I never watched Oprah, because she was a gullible woo-artist; I don’t watch Dr Oz, because he’s quack; and now all I can say is fuck Bill Maher, because he’s a crank on so many things. On his latest show, he surrounded himself with Marianne Williamson, a “spiritual teacher” and proponent of prayer, Amy Holmes, a news announcer for The Blaze (Glenn Beck’s spinoff), and some guy who didn’t say much, and he went off on a grand tour of kook talk, confident that his panelists wouldn’t disagree with him. Watch. Be embarrased for him.
I’m not an anti-vaxxer, I never have been,he told his panel.I’m an anti-flu shot guy. I think that’s bullshit and I think the fact that it was 23 percent effective this week bears that out. But if Ebola was airborne, I’d get the vaccine tomorrow.
Yeah, you’re an anti-vaxxer. We understand why this year’s flu vaccine had reduced effectiveness; the influenza virus is a combinatorial machine that varies its antigens regularly, tossing up different arrangements of allelic versions of its coat proteins, like a Vegas slot machine. Scientists have to make an estimate of the likely arrangment to spread rapidly, and they have to do it months ahead of time, because it takes a lot of lead time to produce the vaccines. This year, they were wrong in which strain would predominate. It happens; it’s just like NOAA, looking at emerging tropical storms, and estimating likely tracks for where they will hit the mainland. Sometimes conditions shift and they’re off by a few hundred miles. Same with the vaccines — biology is no more predictable than a cyclone in this regard.
But here’s the thing: it’s 23% effective. That’s not nothing. I got a flu shot, knowing that this year’s batch was far from perfect, because a little bit of protection is better than no protection.
But that’s not the part that had me fuming. It’s the bit around 4 minutes in, in which he pretentiously announces to us that not all science is alike, and climatology is a good science, so he accepts global warming, and he also explains that there is also consensus among climate scientists (he also argues that the earth is just a rock, so it’s simple enough to understand — but then, as he demonstrated so well on this night, Bill Maher is a goddamn idiot). And then he tells us that medical science is nothing like that, because they’ve had to retract a million things
. People get cancer, and doctors just don’t know why,
he says, condescendingly. His father had ulcers, and they treated it wrong when he was a kid.
Good god.
Science is a trial and error process. It is not an infallible track that leads invariably to correct answers, instantly and every time. When he says that climate science is completely right, that’s because he has only the most superficial knowledge — he knows a little bit about the conclusions they’ve reached now, but nothing about how they came to those answers. I guarantee you, there was a long slow gradual effort to understand climate, with false starts and dead ends and pointless detours all along the way, because that’s how science works.
When medical scientists retract something, it’s because they’re doing normal science. Of course there are errors along the way! The whole point of science is that you generate hypotheses, you make tentative conclusions, and you test them, and sometimes you’ll confirm your hypothesis (which means you’ve learned something), and sometimes you’ll falsify it (in which case you’ve learned something else). Do you know why Maher’s father got the wrong treatment? Because the cause of ulcers, the bacterium Helicobacter pyloris, was not discovered to be the causal agent until 19-fucking-84. Maher is complaining about an important medical discovery, one that won the Nobel Prize, because scientists didn’t discover it soon enough for him.
As for cancer, he has no idea of the huge strides that have been made in the last few decades to understand the molecular causes. We can tease those apart pretty thoroughly; the problem is that cancer is a thousand diseases with a thousand alternative pathways that lead to the malignant state, and we don’t know how to treat them all. But like ulcers, this pompous ignoramus thinks we ought to be able to just snap our fingers and solve all the complex problems right now, because science.
Science, that is, which Bill Maher does not understand.
Next he goes off on a standard anti-vax trope: but maybe we’re giving kids too many vaccines. There have been no long term studies of groups of people who get a lot of vaccines
, he whines. The kids are getting three times as many vaccines now as they did in the 1980s!
It’s absurd. You are continuously assaulted by potential pathogens, while the vaccination schedule hits you with…26. Simply living slams you with far more foreign insults to your immune system. Maher tries to argue that maybe the bad thing about vaccines is that they insulate us from our environment. your immune system is not up to par,
he implies, because you don’t use your immune system
. Christ. Vaccinations specifically challenge your immune system, that’s how they work, and there are multitudes of pathogens you encounter — we’re not living in bubbles, you know.
And yes, there have been a great many studies of vaccine safety — it is completely settled science, every bit as robust as the climate science he touts. The difference? Kooks build contrived, nonsensical stories in an attempt to discredit climate science, and Bill Maher dismisses them. Kooks build contrived, nonsensical stories in an attempt to discredit biomedical research, and Bill Maher…complains that they’re called kooks, and calls in a claque of kooks to surround him and agree with him.
Then it just goes downhill. He complains about doctors: they never ask the most simple, important things, like “what do you eat?” To which I must ask, “what kind of doctor does he go to?” I suspect that it’s more that a Big Important Celebrity like Bill Maher doesn’t pay any attention to what the doctor says, because I routinely get asked about diet and exercise, those basic things, and my doctors hand out pamphlets with diet recommendations, and they regularly tell me lists of things I should avoid and what I should eat, with careful qualifications (for example, fish is a good heart healthy protein source, they say, but at the same time you shouldn’t have it more than once a week, because of concerns about mercury.) I don’t think most general practitioners would recognize the caricature he was peddling.
He rants about GMOs. You want to see something? Jump ahead to 11:05, where the hapless middle panelist asks, “But what studies have shown that GMOs are harmful?”, and Marianne Williamson makes a melodramatic and totally condescending gasp, and speechlessly touches his arm. That was not informative. Go ahead. Tell me about these studies from reputable scientists that show GMOs are harmful to your health. Are these going to be from the same kind of people who are horrified that food contains genes?
Finally, just to confirm that he’s a goddamn moron, the man who just complained that doctors don’t know what causes cancer sneers that doctors demonize things like the sun
. Guess what, Maher? We do know that genetic damage causes cancer. Radiation causes genetic damage. And that great big glowing ball in the sky is great big radiation source.
At the end of this segment, Marianne Williamson just has to jump in and praise intercessory prayer — which is all bunk, a collection of badly designed studies with nonsensical results. This is what happens when you open the door to anti-science lunacy, Mr Maher: you get bit in the ass by clowns. Oh, well. You and Oz and Oprah and all the other shills for bullshit will at least have the comfort of all the money from the gullible that will come rolling in.
Several years ago, when he got the Richard Dawkins award, I went along with it despite my reservations, because he was clearly getting it specifically for Religulous. I know Orac was vehemently against it.
Orac was right.
Maher is an anti-science crank.
I’m just going to have to go along with everything Orac says from now on.
I’ve found a few of his spiels amusing in the past, but I’ve always disliked his tendency to call everyone who disagrees with him stupid anyways. This just adds to my list of reasons to not like Maher.
Well, I only watched the first few minutes, but the middle guy gets a cookie for trying.
As for vaccination vs. climate change: I’d say we have more than enough evidence for the latter and even more for the former due to having a few decades more data.
Don’t get my hopes up like that.
One of my objections to Maher is his smugitude. I sort of agree with him on various topics but he’s such an arrogant asshole that I find him unpleasant to watch even when he’s slamming someone worthy of being slammed.
You are right about 23% being something. How come all these people who seemingly want to discourage people from flu shots are not at the very least letting people know if you do get flu there are antiviral medications if you start within first 48 hrs of the flu.. They don’t even tell them that..
That was one of the most excruciatingly idiotic episodes of Real Time I’ve ever dealt with, that melodramatic and condescending “Oh! (that encapsulated a whole “aren’t you so pathetically naive” subtext)” when the guy asked about evidence that GMOs were actually harmful resulted in my turning it off before I threw something at my TV.
If we could invent something that reduced all car accidents by 23% it would become mandatory overnight, yet somehow this is unacceptable for a vaccine?
Hey now, NO HEROES.
I will just continue to ignore Bill Maher, with a bit more vehemence now than before.
Flu vaccines are a miracle of modern science. They are useful and interesting and effective.
Maher? Not so much.
Unlike Maher, this years’ vaccine is 23% effective.
Think how awesome he’d be if he was 23% funny!!
Maher lives in the LA entertainment bubble where every associate producer and starlet feel qualified to issue medical advice and opinions because they read a book they got at Whole Foods. He does have a good handle on renewable energy and conservation but falls off a cliff when the subject is science. Somehow the idea of remaining pure and natural seems to guarantee a long health life in their minds, just like in 1100 AD when everything was organic, there was no pollution or “Western medicine”. Maher has too many toadies following him around.
This comes up, frequently, whenever the Bad Astronomer (Phil Plait) writes about an anti-vaxxer loon.
One replier will always jump in to say, “I’m not an anti-vaxxer, but … the vaccine schedule is overloaded and too fast: 20 vaccines in 3 months. I want my kids to get them more slowly, to be able to respond to each more fully…”
My hypothesis as to why this guy, and Maher, repeat the “too many, too quickly” line is misunderstanding the “toxin” analogy. Naturally, IF vaccines were toxins to ward off the virii, hesitation may be good. Vaccines don’t work like that. Vaccines aren’t toxins, they are the mechanism to make your body toxic to a particular virus. And our immune system can’t be overworked by receiving too many vaccines too quickly. It don’t work like that. Like PZ noted, our immune system is always working to fight off more viruses at any one time than doctors administer, following the recommended schedule. Vaccines don’t substitute for our immune system. they strengthen it, not weaken it. Weak immune systems are often rightly exempted from the vaccine schedule and more reason to distribute vaccines, to create “herd immunity”, to protect the immunology-compromised individuals.
.
Back to Maher specifically: I too avoided Real Time, thinking he was just an arrogant smugfest. Not knowing he was a crank, but now I think different. Bye Bye Maher, (bad rubbish).
Fixed that for you with a very important caveat. My ulcer is not caused by that, or it would have gotten treated by now.
So PZ . . . if you make an unfunny joke I guess I have to reject all of your science.
Huh. I doubt rather less than 23% of Americans watch Maher’s show, yet he continues to produce it.
@Dag Johansen: Welcome to Earth, Dag. (I assume you were born yesterday.)
I think his show needs to be renamed from Real Time with Bill Maher to Dunning-Kruger Effect Exemplified by Bill Maher.
I await news of the howling mob of geomorphologists, mineralogists, vulcanologists, geophysicists, and so on and so forth to show up at Maher’s door with
pitchforksrock hammers, torches, and a surprisingly wide variety of hand samples. . .twas brillig,
Aren’t Diphtheria and Tetanus vaccines aimed at the toxins, not the bacteria?
Why should I have to get vaccinated? I mean, I can’t catch anything as long as everyone else is immune! So all you guys better get your shots so I don’t have to bother with it kthxbye.
The big problem isn’t his position on this one issue, it’s that just like Harris & Dawkins he’s unable to see that the logic behind his justification is the exact same logic the Tealiban use when they do shit like cut taxes and then complain that all the schools are going to shit and there are potholes everywhere.
Medical research could be even better even faster if we let research be conducted on people without regard for their well-being or personal agency. Does he think that’s a good idea?
Trust, but verify.
