What is an "altie"? (2006 edition)

ORAC;
You would call me an Altie even though I followed your advice and it worked. I chelated my kid for mercury poisoning which you said was the proper treartment. His constipation went away. He can now feel pain. He doesn't drag one leg when he walks anymore. He makes eye contact, has about normal receptive language, speaks once in a while, stopped banging his head, stopped biting himself, stopped screaming for no apparent reason, can do puzzles and count to at least 10. He lets me read to him instead of eating the book. He stopped smearing feces. The chelation might not cure him completely but he's certainly come a long way with 20 full rounds and 17 partial rounds of chelation. Now, all we have to do is to get you to admit that mercury had something to do with the autism.

I have never advised any parent to chelate their child for autism, nor have I ever said that chelation therapy was the appropriate therapy for autism. Quite the contrary, in fact, as my regular readers know. Don't try to state or imply that I gave you any such advice.

Great List! I keep imagining Jeff Foxworthy in a lab coat delivering these to a convention center full of lab coats. Maybe Carrot Top could open for him since he looks like the victim of some altie shenaniganry.

Foresam, "we" being like four guys.

If you accept without questioning vague and/or poorly documented anecdotes and testimonials as sufficient evidence for you that an "alternative" therapy can produce remarkable results "curing" cancer, heart disease, autism, Alzheimers, etc., but routinely brutally nitpick and then dismiss well-designed randomized, double-blinded Phase III clinical studies for conventional medicine, you just might be an altie.

You've got Fore Sam pegged, Orac.

By implication, you are claiming that creationists are more rational than an altie. I would place them on an even par.

One of the main characteristics of an altie (alternative term is 'altnut') is that it is perfectly acceptable for them to trash the messenger when the message calls one of their Firmly Held Beliefs into question. However, if it is pointed out by John Stossel and Steve Barrett that one of their gurus, e.g. Kevin Trudeau, is nothing more than a twice convicted felon who is a well known scam artist, it is an evil thing and not true, although Dr. Sidney Wolfe, who is no lackey for "organized medicine" excoriated Trudeau and his message in the same broadcast.

They main underlying characteristic of an altie is that they have a blatant double standard, or no standard at all.

Sam, the truth is that Autism has a really good spontaneous improvement rate, some studies put it as high or higher than 40% depending on what they consider enough of an improvement to count. This makes it a very good target for altie cures, since they can claim that those improvements are due to them.

What you're going to have to face is that your child would be exactly where he is now, even if you had not spent large amounts of money on endangering his life with quack docs.

I have finally got back to your blog at your new site. Floreat.

Old news, but in case you haven't seen it:
Kevin Trudeau Banned from Infomercials

It's just another example of The Man trying to keep The Truth from the people. At least that's what Alex Jones tells me. When I visit him on my space ship.

Orac;
I said: "I chelated my kid for mercury poisoning which you said was the proper treatment". You said: "I have never advised any parent to chelate their child for autism...".
So, if you switch the words around, you can dodge the question. You did say that chelation was the proper treatment for mercury poisoning.
Doublespeak and "stonewalling" fail to address the subject. I predict the next reply will be; "I am not a crook" while holding up the peace symbol.
And, of course, addressing the improvement in symptoms would be out of the question, especially the obvious neurological problems like dragging a leg and having no sense of touch.
It's time for doctors to end the charade. They should have known they were giving babies too much mercury. They can make themsekves look better by helping to cure the kids now. The longer the lie goes on, the tougher it is to climb out of the hole they dug for themselves.

And doctors don't have kids.
And they don't vaccinate their kids.
And some other nonsense... Foresam, this absolutism was cute for a bit but it's really stale.

Fore Sam:

I'd really like to see where Orac said anything close to "chelation was the proper treatment for mercury poisoning" - please provide a link to that statement. I've been reading his blog for a long time now, and I would be very surprised to see that, since he often says the exact opposite.

"addressing the improvement in symptoms"
For actual research, please see this.

As for the mercury-autism link, while your searching for Orac's stance on chelation, I'm pretty sure you'll find ample discussion on that subject.

grr.. I meant "you're" of course.

