The Quackometer

In a shocking move the Daily Telegraph has got rid of its Business Editor, and subsequently the other Financial and City columnists have left. In the future, its business coverage will be written by their sports, arts and news desk staff and will not undergo thorough and knowledgeable editing. Actually, this is not true. There would be riots on the 0720 commuter train from Surbiton. What is true, is that the Telegraph has lost its science staff. London commuters are unperturbed.

Accuracy on the business pages is not just morally important, but legally too. Receiving accurate information about the state of the economy, businesses and the markets is vital for the efficient workings of of commerce. Bad information leads to financial loss, inefficiency and even fraud. The papers know this and their responsibilities are monitored.

Accurate science and health advice does not appear to be quite so highly valued.

James Le Fanu is writer of the Telegraph's Doctor's Diary. The strapline claims that 'James Le Fanu has solutions to your health conundrums'. Le Fanu has written interesting things before. His book, The Rise and Fall of Modern Medicine, follows the staggering benefits that modern medicine has given us by documenting 'twelve definitive moments' including the developments of penicillin, chlorpromazine, open-heart surgery, hip replacements, transplanted kidneys and childhood cancer cures. The risks taken, vision and determination of the pioneers of these fields make fascination reading. He then charts the 'fall' of medicine by describing the difficulties in finding the next breakthroughs with the tools of molecular genetics and epidemiology.

What is then surprising is the flippancy with which he writes about his 'solutions to your health conundrums'. He posed a conundrum in his previous column asking for reader's tips about how to remove a glass splinter from a finger. Amongst the suggestions were three homeopaths who wrote in to suggest Silica 30C. Le Fanu reports this suggestion without comment. Amazing. So, glass being silica based can be removed from the body by magic sugar pills that have been exposed to the vitalistic energy of silica. Straightforward witchcraft in the Telegraph.

Passing on the bizarre coordinated suggestions of a witches coven is one thing. But promoting unproven and doubtful commercial health products is another. Le Fanu goes on to give a straightforward plug for a product called Qu-Chi,

A non-drug treatment for hay fever devised by acupuncturist Andrew Broch, himself a sufferer, who found that a couple of rubber bands around the elbow reduced his symptoms of sneezing and itchy eyes. The idea is now commercially available as "the Original Qu-Chi acupressure band" from Airtight International (http://www.airtight-international.co.uk/).

So, not only are we to believe that wing-of-newt silica non-potions can remove splinters, but rubber bands around the elbow can relieve hayfever. Does Le Fanu realise how ridiculous he sounds writing about such balderdash?

The staff at Airtight International must be delighted at securing the coup of this promotional plug in the Daily Telegraph. Their web site tells us,

Airtight organised some medical trials with some proto-type bands. The studies suggested a benefit experienced by people wearing the ‘Qu-Chi band’.

That's nice. The company say they have done some tests themselves, and so they claim they have some sort of scientific proof by medical trial. The product is supposed to stimulate an acupuncture point. It does not appear to worry Le Fanu that acupuncture is pseudoscientific nonsense without a shred of evidence to support it.

Maybe he is taken in by the web site that quite simply asserts,

The 'Qu-Chi Band' works very quickly and there are no side effects.

It would be interesting to see what Trading Standards in Leeds would make of these claims in light of the new EU based legislation that states that, "falsely claiming that a product is able to cure illnesses, dysfunction or malformations" will be against the rules.

I emailed a chap called Richard at Airtight to ask if he can point me to the study that shows that the magic rubber bands work. He responded,

We don't yet have any published trials to date. Our latest study has just been completed and the raw data is being analysed. It is our intention to submit this for publication, once it is written up.

Unpublished scientific trials from commercial sources are the science eqivalent of city rumours. If the Telegraph business pages flippantly reported such rumours and unsubstantiated claims about companies profits or stability, it is likely that heads would roll. If fraud was suspected, then journalists could go to gaol.

The Telegraph needs to strengthen its scientific editorial or risk becoming the next newspaper laughing stock. The Independent went there. The Observer is rubbish. Science is the best method we have invented for determining what is true about the world. A lack of commitment for science displays a simple lack of commitment for the truth. It is no wonder that no-one is buying newspapers anymore.