Are you claiming that PZ is rejecting legitimate scientific claims because of unfunny jokes? Please make clear what exact claims are being rejected. I’d be most interested.
Robertbaden@19:
Yes they are. The Tetanus portion of the DTP vaccine is inactivated Tetanus toxin, as is the Diphtheria portion. The Pertussis portion is proteins from the cell wall of the Pertussis bacteria.
As far as this years Influenza vaccine, 23% protection is better than 0% protection. The CDC messed up last year – predicting a year ahead of time isn’t easy. When they predict right, the efficacy of the vaccine is better than 80%.
@22, Nerd you triggered my quotemine, as in:
Trust in Allah, but always tie your camel ;-)
[from Sinbad (I think)]
I didn’t know about the other two panelists, but seeing Marianne Williamson was a dead giveaway. For almost 25 years she has been a major purveyor of word salad woo-woo. She’s full of shit and of herself.
I got out of hospital just yesterday following complications to my lifelong chronic asthma brought on by mycoplasma pneumonia. As someone who’s more susceptible to respiratory problems than your average person, I’d happily take 23% protection from a flu infection over no protection at all.
Maher’s a stuck-up smugnorant fucking arseclown – the embodiment of today’s over-privileged semi-educated star who’s “concerned about vaccines”.
I’ve thought of a couple of alternatives for the term “anti-vaxer”, should any of them (like Maher) object to being so labelled:
Plague rats (my personal favourite)
Epidemicists
Contagionists
Infectioneers
Typhoid Marys
Health-hobblers
Feel free to add your own.
So in Marianne Williamson’s world we should be sceptical of scientists and doctors. People who claim to be channeling Jesus while spouting the Bhagavad Gita on the other hand…
In addition to the flu vaccine preventing flu 23% of the time, it also reduces the impact on those who do get it. That’s important.
A couple of weeks ago, Maher had Dr. Atul Gawande on his show. Maher asked him “Aren’t I right about the flu vaccine being bullshit?” with his usual level of smugness. He could not have been less interested in hearing the answer when the doctor began explaining that yes, he was indeed wrong.
#25 twas brilig
I remember an old Sinbad movie in which this was repeated extensively, but I believe it had its origins in Sunna (Tirmidhi 2517).
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Absolutely, hands down, worst show ever!! Nevertheless, I think Bill Maher is a little nervous and uninformed about science, not anti-science. His atheism is more an outgrowth of his skepticism, which is sometimes too broad-brush. When things are explained to him, he readily accepts and champions scientific concepts. He’s a valuable, charming and tireless advocate for the atheist viewpoint. His stupid HBO show probably reaches an aufience many orders of magnitude larger than any other public atheist. And even in this show, he strongly pushed back against the religious comments. I find most of his shows enjoyable, but I turned this one off after the first 5 minutes.
Bill Maher is icky.
It’s been a long time since I’ve seen Maher, but I do understand (note: “understand”, not “agree with”) his feelings about medical science.
Since Nixon’s “war on cancer”, I’ve lost track of the number of highly touted new cures, directions in cancer research. There’s been a constant flow of new data, promising new drugs … and today we still are left with pretty much the same barbaric chemotherapy and surgery.
Similarly, the field of nutrition is riddled with “do this, no do that, no what we told you was bad is now good, rinse, repeat”.
Medicine and nutrition are the two scientific fields that most of us interact with in one way or another. It’s no good repeating that “this is how science works. We theorize and test until the truth emerges”.
It doesn’t much matter to the ordinary person whether or not the BICEP2 results re the CMB were correct or not. Learning that yet another promising cancer drug has failed in practice, or that we can now eat the butter and eggs we shunned for decades does affect the average individual.
In short, I think the constant barrage of “wow!” followed by “sorry, my bad” probably spills over onto “SCIENCE” in general. The science that affects us daily seems to be often/always wrong, so why should we believe scientists in other fields?
Part of the problem, of course, is media hype. But scientists contribute to that hype in the way they announce and talk about their findings. Drug research is especially problematic because the negative studies don’t get published, to say nothing of data manipulation, funding sources, etc.
So I’m not excusing Maher. He deserves your takedown. But I also think that scientists themselves bear some responsibility for how ordinary people respond to what scientists say.
Seems like Maher’s opinions are based more on an Eco mindset than skepticism. He loves climatology because it suggests we ought to do more to protect the environment, grow more trees, etc. He doesn’t like medical science because it suggests that our natural immune system needs help outside of just eating some kind of paleo diet.
I’m fairly sure there has been progress on cancer treatment. Especially children’s cancers where the survival rate is much much higher than it used to be. But it isn’t whizz bang obvious because it’s slow improvement. So people don’t realise how much better it is.
I got HBO recently and I kept turning in over the last few weeks mostly in the hope of an interesting guest, but he has been so awful I can’t watch a whole show.
The show with Salman Rushdie was terribly sexist even for Maher and the vaccine one was just.. I dunno, hard to even listen to. Completely irrational with a bunch of “well, we all know” sort of statements followed by faux skepticism.
In between there was the interview with a doctor that you also posted about (I think).
Just a whole series of the worst of his character and show with little of redeeming value these last few weeks.
More worrisome to me was having Bret Stephens (Wall St Journal) on the show two weeks ago. Stephens is exactly the wrong kind of panelist for that show. A walking compendium of bad information about things like global warming, and good at using the Gish Gallop to inundate Maher with more crap than there is time to dispell.
And yeah, this latest show was pretty bad about the science. On the other hand, I can forgive Maher a lot after his line during New Rules last week: “If Sarah Palin suffers a stroke, how will we know?”
@lcaution #34:
The National Cancer Act was signed in 1971. It takes an average of 6 years for a drug to reach the clinical trial stage, another eight years to complete those trials. For diseases like cancer, determining improvement in survival and remission rates takes time too. Even assuming just 14 years for a new drug to make it to the general public, that means we’ve had time for three full clinical trial cycles. Forty-four years is not a long time in terms of pharmaceutical trials. And yet, the five-year survival rate in 2006 was 68.5%, up from 48.7% in 1975.
It’s easy to diminish any advances when they’re incremental enough to be described by the same terminology. “We’ve been promised huge advances in computing, but today we are still left with pretty much the same keyboards and word processors.” It’s more than a bit like the creationists who point at the Lenski experiment and say “yes, but they’re still E. coli.”
Is the field of nutrition riddled with that, or is the public understanding of the field of nutrition riddled with that? How many of those promising new drugs or great leaps forward or earth-shattering changes to our understanding of cholesterol or whatever were less the fault of the scientific community and more the fault of reporters latching onto individual studies and blowing them out of proportion, as happens all the goddamn time? I don’t actually know enough about nutrition as a field to know if the common joke about “eggs are good, now they’re bad, now they’re good again” actually holds any scientific water, or if it’s the equivalent of the common anti-AGW refrain of “they were predicting global cooling in the ’70s!” Science generally seems to be less capricious than a casual reading of sensationalized headlines would lead the general public to believe, and “they were saying one thing yesterday, who knows what they’ll say tomorrow” is yet another all-too-familiar creationist talking point. Maybe it’s valid with nutrition, but I’m going to view it with skepticism.
That’s actually probably the best analogy, in fact. The press jumped on a handful of global-cooling guys in the 70’s and promoted them, even though (or possibly because they were outside the consensus; similarly, it’s my impression that the press is taking very tentative new nutrition results and running with them far further than the science actually goes.
Ugh. When I hear any formulation of “ebola goes airborne”…
First, airborne or not, I’m getting the vaccine. I might wait my turn so that regions where ebola is a more urgent problem can get it first, but I’m going to want the pill or the spike or the enormous suppository eventually.
Also, how much sleep are we losing over say, gonorrhea becoming airborne? How about HIV? Do we have a team of specialists on that? The earliest documented ebola outbreak was almost 40 years ago. Apparently, now that it has reached the developed world, it’s going to pick this exact moment for that specific mutation or series of mutations to become airborne. Because we’re special.
But I’m no expert. Can anyone comment?
So is Orac our new squiddly overlord??
Unsurpisingly, Maher is on the advisory board of Sam Harris’s reason.org: http://www.project-reason.org/about/advisory_board/
I have written to Harris several times asking him how he could possibly have an anti-vaxxer on it.
(Silence)
Which, in case you’Re worried about “toxins” and vaccine reaction is bloody stupid. I understand it, parentes, even hardcore pro-vaccine parents like me don’t actually “like” childhood vaccinations. Somebody pierces your baby with a needle (why isn’t that baby hoarse? Afterthey already cried all night long they shouldn’t be able to be that loud. Please, somebody make it STOP) and you know that they’ll most likely be cranky for some time afterwards.
From that perspective having a 6 in 1 vaccine is a godsdamn blessing. If you want your child to get 18 injections instead of 3 and 18 days of moderate sickness instead of 3 you’Re a cruel asshole.
lcaution
The same ‘barbaric chemotherapy and surgery’ which somehow results in a lot less discomfort for patients overall, and for a lot of the more regular cancers in an incredible increase in survival rate.
But it is still the same treatment. Right.
It doesn’t surprise me if you come here defending Maher while you yourself seem to be wildly uninformed about the state of medical science. Please educate yourself.
Maher is all too often the clueless brogressive (motto: “Bros before women”), like Dan Savage, or Hugo Schwyzer, or Jon Stewart. If it’s “funny”, then it doesn’t matter who gets hurt by it, the punch is the funny part, not the question of up/down.
He’s a good example of the old idea that it is better to be silent and thought a fool, than to speak and remove all doubt (attribute to your favourite Wise Man™).
You got 23% success with this year’s ‘flu vaccine in the USA? And you usually expect 80%? You don’t know how lucky you are!
Here in the UK this season’s ‘flu vaccine achieved a magnificent rate of just 3% success. Yep, you read that right: 3% (http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/feb/05/flu-vaccine-low-protection-uk-this-winter and many other sources). And the same article lists the normal success rate as just 50%. As a microbiologist I fully understand how such a low rate of protection against this damn slippery virus can arise. As a person surrounded by non-microbiologists I can also understand how these data add, at least subliminally, to an anti-vaccine (and anti-science) psychology in very large numbers of perfectly reasonable people.
Of course none of this changes the entirely reasonable attitudes expressed in this post towards Bill Maher.
It’s interesting how much peoples’ reactions to Maher differ. It only took one or two exposures to him for me to build up a lifetime immunity!
We might dismiss Maher is a waste of bandwidth, but he’s worse than that. He actively harms progressive causes by failing to defend them adequately against the “other side” representatives he has on his show. For example, he recently hosted smooth talking climate science denier Bret Stephens and surrounded him with people who hadn’t a clue on the subject. The best Maher could do was roll his eyes and make weak arguments from authority (he doesn’t really understand climate science any better than he does medical science).
When he’s not actively being an idiot about vaccines, he’s making right wing polemicists look smart on other subjects. It will be a good day when his show disappears from television.
This is not to defend Bill Maher, who is the same kind of walking example of white male entitlement pretty much everyone else on TV is.
