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“Waving cancer goodbye” (Quack treatments)

CANCERCENTERPHOTO

Having your cancer treated by someone waving their hands over your torso is an approach most persons would reject. But mix it with other techniques and impressive-sounding terms presented under the umbrella of Integrated Oncology, and the patient may be swayed.

In a worst-case scenario, Magical Thinking, chemotherapy sickness, and assurances from a naturopath they’ve come to trust may combine to convince the patient that Reiki is all that’s needed reverse rouge cell growth.

Oncology deals with tumors, so genuine integrative oncology might involve a physician, pathologist, surgeon, chemotherapist, and radiologist working in conjunction to diagnose and treat a cancer patient. It might also include palliative care that focuses on the unpleasant symptoms of pain, nausea, and anxiety.

This is where the lines can start to become blurred. Since many cancer patients suffer vitamin and mineral deficiencies, nutrition is important, but a nutritionist is not treating cancer and the service provided is not nutritional therapy. Likewise, there is no relaxation therapy, music therapy or humor therapy. It is a problem when the likes of yoga, visualization, and meditation are presented as tools that fight cancer.

Integrative oncology involves many unproven and highly implausible treatments. Taken by themselves, the techniques may be harmless. But it is potentially fatal if they are relied on in lieu of medicine, and this could happen. Since patients don’t see the cells growing or regressing, they are more likely to be fooled into believing naturopathy or homeopathy is working. But using these to treat cancer is as ineffective as seeing a naturopath for a severed artery or popping homeopathic tablets for a concussion.

In integrative oncology, highly-effective, repeatedly successful treatments are on the same plain as sound nutrition, which is palliative care but is not fighting cancer, and also in the same category as reflexology, craniosacral therapy, and Therapeutic Touch.

Some integrative oncology techniques used in respected cancer-fighting institutions violate the laws of physics and chemistry, and are rooted in pre-scientific vitalism. Some invoke non-existent anatomical features such as acupuncture meridians, chiropractic subluxations, and reflexology points that correspond to organs. Traditional Chinese Medicine blames illness on wind, heat, dryness, temperature extremes, and dampness. Your mother may have thought this too when she told you to come in from the rain or you’d catch cold. Updated for today’s integrative oncologist, the admonition is, “Come inside before you catch mesothelioma.”

Another concern is that time, money, and resources are spent on researching treatments and techniques that have no prior plausibility, and aren’t based on science. These ideas bypass preclinical observation, in vitro testing, and animal research, and jump straight to randomized controlled tests. $50,000,000 in tax money went to integrate ancient Chinese medicine, homeopathy, and Ayurvedic medicine into cancer-fighting regimens. The Cancer Treatment Centers of America offers acupuncture, chiropractic, mind-body therapy, and naturopathy. At the Cleveland Clinic, a staff member analyzes patient tongues to determine what herbs would help fight cancer.

Then there was a test of a pancreatic cancer remedy that included massive amounts of vegetable juice, 81 daily tablets, skin brushing, salt and soda baths, and two daily coffee enemas. One-year survival rates for the unfortunate human guinea pigs was four times worse than those receiving standard care.

Most integrated oncology ideas are under the naturopathy umbrella, and this field is as diverse as the number of practitioners. The only common ground is the conviction that the body can heal itself if properly prompted. This is an idea that has no place in any cancer treatment.

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“Hunter-blatherer” (Paleo Diet)

CAVEMAN EATING

The Paleolithic diet attempts to replicate the dining habits of our ancient ancestors. To do this in the most genuine manner, shovel some plants, roots, and barely-edible berries in your mouth and hope you survive. Rats, beetles, and any other living creature you can catch are also on the menu.

The impetus behind this movement is the belief that we evolved to be hunter-gatherers, and that today’s food wreaks havoc with that. This represents a misunderstanding of an evolutionary tenet. If an animal could only thrive in environments identical to their ancestors, this failure to adapt would lead to extinction.

So as agriculture progressed, humans evolved the ability to digest gluten and dairy products, and their mouths developed a shearing overbite that replaced a straight-on cutting shape. Besides being biologically distinctive from our Paleolithic grandpappies, we eat food that has been greatly improved through artificial selection. When a Paleo dieter eats cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts or kale, they likely don’t realize that post-Paleo Man developed all these from one plant species.

The diet eliminates not just processed foods, but anything dieters think was unavailable to those in the Paleolithic Era. A partial list of off-limits sustenance includes corn, potatoes, sugar, salt, dairy, grain, and legumes. But the idea that we have gotten away from an optimum diet fine-tuned for human benefit is erroneous. Hair and bone samples of persons from the era showed several instances of malnourishment and even starvation. There is no reason to adopt the purported dietary lifestyle of this or any era. As evolutionary biologist Marlene Zuk has asked, “If we’re going to nominate a period to emulate, why not eat like a medieval peasant or an ancestral tree shrew?” And if picking the Paleo Era, one still must decide which society to copy from, among all that existed during the 2.5 million years. There is no seal or walrus in any variants of this diet, yet Inuit hunter-gatherers consumed sea mammals with as much gusto as Don Gorske does Big Macs.

Indeed, the diet is said to be based on foods which hunter-gatherers ate, but is more accurately based on what proponents think they ate. For instance, anthropologists have found fire pits from early humans that contain grains, one of the most verboten foods in the diet. There is also evidence suggesting humans in this era cooked wild potatoes, legumes, and sugars.

