Junk science, junk thought, junk culture---it's everywhere in our tabloid world. Let's resist it.

JUNK SCIENCE

-- Lars (lars@indy.net), March 31, 2000

Answers

You may find stuff here that you agree with, but this is a very ideologically driven site, not necessarily a scientificly valid one. The author has turned "junk" into a general term of abuse with no meaning other than he doesn't like the results.

This is the only site besides the cigarette manufacturers that thinks second hand smoke is good for you.

-- kermit (colourmegreen@hotmail.com), March 31, 2000.

This is certainly a junk website. Our Stolen Future by Theo Colburn is now undergoing a PR greenwashing campaign, just as Rachel Carson's, Silent Spring did. Chemical companies and others, whose actions, cannot stand the truth, immediately hire a PR firm, such as Harrison's to put the best spin on their pollution and toxic residues.

-- gilda (jess@listbot.com), March 31, 2000.

Dang!

I was kindof hoping that those folks who spend the entire day with cell-phones stuck in their ears [including when they drive] would suffer SOME consequence.

-- Anita (notgiving@anymore.thingee), March 31, 2000.

Kermit:

You may find stuff here that you agree with, but this is a very ideologically driven site, not necessarily a scientificly valid one. The author has turned "junk" into a general term of abuse with no meaning other than he doesn't like the results.

You are correct in saying that the site has an agenda. It mostly reports news releases. It is important to me to know what kind of information the general public is receiving. For that reason, I find it useful. You are incorrect in questioning the science being reported. Most of the true junk is the scare tactic stuff. You know the dangers of second hand smoke; or GM foods [not that problems aren't possible, but that misreporting and junk science hasn't added any useful information to the debate]. As someone who reads a very large number of original papers on a daily basis, I do find that a lot of the work that they deride is pure junk [not all, but they are pretty good]. People claiming to prove causual relationships based on statistical analysis. Much of it follows the pattern that we saw with Y2K. People spread scare stories saying such and such could happen [and in general, such and such, could have happened].

The question was never, in common terms, is it likely that these possible effects will occur. It should have been. Once again few were listening

Bes

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), March 31, 2000.

Hello Z,
I agree that it is risky to infer causal relationships from statistical analysis. But the following excerpt of Junkscience's critique of the Air Force's Agent Orange study caught my eye.

Moreover, cholesterol and triglyceride levels were reported to increase with serum dioxin levels -- meaning the observed diabetes was likely a result of obesity, an established risk factor.

This seems to be saying that obese people have higher levels of cholesterol and triglycerides than non-obese people, which may or may not be the case for the study subjects. But it also seems to be saying that dioxin's inducing other effects that in turn induce diabetes, would be insufficient to qualify dioxin as a risk factor, which seems a peculiar way to define risk factor.

I haven't read any of the many hundreds of pages of the Air Force study, so I have no opinion on its validity. But the lack of clarity in the above statement makes me wonder how much of the study was read by the Junkscience critic.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), March 31, 2000.

David L:

I have always enjoyed talking to you. You are a reasonable person. I can't comment on that particular study at this point. The problem with clinical research is defining the variables to be considered. Some of the studies that have been criticized on junkscience.com [such as the effect of second hand smoke on breast cancer incidence] are fully justified. They eliminated known variables to get press coverage. We have this problem of inaccurate press coverage of technical subjects. Hell, I know this well. I work at the center of journalistic training. The jour's [as they are called] all swim up the Missouri every spring and spawn. They practice on people actually doing science. The general requirements for being a science jour is to have an introductory course in science. I remember starting a conversation with one and asking if she knew what DNA was. She said yes: Defense Nuc. Agency. So it goes.

Best w

-- Z1X4Y7 (Z1X4Y7@aol.com), March 31, 2000.

Z, surely you don't mean that "DNA" stands for something else. 8^)

I once took a course in college where the instructor mentioned that NASA stood for National and Space Agency. (The course was horrible.)

But returning to the topic at hand, I too have found that the only reliable way to know what a study says, is to have actually read it.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), March 31, 2000.