1) This is a listing of vaccine schedules in different countries. They are actually fairly different between different developed countries. Is our theory that the docs’ orgs in every developed country except the US are secretly antivax?
http://apps.who.int/immunization_monitoring/globalsummary/schedules
2) Bill Nye has come out hard against GMOs for exactly the right reason — they present an unacceptably high risk of catastrophic biosphere collapse. Is our theory that Bill Nye is anti-science? Or that reasonable people can disagree, so it’s inappropriate to put GMOs and childhood vaccinations in the same category?
http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/2le34s/bill_nye_undeniably_back_ama/
Or is it just barely possible that the science behind the vaccines themselves is excellent, the scheduling guidelines are basically arbitrary (taking into account when the vaccines seem to take), and there are perfectly sane reasons why a scientifically educated person might not be thrilled about GMOs? That is, could different things actually be different?
Well Michael, your ‘1’ is actually a giant straw-man you build, your ‘2’ is a blatant appeal to authority, and your entire post seems to be devoid of, you know, even one smidgen of proof of anything you try to claim. And the claims you make are not entirely small.
zenlike: if it’s the same Michael Kimmitt I found on Facebook, you’re talking to someone who signed a petition to get Mars Candies to disclose that it’s the artificial dyes in M&M’s that causes hyperactivity in some children.
That would be the plural of virius.
If they don’t, they have no hope of getting that research funded. Such, alas, is the way of things.
That link is not specific enough. Please link to the comment; I have no idea on which “load more comments” link to click, and trying all of them would take very long.
It was this combined with his sexism that got me to stop watching him over a year ago. I want to like the guy, but I’m really glad I don’t.
” ‘1’ is actually a giant straw-man you build, ”
Would you like links to a half-dozen docs claiming that any deviation from the current standard schedule is the same as being antivax? Because Google is here for you.
“your ‘2’ is a blatant appeal to authority,”
Yes! It was. Good work. So, what’s your theory, that Bill Nye The Science Guy is secretly anti-science after a lifetime of proselytism and education in the field? Remember, the thesis is that anyone who does not take the current scientific consensus at face value as received ultimate truth, no matter whether the consensus is based on Actual Good Science (vaccines for childhood illnesses, extensively studied), Reasonably Ok Science (the schedule), or Unbelievably Shitty Industry Funded Science (GMOs) as being all precisely the same level of denialism. My point was that if that’s the framework, then we must EXILE BILL NYE FOR APOSTASY!!!!!!1111ONEONEONEONEONE
It’s this bullshit borrowed authority from being super-right about something very important (childhood illness vaccines) to therefore they must be right about everything else ever forever which is complete crap. I have a brother in law in medical school. He got a week of halfhearted and outdated information on nutrition. It’s not in their damn wheelhouse, and most GPs are pretty much completely useless on the subject. The original post here describes nutritional information on the level of “that chapter in my 10th grade health textbook” or “the webpage at Mayo Clinic”. That’s not actual information, it’s a Wikipedia stub.
Which is fine! Nobody can know everything. So stop pretending.
Nye’s quote, for which he must be cast into the darkness:
“I stand by my assertions that although you can know what happens to any individual species that you modify, you cannot be certain what will happen to the ecosystem.
Also, we have a strange situation where we have malnourished fat people. It’s not that we need more food. It’s that we need to manage our food system better.
So when corporations seek government funding for genetic modification of food sources, I stroke my chin.”
Michael Kimmet, I don’t believe that malnourished obese people are malnourished because of the slightly lower measurements of genistin and daidzin in the GM soybean oil used in the cheetos they ate. I’d go out on a limb and say it was the cheetos.
(and before we start slinging “fat shaming”: for those individuals who are overweight or suffer from obesity for other reasons, glandular, hereditary or otherwise-non-diet-related…. well then it’s not about the food or them, is it?)
(i understand it was Nye’s quote, not your own words… I’m only speaking to the argument.)
The YouTube video has been taken down. Here is a new link:
You know, it occurs to me that I should have mentioned Marianne William’s BS about intercessory prayer in my blog post about this because it was so incredibly wrong (in fact studies show exactly the opposite of what she claims), but, damn, by the time I got to that bit of stupidity I was just too tired. There was too much crankery in a mere 12 minute segment even for me. Mentioning it all would have doubled the size of an already Orac-ian length post.
Michael Kimmitt, still strawmanning and missing the point I see. And still missing, you know, some actual proof to the wild claims you make.
Try to educate yourself even one bit, maybe then people will want to waste time debating you.
There are insufficient bits in all the cosmos to store something of that length. ;-)
The whole point is that GMOs are a solution in search of a problem. Why pay or run risks for something that promises us mainly slightly improved nutrition-poor calorie production, when our main problem is that we are already super good at nutrition-poor calorie production?
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. If I’m supposed to live off of this stuff for the rest of my life and have no choice in the matter, 99% is actually too low a chance that it’s as good as what came before. I really just want to be able to opt out and let y’all enjoy the new flavors of gut biota that will emerge, but in a remotely perfect world, it’d be the self-selected as scientifically educated who would be able to rationally evaluate risks that involve nonzero chances of catastrophic failure.
I’m not gonna convince anyone here to stop the circle-jerk and sense of superiority that comes from conflating actual nutjobs (antivaxxers) with sane people who hold a minority opinion (vaccine timing, GMOs). I just wanted to point out that different things are different, which is a fairly ordinary statement in this empirically tested world of ours.
I think once again you’re being a little too hard on Bill Maher. He’s a bit dismissive and flippant about some of the details but I think that’s a symptom of him being a comedian with limited time to make his point. I think it would be interesting if he had you on his show and I do believe he would welcome the debate. I like his stance on religion and a lot of his views on politics, but in science and health stuff I too think he sort of sucks rather often. His choice of guests can sometimes be lame, but he is willing to have opposing views on his show. He regularly has tea party ass clowns on just so he can lay waste to them for example.
Michael Kimmitt, which GMO’s are you talking about? What foods are you talking about? You do realise quite a lot of crops are being genetically modified in lots of different ways right? Because from your post it seems you think ‘GMO’ is one specific thing. Also, which claims are you talking about? Once again, you are tilting at windmills, burning straw-men left and right, and seem generally confused and uneducated about a subject you nevertheless want to rail against.
I repeat: educate yourself before opening your mouth. It’s not that hard.
I fail to see the joke in this statement, but then again, my brain isn’t addled by extreme fanboyism.
There are no extraordinary claims for GMO plant, so there is nothing requiring more than normal evidence. Nothing but a strawman.
Nobody thinks that all problems can be solved with GMO, but it’s a demonstrable fact that some problems can be solved with these means.
E.g. Golden Rice solves the problem of blindness caused by Vitamin A deficiency; something affecting hundreds of thousands of children every year. Some of us think that might be a problem worth solving. How about you?
Serious question: If GMO can save the eye sight of hundreds of thousands of children, is that something you think is worthwhile or not?
Who says you have no choice in the matter? Nobody is trying to make non-GMO food illegal, so what exactly is your argument here? Be specific, please.
Really, in general, be more specific. If there’s one thing that’s swayed me more in the GMo direction, it’s the fact that anti-GMO people tend to be infuriatingly vague; something that I associate with people who are full of shit.
What precisely is causing you to be worried about GMO foods? What exact risks are you referring to? Given the demonstrable benefit, what’s the demonstrable harm?
Ben Lutgens #64:
If he were a random person plucked from the street, you might have a point. He’s not. He’s a successful comedian. Successful comedians, by the nature of their job, are very good at using words to get their meaning across to an audience. It’s pretty much a given that he means exactly what his words convey.
@Michael Kimmitt:
Oh, hey, it’s not often that someone proves in a single paragraph how little they know about the subject they’re wildly opinionated on.
Point one: Bill Nye is a great science popularizer. He is not a biologist, a geneticist, an ecologist, or an agricultural scientist. He is, like all people, capable of being wrong when speaking outside his field. Linus Pauling wasn’t being “anti-science” when he promoted vitamin C megadosing to cure illness, he was just trying to parlay his authority in one specialized field into authority on another in which he had no specific expertise.
Point two: “GMOs” is a very broad category that technically includes, you know, every organism produced through selective breeding. But even if we restrict it only to organisms that have been altered with modern genetic technology, it’s kind of hard to say that bacteria modified to produce insulin and blood clotting factors are “solutions in search of a problem.”
“But that’s not the kind of GMOs I was talking about! I was talking about Monsanto frankenfoods!” you exclaim. Okay, then how about Bt and RoundUp Ready crops? Were herbicide and pesticide overuse not problems? Was the regular loss of billions of dollars worth of crops to pests not a problem? There may be new problems, to be sure, and those have been and are being studied by researchers and regulatory groups. But we know that there are problems with runoff and soil contamination that can be alleviated by reducing how much pesticide and herbicide we spray. GMO crops help solve that problem.
That may be “our” main problem in the developed world (and, in fact, I don’t think it is), but it’s certainly not the main problem worldwide. Worldwide, getting calorie-rich or nutrition-rich foods cheaply and easily can be a major problem, which is why the development of (open-source, freely-licensed) Golden Rice has been such a major deal. Taking one of the world’s staple crops and making it more nutritious helps everyone, especially those who don’t have reliable access to nutritious food.
And that’s a big part of the real problem: access. The reason there are “malnourished fat people” is because conditions like poverty and food deserts in the US create a situation where people choose easily-prepared foods with long shelf lives, which tend to be calorie-dense and often nutrient-poor. GMO crops that have, for instance, longer shelf lives, can be a major boon to such systems, because they make it more cost-effective to buy fresh fruits and vegetables, but when your access to things like refrigerators or cookware is inconsistent, you’re not going to waste money on food that can rot.
There are, of course, other factors like the way that working multiple jobs leaves little time for home cooking or gym memberships, but then we might have to admit that reality is more complex than “fat people need to eat better” and “GMO bad!”
“Millions of years of natural selection, several centuries of artificial selection, and a couple of decades of irradiating seeds just to see what happens have produced perfect food crops and any further change can only make things worse!”
Oh, and my understanding is that a lot of how the vaccine schedule is chosen has to do with when children are most likely to be exposed to the preventable diseases. The CDC provides some explanation. Different countries may have different school schedules, different disease prevalences, or different priorities. That said, I did some brief comparisons and saw a whole lot of similarities between the schedules of developed countries.
I would imagine that someone who’s “scientifically educated” and can “rationally evaluate risks” would educate themselves on the relevant science and learn that a delayed vaccination schedule increases risks with no apparent benefit, but hey, it’s always more scientific to go with your gut, whatever biota they may have.
Michael Kimmitt @ 56:
If you were to ask Mr. Nye what sorts of agricultural breeding don’t result in “genetic modification of food sources”, what do you think he’d say?
For that matter, what would you say to that question?
In order:
[after a lot of concluding that I meant what I obviously meant, thank you for dispensing with the wankery] “Were herbicide and pesticide overuse not problems?”
Yes, and the Organic movement has provided a solution. Overall pesticide use increases with the use of RoundUp Ready critters, though of course the mix changes.
“Was the regular loss of billions of dollars worth of crops to pests not a problem?”