Labels: journalists

 

Reported today in Pulse,

Campaigners look to have lost their fight to save a leading homeopathic hospital, in a landmark case that accelerates the treatment’s deepening crisis over NHS funding.
West Kent PCT decided there was ‘not enough evidence of clinical effectiveness’ to justify funding routine homeopathic consultations and treatments at the Tunbridge Wells Homeopathic Hospital, a decision which may force its closure.

Amazingly, most patients and GP's did not want to see funding for homeopathy,

Campaigners against the cuts in West Kent applied for a judicial review last year . Although it was later dropped it forced the PCT to launch its own independent review. But this found 66% of patients and 80% of GPs did not support funding homeopathic services at the hospital, justifying the PCT decision to stop referrals for homeopathy.

It won't be long before the rest follow.

Dr Tim Robinson, a GP who provides a local homeopathic service in Dorset, said this was a ‘test case’ which would send ripples around the country. ‘The worry is that other PCTs may follow West Kent’s lead. The monies that are being spent on homeopathy compared with the NHS budget are small and are falling.’

Let's be clear. The Quackometer does not want to see homeopathy banned. It just thinks that spending public money on witchcraft cannot be justified in a modern social healthcare system. GPs may well still prescribe homeopathic remedies if they like and I do not have too much of a problem with this, but there ought to be a franker debate about the ethics involved in lying to patients about the pills. At the end of the day, people can still pop into Boots the Chemist if they so wish and pick up some sugar pills. Or even, if they are feeling brave, consult a lay homeopath. But the NHS does not have to pretend anymore that homeopathy works. A good decision.

Labels: homeopathy, NHS

 

It has not been a good few weeks to be a supporter of alternative medicine. We have seen reports that GP prescriptions of homeopathic remedies are in terminal collapse. A Nutritional therapist has had to get their insurers to fork out hundreds of thousands of pounds after a patient was left brain damaged. And of course, genocidal maniacs appear to be able to shift their talents quite easily into becoming homeopaths and live unnoticed for years.

In the Guardian, Rose Shapiro described how this was the week when "alternative medicine finally gets the reputation it deserves and is seen for what it is - a massive social and intellectual fraud". Not to be disheartened, the Prince of Wales is announcing large cash prizes for quacks that do well in infiltrating mainstream medicine. Or, in his words,

[The] prestigious Integrated Health Awards shine a spotlight on outstanding examples of how integrated health can make a real difference to people’s lives. Where treatment is offered they should draw on the best that mainstream medical science and complementary approaches have to offer in order to prevent illness and treat the whole person.

A Judges' Special Award is going to be made for "the project that in some way stands out from all the rest as a great example of integrated health." The prize money of £2,500 to each region is generously being provided by ConvaTec who make things like 'faecal incontinence management systems', which I thought was nicely ironic for an award for people who cannot stop spouting shit.

ConvaTec specialise mainly in 'wound care'. They are a subsidiary of Bristol-Myers Squibb; about as Big Pharma as you can get. BMS is as guilty of all sorts of dodgy commercial practices as any other Big Pharma company, including anti-competitive obstructive measures to stop the development of competitive generic versions of its cancer drugs.

I cannot wait for the results. Who in the alternative medicine world, is going to be prepared to accept the Big Pharma money? Will the homeopaths take the allopathic penny? Will the Reiki healers withstand the bad vibrations from the cheque? What a hoot.

Labels: Prince Charles

 

This morning on Vanessa Feltz's BBC Radio London show, the discussion was about London's urban foxes. Nothing is more likely to split opinions in the UK. For city dwellers, foxes are a common sight for early rising suburban commuters, occasionally upturning bins, but mostly tolerated and even enjoyed. For us country folk, they are vermin. They need to be destroyed along with rats, rabbits, otters, red kites, swans and unwanted litters of kittens.