Amazing timing, considering the series of comments by an altie on my blog today.

Granted, not in medical school (at least not yet), but I have a degree in Human Biology, and as far as I know, chelation could work for mercury poisoning (just like it would work for lead poisoning). Orac, please correct me if I'm wrong on this. Fore Sam, the problem with this is that you assume three things: 1. That your kid was actually poisoned with the miniscule amounts of mercury in his or her vaccines. 2. That this mercury poisoning causes autism. 3. That even though the mercury in his or her body would be long gone by now, treating it with chelation will somehow reverse nerve damage. Wrong, wrong, and more wrong. Just think about it, if you ingested strychnine and got better because your liver and kidneys cleaned it up, but then had kidney problems a year later, would you still try to treat it by removing the strychnine? No, because it's long gone, but the damage is still there. You would treat it with dialysis, kidney transplant or some medication, not by trying to remove a poison that isn't even left in the body! Try thinking a little next time, it may hurt at first, but I promise you and your kid will be better off for it.

Fore Sam, any Mercury poisoning going around probably came from some Chinese medicine or other....

"Fufang Luhui Jiaonang capsules were found to contain around 13% mercury, and were supplied in blister packs contained within a cream and blue carton."

13%!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! flip me 13%

http://www.mhra.gov.uk/home/idcplg?IdcService=SS_GET_PAGE&nodeId=663

To clarify:

Chelation is an appropriate treatment for acute mercury poisoning, but it is not an appropriate treatment for autism. The reason ought to be clear, but for Foresam's benefit I'll spell it out explicitly: It's because autism is not mercury poisoning. The evidence does not support the contention that autism is mercury poisoning. Finally, even if autism were mercury poisoning, there is no evidence that chelation, done years after the "insult," would do one bit of good to reverse the neurologic damage presumed to have been caused by mercury.

Can I be any more clear than that?

The fallacy of Foresam's thinking is that he swallows the Generation Rescue line whole and assumes that "childhood neurological disorders such as autism, Asperger's, ADHD/ADD, speech delay, sensory integration disorder, and many other developmental delays are all misdiagnoses for mercury poisoning."

I was thinking about it on the way to the neuro lab (oh no! I'm part of the conspiracy!), and I realized I had hastily posted that reply and confused Fore Sam's line about mercury with chelation for autism. Apologies for the mistake; a fight was breaking out next door while I was posting, so I was a little distracted. ;)

Rob;
Perhaps you are not aware that once the mercury clears the blood, it remains in the brain, intestines, liver and kidneys in those children who can not excrete it. It's not so much that mercury causes nerve damage but the fact that the mercury inhibits methylation. The body can't produce methyl B-12 and the brain won't work right without it. When adding methyl B-12 resulting in the onset of speech, it stands to reason that when the mercury comes out, the body will be able to produce the MB-12 itself. Why would the MB-12 produce speech at all if the mercury had done irreversible damage?
Orac;
Thank you. There we have your statement again that chelation is an appropriate treatment for acute mercury poisoning. What could be more acute than autism, aside from death, of course, as in SIDS? Did I miss your conjecture as to what might have caused the sense of touch to return and the leg to start working properly? Is this where you plug in the anecdotal evidence argument and shoot me down for not having done a DBCS to confirm those improvements? And then some genetic enthusiast will chime in with evidence about kids who regress being programmed to function normally for awhile before they suddenly lose all their speech. "I am not a crook". "Stonewall those reporters". "What tapes"?

So, if you switch the words around, you can dodge the question. You did say that chelation was the proper treatment for mercury poisoning.

I'm guessing that under Fore Sam's logic "I'm not married" qualifies as dodging/stonewalling the question of "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?"

And, of course, it's my understanding that chelation is a proper treatment of mercury poisoning. It's NOT a proper treatment for an entirely unrelated condition like autism.

I see Bronze Dog has no conjecture about the leg or sense of touch either. As usual, more evasion.