I’m gonna have to go with, “It was a problem for which there was such an enormous level of success in the current solutions that it’s almost ridiculous to bring it forward as a motivating factor for macro-sized GMOs being released into the environment willy-nilly.” Now, you might say that “a solution in search of a problem” is an oversimplification, and I might even go along with that to be polite, but we’re still in the “problems that have been solved on a fundamental level”.
“For that matter, what would you say to that question?”
I would say that Tom Foss has provided my answer fully — slow and steady ends the probability of massive ecosystem devastation. Whether or not Tom Foss agrees with me, he does have the intellectual honesty to state my position correctly, which I appreciate, given the elisions presented until now.
I have a personal issue with GMO on a micro level, which is that I have several idiosyncratic food sensitivities. Of course, since a given food is a massively complex result of enormous numbers of processes, I have no idea which specific protein or random byproduct I happen to respond to for a given food. So, like a sane person, I simply avoid that food.
GMO makes that kind of impossible. Not only do I now not know whether or not a given set of genes that causes me trouble happens to be in a given food now (gyah), but also I don’t know whether the new thing that was created via the new GMO processes happens to produce now the random thing I happen to have a sensitivity to.
Before GMO, I could read labels and move on. If GMOs are labeled, I can read labels and move on. If we insist that it is unpossible that any problem could ever result from any GMO under any circumstances, I’m in for a world of suck going forward.
On a micro level, please let me eat. On a macro level, please don’t run a nonzero chance of exploding the biosphere. kthxbai.
No serious person has ever suggested that genetically modified organisms cannot cause any problems whatsoever. The thing people object to is when people get all hyperbolic like “Oh, know, the planet will explode due to gene splicing!” That’s just silly. At worst you’ll have the same problems that people did bringing nonmodified organisms into new ecosystems, which can be problematic but it’s been happening for millennia and it hasn’t blown the planet up. And, of course, genetic modification could very well serve to isolate and eliminate many allergens in food. It seems to be a low risk/high rewards situation.
@Michael Kimmitt
Can I just rofl =D. It’s gray goo all over again. Luddite extraordinaire. Either that or reading too much Sartre and being overwhelmed with nausea – reality may collapse at any minute as soon as we splice the wrong gene! Also: “organic” foods supposedly don’t use pesticides. The facepalming may never end.
Also, to the various people here talking about “calorie-rich, nutrient-poor”. Nutrients are the things in food that provide calories (are translatable into energy) and other digestable materials, it’s not really helpful to say carbohydrates aren’t nutrients, but rather the problem would be insufficient vitamins, minerals, protein in food and missing parts of a balanced diet.
“I was showing my ignorant ass, and you pointing it out is wankery!”
Sure they have. That solution is “smaller produce, lower yields, and higher prices” with no evidence of benefit. Ames, Profet, and Gold of Berkeley found that it took seven times as much organic pesticide to achieve the same result as conventional synthetic ones. Organic pesticides also tend to be toxic in lower exposures, and the 2009 Naranjo study found that GMOs led to a 30% reduction in pesticide use. RoundUp use is increasing, (RoundUp is an herbicide, not a pesticide, but thanks for playing) and that carries its own problems, but those problems aren’t solved or alleviated by the arbitrary options labeled “organic.”
Your use of the phrase “willy-nilly” is a pretty gross mischaracterization of the huge amount of testing that goes into GMO approval process, more than is required for conventional hybridization, or for mutation breeding, both of which can affect the presence of allergens in food products, and neither of which are subject to the labeling process you desire. Your fears are certainly understandable; I have a niece with a bunch of food allergies, and I know it’s hard for everyone to avoid causing her harm. What your fears are not, however, is justified, since there have been exactly zero cases of GMOs triggering heretofore unseen allergy attacks in consumers. That risk, while possible, is still strictly hypothetical. The risks of lower crop yields, more expensive produce, produce with shorter shelf lives, increased pesticide use, use of more toxic pesticides, use of dangerous organic fertilizers, and so forth, are real and well-understood.
You want us to “let you eat,” but propose going back to organic farming practices that would roll back decades of progress, and would further exacerbate the food problems of people in poor communities and in developed countries. Maybe let them eat, and you can keep your bullshit boutique organic aisle for your own uninformed self.
Only at the cost of requiring more labor for the same area of land, for the same yields. Otherwise, you need to consider the use of fecal matter as fertilizer. Pathogens on the loose.
Considering the paranoiac hyperbole in this bit of inane fuckwittery, you have nothing cogent to say until you get your rampant paranoia under control, and talk facts, not hyperbole.
“I was showing my ignorant ass, and you pointing it out is wankery!”
Much the opposite; I was praising you for not focusing, as your peers were, on transparent misinterpretations of a quickly dashed-off blog post response. But sure, I understand that the dominance game we’re all playing here requires you to reject anything I say that might be construed as positive for you, or else your peers will think you got cooties. I lived through third grade, too.
“more than is required for conventional hybridization, or for mutation breeding, both of which can affect the presence of allergens in food products”
Are you really going to claim that if I am allergic to cucumbers, then if an orange gets hybridized with another orange, it is somehow likely that my cucumber allergy will then apply to the orange — while if we jam cucumber genes into an orange, that might not be something different? Ok, I’ll take that claim under advisement. In the meantime, I’d prefer to just opt out, if I’m to be allowed to. One of the big fights for the pro-GMO folks is to not label that shit, so I can’t even opt out if I wanted to. I’m almost certain I’m going to lose the fight to keep shotgunned and lab-created genes from being released into the biosphere without major testing in the near future (just because a regulatory-captured USDA says it’s tested now doesn’t mean it is, and even if it were well-tested now, that doesn’t mean it will be under President Jenna Bush). But I’d like to at least try to opt out and stay reasonably healthy, as I’m sure your niece does as well. Enh, best to throw us both under the bus. You know better than we how to maintain our own bodies.
“You want us to “let you eat,” but propose going back to organic farming practices that would roll back decades of progress,”
I would say that a blind faith in the idea of “progress,” rather than a rational evaluation of the results of the Great American Food Experiment, is definitely one thing that’s being discussed here. Certainly the absurd pretense that anyone here cares about the nutrition requirements of the poor is beyond risible. If we really cared about that, we’d be talking about overfishing, climate change, the Gulf of Mexico dead zone, giving people time to cook, and massively cutting meat consumption to free up space and energy for plant production — and nobody here is remotely discussing that. Instead, we’re discussing how to jam more corn into the gullets of sick cows by pouring more fertilizer, pesticides, and herbicides made from processed oil (which, it must be noted, is something of a finite resource) onto the ground. Let’s not get stupid here. We’re discussing how rich white people can feel morally superior to other rich white people. Which is great! Let’s all feel superior together. One thing I think we can totally agree on is that most people suck and you and I are much better than most of them.
I would say that if you asked the average person 20 years ago if we would randomly invade Iraq and occupy it without possibility of pacifying it for over a decade, create a supermajority opinion as a nation that torture is morally fine, allow an entire coastline to be devastated by a natural disaster, and endure a major financial crisis that brings our entire financial system to its knees without anyone being held accountable or any serious reform even being proposed (during the seven year and counting Depression that followed), you would be (quite reasonably) dismissed as a conspiracy theorist. Heck, if you were to propose that a major social movement against vaccinating children against childhood illnesses was a-brewin’ 20 years ago, you’d be looked at like you grew a new head.
Unlikely and terrible things happen, especially when Republicans get elected, as they so often do. Noticing this does not make one a conspiracy theorist; it makes one basically conversant with human nature and recent history. Wanting to mitigate unlikely and terrible things does not make one paranoid; it makes one capable of purchasing workman’s comp.
Michael Kimmitt #79:
I assume that the ‘we’ in that sentence means that you are admitting to playing such a game. Please do not project your own bad habits onto others. Instead, try fixing them in yourself.
“you are admitting to playing such a game.”
Once the game starts, the only way to stop is to exit interaction with the group. Nature of the beast; if I want to continue this discussion, those are the terms that are available. To some degree, this has to exist — the group has to enforce what the allowable discussion topics are, or else the group disintegrates. I’m an outsider, I’m low on the totem pole. If I espouse popular opinions, I might work my way inside eventually. If I start with an unpopular opinion . . . well, you see where this is going.
The good news is that Tom Foss really is genuinely smart and intellectually honest. He’s a person I can disagree profoundly with and still get something out of the conversation. In this case, I got a lot out of the “progress” comment, and I think it got to the core of the disagreement.
This isn’t about science or healthy skepticism, it’s about whether or not one “believes in progress”, and as someone who has suffered for over a decade from a poorly understood illness that is likely environmental in origin, I’m not someone who “believes in progress”. I’m someone who thinks that some things turn out well and some things turn out badly. I understand better why otherwise sensible people elide the categories of “things which are incredibly well-established and have an enormous track record of success” and “things we just invented recently and are likely to display emergent properties and we really can’t predict”. If they’re both “progress”, they’re related to each other in a way that’s not true for me, and if I attack one, it’s possible I’m attacking the entire category.
Whereas for me, they’re just completely distinct and there’s no category under attack at all. This will definitely help me when discussing the topic with the other decent people who disagree with me on this topic in the future.
so… you actually think organic farmers don’t use pesticides?
LOL
that marks you at as a fool. just that, right there.
I don’t even need to read the rest of your inanity. you very clearly haven’t the slightest clue what you’re talking about.
“so… you actually think organic farmers don’t use pesticides?”
No, I think the Organic movement has provided a solution, which is irrelevant to the question of how the FDA defines the word “Organic” for advertising purposes. Best of luck learning to parse sentences from people you disagree with in the future.
whereas you are just horribly inflicted with Dunning Kruger syndrome and are a less than useless addition to likely any group you choose to join.
here’s me, hoping you’ll choose to pester some other group with your idiocy.
which, no matter what, says volumes about how little you know of how the industry is actually practiced.
you’re a fool. do you not get this? I’m sure many people have told you this. why do you choose not to believe them?
Michael Kimmitt #82:
This:
…is in direct contradiction to this:
Either a person is intellectually honest, or they are rejecting arguments for less-than-honest reasons. You can’t have it both ways.
Kimmit, you have *exactly* the same kind of mentality of parents who blame thimerosol for their kid’s autism.
they, like you, want to think that there is someone or something to blame.
you never consider the possibility that there is noone, and nothing, to blame. No, you’re convinced it must have something to do with “progress”, but you’re far too ignorant of the thousands of potential reasons you might have an undiagnosable illness that have FUCK ALL to do with anything anyone has ever developed, ever.
here, this should be your fucking bible, seriously, it will help you tremendously to understand what it means:
RECALL BIAS
because I’m sure you’ve basically lived by it ever since you started looking for a reason why you are ill.
look, the reason antivaxxers blaming vaccines for autism get rightfully blasted, is not simply because they make an honest recall bias error.
it’s because they are taking the rest of us down with them, and forcing the rest of us to pay for their error.
fools should never be suffered lightly, even ones seeking answers, for just this reason.
“Either a person is intellectually honest, or they are rejecting arguments for less-than-honest reasons.”