One caller phoned into the radio show to warn listeners about the destructive nature of urban foxes. In particular, she was worried about foxes with mange. This is a rather distressing disease, where mites infest a fox causing severe itching, open wounds, fur loss and eventually death. The mites can be transferred to domestic dogs, and even humans, causing scabies. In the olden days, the only way to treat mange in foxes was with lead therapy. Nowadays, common urban sensitivities mean that many people try to treat them with medicine, and not with shotguns.

The next caller talked about how the National Fox Welfare Society will send out free treatments to people who spot foxes with mange in their gardens. The only problem is that the Fox Society appear to believe that homeopathic treatment is the way to deal with this.

The National Fox Welfare Society is monomaniacal about mange in foxes. This is their reason for being. They want you to report the poor foxes and then they will send you their special medicine. The NFWS is quite clear that it does not want to use real medicine on foxes. There may well be good reasons for this. The standard treatment for mange is Ivermectin. It is not licensed, however, for canids. It can also be dangerous for some species of dogs, apparently.

What the NFWS uses is homeopathic remedies. As with Derbyshire Fox Rescue, they recommend Arsenicum Alb and Sulphur 30C, a homoeopathic treatment for Sarcoptic Mange. Details at the delightfully named http://www.mange.org.uk/. What we are seeing is a difficult and distressing problem, with non-perfect medical treatments, being solved with magical thinking.

Vanessa Feltz did not challenge the caller about their magical homeopathic cure. I still believe most people do not know just how ridiculous homeopathy is. The belief is that it is herbal. It is not - it is witchcraft. And helping distressed foxes with witchcraft is not going to help.

The NFWS is quite clear though. 99% of cases can be cured with homeopathy:

The mange treatment we send out, through questioning people who have used it, letters back etc, we have found it to work in almost 99% of the cases where foxes have had up to or less than 50% hair loss. We have even had great results with foxes suffering over and above this amount of hair loss, although the results are greater in the former. Please help us by reporting back your results. If for whatever reason the treatment doesn’t seem to be improving the foxes condition please let us know

They then provide a handy web form to provide feedback. Tick the box that applies to you. Homeopathy works for me - and my foxes.

Of course, this is hardly proof. The BBC provide a web site on mange in foxes. They report that moulting foxes are often mistaken for mangy foxes. Obviously, a couple of weeks later, the fox is going to be looking better, if it was just moulting. People will of course not know if the healthy fox they see now is the same as the ill one they saw earlier. 99% is pushing it, even for homeopathic claims.

It is all rather distressing that people believe they can treat sick animals with magical fairy water. What people ought to be doing is contacting a local vet, or a animal rescue charity, so that real medicine can be applied - and that is if anything can be done at all.

But what is most shocking is the depth this homeopathic myth has penetrated. Even the BBC fox mange site tells us,

Possible treatments
The conventional treatment is Ivermectin, either injected or given orally. But no product is approved for use with canids - the products used on foxes are designed for farmstock. The other approach is a homeopathic treatment consisting of sulphur and arsenicum. This requires no veterinary approval and there are fewer risks to pets when you treat foxes in your garden. Severely affected foxes are taken into captivity for treatment.

At least they go on to say that "Nor is there any firm evidence that either treatment really works."

I, for one, am very happy that homeopaths appear to want to spend more time publicising what they are and what they do. I do not think they are aware that the biggest threat to homeopathy is that people find out the true nature of it and the magical thinking required for belief. Until more people are aware, like our radio presenter above, delusional healing beliefs will undoubtedly lead to more suffering for urban vermin, I mean, wildlife.

Labels: veterinary homeopathy

 

Barbara Nash is a nutritionist based near Oxford. Dawn Page was overweight and sought the advice of Nash. It is alleged she was put on a 'detox diet' which included drinking lots of water and consuming no salt. If true, the result was very predictable.

Mrs Page suffered 'uncontrolled vomiting and a fit' and was rushed to intensive care. The Oxford Mail now reports she has brain damage. Her husband sued Dawn Nash and her insurers have paid out £810,000 in a settlement for compensation.

It is worth noting that Nash's barrister said she was a.