The diet is not without benefit, as its abundance of unprocessed foods will likely increase satiety. And similar to other low-fat, low-carbohydrate diets, the Paleo combats heart disease and diabetes, and aids in weight loss. It promotes eating lean protein and certain fruits and vegetables, which is healthy enough. But the items it excludes makes it difficult to get adequate calcium and fiber.

While historically dubious, with moderate health benefits, the Paleo diet poses no danger, unless one becomes too dogmatic. Along those lines, there is nothing in scientific literature to support claims from the movement’s leaders that it prevents acne, autism, cancer, arthritis, or the ill-defined inflammation.

Then we have Australian chef Pete Evans, who wrote a children’s Paleo cookbook. It included a bone broth baby formula that contained 10 times more Vitamin A than would be safe for an infant. Because of this potentially fatal recipe, the publisher refused to print it. Evans responded by declaring he would not be silenced, digitally publishing the book himself, and encouraging others to slurp away. Try it and see if you survive. That’s the most authentic Paleolithic diet yet.

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“Fool moon” (Full moon effects)

MADMOON2

Some folks assert that the moon can impact behavior, and there is evidence for this. For instance:

  • Its light and gravity can affect the growth rate of plants. But for lunar effect believers, this is mighty boring, unless it leads to a gargantuan Venus Flytrap.
  • California grunions mate and spawn on four consecutive nights, beginning with new and full moons. But this is because tides are high, making it a successful reproduction strategy that is only indirectly related to lunar phases.
  • Deep sleep decreased by 30 percent during a full moon in a Swiss study.  There could be a connection, but this was a small sample size and no attempt has been made at test replication.

However, an insomniac feeding azaleas to his fish isn’t what people envision when they consider the lunar effect. Rather, they connect the full moon with crime (preferably committed in a London fog), along with suicide, mental illness, natural disasters, accidents, fertility, and werewolves. Hey, have you ever seen someone succumb to lycanthropy under a quarter-moon?

These beliefs trace to at least ancient Assyrian and Babylonian times. They permeate most cultures and have been a regular feature in Hollywood. Nineteenth Century Englishman Charles Hyde got away with a murder committed during a full moon by convincing jurors that the satellite had sapped his sanity.

However, meta-analysis of more than 100 studies reveals no correlation between any phenomenon commonly attributed to a full moon.

Lunar phases are also sometimes erroneously associated with women’s monthly cycles. This is likely due to three factors. One, most moon deities, such as Diana, are female. Also, the moon was central to agrarian cycles, and one can draw a corollary between this and a woman bringing forth a child. Finally, the length of moon and menstrual cycles are similar. However, a lunar month is always 29.5 days, whereas women’s cycle is about 28 days, so this notion is as mistaken as the others.

Despite all this, British police inspector Andy Parr told the BBC, “From my experience of 19 years, undoubtedly on full moons we get people with strange behavior. They’re more fractious and argumentative.”

For every study that refutes this, there are 100 anecdotes from cops, nurses, and friends, who report sinister urges springing forth when the moon waxes. Indeed, there are factors at play here, but they are confirmation bias and communal reinforcement. With confirmation bias, if something malevolent happens during a full moon, it gets noticed. If something doesn’t happen, it goes unnoticed. It something fortunate happens, it likewise is forgotten. Closely related is communal reinforcement, where believers swap tales of moon madness, strengthening the conviction.

Skeptic leader Dr. Steven Novella related this experience: “I was working in the emergency room during a busier than average night. A nurse commented, ‘Wow, it’s really crazy tonight. Is there a full moon?’ When I informed her no, she shrugged and forgot the whole thing. But other busy ER nights that fall on a full moon would resonate with her and confirm her belief.”

Some prefer the moon’s power be veiled in mysterious cloak, while others try and inject a more scientific-sounding spin. One idea is that since the moon affects the ocean’s tides, it must affect the mostly-water human body as well. But astronomer George Abell pointed out that if observing a mosquito on one’s arm under a full moon, the annoying insect is exerting more gravitational pull than the light source. Besides, the moon’s tidal force depends on its distance from Earth, not its phase.

Then we have the notion that positive ions greatly increase during a full moon and that this impacts human behavior. This likewise is without merit. This may be selective memory similar to what believers in the lunar effect experience, but it seems to me that “ions” is one of those words that people who don’t understand science throw out there to make it sound like they know what they’re talking about.

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“Sounding a little horse” (Pet psychics)

DOGTALK

All of us can talk to animals, but only a select few can get the critters to reply.

One such Dr. Doolittle is Aimee Morgana. She owns N’kisi, a parrot whom Morgana credits with talking back in a mix of English and chirps. She also ascribes to him a sense of humor and an ability to improvise language. For instance, rather than saying aromatherapy, the birdbrain comes up with “pretty smell medicine.” That is rather amazing language versatility, either for a parrot or for the person interpreting it.

Morgana keeps a clip of herself talking with the parrot. I encourage people to listen first without using the accompanying transcript. Comparing that transcript with what was chirped, some of it seems pretty close, while other lines require a lot of twisting. It is mostly unintelligible unless the listener is told what to hear. It is similar to listening to music backwards, with suggestion, anticipation, and pareidolia filling in the auditory blanks.

The parrot’s shrieks become sentences and his squawks become jokes, but it’s all through Morgana’s attribution. In reality, the parrot’s responses are likely due to stimuli provided by Morgana or other persons or objects nearby. If the bird had the language skills claimed of him, he could carry on a conversation with any English speaker.