I'm not a medical doctor so I can't verify the quality of medical treatments, especially home-inflicted ones. However, I've been using this intarweb since Fidonet and I know a troll when I see one. Fore Sam is specifically and purposefully goading you into an argument by copying the style of an uninformed "altie". It's the nature of putting a semiliterate culture like ours in the U.S. in communication with each other via text, people can exploit vagaries in the English language to write generic messages, then let you project your frustration with a relevant "type" onto what you read. The result is you wasting keystrokes blustering and them feeling superior for exploiting your naivete.

Years of arguing on the internet will train anyone: respond once, link to source information, if their response doesn't show they're reading the information, then don't waste another second talking to them.

Creationism arguments are pretty much the best examples of how to deal with this, just link to talkorigins and tell them you're not doing their homework for them. Maybe a similar document would help cut down on the 'altard' angst.

To respond to your request for new oneliners:

If you say that bioenergetic fields have been reliably demonstrated in clinical studies and are not scientifically controversial AND you also say that scientists deserve criticism for their close-minded failure to escape materialist presuppositions and accept bioenergetic fields -- IN THE SAME CONVERSATION -- then you just might be an altie.

Sastra,

Now THAT's what I'm talking about: More one-liners, fewer trolls like Foresam. (Yes, from long years of Usenet experience I recognize a troll when I see one, but occasionally when I'm in just the right mood I sometimes succumb to the temptation to "feed the troll." Sorry. It's a weakness I had even on Usenet.)

So, enough feeding the troll, I want more "You might be an altie if..." one-liners!

If you speak of the AMA as if it were a government regulatory agency, you just might be an altie.

If you believe that a "healthy" person's shit literally doesn't stink, you're definitely an altie (I suspect the reason chlorophyll has a reputation as a "detoxifier" is that it's actually an effective stool deodorizer).

If you assert that dosage, mean dosage and standard deviation of dosage are all "pharm concepts" that aren't relevant to your favorite remedy, you're probably an altie.

If you talk about the pH of the "body," you're either an altie or have access to a very large blender.

If you're standing at the blackboard writing:

HIV does not exist
HIV is harmless and does not cause AIDS
HIV is a genetically engineered bioweapon

you're the AltieBart.

Hey, whaddya know, Orac has a sense of humor!

No, I'm not an altie. That stuff don't work.

The problem, though, is that pharmaceutical drugs -- even in correct doses -- often kill you.

See, Lazarou, JAMA (1998)

According to Lazarou, fatal adverse drug reactions (correct dose, not overdose) account for about 106,000 deaths/year.

After heart attack, cancer and stroke, that's the 4th biggest killer in USA.

I know you boys ain't too fond of actually citing and quoting from the published literature, but here's a choice tidbit from Lazarou:

We have found that serious ADRs are frequent and more so than generally recognized. Fatal ADRs appear to be between the fourth and sixth leading cause of death. Their incidence has remained stable over the last 30 years.

Here's another:

Research to determine the hospital costs directly attributable to an ADR estimated that ADRs may lead to an additional $1.56 to $4 billion in direct hospital costs per year in the United States.57-58

So, Heck ya, it's fun to beat up on the granola, tofu, bean-sprout enema crowd and their silly medical superstitions. It beats facing up to the hundreds of thousands of deaths and billions in costs attributable to quack doctors, endemic to the profession.

Hank Barnes

p.s. Happy President's Day!

This just in:

Life has been found to be universally fatal. Regardless of dosage, all living things will inevitably die.

If you believe in the contrary, you are definitely an altie.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled commentary.

Great topic for this conversation: Wilhelm Reich
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_Reich

So here goes,

You might be an altie (cue Kate Bushâs Cloudbusting) if you have an Orgone Accumulator (ORAC) rusting in your backyard.

Hmmm...

If you think 'artifical' medicines contain harmful impurities not found in 'natural' ones - as opposed to the other way around - you're probably an altie.

If you talk confidently about quantum mechanics, string theory and alternate universes, but find algebra scary, you could be an altie.

If you think a measles vaccine causes autism, but not because of mercury, you're a british altie.

