denialism | February 18, 2009What to say about psychiatry that isn't already completely covered by television and movies? It's unique among the specialties for its coverage in the media. Maybe because we're such social animals, or maybe because such shows about psychiatry or therapy appeal to a voyeuristic impulse in us to peer into people's most private thoughts and feelings.
Our exposure to psychiatry in medical school, however, is primarily with inpatient psychiatry - people who for whatever reason require hospitalization to deal with their mental illnesses. Reasons may range from soul-crushing anxiety attacks, to…
denialism | February 17, 2009Dan MacArthur has started a big discussion on whether or not the relationship between IQ and race should be studied. Inspired by a pair of essays for and against the idea it has created a pretty healthy debate among the sciencebloggers including Razib with whom I will likely never agree on this issue. For the record, I'm on the side of those like Richard Nisbett (for a good review of his analysis of race and the black white divide see here PDF) that genetics are a poor explanation for the divide.
But this issue aside, why do I believe this is a still a bad idea to expend resources to…
denialism | February 16, 2009We'll have to add Scientology to Pal's list of disease-promoting groups. Via Screw Loose Change I learn that as part of their bizarre hatred of psychiatry, they've now taken to saying that 9/11 was caused by psychiatrists in addition to the holocaust. Apparently, Osama was just a regular guy until al-Zawahiri, a psychiatrist, got to him. Strange considering al Zawahiri was not a psychiatrist at all.
Scientologists Try to Explain how Psychiatrists caused 9/11 and the Holocaust from Chris Doyle on Vimeo.
Anyway, watch the crazy!
I'll have a post up on my experience on my psych clerkship…
denialism | February 16, 2009One would think given recent findings that antarctic warming is robust for instance, that the canard of antarctic cooling would go away. Or, that based on the round dismissal of the myth of 1970s global cooling warnings we'd stop hearing about that in the media too. But instead I'm watching TV last night and there's all these unbelievable crank ads sponsored by the anti-regulation ideologues the Americans for Prosperity featuring fake expert John Coleman. His senseless rant against the stimulus and the evils of regulation is accompanied by text on the bottom of the screen declaring "global…
denialism | February 14, 2009For those artistic evilutionists out there, Burning Man, the yearly festival celebrating freedom, expression, and self-reliance, is sponsoring art based on this year's theme of Evolution. The details for getting a grant to support your artwork are here.
So, come up with some ideas for interactive, creative expressions of what evolution means, where humans have come from or where are we going, and submit them for entry into the festival!
choofnagle | February 13, 2009I'm very pleased with today's decision from the DC Circuit Court of Appeals on recently-strengthened privacy protections for phone records. The short history goes something like this: the FCC created strong opt-in (affirmative consent) provisions for the sharing of phone records (who calls whom, for how long, etc). In 1996, the 10th Circuit held that the restrictions violated the First Amendment rights of companies that wanted to sell this data to marketers. Thus, the FCC relaxed the standard to opt-out, meaning that you had to take affirmative action to stop your phone records from being…
denialism | February 10, 2009I have to admit I'm somewhat surprised (even if Orac isn't). We all knew that Andrew Wakefield's research was bogus and the link between vaccines and autism was engineered by ideologues who fear vaccines irrationally. But fabrication of data? Sloppy research is one thing, but the need for cranks to be correct, no matter what reality reflects, has resulted in yet another example of egregious dishonesty.
This is in line, however, with what we know about cranks. Mark Crislip recently wrote an interesting piece on mathematics crankery which bears upon just this phenomenon. Mathematics is a…
denialism | February 6, 2009
What do this cartoon and the latest edition of PLoS One have in common? Well, reading Bora's blog this week I saw an article entitled, Risks for Central Nervous System Diseases among Mobile Phone Subscribers: A Danish Retrospective Cohort Study and my ears perked up. We have been mocking the idea that cell phones cause everything from brain cancer to colony collapse disorder and it's always fun to see what cell phones are being blamed for based on weak associations and correlations.
In this article the authors identified more than four hundred thousand cell phone subscribers and linked…
choofnagle | February 4, 2009Obama has delayed am important political risk: he's pushed back the DTV transition. If the televisions stopped working on February 17th, we would probably have an impeachment trial (as soon as the televisions were back on again).
denialism | February 4, 2009The process of choosing a medical specialty, and applying for residency programs is nearly complete as I have returned from my tour of the West Coast and am nearly done with interview season. This is when medical students travel the country at great (and unreimbursed) expense to find their future training program. When all is said and done, all your research into programs and time spent interviewing boils down to a simple question. Do you want to work with these people for the next 3-7 years of your life?