Morgana and Rupert Sheldrake also put N’kisi to the psychic test. The idea of tackling the resultant article, “Testing a parrot for telepathy,” causes me to salivate in a Pavlovian manner. But it’s a little beyond this post’s topic, so we’ll drive on.

One of the earliest documentations of supposed language in an animal focused on a 19th Century horse, Clever Hans. If asked what 2+3 was, Hans tapped his hoof five times. Hans was a sensation for over a decade before Oskar Pfungst deduced that the horse was responding to his owner’s subtle movements.

This was not fraudulent, as the owner really believed in the horse’s ability, as did many scientists. The owner was unconsciously adjusting his position slightly once the “answer” had been tapped. Pfungst figured this out by noticing that when the correct answer was unknown to anyone, Clever Hans was likewise mathematically challenged. Also, when the horse was unable see the person who knew the answer, he responded incorrectly.

In the ballpark of reason, comedic parrots and math whiz horses are out in left field with a hockey stick. But a seemingly more plausible animal language claim centers on gorillas and chimpanzees employing sign language. This comes across as more reasonable since the animals are intelligent, and the language is through hands, not voices. To split ape hairs, primates can manage communication, but not language. This was best documented in Joel Wallman’s book, “Aping Language.” Here’s the book condensed into a paragraph: “Apes in these studies acquired merely crude simulations of language rather than language itself. A survey of the communication systems of apes and monkeys in nature finds that these systems differ from language in profound ways. Language is a uniquely human attribute.”

In the interest of balance, I here introduce Chris, a woman I found online who touted her ability as an interspecies telepathic communicator.

Her website includes glowing testimonials, which disappointingly, are all from homo sapiens. One satisfied customer lauded Chris’s ability to communicate with the woman’s Terrier. “Chester was hit by a car, and they didn’t know if he was going to make it. Chris told me, “Chester is going to be OK,” and he was.”

If your mutt is less fortunate that Chester, that’s OK, because Chris claims the ability to channel dead animals as well.

Talking with animals is the least Chris can do, since a horse told her which career path to gallop down: “He enlightened me to how I was to bring my blessing to the world and what I was to do with my life: Bring people and animals closer in their relationship.”

Prompted by this Mr. Ed revelation, Chris now offers private consultations, coaching, and a series of classes on animal communication, animal Reiki, and animal Shamanic healing. She also offers telephone consultation, so I signed up for my 15 minutes of lame. I have no pets, but figured she could give me some advice for my daughter, who was sick a couple of days last week.

It starts with a simple form: Contact information and the pet’s name. Customers rave about the animals being able to relate to Chris their complex mental, physical, and spiritual concerns, but none of the pets can tell her their name. In the animal dropdown menu, there was no human option, so I selected CAT, for Continually Animated Tyke.

Here’s how some of the conversation went:

“I get the feeling that you have something that’s bothering you about Isis and you’d like to fix it.” She’s figured that out already and all she knows about me is that I’ve filled out a form addressing that very issue.

“Well, she’s been sick a couple of times in the last week, and that’s unusual for her.”

“How old is she?”

“Six.”

“Has she been spayed?”

“No.”

“That might be worth considering. At her age, pregnancies can became complicated.”

“She’s not the ideal age for it, that’s for sure. ”

“How has she been sleeping?”

“Fine, but she hates getting woke up. She can be very feisty then.”

“Sounds like you want to make sure you stay free of her claws when she get roused.”

“Man, you’ve got her down.”

“Isis is telling me that she may have stomach problems. How has her appetite been?”

“Well, I sometimes have trouble getting her to eat in the morning.”

“What are you feeding her?”

“Just the usual for someone of her age and species.”

“So much of what you find in stores is lacking in nutrients and are full of chemicals. I would recommend some homemade recipes I will e-mail you. You could also try changing where she eats. Try taking her bowl off the floor.”

“That’s probably a good idea. My wife has never much cared for that approach anyway.”

“If she’s getting enough sleep, but is lethargic and has a poor appetite, her illness may be psychosomatic. She needs some new excitement. I’m sensing she would like a ball with bells or a scratching post.”

“She does love toys, but doesn’t have any of those. That might be worth a try.”

“This just came to me. I’m seeing very clearly that her tail has been drooping a lot.”

“Now that you mention it, I haven’t seen her with a tail in the air much lately.”

“This means she needs more time to herself. I know you love her and want to spend time with her. But they are very solitary animals. She needs that time alone and wants to feel that she is in charge.”

“Yeah, she makes that’s last part pretty clear. Another problem is that she tears up things around the house.”

“That’s her way of reaching out. Respond with love. Do not declaw her. That is so cruel.”

“Yeah, that would be mighty rough. Well, thanks, you’ve suggested a lot of things for Isis that I would have never come up with on my own. Oh, and when you send those recipes, could you include something with Reese’s Cups?”

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“Spoke on the Water” (Jennifer Groesbeck case)

BABY

Jennifer Groesbeck died last week when her car crashed into Utah’s Spanish Fork River. This tragedy would normally have been a regional story, but it became a major news event because her 18-month old daughter Lily survived half a day hanging upside down, her car seat positioned above the water.

But it was a specific element to the rescue that garnered much of the attention. The four hero police officers who rescued the baby later reported they heard an adult voice coming from the car. Officer Jared Warner said he had no explanation for the voice. But hundreds of posters on CNN, Fox News, and other sites filled the void. It was an angel or the mother’s ghost, they emphatically declared, often in all caps and with exclamation points to the power of 10. Praises were lifted to God for sparing the baby, with no accompanying curses for him leaving the young girl motherless.