If you believe in ADD, ADHD, Asperger's Syndrome, Social Anxiety Disorder, MPD and Recovered Memory, but not in the Oedipus Complex, Hysteria or Demonaical Possession, then you're an altie who think's they're a skeptic.

If you think this article is serious and insightful, you are altissimo.

Hank,

3/4ths of the incidents were dose-dependent, but not overdoses. 1/4th were allergic reactions. How can you attribute any of the former to "quack" doctors if there was no theraputic failure?

The study in a nutshell: if you're very ill and given a drug with potentially harmful side-effects, there is a significant risk associated with taking that drug. Nowhere does it say that, on average, you'd be better off taking nothing.

Damn good reason to continue research characterizing individual reactions to pharmaceuticals via genetic or metabolic information, though.

If your definition of "acceptable risk" is:

"What the hell, let's give it shot, what have we got to lose"?

You might be an altie.

If you "think" recommended dosages are for sissies, and that median ED/LD's are best determined by experimentation on your child...

You might be an altie.

Hank is also obviously seeking to distract attention from the main point--the lack of science or evidence for the efficacy of the vast majority of alternative medicine "cures" and the offenses against science and logic all too many alties routinely perpetrate. He also seems to think that I haven't read the JAMA paper to which he refers.

The Lazarou study has been roundly criticized for methodological flaws, including lumping together rates of ADRs from the 1960's on. There was also considerably heterogeneity in the studies included in the metanalysis that made including them in a metanalysis questionable.

Even so, even if the Lazarou study were spot-on accurate, Terry gets the implications of it correct. More importantly, even if the Lazarou study were correct, it would not constitute a defense of alternative medicine.

Everyone else, keep the "You might be an altie if..." one-liners coming!

The Lazarou study has been roundly criticized for methodological flaws

LOL. I notice when you get spanked you tend to make up stuff. In your world, Does the phrase "roundly criticized" mean the same as recently confirmed by similar prospective studies in other countries?

Money Quote from the British Journal of Medicine in 2000:

Our findings are similar to results obtained in two meta-analyses. In Australia, an incidence of between 2.4% - 3.6% was found and in the United States an incidence of between 3.6% and 6.2% was found.

The authors are talking about hospitalizations required because of adverse drug reactions suffered by patients.

Ya might by an "altie," if the medicine your doctor prescribes makes ya real sick:)

Barnes

Hank B.

I see Bronze Dog has no conjecture about the leg or sense of touch either. As usual, more evasion.

If you think shifting burden of proof onto someone who doesn't have access to medical information on an unverifiable, unblinded, uncontrolled anecdote is the height of debate, you might be an altie.

If you think someone pointing out your failed efforts to shift the burden of proof is "evasion," you might be an altie.

Orac, I'm not sure I understand this periodic trolling for trolls that you do...an obsession? a character flaw? simply a boost-my-sitemeter ratings ploy?

My brother has a hypothesis that all humor (except maybe slapstick) is based in logical fallacies. If we can't learn to laugh, we end up crying.

What a bunch of gutless wonders! Will MD's ever stop harming infants?

"Ya might by an "altie," if the medicine your doctor prescribes makes ya real sick:)

Barnes

Hank B."

Oooooh. A convert. /rolls eyes

You might be an altie if you view cherry picking quotes from the abstracts available on pubmed to be the main duty description in your role as soldier in the war against vaccinations.

You might be an altie if you cite a contentious review as gospel and declare victory over your imagined enemy (99.99% of the world) in the process.

If you think that your kid is getting better when you dose him with something recommended by a "Defeat Autism Now!" doctor or Rashid Buttar because the kid grows pale, vomits, breaks out in a rash, loses hair, skin starts peeling and he has a serious change of fecal color or has a seizure and/or a high fever, you are probably Fore Sam or one of his altie antivax buddies from the altie autism boards and the quacks just love you to bits.

If you are like Fore Sam and you refuse to see that your buddies are a quacks and liars who are ripping off parents, then you just mightbe delusional.