Don’t be absurd; he was genuflecting toward the group’s needs and then taking care of business. He’s got you and Ichthyic to appease before he gets to the business of actually engaging some ideas. Otherwise he’ll lose face. Are we all under the delusion that we’re here to challenge ourselves (or for y’all to support one another), rather than reaffirm your superiority via a circle-jerk? I assure you, reading this comments thread and several others, it’s about the circles and the jerking.
“you never consider the possibility that there is noone, and nothing, to blame.”
I mean this in the kindest possible way, but are you under the mistaken impression that we’ve ever met or that you know me in some way? I’m pretty sure I’d remember you; you’d be that entitled ass with the pretentious fish name.
No, it never occurred to me that God reached down from Heaven with his holy prostate and that my disease process was unexplainable by reference to natural processes. That was never on my list of available explanations. It was obvious that our current scientific understanding was inadequate, but as the frontier of science continues to advance on the ridiculously difficult problems associated with understanding ecology, I’ll get more and more relief. As will the poor souls suffering from autism spectrum disorders.
But that’s not a “belief in progress”, which is the sort of thing that gets the sort of angry, emotional, and childish responses I’ve read here. It’s a belief in the value of knowing things, which allows human beings to transcend illness and avoid bad decisions or systems.
We need to be careful not to overly generalize or show ourselves mere selective, fairweather friends with Maher and his messages. Surely, one cannot subscribe to all his notions or support all his show guests and their topics. After all, it’s his show (and his ratings) and not uniquely ours (ours would never be picked up by HBO nor anyone else of this capacity).
Let’s not regard him categorically anti-science, just because of the vaccine matter (which he vehemently assures is misrepresented in its circumferencing), and modified food, etc., when in fact, he diligently stands strong with scientists for global warming, biological evolution, the need for understanding our solar system, molecular/synthetic laboratories over cruel animal testing, archaeological standings on the misnomer of ancient holy scripture narratives, etc, etc.
He has been just as much a friend of (and steadfast fighter for) scientific standings as not. His limited dissention notwithstanding, which he takes because he *feels* it’s protective of society. Some of the greater scientific minds authored essays hotly disputed by other scientists. Is this mere comedian to be universally correct upon, or held to, all standards? Let’s take the good with the bad.
Christopher Jones
Sorry, but Maher is anti-science. That’s just a fact. You don’t get to pick and choose which conclusions you like and which you don’t. By that standard, most creationists would still qualify.
Science isn’t so much about the conclusions as it is about the method. If you don’t accept the method – the absolute supremacy of evidence – then you’re not pro-science, even if you accept some, or even most, of the conclusions.
Maher may be in favor of many good things (and feel free to credit him for that), but science isn’t one of them.
LykeX,
So, by your standard, if one has a dissenting view of what some feel is the established science (remember, there are “scientists” that underpin his thoughts on the GMO/vaccine topics; his only detracts, too – that’s where those types get it from), then they are categorically anti-science because one cannot “pick and choose conclusions.” I see. That’s an overgeneralization of magnitude, but let’s compare that.
Preface: I am proscience. I am a skeptical of anything beyond the natural word. I have been active in secular, humanistic (atheistic) circles against matters of faith or paranormal notions most of my adult life. I subscribe to many national magazines for years on the topic and have supported selector personalities in this spectrum for years. I am pro-vaccine and skeptical about GMO’s, etc. I subscribe to the scientific methods (on everything), but acknowledge that science can be divided, too. (Not so much on matters of global warming where the science to me is clear, but towards what is native and non-native species, nature and nurture, etc.).
Akin to yes, the credulous creationist argument, cannot one cite scientists on both sides on many topics (for better or worse)? In truth, don’t we (people regarding ourselves empirical adamants) really regard science by what the “majority” of scientists say (at the time) and ignore the dissenters on every topic (not such these)? Global warming, extinction, nature vs nurture (the Bell Curve had scientists), wildlife control and wildlife protection, vivisection, circumcision, nutrition, radiation, gene-manipulation, space cost-to-benefit, even processes for biological evolution? (Gould and neo-Darwinism; i.e. punctuated equilibrium vs phyletic gradualism, etc., etc.). Some scientists admit that Mengele advanced medical science by many decades through his barbaric study of twins during the war. He (and many like him) were indeed scientists and published articles on how to eliminate birth defects through gene-manipulation. Were they anti-science, or just anti-moral?
So what makes the difference from what you and I would regard just two more pseudosciences in the entire scheme of things; why are these unique and worthy of categorically segregate one into being anti-scientific? Gould had plenty of dissention; is he anti-science? After all, one cannot pick and choose conclusions and still be within the “absolute supremacy of evidence,” right? Even Arthur C. Clarke would commonly say that “the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.” If science were to take any contrasting stance they could be regarded as dogmatic as well.
You’re right; it is about the method and those methods can be explored by anyone with a scientific degree at some university and be labeled a scientist, much to our chagrin. So if it’s about the method and that’s where you’re governed, then great, but can you establish the methods of all accredited scientists that may have an unpopular or dissenting view from the mainstream view to categorically label what is science and what is anti-science? Isn’t it about about methods and processes?
Are we to dismiss Maher’s stark, diligent stand for the scientists supporting (human advanced) global warming against the many show guests that have come on adamantly citing scientists opposed to global warming (human advanced or otherwise) because he bit on a couple of suspect apples? He’s just a comedian. There are actual scientists with accredited degrees seeing things his way. They would expound their dedication to the methods. Yet Maher has stood tall with the science (what we regard “true” science) on most issues.
So to say he’s not in favor of science as a blanket assessment is just untrue and rather unfair. He has a couple of controversial asides and has recently (for ratings) allowed some suspect characters on his show. He does not necessarily endorse non-mainstream science apart from those couple of reaching excursions. My statements stands. It’s fair to take the good with the bad. Call him quasi; call him confused or a misinformed cannabis intoxicated lost lot, but anti-science is a tad over the top, respectfully.
Wrong. Gould had some evidence. Not for everything, but that is typical of evolution.
There is a difference between expert opinions, like climate scientists talking about climate change, and physicists not understanding the models for political reasons, and trying to sow doubt.
No, he is anti-science on several topics. It stands. Don’t like it? Take it to non-scientists. We real scientists know better.
What’s a “real” scientist”? Those dissenters are scientists, too, whether you agree with them or not. A scientist is only a scientist right up until you disagree with them? Great model. You would have had a place in the Inquisition against Copernicus, Bruno and Galileo under that model.
No. A scientist is a scientist right up until they disagree with the evidence. You know that word? “Evidence”? It’s kinda important in scientific circles.
The position you’re describing is Maher’s. He accepts the evidence… right until it leads to a conclusion he doesn’t like. Then he ignores it. That’s why he’s anti-science.
If you only accept the conclusions that agree with your biases, you’re not pro-science. That’s simply. not. what. it. means.
Nope, not me. The arbiter is THE EVIDENCE. And where I don’t have time to look at the evidence, I listen to experts who show they know both the evidence, and how to evaluate it properly. In Maher’s case, that would be the CDC and other public health officials on vaccines, for example. He’s off in non-scientific territory by ignoring the evidence, and going with his twisted ill-thought out beliefs. I don’t listen to those who ignore the evidence, or misuse it. Science is about evidence, not presupposed opinions.
LykeX,
Firstly, credulous ad hominem displays upon universally accepted principles does not elevate your position. It only weakens you as it reveals that you require trivial misnomer to attempt your hapless leverage. Yes, we all understand scientific principles and the essential components thereof of. Secondly, on these excursions, I never implied that Maher wasn’t offtrack. Only that there are “scientists” on both sides leaving one to decipher the “evidence” for themselves as they see it. Meaning, accepting conclusions which coincide with biases isn’t unique to Maher. One could say that of a few here.
So, science is only science when it fits the majority of what scientists say is the ‘evidence, and the “evidence” presented by the non-majority is pseudoscience? (The common cold and ulcers coming from viruses as opposed to being exposed to cold or from stress levels was once a minority, dissenter’s domain as well.)
Back to the base premise which you countered: The arrival and labeling of who is a “real” scientist. You’re doing the same thing as you say Maher is doing. If a scientist relays their findings in contrast to what you believe is the properly supported “evidence” on the matter, that in of itself labels the scientist not a real scientist? Because they arrive with results apart the predominant impressions of other scientists, this converts the dissenter to anti-science, and thus no longer a real scientist? There’s no such thing as an incorrect real scientist? Because as soon as they’re deemed incorrect (by other scientists who have presented their “evidence”) the university strips them of their title and their doctorate’s degree is cancelled? Please.
If that was the case, many of the great scientists would have no longer been “real” scientists remembered by history when they finally got things (what the rest of us believe is ) right. Science is designed to be far more flexible than you seemingly understand.
Nerd,
The arbiter is the evidence. I see. And the “evidence” you regard reliable is only that of the “experts” which can “show” you that they can “evaluate this properly.” Because you have schooled yourself enough to know that the CDC is correct (not that I disagree with the CDC – just making this point) and thus any scientist disagreeing with the CDC is no longer a scientist apply science? Goodness, that’s most interesting indeed. That’s not what skeptical inquiring truly means, but let’s go with that. (And that’s coming from a Stephen Barrett subscriber like me.)
Tell me, given that in any court of law both counselors present their “evidence” which they believe is the indisputable evidence that should be digested and any “evidence” contrasting the one favoring their client is suspect evidence; meaning, not to be trusted (by way of example, OJ Simpson’s team brought the best DNS evidence scientists and lawyers in the world to say that the “evidence” wasn’t what it seemed), should the scientists testifying for the losing side be regarded as “ignoring or misusing the evidence”? Are they no longer real scientists? They may have believed in their evidence. They may have seen their scientists and their “evidence as their arbitrator.”
Should the same apply to majority science? Is science thus a byproduct of popular (predominant) findings and the rest are all anti-science? What is the beacon for whom you will regard the “experts”? Majority? Your impression of scince bias? What? Only if one categorically insists that the science here has no more flexibility and that the CDC represents that hardened, fixed science can one deem just whom the “experts” actually are, as both sides believe they are the experts. Therefore, one is left to personally choose just whom they regard is the proper expert.
The difference with me is that I am able to find persuasion with the findings of a certain side and see the others as incorrect (even quacks), but not always “anti-science” or as not “real scientists.” Meaning, real scientists can be mistaken, or what the majority of others deem trailing in their methods. It need not have anything to do with fixed mentalities trying to curb science to their liking. It could just be that they’re missing things clouded by inconsequential factors. They can either come around to mainstream (what “most” regard in-line with the evidence) or they can be vindicated. Both scenarios have happened in “real” science. That’s what the true hallmarks of scientific principles are. It is not fixed. Otherwise it’s an ideology.
One could even argue that creation “scientists” are scientists, too, even if not very sound ones (meaning they may have a degree somewhere – usually not very accredited), whom have yes, woefully trampled scientific methods in order to reach for support for their emotional biases and thus completely lost their way [if they ever had it]. I suspect these anti-GMO/vaxxers have a few of this ilk as well. Joseph Mercola comes to mind. Buy not all are trying to advocate ideologies.