It's also nice to see the cities where you may live and get a feel for the type of…
choofnagle | February 3, 2009The San Francisco Chronicle reports that Elephant Pharmacy, a "holistic" drug store has closed and will file for bankruptcy. Why should you care? Elephant was an upscale store based in the Bay Area, the epicenter for wooishness. If this type of business fails here, how well will woo do elsewhere?
There's something to be said for the idea that perhaps people know that woo doesn't work, and maybe they cut back when the economy goes bad. Could the popularity of alternative medicine be a reflection of economic exuberance? Will individuals act more rationally when they have less money to…
choofnagle | February 3, 2009I'll be on Minnesota Public Radio this morning with LA Times consumer reporter David Lazarus, talking about identity theft. Here's the preview and I'll post the stream later. I'm going to be talking about my recent articles on identity theft: Identity Theft: Making the Known Unknowns Known and Towards a Market for Bank Safety.
choofnagle | February 2, 2009The toy companies that moved their production to China in order to save money apparently didn't calculate the full costs of offshoring. Testing their products for lead is just too expensive, they argue. They have successfully lobbied to delay lead testing rules for children's toys. Joseph Pereira and Melanie Trottman of the Journal report:
Under pressure from manufacturers, federal regulators have postponed for one year certain testing requirements for lead and other toxic substances in toys and other children's products.
But unless Congress acts, retailers and manufacturers still won't be…
choofnagle | January 24, 2009In good Denialism blog form, the San Francisco Chronicle's C. W. Nevius has urged readers to just ignore this week's anti-abortion protest in San Francisco. He makes a good point:
This is the fifth year in San Francisco for the "Walk for Life." Bolstered by supporters who are bused in from all over - this year's bus schedule lists departures from Yuba City, Bakersfield, Fresno, Reno, Clovis and Chico, among other cities - the anti-abortion group stages a march in liberal San Francisco and then expresses shock and disappointment when they are jeered and booed.
It's a scam and a setup. Nothing…
choofnagle | January 15, 2009"All that remains is . . . recognition of a man."
Patrick McGoohan, the creator of one of my favorite television series, The Prisoner, has died at 80. The Prisoner was a challenging and entertaining series that explored civil liberties, privacy, individuality, and democracy. My favorite episodes were Free for All and A Change of Mind. The good news is that these and all the other episodes are available online free at AMC.
choofnagle | January 13, 2009Guess what? A natural therapy can cure cancer, but evil doctors don't want to tell you about it, because the medical establishment wants to make money with Mosanto and Dupont rather than cure your illnesses! Watch all about it.
Update: Sorry, I missed Orac's successful attack on this thing. Thanks Science Pundit, for pointing it out.
choofnagle | January 13, 2009Sciblings,
I really appreciate all of the suggested texts submitted for the Ayn Rand Deprogrammer. If you visit the comment thread, you'll see that the inevitable happened: Objectivists tried to hijack the discussion. I say ignore them. Eyes on the prize: a solid Ayn Rand Deprogrammer. Any distraction will slow us down, and delay publication of forthcoming projects, the Hayek Deprogrammer and the Milton Friedman Deprogrammer.
I am going to bundle up all the good suggestions made by commenters. But here is one that no one else has found. Written in 1957, it is clear eyed and prescient…
choofnagle | January 12, 2009are brought to you by mental floss. HT to Rebecca Tushnet via Frank Pasquale.
choofnagle | January 12, 2009I am really proud of my colleagues here at UC Berkeley for performing a first of its kind (in the US) study of the efficacy of police surveillance cameras. Its findings are limited to San Francisco's system, but it is valuable in thinking through whether and how surveillance cameras should be implemented. I have to be careful about characterizing it, but here is an article in the Chronicle on its findings, and the full report is here (8.9 MB PDF). The authors explain: "...The findings include a determination that while the program decreased property crime within the view of the cameras by…
choofnagle | January 11, 2009Sciblings, I request your assistance in an important venture.
I recently learned that Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead was a top read among UC Berkeley undergrads in 1987 and 1997. This dismaying fact drove me to start assembling a reader, The Ayn Rand Deprogrammer. I've spent the last several weeks reviewing possible texts for this important new work. Here is the first candidate for inclusion, and going forward, I would appreciate any suggestions that you have for the Deprogrammer.
Mary Gaitskill: Two Girls, Fat and Thin
I spent much of my vacation reading Mary Gaitskill's Two Girls, Fat and…