If you write about Herxheimer reactions in autistic kids but you can't spell "Herxheimer" you are probably Rashid (coffee enemas are our friends) Buttar.

If you think you can put a paste of bloodroot on your skin that will eat a big hole through your flesh and that what is happening is really that cancer is being pulled out of your body and that the accompanying pain is necessary and better than what allopathic medicine would offer you, you are likely an altie.

If you are saving up for your own Ondamed (tm) device, you might be an altie.

If you've ever grown/brewed your own jar/crock of "Kombucha tea", yup, you're an altie.

If reading the words "quackwatch.org" makes you break out in a cold sweat, you might be an altie.

If you think moxabustion, high colonics and ear candling are really fun things to do, you're probably an altie.

If you named your child Mugwort, pretty good chance that you're an altie.

---

Orac, the link to the Hulda Clark liver fluke thing doesn't work, it has an extra http: in the link.

If you think natural is synonymous with good then you're probably an altie.

"His constipation went away. He can now feel pain. He doesn't drag one leg when he walks anymore.....has about normal receptive language, speaks once in a while, stopped banging his head, stopped biting himself, stopped screaming for no apparent reason, can do puzzles and count to at least 10. He lets me read to him instead of eating the book. He stopped smearing feces."

And as we all know, these are textbook indicators for autism.

Kev;
Nice of you to show us another yellow answer. Too bad you can't argue with the statement you quoted.

Helga;
If you think mercury doesn't cause autism, you might be a baby killer. Is that better than turning to alt. med. when the baby poisoners won't help you?

Orac; Would addressing the return of sense of touch and a normal leg be "feeding a troll"? Why do you dodge a question that simply proves your point about chelation being the right treatment for mercury poisoning?
Do doctors get blackballed for telling the truth about autism?

If you read Orac's blog just so you can start arguments, you are probably missing the point.

LOL. I notice when you get spanked you tend to make up stuff.

I notice that, in your supposed "spanking," you continue to evade Terry's and my points, which are:

1. Even if the Lazarou study were accurate, it would not constitute a defense of alternative medicine, nor, more importantly, would it show that alt med does a better job than conventional medicine or that the jokes in this post are without merit.

2. Terry's point: The study in a nutshell: if you're very ill and given a drug with potentially harmful side-effects, there is a significant risk associated with taking that drug. Nowhere does it say that, on average, you'd be better off taking nothing.

You must be bored since Tara took off for the weekend; so you come over here to troll my blog. And, yes, you are a troll, as is obvious from your behavior on Tara's blog and on the MUSC Tiger a while back. Your calling me an "intellectual poseur" over on Aetiology is an utterly transparent attempt to draw me out. The fact is, the Lazarou report was widely discussed at our faculty meetings, at several national meetings I attended, and in various committee functions. Its pros and cons were dissected ad nauseum. It still comes up from time to time even now. You would know this if you had any clue.

You also seem to have mistaken me for someone else when you claim that I never take on craziness in "conventional medicine." You obviously haven't been reading me very long. Try these two for starters:

Battling quackery in conventional medicine
Avoiding scientific delusions

You are also mistaken in implying that I am unrelentingly hostile to alternative medicine. I just want it to be evidence-based, and I applaud efforts to do so:

Now that's the way you do it!

In any case, I know my limitations; you apparently don't. My observation of your behavior over on Tara's blog leads me to conclude that your MO is thus: You cherry pick one article and keep beating on it again and again, in Tara's case the Padian article and in my case the Lazarou article. At least here you were able to find a second article. Congratulations. I now predict that you'll go off to Medline in search of more now that I've pointed this out. It will all be a smokescreen because it will not address the central point: The ineffectiveness of the vast majority of alternative medicine and the offenses against reason, evidence, and science that are used by alties to justify all too much of it.

Oh, and I also predict that you'll throw around some more insults and accuse me of "whining" again. It's what you do. You don't seem to be able to help yourself.

In any case, this ain't Usenet. It's my blog. I decide what I will and will not discuss and when. If I feel like responding to you (like right now) I will. If I don't, I won't, and no amount of your petulant name-calling will draw me out. I have only a certain amount of time each week to dedicate to writing for this blog, and I don't want to waste any more of it than I already have on you.