There’s no reason to believe the officers invented the tale. It could have been the child, but this is unlikely since she would have had to go from speaking to unconscious in the relatively short time it took for the sounds to be heard and the rescue made. Another possibility is the officers were experiencing apophenia, where one detects patterns or phenomenon in sights and sounds. This happens when you wrongly think your cell phone is vibrating or that there’s a knock at the front door when you’re in the basement. Expectation can make a person especially vulnerable to this.

Discovery.com related a story from 2012, where customs officials searched a cargo ship for suspected stowaways. The officials heard knocking and shouts of distress from the ship’s containers. But when opened, no one was inside. The officials’ anticipation had led them to misinterpret other sounds as panicked pleas. This could have been what the Utah police officers experienced. Boats, anglers, bicyclists, hikers, frogs, birds, echoes, trucks, or a flowing river could have made sounds that were interpreted by adrenaline-pumped rescuers as a plea from the netherworld.

There’s no recording of the event, so there’s no bolstering either position, whether asserting the miraculous or the mundane. The accident report has yet to be made available, but it will contain a crucial point, either by documentation or omission. If the four officers independently reported a voice coming from the car, this would be strong evidence they heard something. Not necessarily a deceased woman yelling, but something. But if the memory of the cry for help only surfaced when they were discussing it afterward, with one mentioning it, then another saying maybe he did too, and the others coming to that conclusion, this would be strong evidence of distorted memories and groupthink.

Sharon Hill, editor of Doubtful News, said these ghostly tales are a societal phenomenon. “The apparent sighting or sign suggesting the intervention of a guardian angel are very common cultural stories,” she said. “These types of colorful flourishes are a result of the person relating the story interpreting it in a comforting way. We interpret the event in the framework of our beliefs.”

Unlike the great majority of excited posters who declare there is no possibility beyond their interpretation, I do not assert absolutely that this was apophenia or groupthink. But I do insist that no miracle is required to survive a car crash that is reported by a fisherman, responded to by police officers, and mitigated by a functioning car seat.

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“Do you deceive in miracles?” (Weeping Statues and Shroud of Turin)

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The most frequently-cited wonders centering on Biblical characters are weeping statues and the Shroud of Turin. One is temporary, the other permanent, but both lack scientific evidence for being genuine.

Weeping statues are representations of Mary from which tears are said to be gushing forth. The crying is usually interpreted as her trying to tell us something. A more impressive miracle would be the statue opening its mouth and leaving no doubt about the message. Then again, who these days could understand Aramaic?

Weeping statues are usually frauds to drum up attention and money, though a few are caused by natural phenomenon such as condensation or a chemical reaction to air. When done as a hoax, olive oil is usually employed since it never dries.

An Italian skeptic with the preposterously wonderful name of Luigi Garlaschelli explained how it works. A hollow statue made of a porous material is glazed with an impermeable coating. The statue is then filled with a liquid, with the porous material absorbing it and the glazing keeping it from flowing out. Next, the glazing is imperceptibly scratched under the eyes, causing drops to come forth.

A simpler, lazier method is to smear blood or oil on the icon. This, or just about any technique, will be effective when used on the devout. They already believe on faith, which is impervious to logic, facts, reason, and persuasion. Augment this with the thrill of witnessing a miracle and having to travel a long distance and stand in a long line to do so, and belief is a virtual certainty.

It is noteworthy that skeptics are seldom allowed to examine the statues or take samples from them. When that has happened, the ruse has collapsed. Statues in Quebec had been weeping blood, and Canadian Broadcasting Corporation reporters were allowed to put it to a scientific test. This revealed that the blood had been mixed with pork fat, which liquefied and ran when the room temperature rose due to the body heat of the faithful.

Mary also showed up in a California tree, with this turning out to be a fungus. She has also visited oil stains, doors, and my Froot Loops this morning.

The most nauseating manifestation of Mary’s presence was though a comatose teen girl in Massachusetts. The child had been unresponsive and bedridden for 11 years after nearly drowning. The family garage became a makeshift chapel, with miracle seekers stopping by to receive healing after seeing the girl and a weeping statue. The statue could cure every malady except for the one which afflicted the girl who lived adjacent to it 24-7. A window was added to the garage so throngs of onlookers could stare at the vegetative girl and pray that she channel God in order to help them find their car keys.

Her mother allowed 20/20 to take a sample of the oil, with the analysis revealing it to be 80 percent vegetable oil and 20 percent chicken fat. In fact, skeptic author Joe Nickell, who penned a book on weeping statues, reported that all he statues he ever encountered were the result of fraud or condensation. Of significant note, neither he nor any other investigator has ever seen an object start to spurt liquid.

While weeping statues can pop up anywhere there’s an adequate olive oil supply, seeing the Shroud requires a trip around the world, unless one lives in Turin.

This piece of cloth has an image of two men on it, one frontal and one rear, with the heads meeting in the middle. The Shroud was probably an artwork from the 14th Century employing red pigment and vermilion paint. Art historian Nicholas Allen, using only techniques and materials available in the Middle Ages, replicated making the Shroud for his doctoral thesis.

The assertion that the image is of Jesus wrapped in a blanket poses serious issues. There are a lack of wraparound distortions across the torso, thighs, and lower legs that would be consistent with a man being wrapped inside. If the cloth were genuine, the face and body would barely be recognizable as such.

