Tomfoolery Blog

Finally, we have received the government’s response to the Science and Technology Committee’s Evidence Check on Homeopathy. It’s not good. Rather than act on the recommendations to stop NHS funding and MHRA licensing of homeopathy, the government have completely copped out and kept the status quo, whist somehow agreeing with the evidence check. The government seems to be trying to pander to both scientists and homeopaths, and as such the response is horrible to read. I’ll go into detail later, but in the meantime I’ll leave it to Martin Robbins at the Guardian.

The response is being discussed in the media, and last night our own Michael Marshall from the Merseyside Skeptics Society and 10:23 campaign appeared on BBC Radio 5Live (1:48 in). He was joined by presenter Tony Livesey, and not one, but two homeopaths: Dr Brian Kaplan, a medical doctor and fellow of the Faculty of Homeopathy, and Mary English, a “qualified homeopath”.

Brian Kaplan came across as rabid, massively overplaying the government’s decision on homeopathy. Mary English seemed nice and polite, but as expected she only bought anecdotal evidence to the table. The debate felt unbalanced, even for the BBC’s standards, and seemed like an ambush, although Marsh did well to keep a level head and put across his points calmly and succinctly. To be fair, the first two callers made good points about the studies of the efficaciousness of homeopathy. However, support for homeopathy was taken from a couple of callers, who again could only come up with anecdotal evidence.

Which brings me to my first issue: why don’t the BBC train their presenters in the basics of critical thinking? For example, you do not counter systematic studies and randomized double-blinded controlled trials with a couple of personal anecdotes! The presenter, Tony Livesey, actually said “That wasn’t an anecdote, that really happened!” when Marsh pointed out that a caller’s story about his daughter’s experience with homeopathy was an anecdote. Is it unreasonable to expect a BBC presenter to know what an anecdote is? He also seemed impressed by authority, noting that Brian Kaplan is a medical doctor, and accepting that Mary English had trained in homeopathy for five years. In my opinion, the qualifications of the debater are irrelevant, bullshit is still bullshit. If you ever hear me saying anything like “Trust me, I’ve got a PhD”, then please shoot me.

My second point is to do with the BBC’s obsession with ‘balance’. Now, balance is fine if you are discussing something subjective like an art exhibition or Mel Gibson’s latest crap film, but when discussing scientific issues, things are different.  Science should be recognized and discussed by people who have at least a modicum of scientific understanding, not pseudoscientists with vested interests. If the BBC were discussing the rights and wrongs of murder, would they have the Prime Minister squaring up to Peter Sutcliffe? Would you see the head of the NSPCC discussing the merits of child abuse with a catholic priest? I think not. Sort it out BBC!

Tony Livesey: well meaning, but could do with a little scientific training

Every month, the Merseyside Skeptics Society holds a lecture in the grandiose setting of the Vines. Thursday night’s guest was none other than David Aaronovitch, acclaimed journalist and author of Voodoo Histories.

The MSS are a highly socialable, friendly bunch, and I was lucky enough to sit right next to David Aaronovich before his talk, where he was kind enough to share a few anecdotes with us over a beer. When the event itself started, MSS President Mike Hall gave Mr Aaronovich a warm humorous welcome, although he seamed more concerned about the welfare of David’s brother Ben Aaronovich, a scriptwriter for Dr Who!

David’s talk was engaging and passionate, as he effortlessly explored the conspiracy theories in his book Voodoo Histories, including the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the death of Princess Diana, and of course 9/11. Each one was skillfully demolished in turn, and it was a joy to hear his thoughts on the mindset of people who cling to such ludicrous beliefs such as “9/11 truth”. I could have listened for hours, but sadly due to time constraints host of InKredulous Andy Wilson had the unenviable job of cutting him off!

Copies of Voodoo Histories were available at a discount (bargain!) during the interval. I bought a copy, and David was kind enough to sign mine “To Dr Tom!”. Fortunately, someone was around to capture the meeting on camera.

Myself and David Aaronovich (photo from Andy Wilson)

The second half was a Q and A, although each question seemed like a valid excuse to hear more of David’s entertaining thoughts on conspiracy theories. I asked a question on the irreversible mindsets of conspiracy theorists and skeptics, but before I was handed the microphone Mike Hall was kind enough to congratulate me on my PhD graduation! I was touched! Dr Who?

To conclude the evening, and in keeping with the jovial atmosphere, Mike Hall got David to sign one of his brother Ben’s Dr Who books, which was a lovely little moment. After much more chatting and a few drinks, the night was over, everyone I met went home very chuffed. It felt like another step forward for the skeptic cause on Merseyside.