Back to more "You just might be an altie if..." items. Keep 'em coming.

If you tell me not to touch my apple because it's covered in pesticide while you're eating a Big Mac, you may be an altie.

If you buy your kids cokes while protesting against water fluridation, you may be an altie.

If your grandmother never talks about the two children she lost as infants and you hear other family members and your friends talking about how dangerous immunization is and so you become concerned for the health of your children, you may be human.

You cherry pick one article and keep beating on it again and again, in Tara's case the Padian article and in my case the Lazarou article. At least here you were able to find a second article. Congratulations

LOL! So, Orac, you're now a: (a) surgeon, (b) scientist and (c) a drama queen to boot:)

Lemme quickly clarify a few things for you:

1. I tend to agree that alternative medicines don't really work.

2. I tend to agree that to determine whether they actually work, they oughta be subject to some rigorous, case-controlled studies.

3. Padian was "the largest and longest study of heterosexual transmission of HIV in the United States." (Padian, page 354.)

4. Yes, I try to quote the best paper on the relevant subject. Don't you?:)

5. Padian and Lazarou were not obtained on line -- I have hard copies of these papers, as well as perhaps 1000 or so more relating to AIDS, cancer, adverse drug reactions, etc, etc. Would you like to discuss those too?

6. I'm glad that you discussed Lazarou ad nauseum -- what did you do about it?

Ciao,

Barnes

You might be an altie if even with overwhelming evidence that you might be wrong, you absolutely refuse to admit any error in your thinking.

An example of this recently in misc.health.alternative is "vernon" who think he knows the history of homeopathy:
This is part of the conversation

And again, Hank won't answer the central question which is....

(sing it with me, boys and girls)

Even if Lazarou is completely correct, is it better to take a drug with potentially harmful side effects or to simply suffer from the condition which the drug can treat?

Ivan

If you think medicine is organized, you ARE an altie.

If your replies start with "lol" you probably are an altie.

If you try bazillions of cures until symptoms go away, then declare the last one to be a cure, you might be an altie.

If you think researching a possible cure is a waste of time because you have to cure people right now with your shot in the dark, you might be an altie.

If you like to talk about some anonymous guy's finances before you talk about a critical medical issue in a blog entry about that very critical medical issue, you might be an altie.

If you think financial motivations alter the laws of thermodynamics, you might be an altie.

If you complain about the chlorine in Splenda while putting salt on your dinner, you might be an altie.

If you complain about Coca-Cola's acidity while drinking a glass of orange juice, you might be an altie.

If you have a conspiracy theory that requires the non-existence of doctors who are both compassionate and require double-blind control studies to make decisions, then you might be an altie.

"Too bad you can't argue with the statement you quoted."

As ever John, what possible argument is there to someone who is just plain old wrong? Unless of course you know where the loss of feeling in ones leg is in the ASD diagnostic criteria?

If you routinely complain that evidence-based medicine doesn't work as well as the mass heal, greater restoration, and true ressurection cleric spells, and consider that a legitimate argument in favor of unproven quackery, you might be an altie.

"If you believe that thimerosal is 49% mercury, you might be an Altie."

Except that its about 47.5% mercury, based on my quick calculation. That's close enough to move it to "misinformed" rather than "altie".

If you complain that evidence-based medicine doesn't work as well as the mass heal, greater restoration and true ressurection spells, and consider that to be a legitimate argument in favor of unproven quackery, you might be an altie.

Here is a few

If you believe the plural of anecdote is data you are probably an altie

If you believe alternative and complementary therapies cannot adequately be studied using randomized, double-blind, placebo controlled trials because they miss the essence of the therapy, as was recently suggested in an articlein the BMJ, you are almost certainly an altie.

If you prefer to use the term "babies" to describe all children under the age of 10, there's an outside chance you're an altie.

