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Ben Goldacre's book "Bad Science" should be required reading for HS students. "Ben Goldacre: Battling Bad Science" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4MhbkWJzKkIt's generally not sufficient for kooks to spew stupid crap; they want to convince everyone else they're not kooks, spread the gospel, so to speak.
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Interesting links TFF; but don't filter out all the kooky stuff, we have to have some fun.
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"Scientists investigate water memory" http://odewire.com/170441/scientists-investigate-water-memory.htmlIt's difficult to resist sometimes - the stories they weave around their "research" is so compelling. There are several red flags in this article. No citation. No mention of any specific individual who did the research. No mention of a specific lab. No detail about the preparation or process. I would reject this as unsupported - poetic as it is - out of hand. Substantiating the work actually occurred does not mean it's right, but it's a necessary first step. It's okay for them to write "Researchers at X university showed amazing thing Y." But it needs to be followed up with something like, "Journal W will publish the protocol and results this week, but Dr. Z, the PI (Principle Investigator), outlines the experiment as follows ..." One could spend a lot of time and resources trying to explain something that can't and SHOULDN'T be explained, because it never happened. Here's a blog entry on the article that details other problems. http://blogs.nature.com/kausikdatta/2011/12/28/water-memory-myth-that-wouldnt-die
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I like to believe that the good doctor was correct–if for no other reason, because the phrase “the memory of water” makes my heart leap up and spin. OK in some circles, but perhaps not calculated to win the hearts and minds of the scientific community.
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Amusing stuff, TFF, with, undoubtedly, a lot of underlying truth. However, having spent several years working in close association with the Psychiatric Services (all well and lengthily qualified) I suspect that not all quackery lies outside the medical profession.
I would also be inclined to treat this smart-arse approach with the same caution I would accord to the peddlers of snake oil.
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Most doctors are not scientists. In any case, science does not mean "right" or "true."
Last edited by TheFallibleFiend; 01/12/12 01:08 AM.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OedkyxEqtA"How Not To Be Stupid - A Guide To Critical Thinking" The problem is that even "wishful thinkers" do not perceive that they "make up their minds prior to examining the evidence." Same for a number of the others. OTOH, just being consciously aware of some of the errors of reasoning and talking about them can help people recognize them and provide some inoculation.
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TFF, your You-tube link gave me a link to a video which would not play. Maybe it is my day to have trouble with the internet, but it refused to start/play. Do you have another link to a like video? It sounds interesting.
If you don't care for reality, just wait a while; another will be along shortly. --A Rose
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Rose, the video ran with no problems for me.
I'm struck by the number of times I chat with people who are bright, hold down intellectually demanding jobs, yet are seemingly chock full of wishful thinking. My most recent such encounter was with a 43 yr old woman who was somewhat proud to proclaim that she was a MENSA member. She was also proud to inform me that she was into witchcraft, astrology and tarot. Do you suppose that women are more predisposed to wishful thinking? I'm curious about that, since I once knew another woman who was equally smart - I.Q. 140, several uni degrees - and equally smitten by the very same set of beliefs.
"Time is what prevents everything from happening at once" - John Wheeler
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Rede, As far as I can gather, there is nothing in the "rule book" that says that intelligent people should not hold beliefs. Back in the 1950s, one of the first things I learned in sales training was that intelligent, educated, people are far more susceptible to sales talk than are the (apparently) less intelligent, less well educated. Of course, this may mean no more than that people in the former group are more ready to change their beliefs, but it might also be a “king’s new clothes” situation. I don’t even know if this has anything to do with the topic, but that seems to be a minor consideration in these days of scientific paucity.
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Great intelligence and great stupidity can reside in the same individual. I've had several creationists pull the Mensa card on me as if that settles anything.
Decades ago, when I was an intern there was a fellow who carried around his Mensa results in his back pocket and when someone would disagree with him, he would whip them out.
The obscurantists approach science in two ways. In the first way, they assert that they are, in fact, true science and in the second that science is flawed and needs to be improved by accepting that supernatural explanations are just as scientific as any other.
"Science is more than a body of knowledge; it is a way of thinking. I have a foreboding of an America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time – when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the key manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness." ― Carl Sagan, in The Demon-Haunted World.
Neither "God did it!" nor "It must be magic!" is an explanation. These kinds of assertions are not science; they are the opposite of science.
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almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. I suspect that as/when this happens in one part of the World, another will be just be pulling itself out of the mire of superstition. The most that any of us can do is try to shine a light in that part of the World over which we have some influence. The important thing to remember is that our light does not necessarily have a monopoly on rightness.
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Well it seems that as a scientist Carl Sagan was a better than fair to middling prophet.
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almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness. I suspect that as/when this happens in one part of the World, another will be just be pulling itself out of the mire of superstition. Sounds like wishful thinking in itself, but in any case, I prefer not to live in the society where reason is impossible. The most that any of us can do is try to shine a light in that part of the World over which we have some influence. The important thing to remember is that our light does not necessarily have a monopoly on rightness.
I agree with the first sentence. The second sentence misses the mark. Not all mistakes are equally wrong. Being open to possibility - even inevitability - of error is no justification for silence when people are saying things we know are wrong or even stupid.
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I prefer not to live in the society where reason is impossible. Reason may be supressed, but it becomes "impossible" only if we let it. The second sentence misses the mark. Does that mean you believe there are beliefs that have a monopoly on rightness? That would sound like some of the more dogmatic religious viewpoints.
Last edited by Bill S.; 01/20/12 10:49 PM.
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Does that mean you believe there are beliefs that have a monopoly on rightness? That would sound like some of the more dogmatic religious viewpoints.
I don't know. Is it dogmatic to insist that 2+2=4 (except for sufficiently large values of 2)? Is it only dogmatism that allows our society to put people in mental institutions? Or prisons?
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