Forthcoming talks look very promising, with August seeing MSS President Mike Hall giving a talk on God, before Dr Evan Harris turns up in September. These events (and the skeptic socials in Dr Duncan’s) are always great fun, and it feels like there is a real skeptic community in Liverpool now. If you see me there, be sure to say hello!

David Aaronovitch signs Mike Hall's Dr Who book (photo from Andy Wilson)

Gillian McKeith has managed to embark on a spectacular failure with Twitter. Firstly, she has a go at a random twitterer who had a go at her, then she pretends that her Twitter account doesn’t actually belong to her. Following that, she tries to remove all record of her social networks on her website. However, a brilliantly lazy web designer just commented out the code, so it was there for anyone who has the ability to right-click then select “view source”. Now, it’s exploded all over Twitter and Gillian McKeith is once again looking like a total arse.

That, and the diploma mill she went to corresponded with has announced it will shut down. Happy days.

Plenty of people have written excellent blogs about this:

• Ben Goldacre (obviously)
• BoingBoing
• David Naylor
• Tom Chivers in the Telegraph
• zenbuffy.com

Brian Cox and Joachim Loew: seperated at birth? Er, no.

I’ve a heard a few times on Twitter that the manager of the German football team, Joachim Loew, looks a bit like Professor Brian Cox, particle physicist and documentary maker extraordinaire. I’ve wedged them together for the hell of it.

Surprisingly, I found getting two pictures of these men making the same expression to be almost as difficult as squaring the circle. Brian Cox is nearly always grinning from ear to ear like a cheeky schoolboy, whilst Joachim Loew invariably has the stern face of the stereotypically professional efficient German.

Maybe Loew will have a smile on his face come Sunday?

The big celebrity news here in the UK is that pop singer Cheryl Cole (nee Tweedy) has been diagnosed with malaria following a holiday to Tanzania. In their infinite wisdom, the BBC News website has decided to run an article entitled “Anti-malarial pills didn’t stop me getting the disease”. As I type, it is at number seven on their “most read” list, and is even featured on the front page of the site, captioned “Malaria Misery: Cheryl has it, and the pills don’t always work”.

The article itself is a story from Katie Fraser, and it details her symptoms following a trip to the Soloman Islands.  She claims she took anti-malarial drugs everyday, and also used a mosquito net and repellent spray, yet still caught malaria. The take-home message appears to be “don’t bother with antimalarials, they didn’t work for me”, but it’s also got a whiff of “don’t trust doctors” about it, as she was misdiagnosed as having flu three times.

People tend to be curious about diseases when a celebrity catches them, so why on earth have the BBC deemed it necessary to publish and promote an unfortunate, individual scare story? The article does NOT stress the importance of antimalarials when traveling abroad, and in my opinion publishing it is dangerous. Any neutral could come away thinking “antimalarials don’t work, so why bother?”.

If you feel like I do and want to complain to the BBC, you can do so here. You’ll need the full URL of the article, which is http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/10522909.stm. Thanks.

Followers of quack medicine and general wingnuttery will be well aware of naturalnews.com, home of “Health Ranger” Mike Adams. It’s always worth perusing if you want to keep up with the latest “all natural” nonsense, but there was one recent article in particular that caught my eye.

The article in question is on natural male contraception. One recommendation is to eat papaya seeds, which apparently affects the infertility of rats and rabbits. I’ve no idea if a study has been done on humans, but it seems like a breeze compared to the other option: dangle your testicles in 116 °F (46°C) water (just below the pain threshold, supposedly) for 45 minutes a day every day for 21 days. This should keep you sperm-free for 6 months.

Now, I’ve got so many questions. Firstly, where is the evidence that this works? Did someone carry out experiments to determine the optimal time and temperature, or did Kim Evans (the author) just make it up for a laugh?

Second, what exactly is the technique involved? Can you boil the kettle, fill a teacup with hot water, wait until it cools to the right temperature, then squat over it naked whilst holding your old chap out of the way? How do you maintain the temperature of the water? With an industrial waterbath? Also, what are you supposed to do for 45 minutes? Listen to music? Read a book? Hope the dog doesn’t wander in?

Third, how would this be introduced into a relationship? I can picture the scene: a girlfriend is cuddling with her boyfriend on the sofa, she’s surfing the net. “Look what I’ve found on naturalnews.com darling!”.

Insane. What’s wrong with condoms or the pill?

I sent this email to Fair Deal Homeopathy today. Think I’ll get anywhere with it?

Dear Sir / Madam,

I am interested in building my own repository of homeopathic medication for my own personal use. I believe 100 of your homeopathic products will cover every known ailment.