As it is, the head is a bit large for the body, the nose is disproportionate, and the arms are too long. But hey, you try hanging on a cross and wearing a crown of thorns for 36 hours and see how peachy you look.

Even if the Shroud had been a malformed man’s burial linen, radiocarbon 14 dating proved it was less than 700 years old. This spurred an ad hoc hypothesis that a blaze in 1532 screwed up the carbon dating, an assertion void of fire science reality. In fact, samples for carbon dating are completely burned to CO2 as part of the procedure.

Meanwhile, University of Turin professor Alberto Carpinteri explained the dating discrepancy this way: “Neutron emissions by earthquakes could have induced the image formation on the Shroud’s linen fibers, through thermal neutron capture on nitrogen nuclei, and caused a wrong radiocarbon dating.”

Other than subatomic influence from natural disasters, other pieces of evidence put forth by the Shroud Crowd is that the cloth contains both AB blood and pollen grains found only in Israel. However, blood blackens when aged, while the “blood” on the Shroud is red. Another miracle, perhaps. Furthermore, the red blots were subjected to a series of tests by forensic serologists, with the results indicating it is not blood.

Even if it were, it could have come from anyone who ever came in contact with it. Likewise, the pollen could have been added by anyone who ever handled the Shroud, either by chance or deception. Though doubtful, it could mean that the Shroud had been in Jerusalem at one point, though this fails to establish that it is Jesus’ burial garment. Nickell, who also wrote a book on the Shroud, cites more circumstantial evidence. He notes the complex herringbone weave is inconsistent with what was used for burial in Jesus’ time and place. Hebrew law also dictated cleansing of the corpse before wrapping, and bodies don’t bleed days after death.

Even if evidence pointed to the cloth coming from the Middle East two millenniums ago, this would fail to establish that it is an image of Jesus rising. No explanations are offered for how the image was impressed onto cloth through a physical resurrection. Holes in the cloth would be better evidence than an image on it.

Believers generally attribute all this to the miraculous. These miracles include the Shroud Jesus precisely resembling how he is portrayed in Middle Age European paintings, as opposed to how a First Century Israeli more likely appeared.

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“Quack to nature” (Naturopathy)

SANDWICHNaturopathy is to health what a peanut butter-and-crack sandwich is to nutrition. It starts off with good ingredients, then rolls steadily downhill.

It suggests eating healthy foods, exercising, and giving up smoking. Hardly revolutionary, but at least sound advice. That’s where the positive traits end.

The field, which eschews drugs and surgery, is an umbrella term for techniques that purport to set the body on a course to healing. The overarching idea behind the practice is that the body will heal itself if given the right prompting. These prompts can include sunlight, fresh air, and a smorgasbord of alternative medicine techniques, be it acupuncture, applied kinesiology, iridology, reflexology, or something else. Venturing further from the mainstream, some practitioners embrace St. John’s wort to combat HIV positivity, increased grain intake to cure mental illness, and wet compresses to halt a stroke.

The ancestors of today’s naturopaths were the spa healers of the 19th Century, who touted bathing in the Danube as a cure for tuberculosis. Naturopathy went virtually extinct with the advent of Germ Theory and vaccination, but rebounded with the New Age movement. It now embraces ideas such as Goldenseal as a cure for Strep throat, homeopathic onion pills to conquer lupus, and the belief that excess sugar will concentrate in the ear.

There are no standards or agreed-upon practices, so depending on which naturopath your arthritis-riddled Aunt Mae sees, she may be treated by being wrapped in wet towels, poked with needles, or given either a coffee enema or the decidedly more pleasant scalp massage.

While the standards vary, the two constants are the use of alternative medicine and the belief that body, mind, and soul must be treated as a unit. For instance, Whooping Cough might be treated with Ayurvedic medicine for the body, Ravi Shankar music for the mind, and yoga for the soul. Common in the field are use of undefined or misused terms such as balance, harmony, energy, and qi. Most naturopaths believe people possess an unexplained energy which is the key to their health.

Naturopaths gloat that they listen to their patients, get to know them, and encourage them. This may make the patient feel special, but if the idea is to be cured, not loved, naturopathy is only of value if the condition is loneliness.

Besides, it’s not as if mainstream doctors don’t do the same. In a column for Skeptic Magazine, Harriet Hall notes that she and fellow doctors, when constructing a health care plan, consider a patient’s history, psychology, genetics, lifestyle, and environment. It’s also a myth that mainstream medicine only treats the symptom. Hall wrote, “If you are coughing and have a fever, we don’t just treat your symptoms with cough medicine and aspirin. We take an X-ray, diagnose pneumonia, figure out what specific bacterium is responsible, and choose an antibiotic effective against it.”

Many naturopaths are fond of claiming they can boost the immune system, through iris exams, foot massages, or biofeedback methods. In reality, it is rare for the immune system to be compromised, and this is a potentially fatal condition that only a medical specialist could diagnose and treat.

Referencing terms like immune system is a common ploy of naturopaths, says Britt Hermes, who trained and worked as one. “Naturopathic medicine … borrows loosely from medicine when convenient,” she said. Furthermore, she adds, “What matters in naturopathy is not what science says, but belief in an alternative, magical healing force. No medical system can be built and sustained on beliefs, hunches, conspiracy theories, and notions supported by glaring biases.”