If your arguments tend to degenerate to comments about "baby poisoners" while never once considering the concept of "infant mortality rate", the massive reduction in infant mortality in industrialized societies in the last 150 years, or what that means in the grand scheme of human happiness, you're almost certainly an altie.

If you've ever screamed "won't somebody please think of the children?!", you might be an altie.

If you refuse to believe that any disease or condition could possibly cure itself or regress to a mean, that all improvements in health are driven by outside influences, while simultaneously describing the body's own miraculous healing powers, you are an altie.

If you don't know that many diseases are caused by the immune system, under the term "autoimmune disorders", and that "boosting" or "energizing" one's immune system is the key to health and longevity, you might be on the path to being an altie.

And finally, if you were offended by this list to the point of becoming troll, you are either an altie or just a garden-variety jackass.

Thanks Orac, I've been reading your stuff for a few months now, keep up the good work!

If you respond to skeptics by pointing out how Semmelweis was ridiculed for his ideas......

If you don't know the difference (or know that there is a difference) between ethylmercury and methylmercury, yet still claim you know that thimerosal in vaccines causes autism, you might be an altie. (You might also want to read this.)

If you attribute the sudden, radical decline in polio incidence that occurred when the Salk vaccine was introduced to the fact that "polio rates were already declining anyway" ... you may be an altie.

If you believe that...
-- A worsening of symptoms proves your alt.therapy is "cleaning out the toxins"
-- An improvement in symptoms proves your alt.therapy has cured you
-- Unchanged symptoms prove your alt.therapy has "halted the progression of disease"
... you may just be an altie.

If you insist that "the flu shot gave you the flu," and your evidence is that you got a "stomach flu" 3 months after getting the shot... you may be an altie. Or just a garden-variety idiot.

If you can utter or hear the words "psychic surgery" with a straight face... you could just possibly be an altie.

If you believe that any efficacious treatment for anything ever could, or should, be 100% safe for everybody... you must be an altie. (Corollary: If you believe that a drug/vaccine that saves 1,000,000 lives and kills 5 people is no better than rat poison... I'm afraid you might be an altie.)

If you believe that this makes logical sense:
-- My child did not get the pertussis vaccine.
-- Yet my child did not get pertussis.
-- Therefore, the pertussis vaccine is useless...
... well, it looks like you might be an altie.

(Corollary: If you react violently when someone suggests your children stay healthy because of the herd immunity bestowed by all those kids who did get the vaccines... you might be an altie.)

As a nurse who firmly believes in the efficacy of myriad medical treatments and the veracity of reproducible scientific research, I also subscribe to some alternative views. That said, I never buy an alternative treatment hook, line and sinker, and often caution others to be more discerning.

There is more and more research being done on alternative therapies (echinacea, for instance) and the acceptance of the importance of such studies by the wider medical community is crucial. It is also important that alternative-minded people who call for research actually accept the results of said studies, especially if the studies were done properly and transparently (like echinacea, again), and even if said research debunks a popular herbal remedy or treatment.

My personal practice is to consult alternative providers for specific issues (acupuncture for various issues, chiropractors for back pain), but also to take antibiotics when needed, not to mention the pharmaceuticals that daily enhance and improve my life.

Over all, there is a middle road, I believe, with room for all, as long as intelligence and rational thinking rule the day.

If you refuse treatment for depression that is an understandable side-effect of your chronic, painful illness because you think receiving such treatment would mean admitting your illness is "all in your head" and you wouldn't then be able to access further treatment for the disease itself, you might be an altie.

If you believe your overweight or obesity is caused by "toxins" and take great pains to remove these toxins from your diet and home, while neglecting to look at whether you may simply need to eat less or get more exercise (or indeed check for underlying medical conditions like hypothyroidism), you might be an altie.

If being seen to be right about your chosen theory or treatment is more important to you than recovering as much of your health as possible, you might be an altie.

You're an ass

Ah, an altie speaks. ;-)

If your greatest contribution to medical science is a collection of one-liners, you're probably a passive-aggressive Quack!Quack!Quack!. Wow this is fun!

BronzeDog says
"My brother has a hypothesis that all humor (except maybe slapstick) is based in logical fallacies. If we can't learn to laugh, we end up crying."