As your homeopathic products are £4.99 each, 100 products would cost £500 (rounded up). However, I wish to pay for these products homeopathically. Therefore, I wish to pay with a 2C version of £500, which is 5 pence. According to the law of infinitesimals, 5 pence is far stronger than the original £500 pounds. In addition to this, I will succuss my cheque book against a leather Bible.

I’ll let you know how I get on.

Thanks to the British Medical Association’s slaughtering of homeopathy, that very subject was discussed on BBC Radio Leeds today. Presenter Liz Green did well to introduce homeopathy as being unscientific and costing the NHS approximately £10 million per year, but she was quickly inundated by the “it worked for my dog” brigade.

Thankfully, Merseyside Skeptic’s Society co-founder Michael Marshall was bought in towards the end of the discussion to give the skeptic’s point of view. In the limited time available, I thought Marsh did very well, especially to introduce the “secondary placebo” effect to explain the effect of homeopathy on dogs.

From a personal perspective, I thought it was good to hear my own email broadcast. (I’m such a media whore wannabe). I gave three reasons why people may feel better after taking homeopathy:

1. They were going to get better anyway.
2. They were experiencing the placebo effect (or a secondary placebo effect in the case of dogs).
3. If they were taking homeopathy as a ‘complementary’ medicine, the conventional medicine may have been working.

There is also one aspect of the homeopathy argument that really bugs me: homeopathy supporters claim that the estimated £10 million per year the NHS spends on homeopathy “isn’t that much”. Well, if that’s the case, could I have £10 million from the NHS budget every year? If it’s not that much…

The whole BBC Radio Leeds Liz Green program is available here (homeopathy discussed towards the end of the show, Michael Marshall’s appearance and my email from about 1 hour 30 minutes onwards).

In the last parliament, you may remember that the House of Commons Science and Technology committee produced an evidence check on homeopathy, concluding that it should no longer be funded on the NHS. Following this, quack-supporting MP David Tredinnick wrote Early Day Motion (EMD) 908, criticising the report and supporting homeopathy. This EDM became a nice little reference, because MPs could demonstrate their scientific inabilities by signing it.

Now that the dust has settled on this new parliament, David Tredinnick is back to his old tricks in a big way. Not content with EDM 908, he has tabled an additional four (yes, four) EDMs. Each one offers a smidgen of support to homeopathy:

EDM 284 expresses concern about the British Medical Association’s recent motions concerning homeopathy. EDM 285 welcomes the publication of a paper in the Journal of Oncology, which appears to show that some cancer cells can be killed by homeopathic preparations (which of course, isn’t the case). EDM 286 similarly welcomes a Brazilian study on homeopathic antidepressants, while EDM 287 welcomes yet another study, this time from South Africa on homeopathic insomnia treatments.

Of course, each EDM from David Tredinnick contains factual inaccuracies and references to poorly controlled studies. To point these errors out, step forward Dr Julian Huppert MP of the Liberal Democrats  (who else?). Julian has tabled an amendment for each of Tredinnick’s EDMs, correcting each of David Tredinnick’s mistakes.

So now we have another tool for quickly judging the scientific competency of our MPs. With EDM 908 it was simple: if they signed it, they were an idiot. Now, if your MP signs EDMs 284-287 in their original forms then they are an idiot, but if they sign the amended forms then they are showing some respect for science and evidence based policy.

I would advise you to write to your MP to ask them to sign EDM 284A1-287A1. They can be found and contacted via the site www.theyworkforyou.com, and the Merseyside Skeptic Society have written a template to make things a little easier. Hopefully together we can put a stop to David Tredinnick’s quackery nonsense.

Viewers of Channel 4′s excellent series “Derren Brown Investigates” will be familiar with Joe Power. He is a psychic medium who has the uncanny knack of knowing things about his sister’s next door neighbor and television actresses who he parks next to. However, Richard Wiseman took us through the techniques of cold reading that Joe was “allegedly” using, and when Joe was tested to read the mind of a believer who wanted to contact her deceased friend, he failed miserably.

Recently I found that Michael Marshall (aka ‘Marsh’) of the Merseyside Skeptics Society, host of the Righteous Indignation and Skeptics With A K podcasts, has a history with Joe Power. When Marsh challenged Joe Power to the James Randi million dollar challenge, Power went on the offensive, comparing all skeptics to paedophiles.

Well, it seems that Joe Power is now making frivolous complaints to the police about Marsh, based on so-called “threats” on the MSS Facebook group.  In response, Marsh has written a very nice history of Joe Power, including his shameful involvements in the cases of Madeline McCann and Shannon Mathews. Enjoy.