Meanwhile, Hall says naturopathy is philosophical and not scientific. She criticized the nonexistent standards and lack of prerequisites of a field that purports to be medical. She related a study in which 60 percent of naturopaths failed to realize that a fever in a two-week-old requires hospitalization. She also reported that a Seattle girl died after naturopath treated her severe asthma attack with B-12 and acupuncture. “They invoke simplistic and unproven causes such as toxins…and qi imbalance,” Hall wrote.

This sat poorly with a Naturopath who identifies herself as Oryoki. This was Oryoki’s response to Hall’s claims that the field lacks standards and science: “Your head is buried in the sand and your ass is waving in the air. Naturopathic medicine is not universally recognized because the AMA has at its core a mission to wipe it from the professional field. Last year I was at a conference on hormone replacement and anti-aging and many of the MDs looked pale and aghast. If you don’t believe in Qi, you probably should not be in patient care.”

Oryoki seems a little stressed. Maybe she could find a naturopath to recommend she unwind with a little peanut butter and crack.

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“Watch your backfire” (Backfire Effect)

BACKFIREWhen the 2012 college football season was in high gear, speculation abounded about which teams would play in what passed for the national championship in those days that we wandered in the pre-playoff wilderness. One poster asserted that, if unbeaten, Kansas State and Notre Dame would play for the title. Enter an SEC advocate, whom we’ll call Billy Bo Jim Bob. No way, he insisted. For the SEC was so high, so mighty, so revered, that a one-loss SEC team’s mere presence in that majestic conference would sway the committee to select it over two unbeaten teams. I responded that in 2004 there were five unbeaten teams, including Auburn, and that the Tigers were bypassed for two non-SEC teams. Billy Bo responded, “That proves my point.”

By no means is this mindset limited to sports-crazed Southerners. Billy Bo’s retort was a manifestation of the Backfire Effect. This is when deep convictions meet contradictory proof, resulting not in a new viewpoint, but in a hardening of beliefs.

The most well-known example of recent years is Barack Obama’s birthplace. The newspaper birth announcement, ironically, was discovered by an early Birther who was hoping that a lack of announcement would bolster his position. Instead of accepting this evidence, Birthers promulgated the preposterous notion that Obama had been born in Kenya, his relatives in Hawaii had received news of this, had applied for a Certificate of Live Birth for someone born overseas, the state had granted this request, this information was forward to the newspapers, and the announcement ran, all in 11 days.

Birthers then attributed the release of the Long Form to the imminent release of the Birther Bible, Jerome Corsi’s book Where’s the Birth Certificate? They gathered in their online inculcation chambers, making a big deal about layers and whatever else. When their most cherished idea was disproved, they considered this more evidence for their position.

Imagine your mail includes an unexpected bill you can’t pay. Or you’re on a hike when a cougar appears in the clearing. Or, for maximum effect, you get the unexpected bill AND there’s a cougar nearby. These are bad elements, and they require a response. That same evolutionary wiring may be the reason behind the Backfire Effect. You feel threatened and need to react.

Indeed, we often pay more attention to ideas that upset us. Psychologists Peter Ditto and David Lopez conducted a study in which subjects put a drop of saliva onto a strip. Half the subjects were told if the strip turned green within 20 seconds, it indicated an enzyme disorder. Most in this group waited 20 seconds, then put the strip down and walked away. Just one in six retested to make sure. The other half was told that green meant no disorder. Subjects in this group stood at the strip for far longer than 20 seconds, and over half retested themselves. So good news just passes through us, but potentially bad news can get us stewing.

The Backfire Effect has always existed, but has been made much easier to employ thanks to the Internet. There are sites where nuclear power and the Hiroshima bombing are hoaxes. If regular Birthers are too moderate for you, there are sites that insist Obama is not the president. No matter what reality one if hoping to flee, there are sites that offer comfort.

Whether or not the Backfire Effect kicks in is based not on the amount or type of evidence, nor how much the person believes it. It’s based on how important the belief is to the person. The most common misconception about journalism is that reporters write the headlines, when this is actually done by editors. It greatly surprises people when I tell them this, but no one decrees this an unfounded, immoral, reporter-bashing, editor-shill, conspiracy. By contrast, Galileo’s discoveries threatened the Church, the State, and the population’s understanding of their world, and insinuated that they were not the center of the universe.

I sometimes encounter claims that the United States was founded on the Bible. I respond with mentioning the Constitutional prohibitions against establishing a religion and imposing a religious test for public office. I further point out that the First Commandment mandates the worship of Yahweh, whereas the First Amendment guarantees the right to worship any god or none at all. While offering no evidence, the others insist their point is still valid, saying “Faith was very important the Founding Fathers,” or “The Constitution is our legal foundation, but the Bible is our spiritual foundation.”

One of my favorite mantras is “Never be afraid to have your views or beliefs challenged. If they are correct they will withstand the challenge. If they are wrong, you will be enlightened.” As far as putting this into practice, however, there is little advice I can offer because the Backfire Effect is so strong. But here are some ideas on how you can bring someone to accept unpleasant evidence:

  • Let them know that they and their beliefs are separate. They are not one and the same.
  • Frame the disagreement as a collaboration, not a conflict. You should both be after the truth.
  • Learn what logical fallacies are and how to avoid them. Some right proper, jim-dandy posts about that on this blog.

The how and where are also important. It is probably only the slightest exaggeration to write that no one in Internet history has changed an anonymous person’s deeply held belief online. Facebook messaging and e-mails with someone you know is a little more possible, but in person is best, especially if the person likes and trusts you.

