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How bad science can
be hazardous to your health
News You Can Use 5/8/00
How bad science can be hazardous to your health
By Avery Comarow
Sales of Voodoo Science (Oxford University Press, $25) could wind up
being less than author Robert Park might
On May 5, if Web postings based on a doomsday book are to be believed,
the world will end, swamped by tidal waves and torn to pieces, when the
Earth, moon, sun, and five planets line up. It's the kind of
pseudoscience that Park, a physics professor at the University of
Maryland, takes on in his book, which
will be published this month.
What do you mean by voodoo science?
All bad science. There are scientists who
fool themselves, as happened with cold
fusion. There are scientists who
deliberately try to fool others. We see
this mostly in the courts, where expert
witnesses concoct justifications for all
kinds of points of view without solid
evidence. And there is non-science
dressed up to look like science. A good
example would be the books of Dee- pak
Chopra, in which he writes about using
quantum mechanics to keep from growing
old. In my talks, I like to show his
picture on the book jacket. He doesn't
seem to have managed to stop the aging
process.
Do
people embrace voodoo science because
they have too little information?
Not necessarily. Part of the problem is
that while the public should have access
to the latest findings, those findings
haven't been digested. Fiber is a
wonderful example, if you'll pardon the
double-entendre. The latest evidence says
the previous evidence was wrong–eating
fiber does not reduce colon cancer. The
public gets the feeling, why can't
scientists make up their minds?
How can a bogus claim be detected?
Common sense can help, but people don't
have enough confidence in their common sense.
Take homeopathy. If there's no
medicine in a medicine, most people would
believe taking it is not going to be
effective, and that's the case with
homeopathic remedies. Most of them have
no detectable level of any active
substance, and instead its practitioners
have concocted this remarkable argument
that water "remembers" what was in it.
Lots of people use magnets for medical
reasons. Why do you say they don't work?
Put sheets of paper between the magnet
and a paper clip and see how many sheets
it takes before the paper clip won't hang
onto the magnet. The magnetic field drops
off rapidly to the point that it is no
stronger than the Earth's magnetic field.
Why is there so much interest in
homeopathy, massage therapy, and other
forms of alternative medicine?
We tend to get over whatever it is that
afflicts us. If we happen to be taking
prune juice when we get better, some of
us will believe that it was because of
the prune juice. Presto, the Prune Juice
Therapy.
Are Americans the worst suckers when it
comes to bad science?
Oh, no. This is worldwide. Alternative
medicine is much more prevalent in
Germany. Superstition is rampant inRussia, all over Eastern Europe. A
lot of
pseudoscience is based on stuff from
Asian countries. We're certainly no worse
than anywhere else.
Is
voodoo science really a threat?
It's not much of a threat to science. But
to the people in the Heaven's Gate cult,
who died thinking they would be taken
away by aliens traveling in a comet's
wake, it was a serious threat. To people
who rely on useless cures, it's a threat.
To mothers who suffer terrible anxiety
over supposed dangers to their children
from electric power lines, it's a threat.
It's the public that pays a price for
this.
What will you be doing on May 5, when the
world ends?
I have no particular plans. It's Cinco de
Mayo, Mexican Independence Day. I will
cheer them on quietly, at home.
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This article was fisrt published by
U.S. News and World Report May 8, 2000 and then mirrored at
http://www.coldfusioninfo.com/skeptics/howBadScience.htm
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