Some anti-vaxxers are as atheistic as we are and have no motive beyond what they truly believe is a means to protecting our health (like Maher). They just mistaken. Not necessarily anti-science across the board. Maher stands up for science on every front and has scientists underwriting his position (even if you see them dead wrong) on these two rare excursions from mainstream.
For instance, there are scientists that go to church and subscribe to primitive, ancient creeds, clouded by their emotional need to compartmentalize their ration for internal comfort. Are they real scientists? Isn’t the whole deity thing beneath any person apply scientific principles? Yet, aren’t they supposed to be “experts who show they know both the evidence, and how to evaluate it properly”? After all, “Science is about evidence.” Is there evidence for biblical divinity? Then why are they going to church? Are they not scientists/experts in their field whom evidently choose to check their brains at the door when they go to church? Or are they anti-science, too, just like those which Maher promotes?
Every single scientist from accredited universities who believes in and promotes god (to their children, etc.) is also “off in non-scientific territory by ignoring the evidence, and going with twisted ill-thought out beliefs,” too. Are you willing to cite your “experts” against them on their papers in their fields? After all, the arbiter is the evidence. (Note: I emphatically see it as they are checking their brains at the door. Just making the point.)
I’m a professional scientist (40+ years), so you can’t bullshit me. Which is what you are doing.
Everybody can be delusional on given points, culturally learned and reinforced. But there is no scientific evidence for any deity, so NON-SEQUITUR. You don’t have arguments, just sophistry. Dismissed.
I don’t believe “bullshit” is a term any “professional scientist” I even knew stooped to, but I can assure you that there is not even a semblance of an attempt to skirt the truth, which is what bullshit means. Yes, “delusional on given points, culturally learned and reinforced.” That’s how I would categorize Maher and his supporting scientists. As to how one group is anti-science and the other only delusional on certain points escapes me, but we’ll call it your “sophistry,” at work and hereby equally dismissed. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
As if I care. If you were so hep up on showing me evidence, rather than stupid ass questions that are non-sequiturs, you might have been paid attention to. Philosophy is always taken with a huge grains of salt here for good reasons, as some liars and bullshitters JAQ off like you did. Not one link….
Links of what? I never represented a dissenting viewpoint on the science. The clarification was on the simple preposterous notion of labeling any dissenting scientist somehow not being a scientist for doing so. There’s no link that will aid you if that universal truth isn’t already resoundingly clear.
Never mind. I have you pegged now. Your rather telling display says it all. Does it ever. Far more hot air and emotional channeling than anything else. Yet, you wish to elevate your status through such display. Guess I shouldn’t be surprised.
In other words, bullshitting me. Your philosophical posturings are dismissed. Either provide a scientific, not philosophical argument, or you have nothing but unevidenced opinion. Which is the case. The fact I don’t fall for you bullshit is that I have been a skeptic for 35+ years, and burden of EVIDENCE is always on those claiming that science doesn’t do it right. Funny how that evidence never makes the literature….
Just more wayward misnomer. You lack the simplest definition of the notions you placate. You can save all the boasting, too. If one cannot even track the premises of this simple discussion here without showing their true, very unrefined street-talk self, then advanced wherewithal beyond this is where the true posturing is.
I think we’ve all said our minds here.
CJ, why are you still here? You lost. You can’t win, as you don’t understand the argument. Typical of those who defend woomeisters. They are full of woo themeselves.
Nerd,
Was there a contest? See what I mean about you? This isn’t about the topic with you; it’s about your internal issues which reveal obsessive compulsory disorders. Your display uncovers your thin disguise.
And I am only responsible for what I say, not what you understand.
Finally, we’ve all said our minds here. Further lamenting does the site a disservice.
I’m just going to cut through the crap, ignore most of your pointless babble (for the record, please stop trying to interpret my words; you suck at it) and get straight to the point:
Would you object to calling creationists “anti-science”?
If not, why not?
Christopher Jones:
Cut the ableism.
Also, your post at 104 looks like you fed your dog a thesaurus.
As a person with a documented elevated vocabulary, I have to say that CJ’s very mode of speech betrays him. Much as the content of his posts belies his scientific literacy, his very word choice shows him to be one who aspires to eloquence; yet, only feebly grasps the meaning of his own words. It’s really been quite entertaining to read.
anteprepro:
Pro-tip for self: remember to use the preview button!!! (Grrh.)
Michael, it’s puzzling that someone with such self-described elevated vocabulary struggles for coherence from that of others and worse, chastises another for your difficulty.
Once again, I think we’ve all amply said our minds here. Piling on only belabors the exercise. But as you’ve come forth to jab me with such ill diplomacy, let’s see if we can assist where you’re falling short.
Betrays and belies? Goodness, this ought to be good. Firstly, I must say that some within this “freethought” forum would pass for staunch fundamentalists with their mob rules fervence and demeanor.
Nevertheless, since you’ve been entertained here, surely then, you won’t mind entertaining me with actual examples of my feeble grasp of my own words.
Please Michael, isolate a single word, inference or implication in which I fail to identify with the very meaning of my chosen words. How credulous and insulting. Are the abelisim police minding your words? This is really pathetic.
Typo of ableism notwithstanding.
Leerudolph,
Proof that an inadvertent autocomplete function from one’s mobile between breaks shouldn’t be confused as a misapplied word or inattentiveness. Example: compulsory vs the proper compulsive. Just a typo. Nothing to fixate on. Indeed, the compulsive bit fits some here. Does it ever. Exacerbating trivialities.
LykeX,
I’ve already covered the creation science misnomer. Again, I’m only responsible for what I say. Not for what you understand.
Creation science is of course not a science at all. It offers no testable hypothesis nor foundation for its assessments. It is of course, merely a byproduct of faith itself, starkly mislabeled as science. Faith is its only beacon and it acts entirely in spite of mainstream science in efforts to underpin that faith.
The two excursions of science Maher is guilty of, noting that he upholds the science as most of us see it against critics everywhere else, also has accredited scientists (I wouldn’t say the same for creation “scientists” in any way) publishing their findings, flawed as they be, to whom he subscribes to.
The anti GMO and anti vaxer scientists are real, accredited scientists that are (to me) just phobic in their approach.
Mistaken? Sure. Motivated solely by faith? I wouldn’t say so. That’s the difference as I see it. Maher fits the former.
Only in that they have science degrees. Their objections aren’t scientific, but emotional. You don’t understand science, so you should stop talking about it. Makes you look stupid when you do.
Nerd,
Having accredited science degrees confirms them real scientists, irrespective of their objectives and errant methodology. That’s the point. Phobias are emotional. That’s what it means.
And you are the very last one here that has room to infer others stupid or rank scientific understanding upon another.
Those “emotional” scientists would outscore you on any advanced test presented. One can be sure of that.
Your motive here isn’t the defense of scientific principles anyway. It’s about an incessant inner need to quarrel. The belaboring is at chronic levels here.
I wonder if the term ‘projection’ is appropriate here. Inferences are fun!
I’ve yet to see anything scientific from you. Just inane blather.
Degrees in what? Paper methodology? Emotional responses are not scientific.
Take vaccines. Measles (data from the Wiki article) has a death rate of 2 per thousand. The vaccine has a death rate from reactions of 1 per million. Show me, with scientific evidence, it is safer to not vaccinate a million children, or to vaccinate a million children. (My calculations say 2000 die unvaccinated, one dies vaccinated).
Then look at who is arguing against vaccines. Yes, degreed people. Doctors of chiropracty (quack), doctors of naturopathy (quack), holistic healers (quack), homoepaths (quack). Compare this to peditricians (medical doctors), and public health workers. Knowing who is speaking, and why, is very important to evaluating science.
You can keep blathering, but you aren’t getting anywhere.
Still not one iota of evidence (links) to back up your assertions.
Nerd,
You can add poor reading comprehension to your list of shortcomings. You need to go back and reread to aid your decreasing traction.
Assertions to what? What would you like scientific evidence for; that quackery exists within those bearing scientific degrees? Is that something we disagree upon? I had mentioned my heralding of those like Stephen Barrett against credulous sources like Mercola above, amongst other examples.
As far as references, I have provided far more specifics here than I am witnessing elsewhere, certainly from you.
But speaking of inane blathering, you could be the poster child for that. Are you mistaking me for someone subscribing or defending the pseudoscience you’re referencing?
My only point was that some real scientists can reveal poor scientific methods. Those are the ones Maher takes guidance from. He’s far from alone, even amongst some accredited, yet embarrassing scientists.
I have been active in pro-science, anti-quackery circles for years. I know what it looks like. I would include eastern medicinal myths into the quackery and have countered that most of my adult life, even amongst those with degrees in medicine.
Again, Maher has these two unmeritorious excursions. Overall, he sides tenaciously with scientists on climate change, biological evolution, etc. Thus a blanket assessment of him being anti-science altogether is inaccurate as I see it. If another feels otherwise, so be it. But that doesn’t strip his promoted scientists of their degrees (even if arguably, it should).
What assertions do you feel “links” are overdue for? Links for what? What am I promoting that you feel links would help you with?
Truth is, you’re just not paying attention. You’re blinded by your wayward desire to exacerbate for self-stimuli.
You wank. You provide no evidence to third parties. All you have is philsophy at a science debate. You lose every time.
No cupcake. YOU MADE CLAIMS. Links to third party scientific evidence or your claims are dismissed. That is science.
Nerd,
It’s quite clear. You’re nothing more than emotional challenged hot air and far worse than those emotional scientists you chastise. You’re also not reading and you’re clearly unworthy of this discussion.
Again, third-party evidence of what? What claim am I making that you feel demands outside support? What on earth are you intoxicated from that has you seeing an unsupported claim? You keep making the same hollow accusations.
Name-calling an emotional outbursts exposes instability and reveals your inattentive mindset. You are certainly not science. You’re fathoms beneath those you critique.
Overall, one is very underwhelmed at some of the demeanor witnessed here. For a skeptics forum, much is left to be desired. Persons like yourself do this a major disservice.
We’ve all said our minds. There’s nothing left of merit to be covered. Instead, it’s morphed into a mob, piling-on mentality (forcing me to defend myself) that’s rather unbecoming. It’s very telling. Is it ever.
Multiple people voice their disdain at my posts? MOB-MENTALITY! Clearly, it’s nothing I did!
Produces unevidenced assertions, gets roundly criticised, complains about tone, leaves in a huff. Sad really.
You are an unevidence wanker (your word alone isn’t and never will be evidence), so YOU are unworthy of a discussion. Don’t come to a scientific argument and fail to bring evidence. You were given a science lesson, showing you what you needed to do to convince me. You didn’t recognize that. You don’t know what you are talking about.
Nope, I showed what a true skeptic does. That is be skeptical of all unevidenced claims. Which was all you had. You didn’t understand that. You are tone trolling, the classic ending of somebody who is in over their heads.
But Nerd, he’s a very erudite and cultured wanker. Surely that should count for something. Or not, as the case may be.
Such wayward mentalities taking comfort in the company of the others of the same ilk. Like crazed dogs.
The only lesson here is how putrid some can be at missing the obvious.
How many times now does one need to ask for a single example of an “unevidenced claim”? Absence of evidence isn’t evidence of absence.