No one wants to look stupid. Rather than shoving proof in their face, encourage them to look for such-and-such online or in a book, then ask them later what they thought of it. Without sacrificing accuracy, show them how it might benefit them or their family. Let them know it doesn’t have to be all or nothing, if this is true. For instance, I could encourage a creationist friend to accept evidence for the age of the universe without treading into how the universe got here.

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“Memory Lame” (Unreliability of memories)

ELEPHANTPOSTITI sometimes forget where I put my glasses, so I look for them and eventually find them on my head. Most people have had such experiences. And the few who haven’t could probably be made to believe that they have. Dr. Steven Novella has said of our recollections, “You have a distorted and constructed memory of a distorted and constructed perception, both of which are subservient to whatever narrative your brain is operating under.”

That is one reason why 70 percent of participants in a study conducted by Dr. Julia Shaw confessed to a crime that never occurred. Some even offered details of this non-event. Shaw swayed the subjects by mixing facts with misinformation over three hours of friendly conversation. So confessing to crimes never committed can involve more than plea-bargaining. Suspects under duress and torture are even more vulnerable.

I have countless memories of playing Wiffle Ball growing up, but wonder now how accurate they are. The sport was my favorite outlet for suspended adolescence and I played into my 30s, recording some of the latter days on film. Even two days later, my memories of things said and plays made clashed with what I was watching on tape. False memories such as this can be a distortion of something that happened, a combination of past events, or something invented.

Some are called “source memory errors,” in which the event is remembered, but the particulars confused. For instance, I may remember being picked off first base by Jerry, when it was really his brother Steve who nailed me. Or I may confuse this with a scene from the Bad News Bears.

In extreme cases, there is source amnesia. A woman, in good faith, wrongly accused psychologist Donald Thompson of raping her. The doctor was cleared because at the time of the assault, he had been on live television. It was eventually deduced that the victim had been watching the show when she was assaulted, and blocked most of it out, but associated the doctor with the attack.

I have about a dozen memories of the place I lived at ages 2 and 3: Getting candy from my uncle, a bicycle-built-for-two, and most gloriously, winning Pin the Tail on the Donkey at my third birthday party. Memories this distant are rare because the left inferior prefrontal lobe, required for long-term memory, is underdeveloped in toddlers. Furthermore, memories this ancient are usually fragmented.

Fragmented memories don’t end with adolescence. Author Martin Conway documented the case of a woman who became upset when encountering bricks or paths. It turned out she had been raped as a child on a brick path. Returning to the scene of the crime upset her, though she failed to recall the attack. False and fragmented memories are especially worrisome when they are used by prosecutors and therapists. An unscrupulous individual can encourage a patient or witness to dig deeper for memories that aren’t there, or use an incident to suggest something further happened.

False memories are sometimes the result of one anticipating that something will happen, then remembering it as if it did. I was a basketball manager in high school, stuck watching the boring JV game at the recreation center. The game was running long, and I really wanted to leave to catch the start of the varsity game. While I watched from a distance, another manager asked the JV coach if we could leave. I figured the coach would want us to go, since keeping the varsity statistics took precedence. He nodded his head yes, and off I flew. He later asked why I had left, I told him this story, and he insisted he had shaken his head no. Indeed, he had. I wanted so bad and anticipated so much that he would affirm the request, that’s what I ‘saw.’ This anticipation can be even more influential if leading questions are used, if misinformation comes from a trusted source, or if social and peer pressures are in play. UFO abductions began being perpetrated by gray aliens after the creatures appeared in a 1975 television program.

The McMartin preschool case unraveled when children began reporting that their tormenters were flying or that they included Chuck Norris. But in cases where the supposed memory is realistic, the injustice goes unnoticed.

Another key point is that memories are much more likely to be recovered after contact with a familiar object, place, or aroma, rather than in a therapist’s office or police interrogation room. And if a smell or sight rekindles a memory, it will flow naturally, whereas a detective or therapist may help the person fill in details that are imagined, or encourage them to omit others. Children are especially vulnerable to suggestion and leading questions. When children say they have no memory of something, it is unethical to prod them further.

I was in third hour English class when I heard about the first Space Shuttle disaster. My neighbor on his riding lawnmower told me about the Ronald Reagan assassination attempt. That’s how I remember these things, anyway. Cognitive psychologist Ulric Neisser had persons write down where they were when a momentous event occurred, then asked them the same question years later. Memory had a spotty performance in Neisser’s research, with some subjects even denying they had written the entry.

Phrasing can be crucial. When asked how tall a person was, test subjects estimated a whopping 10 inches more than those who were asked how short the person was. In another study conducted by psychologists Elizabeth Loftus and John Palmer, subjects were shown videos of a car crash that occurred at either 20, 30, or 40 miles per hour. Subjects were then asked to estimate the speed. They guessed the speed not based on the rate of travel, but on which verb described the incident. If the word was “contact,” most respondents said 20 mph. It the verb was “collided,” 30 mph was the most frequent answer, while “smashed” yielded mostly answers of 40 mph.

At least the car was traveling. But later in the experiment, researchers asked the participants if they had seen any broken glass, when there wasn’t any. Again, depending on the verb used, respondents were more likely to report seeing broken glass, a completely invented memory. Likewise, when subjects were asked if they had seen “a stop sign,” they usually said no. But there was a sharp increase when subjects were asked if they had seen “the stop sign,” insinuating there was one. These instances show the vulnerability of someone whose memory is being challenged, especially by someone in a position of authority. And don’t you forget it.