Your brother is absolutely correct,this thread is a joke

Orac is witnessing the complete and total self-destruction of his own credibility and that of this blog.

if you use the term "allopathic" when referring to evidence based medicine.. you're an altie!
if you believe pro biotic yoghurt cures measles.. you're an altie.
if you spout ani vax propaganda while relying on herd immunity to protect your(unvaccinated) children.. you're an altie , and a selfish hippocrate to boot.
if you believe polio was not wiped out by vaccination, and that FDR in fact had EPV .. you're an altie ( and probably posting on whale.to)
if you believe chiro works.. you're an altie.
if your response to any criticism of your pet woo woo is- "allopathic medicine and evil big pharma kill 100,000 people a year"... you guessed it , you are most definately an altie.
if you believe measles is harmless... altie
if you believe enemas cure anything other than constipation... altie
if you use the words- energy, vibrations and quantum when discussing vitamins/crystals/homeopathy etc.. altie through and through.
if you believe carl sagen and james randi are members of the illuminati.... altie!
as a nurse i feel that i have a responsibilty to only support treatments that are evidence based and there seems to be very little evidence ( just plenty of anecdotes)for all the altie favourites. shouting about how terrible "allopathic" medicine is ,and conspiracy theories about the medical profession do not constitute evidence. what do these true believer alties do if they get knocked down by a truck? do they ring for an alternative ambulance to take then to a homeopathic clinc? and wait for the sugar pill to mend their broken limbs and internal bleeding? im guessing they're pretty happy to see "allopathic" doctors for proven treatments. all this altie stuff is dangerous self indulgence for rich westerners who know they have real medicine to fall back on when their altie crap invariably fails.
awesome blog orac.

You know your an altie when you are horrified that they are serving cookies and sweets in the chemo room because you know for certain that sugar feeds cancer.....and then you rant and rave about the wonders of juicing, that your off to drink a huge glass of beet juice (as if cancer can differentiate the types of sugar you are feeding it)

As side splittingly funny as I find this, I do have a problem with allopathic nurse's line:

"if you use the words- energy, vibrations and quantum when discussing vitamins/crystals/homeopathy etc.. altie through and through."

While I agree that using the terms energy, vibrations and quantum while discussing vitamins and homeopathy denotes one as an altie, as a physics student, I'd have to disagree with the use of these things when dealing with crystals. "Quantum tunneling" will often be found conjuncture with "crystalline structures". The seperation of energy from quantum mechanics is impossible as all quanta are viewed as discreet energy packets, thus it is inevitable that "energy" and "crystal" will coincide somewhere. Due to the structure of crystals, they have fairly accurate vibrational frequencies, which can also be quantized, as in a phonon. Also, crystals can play an important role in laser technologies such as quantum cascade lasers.

I'm sure this is very far from the context in which an altie would use such terms, but to state that the use of such words directly correlates with one being an altie is absurd. I can't wait for the day some granola crunching Oregonian "OG" nutbag brings up anything about quantum mechanics in my presence. In fact, I (unfortunately) resided in Oregon for a couple of years and in all that time did not hear any altie I encountered mention the word quantum (granted, I heard plenty about "energy vibrations aligning your chakras blah blah blah" which is what, I'm sure, you're talking about).

Sorry people. Farewell.

If you think the bald assertion of the possible existence of completely unspecified logical fallacies is devastating to your opponent, you might be an altie.

If you think that ridicule designed to highlight your logical fallacies is inherently immoral and fallacious, you might be an altie.

If you think that skeptics should hold a straight face when dealing with your silliness, AND that they should be more emotional when they do keep a straight face, you might be an altie.

If you think your "putting babies on spikes" treatment is legitimate because a handful of kids had an allergy to something in the widespread, successful evidence-based treatment/prevention, you might be an altie.

If you think hydrogen, hydrogen ions, hydroxide ions, oxygen, ozone, water, and hydrogen peroxide are all the same and can be labelled the same because they all contain H's or O's, you might be an altie.