Calling this a scientific discussion where no philosophy can substitute for hardline stance for evidence is fine.
So where’s the claim that’s inferred? Where’s the assertion supporting this chronic epidemic of wayward hysteria? Like the crowds screaming for the heretic to be burned, a single claim for evidence missing, I am seeing that here. That’s what’s sad.
What claim what you like me to provide evidence for? You keep ignoring that and calling it science.
Hollow critiquing is far from scientific. It isn’t tone, it’s incompetence and credulous demeanor that’s front and center.
And who’s left in a huff? I am the only with the composer to declare that we’ve all said our minds and there’s nothing more productive here. That’s leaving in a huff?
Mob mentality is not something one does (or triggers). It’s something multiples do.
Christopher Jones #127
Beethoven?
Chigau,
Just a typo from pounding out replies from my mobile at the close of eastern time. Another example of maximizing trivialities in a hyper gang warfare.
Christopher Jones
Ah. A typo.
How do you explain ?
and ?
Yep, you are a wayward mentality, not knowing what argument you are in, what evidence means (not your word), and full of shit.
Don’t worry troll, you came back and deserve the epithet.
Try something other than your own delusional views next time.
Not quite. The new targeted antibody treatments are very promising indeed (different angles are being exploited here, one is to block the “nothing to see here” signs that tumour cells use to get ignored by the immune system), but the early studies have run into problems with, well, evolution.
Gah, where did my link go?
Carl Zimmer explains.
Chigau,
Yes, composer vs composure is an obvious typo via Android autocomplete.
Does wayward mentalities and people being putrid in missing the obvious require explanation?
I’m not witnessing an allegiance to science here. Instead, many could pass for staunch fundamentalists drunk on only the notion of supporting the scientific method. Science moves slowly and takes the time to actually comprehend what’s there before speaking with wayward emotions.
The obvious? Have you noticed the inquisitor’s demanding support for my unfounded claims which they cannot even cite; and do so over and over again? That’s putrid.
Does you being terminally stupid require us to feed you intellect. You are one stupid and arrogant fool.
No, what is putrid and stupid in your part is to ignore your claims needed third party evidence, and must be accepted on YOUR WORD ALONE. Skeptics and scientists don’t believe your word alone. It isn’t worth the electrons used to print it. In other words, you lie and bullshit for effect, not truth.
Nerd,
You couldn’t feed intellect if your life depended upon it. As I have maintained, all I see in you is just emotional, angry, name-calling hot air revealing inner issues. You are an embarrassment to yourself and the sanctity of this (root) forum.
Same goes for any haphazardly piling on with you. None have taken the time to review the content here and have let you slide for your chronic demands for third-party links of my alleged claims which you cannot even cite, in spite of repeated attempts.
Instead, you just keep lamenting the same thing…”show me evidence of your claims,” but cannot identify a single claim you feel is unsupported.
Skeptics? Scientific? Please. Just voices from the fervent mob at a witch trial with no regard for the actual details. I haven’t witnessed any distinguishing themselves apart from that unbecoming trait here.
Science? You would easily fit into the crowd calling for the burning of accused heretics like Copernicus, Bruno and Galileo (if he didn’t recant) at the hands of the fundamentalist holy inquisition.
Where have I asked someone to accept my word on any claim? Word on what? What claim? You cannot cite any claim I have made, but yet come back each time and say the same thing about wanting outside evidence. Evidence for what?
If others here cannot see this for themselves, they’re not skeptics. They’re just taking stimuli from sidebar jabs without even knowing the dividing factors. That’s not skepticism.
The antics for effect is all you. You say I lie and bullshit (which mean the same), but cannot provide a single example; a single claim to which to support your premise.
Your purpose here isn’t scientific principles. That’s for certain. What drives you is solely your clear ailments.
Sanctity!?!‽?
Yes, Chigau, sanctity. As is integrity, dignity, rectitude, honor, decency, respectability.
Christopher Jones
Which dictionary did that come from?
It would be helpful to know and it might explain your other eccentric word use.
Chigau,
Has things become so trivial here that mere definitions for words are needed? Goodness.
Would it suit you if I used virtue, purity or goodness as opposed to sanctity? They’re synonyms of each other if that helps.
https://www.google.com/search?q=sanctity&oq=sanctit&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0l2j5.8572j0j4&client=ms-android-hms-tmobile-us&sourceid=chrome-mobile&espv=1&ie=UTF-8
Chinese, right?
Are you asking the origins? Seems like it’s leftover from popular use with clergy. Nevertheless, it’s just a figure of speech of which many have little or no direct connection to the original usage.
Christopher Jones:
:Snort: Now that’s funny. Pharyngula has been around for a long time now, and you seem a tad dense, so here’s a clue: it’s changed over the years, in pretty much every way. There’s nothing sacrosanct here. And purity? Nope, won’t find that here either. I expect you took a wrong turn at Albuquerque, Christopher, because you don’t know this place at all.
Oh, and because you can’t manage to find a good dictionary:
SANCTITY – noun, plural sanctities.
1. holiness, saintliness, or godliness.
2. sacred or hallowed character: the inviolable sanctity of the temple.
3. a sacred thing.
Protip: don’t use words when you don’t know what they mean.
Christopher Jones:
Wrong. Dead Fucking Wrong.
Caine,
No argument on the lack of virtues here. I saw that rather vividly. On the purity, many regard skepticism as pure; as in uncorrupted by outside factors. I see that’s also a misnomer here, too.
I provided a linked dictionary with synonyms (because that’s the adamant demand here). But because you don’t agree that it’s a “good dictionary” doesn’t mean I don’t know what it means or that it’s not a figure of speech.
The foul language here is very telling. Is it ever. Wrong turn at Albuquerque? Haven’t heard that one, but that part you sure have right.
Christopher Jones
Since I couldn’t find a dictionary with your definition of ‘sanctity’, I ran it through some translators.
The only language that included ‘dignity’ and ‘honour’ was Chinese.
All the other languages I tried, translated it with a variation on ‘sacred’.
Just like in English.
It’s religious concept.
And I have rarely seen ‘wayward’ outside of a religious context.
Chigau,
Again, sanctity is synonymous with virtue or purity As I presented. Virtue shows dignity and honor as synonyms. I was a publicist for a stint and heard this often in scholarly circles.
Wayward is also commonly used with no connection to a religious context. My application was for headstrong, erratic and unruly.
Our erudite and cultured wanker has crossed the line into tone trolling.
You must not be an American. Left turn at Albuquerque.
Tone trolling? It’s just an observation that says plenty. But as I covered previously, it’s more than that. Much more.
I am an America. One that hasn’t heard that phrase. That doesn’t mean it isn’t used.
Ironically, the only recent scientific content was presented back at 132/133, but no takers there. Instead, too many enamored with sidebar quarreling. That tells me plenty. And it isn’t about science.
If I were a comedian like Bill Maher, with a lot of views contrary to the facts, as well as demonstrating a general lack of appreciation for how science and critical thinking ought to be conducted when it comes to factual matters, it would make sense to say I am “anti-science” or something to that effect.
Reasonable disagreements within the sciences don’t look like that. You don’t have people there accepting fallacies and ignorance and various other shenanigans, as part of an honest and respectable intellectual tradition, even when they disagree with present state of “the establishment” or its particular findings. This guy is just some crank who tells jokes on TV, which sometimes align conveniently with the reality-based community, its political agenda, and so forth. He is not comparable to Galileo, Darwin, Einstein or anybody else who has pushed back, in anything like an informed or useful or responsible way, against the received wisdom or the conservative views at the time. That’s what makes Maher’s crap very much worthy of such criticism: his ignorant bullshit is irresponsible and useless.
Christopher Jones @149
No, asshole, you’re tone trolling. You’re concerning yourself with foul language and whining about it. That is prima facie (that’s foreign for “obviously”) tone trolling.
Note to everyone else. What am I bet that CJ says something about me calling hir an asshole but doesn’t bother to refute the charge of tone trolling?
When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.
-Jesus
The most telling thing about foul language is always about who complains about it, why they do, and how.
Christopher Jones #150:
And nine out of the seventeen comments since then have been by, who…?
Essentially, Maher has two anti-science excursions (that I’ve seen), but some pro-science stances as well. He stands firmly, emphatically for science on climate change, biological evolution and elsewhere. He challenges any opposed to the latter science openly on his program.
So, if that makes him anti-science (and each has to measure how the excursions va the allegiances rank him), then at the very least he’s been an intermittent supporter of science depending upon the topic.
Elsewhere, indeed he loses his way. But he doesn’t side with the GMO/ anti-vaxer for ratings, etc. He truly doesn’t know any better. He’s just a comedian with his own (sometimes badly flawed) views. The pseudoscience is in his gullible ear. He needs lessons from more credible sources.
152: I will, and have already, disputed the “charge” of tone trolling. Meaning, it’s much more than tone and name-calling. It’s the unruly, freenzy that belies professional decorum. It’s real simple. Piling on with such demeanor says plenty. Mob rules only lessen the individual.
153: I am responsible only for what I say, not what the next understands.
154: It’s not as much of a complaint as it is a ranking. Conductivity says plenty.
155: Could it be because I am the one being ganged up on? You’ll pardon me for defending myself, right? Thanks. But you, however, not part of the fervent feeding frenzy until now, could have found it in you to reply there instead of joining up on me. But instead, you chose to use the time on me.
Translation: Some much more prefer to quarrel, attacking every word, especially in multiples on a sole party than engage in actual scientific discussion. That’s says it all.
For a pro-science forum, not one has noticed that I have been hounded for third-party evidence upon phantom claims which, though I have asked over a dozen times, the accuser cannot even cite the alleged unfounded claim of the accused. That’s more inline with a witch trial than anything scientific.
Yet, without even taking the time to review, instead found it in them to echo the same misnomer. Observations more than complaints. But it’s very telling.
Christopher Jones #157:
You have the choice to ignore comments which you feel to be off topic. But hey, if you’d rather defend your erroneous word-usage than talk about the science you claim should be the most important topic, go right ahead old chap. I’m merely pointing out your hypocrisy in pretending to want the latter, whilst engaging in the former. Should you wish to bring the conversation back on your preferred track, here’s a handy starter:
‘Bill Maher, while he has been known to make statements which appear to be anti-science, is not anti-science because…’
Now, fill in the blank, old bean. Feel free to use swear words or not, as your taste dictates. The rest of us do.
158: Truth is, I managed to do both. Not only do I have that right to defend myself as you or anyone else would, I also managed to contribute on the very inquiry you happened to mention in advance of you getting your blurb out.
You can “feel free” to review my comments at 156. You see, with me, I don’t use this page to ventilate frustration for the day. Composure works just fine.
Christopher Jones #159:
Ventilate.
Right.
And really, your entire objection could have been stated in three paragraphs to the effect that he isn’t anti-science except when he’s anti-science? Fuckin’ ‘ell, that’s deep!
I now think that Christopher Jones is a ‘bot.
Impressive.
But I don’t think that goes far enough. From what I’ve seen, he’s anti-science even when arguing in favor of the science on “climate change, biological evolution and elsewhere” (whatever that includes).