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“Sound defects” (BioHarmonics)

CANTHEAR

A few enterprising folks hawk music that allegedly contains healing properties. BioHarmonics stretches this idea to an even more implausible level by selling medicine in the form of sounds that cannot be heard.

Linda Townsend began the practice, whose central plank holds that an undetected field of energy exists. It would be one thing to search for this energy. It’s quite another to assert its existence, base a medicine on it, and claim proof that patients are healed by it.

Being unable to detect the source of a health issue would be a major problem for a mainstream medical doctor. By contrast, it is a huge plus for the alternative medicine practitioner, since he or she could never be proven wrong, or the field ever shown to be flawed. It also enabled Townsend to sell her Harmonizer for $1,300. This magic medical machine, she claimed, could detect illnesses and re-tune them, thus healing all manner of ailments, from cancer to circulation problems, from bloods clots to digestive orders, from ear to colon problems.

Wide-ranging claims like this are a hallmark of pseudomedicine. Indeed, because Townsend was making medical claims that required FDA marketing clearance, she had to stop selling the Harmonizer. But she now offers magnets and polarizers, the latter of which she touts as “containing plant life chosen for its ability to attract cosmic light energy.”

Backed by plenty of anonymous anecdotes, though no data, Townsend insinuates that the polarizers have helped patients with cancer, diabetes, heart conditions, and paralysis. After the brush with the FDA, she is careful about explicitly asserting any medical benefits, writing, “We do not claim any medical conditions have been improved by BioHarmonics. We have only seen that bioenergy imbalances can be improved.” That puts her in the clear legally, but she remains muddled scientifically, proclaiming, “If someone is eating a disharmoic diet, there is no harmony in the bioenergy,” and “Frequency in BioHarmonics is a catalyst that influences energy motions.”

People hate being sick or seeing their loved ones suffer. When this unpleasantness and fear is coupled with a cure that seems new, miraculous, cheap, painless, or quick, the promised solutions will sell. That’s why fields like this prosper.

Meanwhile, BioHarmonics has a handy ad hoc reason for any setback: “There is no one frequency that will work on every person with the same disease. What is really needed is the missing harmonics of bioenergy motions for the individual person.”

This allows the BioHarmonics practitioner to claim victory for any seeming success, while brushing off any failure as the need to find the right frequency, which keeps the patient coming back until it’s found.

Of course, real medicine is also no guarantee. But the science behind it is understood, as is the method and, most often, the reasons for failure. By contrast, BioHarmonics is explained with phrases such as “retuning those weakened disharmonious areas of the body commonly found over sites of illnesses,” and “Blue dominates the left side of a healthy body in the outer bioenergy layer and is found in the blood bioenergy.”

BioHarmonics is classic pseudomedicine, incorporating legitimate medical terms (nerve, spine, vertebrae), science-sounding words (bioenergy), and nonsense (“Red dominates the right side of the body in the outer bioenergy layer.”)

A Townsend a disciple carries on her tradition on the Wisdom of Sound website. There, we learn that BioHarmonics is a “non-invasive technology using sound to strengthen the body, boost the immune system, and maintain wellness.”

I also offer non-invasive technology for doing all this:

Strengthen the body: Lift weights and increase protein intake.

Boost the immune system: I actually advise against this, since it’s only possible if one has an autoimmune disorder or has first contracted HIV, is approaching death by hunger, or is undergoing chemotherapy.

Maintain wellness: Eat healthy, exercise, get plenty of sleep and water, have regular checkups.

Wisdom of Sound compares the human body to an orchestra, and asserts that each part must be in sync or everything is thrown off. In classic snake oil tradition, they alone have the solution.

BioHarmonics is both an old and a new idea. Like an acupuncturist with nerves, a chiropractor with the spine, or an iridologist with the eye, BioHarmonics uses one aspect of the body as a purported window to overall health. The new part comes from using computers and ersatz electronic equipment such as the Harmonzier and Korg Tuner to decipher a human voice and plot a graph that is said to match pitch on a music scale. This method purportedly allows the practitioner to “detect stress or pain in the body.” This, as opposed to asking, “Where does it hurt?”

Through a process explained only as “making a formula,” the practitioner uses the voice results to design a healing mix tape. The website notes, “The sound used for treatment is just below the level of audible sound, so the healing is a frequency felt as energy.”

Since it can’t be heard, the patient has no way of knowing if anything is actually there. Perhaps employing an animal with lower-frequency auditory capabilities than humans is the solution. If so, BioHarmonics has value among chronic pain sufferers who are elephant trainers.

One of the few other BioHarmoincs practitioners is chiropractor Steven Schwartz, founder of Bioharmonic Technologies. Schwartz boasts that he has “been able to reprogram our cellular biology,” which loosely translated means, “I’m a mad scientist.”

Under the “Scientific Evidence” tab on his website, he addresses “cellular attunement research,” without ever explaining what the cells were being attuned to, why this is happening, what it means, or how it works. He did, however, include a nifty dot of rainbow chakras of a patient who now experiences complete alignment.

He also sells an Energy Clearing CD, advertised as being “infused with sacred geometry to help create a space to release negative energy from your energetic biofield, with specific frequencies which will vibrate each individual spinal vertebrae, and high frequencies emitted by crystal bowls and chimes.”

Elsewhere he writes, “This is a perfect example of how sound can influence the energetics of a living organism.”

Indeed, if Schwartz used a spiel containing such language to prompt a living organism to buy this stuff, it speaks volumes about his influence.