the paper is that the Cambrian Explosion – the geologically rapid event about 550 million years ago in which multicellular life appears in the fossil record – was so rapid because it may have been the result of alien genetic information. The authors further argue cephalopods, especially the octopus, are so amazing because they either incorporated alien genes into their makeup, or they are completely alien, coming to earth as cryopreserved eggs inside comets. The third leg of their alleged evidence for panspermia is microfossils found in meteorites.

All three arguments are utter crap. The underlying claim of panspermia – that life has seeded the galaxy from one or a limited number of initial sources – is highly problematic but perhaps not 100% nonsense.

The Three Lines of Evidence

Many science bloggers have trashed this article, doing damage control for the irresponsible journalists who probably should not be covering science stories. I will only quickly summarize here.

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May 10 2018

False Dichotomy and Science Denial


Psychologist Jeremy Shapiro has an interesting article on RawStory in which he argues that one of the pillars of science denial is the false dichotomy. I agree, and this point is worth exploring further. He also points out that the same fallacy in thinking is common in several mental disorders he treats.

The latter point may be true, but I don’t see how that adds much to our understanding of science denial, and may be perceived as inflammatory. For example, he says that borderline personality disorder clients often split the people in their world into all bad or all good. If you do one thing wrong, then you are a bad person. Likewise, perfectionists often perceive that any outcome or performance that is less than perfect gets lumped into one category of unsatisfactory.

I do think these can be useful examples to show how dichotomous thinking can lead to or at least support a mental disorder. Part of the goal of therapy for people with these disorders is cognitive therapy, to help them break out of their pattern of approaching the world as a simple dichotomy. But we have to be careful not to imply that science denial itself is a mental illness or disorder.

Denialism and False Dichotomy

A false dichotomy is a common logical fallacy in which many possibilities, or a continuum of possibilities, is rhetorically collapsed into only two choices. People are either tall or short, there is no other option. There are just Democrats and Republicans.

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May 03 2018

What the Flat-Earth Movement Tells Us

Whenever I write about flat-earthers, those who, incredibly, actually believe in the 21st century that the world is flat, there are multiple comments to the effect that we are just getting punked. No one really believes the world is flat, they are just saying that to wind us up, and we are taking the bait.

But this view is demonstrably wrong. I have actually encountered flat-earthers out in the wild, so to speak – in meat space. They really do seriously entertain the theory that the earth is flat. Harry T Dyer also reports recently in Raw Story about a three day convention of flat-earthers. They weren’t tongue-in-cheek having a laugh. They were dead serious.

I think the flat-earth deniers, if you will, are missing the point. They are approaching the issue like most people do initially – looking at the claims from a scientific point of view. From that angle the claims of flat-earthers are beyond absurd. They are so extremely ignorant and illogical that it seems reasonable to consider that either there is some psychological pathology involved, or it’s just a hoax.

There is no doubt that the belief that the earth is flat is rooted in a profound scientific illiteracy. It is not only ignorant of the findings of science, but also of the history of science, and any knowledge of the institutions of science and the participation of countless students and citizen scientists. But flat-eartherism is not about scientific illiteracy – meaning it is not merely a manifestation of profound ignorance of science (which is also why it cannot be corrected with scientific information). As Dyer also points out, belief in a flat earth is ultimately about rejecting institutional knowledge itself.

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Feb 20 2018

Superbrain Yoga is Still BS

Published by under Pseudoscience

In 2015 I wrote about a new fad called Superbrain Yoga (SBY – I suggest just reading that article for background). This one is pure pseudoscience – silly and ritualistic movements are used to increase “prana” energy (which is make-believe) and thereby increase mental energy and focus. There is, of course, no credible evidence to support such claims, and no scientific plausibility.

Even though that is an old article, a comment just appeared proclaiming: “Please do some research before you call things a hoax,” followed by four links to alleged evidence that SBY works. One of the links is dead, but the other three refer to studies published in 2016 and 2017. Since my article was written in 2015 it seems unfair to admonish me for not researching future publications.

In any case, it seemed like a good opportunity to update my article on SBY with the new research. As you might have guessed, the articles don’t show what the commenter apparently thinks they do. In fact they are excellent examples of pseudoscience, displaying many of the features I have complained about over the years.

One article looks at alpha wave activity on EEG. The second studies hyperactivity in children with ADHD. And the third looks at memory and attention in children. All three studies share a number of features which makes them less than compelling as evidence. First, they are all published in low-rent journals, such as the Indian Journal of Traditional Knowledge. They may have a slightly biased editorial approach over there at the IJTK. But let’s look at the studies themselves.

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