Crappy arguments for science on a comedy talk show are not what I would call “pro-science” much less “scientific.” He has certain attitudes and beliefs about specific things which seem okay sometimes, but look at the process. What really happens on his little sideshow? Maher evidently thinks it’s acceptable to muster any old crap argument that will keep the crowd happy or shut down the opposition, no matter how reasonable or factual or empirically-supported it is, with no sense of being accountable for it (because, of course “he’s just an entertainer.”)
I won’t speak for anyone else, but I think that’s really fucked up and not pro-science at all. Even when he supports climate change or evolution or whatever it is, he still acts like a slimy fucking bullshitter. Which is not the kind of ally I want. And I don’t care that broken clocks are right twice a day: they are still broken.
You don’t know what science is. Obvious to real scientists.
Easy stupid fuckwit. That there is a SCIENTIFIC case to be made that the measles vaccine as used is unscientific. I even asked you for you to show your work. NADA, ZIP, ZILCH ZERO, NOTHING.
No, my total work here has been for scientific principles. Those that you so lack. The basic understand of what is and isn’t scientific. Which requires knowing when some claiming to be scientific is fart out bullshit. Like you.
Religious fuckwittery, not part of science. Honesty and integrity are required for science.
Wrong fuckwit. I presented SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE in #119. You were too stupid to notice. Typical of folks who aren’t scientists, but try to pretend they know science.
Doesn’t matter. His approach isn’t scientific, or he would listen to the experts on vaccines. Nope, not scientific at all, and you are delusional in thinking he is.
You don’t understand science. Science and scientists don’t give a shit about your ignorant views. They are dismissed, the same as any creationist saying they are being scientific. No way, no how.
You haven’t made you point, and you can’t without evidence.
consciousness razor #162:
Tentatively agreed; but based on little knowledge on my part. I’ve not really seen enough of his output to be able to really say that I know how well he defends the bits he defends.
Nerd,
You have cited no claim of mine for which you demand evidence for. I never denied the usage of the measles vaccine nor anything else. While you call me stupid, you have made tacit assumptions of way too much. Indeed phantom notions never challenged.
I’m all for the evidence. Evidence of what? That’s what your rabid state blinds you to.
It’s not okay to use ‘foul language,’ but it is okay to call a person rabid?
Wow.
Again, you are being stupid. You indicated that there was scientific arguments against vaccines, just as there were scientific arguments against GMO. Evidently you don’t believe that there are scientific arguments against vaccines now. Or just certain vaccines?
Not sure if this is the best illustration, but the quickest coming to mind on the spot would be that of truly accredited scientists that publish, advance and inspire others for their particular field, but yet go to church and believe in a literal divine deity, to include literal belief in biblical figures and their connection to said deities.
It’s been said they are checking their brains at the door (I agree). So are they anti-science? Many scientists believe in a literal virgin Mary. Are they applying scientific principles? Are they pro or anti science?
I presented my thoughts on this in much greater detail previously in this thread, but many scientists are on record saying…”it is important to note that holding a particular ideological position does not automatically make an individual guilty of being anti-science, or vice versa.”
Summary example here:
http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Composition_and_division
I read this summary today:
“Having a scientifically testable and potentially falsifiable hypothesis which is opposed to the paradigm currently dominant in the scientific community,” because in this case, Einstein, Darwin, Pasteur, Galileo, and Copernicus would also meet the definition of having been “anti-science.”
“Wrong,” in which case every scientist that has held a hypothesis, based on evidence of their time period, that is ultimately proven false would meet the definition of having been “anti-science.”
It is simply the nature of scientific theories to be overturned or updated once new evidence is found, often with technologies not present previously. On the other hand, even pseudoscientific or non-scientific claims can accidentally go right.”
Maher rejects religion. He subscribes to pseudoscience.
Many accredited scientists deny pseudoscience. They subscribe to antiquated scriptures and spiritual deities.
Who’s anti-science? Is one eliminated as pro-science due to some anti)science excursions? That’s the question.
166: On what’s “okay” is up to the individual. I implied foul language ranks demeanor and decorum. Rabid is not foul language and, I think it’s clear that it fits in the specific instance. It means governed by internal forces being displayed outwardly. There’s no comparison upon the two forms of usage.
Nerd,
I don’t subscribe to any credible positions against vaccines. My statements were only that Maher and his kind can present scientists which would underwrite their thinking for them. The purpose was only to illustrate that even bad method scientists are still scientists. (Another had said that the pseudoscience scientists weren’t “real” scientists because they trampled the methods to get to their findings (which is of course true).
I simply expounded upon that notion as there are real scientists subscribing to non scientific platforms, not just those Maher promotes.
Christopher Jones #169:
Rabid:
1. having or proceeding from an extreme or fanatical support of or belief in something.
2. (of an animal) affected with rabies.
I wood erm, ‘ventilate my frustration’ regarding you’re constantly displaced inability to yews language correctly, but I can’t summon the energise.
Only the ones that aren’t credible. Since all of them are incredible, this doesn’t narrow the field down at all.
You only stated vague things about what might happen somehow.
The specific things you said aren’t things you said.
Bill Maher is neither, and you don’t seem to understand the concept of relevance.
So, following the previous quotation, it’s true and it’s false. Either that or “bad method scientists” are not “pseudoscience scientists.”
They’re being unscientific if and when they do that, no matter what jobs they happen to have. If I wrote something unmusical, it doesn’t help to tell you that in fact I write music. It’s not relevant to the criticism.
But it’s not clear how (or if) “non scientific” relates to “bad method science” or “pseudoscience.” What does your thesaurus say?
Citation needed. What else? Vague claims are dismissed as fuckwittery. You should have figured that out by nowd, and would know better if you understood science. Your unevidenced word: considered inane blather.
171: I offered my application as it was the word I used. This wouldn’t be the literal definition, of course, sir. If one said they had to weather a storm, would you assume a literal storm? Perhaps you would have an issue with misplaced meteorological understanding? You’ve taken skepticism to clinical levels.
Daz #171
Your commencing to belie a freenzy, their. Man.
What?
It should either be taken literally or the metaphor should be apt — which is their responsibility, not mine. If they were actually given a gentle massage, I would think they’re not being serious. Or maybe they’re hallucinating or something like that. It depends.
bafflegab
http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-baf1.htm
Does anyone know what this means?
Christopher Jones #174:
Nor is it any non-literal usage which I’ve ever come across. You didn’t merely apply it non-literally, you redefined it. Or, as your previous performance would appear to indicate, you simply didn’t know the proper meaning; which is nothing to be ashamed of, but you could just try admitting that.
And also, please be aware that I am currently doing nothing of import but poking you with a stick to see what happens. You’re kind of amusing.
Also, please do not assume gender. You got lucky this time. (This part is not stick-poking. Don’t do that.)
Chigau, I figured that one was an honest typo for ‘[it] ranks of…’ It’s technically an adjective in the sense of ‘smells,’ but I’ve heard that construction a fair few times. (Sounds Shakespearean, but I don’t know.)
chigau @178
It means that he’s tone trolling but using scholarly language to do so in hopes that he won’t get called on tone trolling.
Interesting, the <q> html adds quotation marks.
172: Let’s rewrite. I don’t subscribe to any position against vaccines as being credible. Hope that helps.
Vague? The anti-GMO, anti-vaxers, of course. There are many whom he’s pointed to. Not sure what you’re asking. Would = should he have them on his show. They already say what they say, of course. Their “findings.”
No one even remotely implied Maher was a scientist. Ever. Only that he leans upon them (those inspiring him) when asked.
Even bad method pseudoscientists rarely have their degrees stripped. Thus they’re still salaried scientists. That’s all. (Would you strip every church-going scientist of being a “real” scientist? Religiosity as science (god controlling the science) is pseudoscience, too. It doesn’t convert to good science. But many are selective with who is real vs not.
My thesaurus has no explanation for “unmusical” because that is subjective to the listener, of course. That’s the best example yet of irrelevance. One cannot test for what is unmusical across the spectrum.
On bad science, sure. Can one test for divinity controlling science for vaccines? Some pro-vaccine scientists say that. Are they anti-science? After all, that’s bad science.
chigau, I think the idea is supposed to be that it “[ranks/counts as detrimental to proper] demeanor and decorum.” That’s foul language, that is.
On the other hand, giving a troll a dose of acid, putting them into a blender with a thesaurus and rigging up a chatbot to deliver the results* is perfectly cromulent demeanor and decorum. For professionals. Because we’re obviously doing our professions here on a blog.
*Just my working theory at the moment.
Yawn, no citations, dismissed.
Citation mother fucking needed.
Why are you defending Maher? He isn’t scientific, and you can’t show he is. Just keep trolling and trolling and trolling evidencelessly
Daz @180
Mea culpa.
Not so much defending Maher as pointing out that on several topics where science is bashed, he’s been outspoken on the side of the science. So if one can take the good with the bad, then he’s been an aly for science on the two topics most aligned by anti-science (climate change and biological evolution).
This doesn’t pardon the bad science at all. I never said it did. If wants to throw the baby out with the bathwater, they’re going to do so. Call bit devil’s advocate.
(Uh, just metaphorically speaking, of course.)
Call it (not bit) devil’s advocate. (Before anyone reaches for their Prozac.) Just a typo.
I am single handedly responding to the bulk of this frenzy. You’ll pardon an inadvertent typo. Thanks. Skepticism on steroids.
With multiples of dogs jumping on a single dog, this dog has stood in the ring, even against those compulsively dissecting my every word. You’ll have to live with an occasional typo. Least one can do. (I would be ashamed to be amongst this multiple display.) But to each their own.
Have to break for dinner folks. The holy inquisition will have to wait. You can go set fire to some other heretics in the interim.
Christopher Jones #187:
So if we look at the good stuff, and ignore the using-his-infulence-to-endanger-lives stuff…
Stand back, please, this translation is a job for a professional. I speak Bafflegab, a different dialect, to be sure, but I think I’m getting the gist of our interlocutor’s variety. Don’t try this at home, you could destabilise your inertial language matrix pruriently, and I don’t have access to an erudition scrambling interface to help recombobulate you.
Trolling by any other name. Typical of your fuckwitted style. Seen one, seen them all.
Bill Nye is an ally of science. Murray is a comedian who finds science useful for some jokes, but doesn’t use it right. He is not an ally, merely somebody to be laughed at when he makes his good jokes.
CaitieCat @191
Thank gods, we’ve finally got a competent linguist to decipher CJ’s amphigory.
The advanced course, of course, is Ecumenical Bafflegab. Or the traditional Catholic version, Eumenicalway Afflegabbay.
I…wut did I even just read? I mean. I know all those words. But the combination and usage has me bemused. Not to mention the partial sentences and odd grammar. I keep trying to read it in pentameter in my brain.
Also, CJ, that “prozac” comment was ablist. Don’t do that. It’s obnoxious, annoying, and frustrating for those of us who do happen to need it [prozac] for various reasons.
(See? I can dust off the big words and politeness too.)
CaitieCat #191
You rock!
あなた石！
(google tranlate rules!!,)