"privately trained nutritionist", and emphasised she continued to deny she was in any way to blame for what happened.

Barbara Nash appears not just to offer detox diets but also sells on her web site kitchen smoothie makers, blenders and juicers that cost more than a thousand pounds.

Anyone can call themselves a nutritionist. Only Dietitians are guaranteed by their training and professional memberships to be fully competent in what they do. Sadly, the proliferation of under trained and badly trained nutritionists is growing unchecked. Universities are in on the act taking money from students to train them as 'nutritional therapists'. Such degrees, from the likes of the University of Westminster School of Magic, are a disgrace. Privately owned colleges appear to offer legitimate diplomas, but their standard of training is unchecked.

But the TV and the Sunday supplements are full of the stupid and dangerous advice about detox and vitamin pills and superfoods and allergy tests. It is quack nutritionists, rather than medical dietitians, who own the media and the attention of the public. It is a handy commercial partnership of supermarkets, quacks, health shops and pharmacies selling pills and tonics and books and over prepared foods.

And the government is not helping. Their new Prince Charles sponsored body Ofquack intends to regulate nutritional therapists. It will give them a veneer of professionalism without protecting the public one little bit. Ofquack refuses to regulate the practice of their members (what they believe and do) and only certify that they have been trained by other quacks and carry insurance.

Personally, I think the British Dietetic Association cannot escape some blame here for the growing rise of nutriquacks. This is the proper organisation that regulates real dietitians. They should be as mad as hell that their turf has been invaded by anti-science know-nothings. I am sure their members have to deal with the catastrophic results of patients who have been misinformed by nutritionists everyday. Where is the noise they ought to be making? Why are they not telling the public and government that something is terribly wrong here with they way we view food and the self-appointed gurus who profit from our confusion?

Until this is sorted out, I expect we will be seeing an ever increasing number of stories just like this.

Labels: barbara nash, detox, Natural Healthcare Council, nutritionist, ofquack, the law

 

Bafflegab - the multiloquence characterized by consummate interfusion of circumlocution or periphrasis, inscrutability, and other familiar manifestations of abstruse expatiation - is word that ought to be familiar to Lionel Milgrom.

Milgrom is a champion apologist for homeopathic 'science'. As a former director of the Society of Homeopaths, he delights the homeopathic community with his musings on quantum theory, entanglement and its hypothesised role in 'patient-practitioner interactions'. Since quantum theory is highly specialised and requires advanced mathematical understanding to appreciate, one can be pretty sure there is not a member of the Society of Homeopaths who has the slightest clue what he is on about, or the knowledge to judge if he is speaking sense. But that does not matter. They wallow in his his quantum words like a medieval peasant listening to a Latin sermon. Or if I was being particularly cruel, like a dog, head cocked, listening to its owner describe her day at work. It is comforting, beguiling, but meaningless. But more on quantum homeopathy later.

Milgrom is now accusing critics of homeopathy as being the 'New Fundamentalists'. Somehow, the likes of Edzard Ernst, Richard Dawkins, David Colquhoun and Ben Goldacre and stuck in some naive philosophical view of science that cannot comprehend the 'new paradigm' of homeopathy. I want to show how his arguments are a distraction and just plain wrong; rhetorical devices designed to deflect from the substantive criticisms being made. They are at essence a classic ad hominem attack using the old devices of straw men and misrepresentation. For homeopaths, his arguments are just impenetrable but comforting words that allow them to ignore the serious concerns being expressed about the activities and beliefs of homeopaths.

Milgrom's accusations that critics of homeopathy are the 'New Fundamentalists' have appeared in a number of places. Most prominently, a series of seminars were held recently by Jayney Goddard. The accusations made it (shamefully) onto the pages of the Times Higher Education Supplement. The presentation that Milgrom gave is available from the vitamin pill industry lobby group, the Alliance for Natural Health. But importantly, Milgrom has set forth his ideas in a paper published in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, entitled Homeopathy and the New Fundamentalism: A Critique of the Critics.

So what are the accusations that Milgrom makes against Homeopathy's critics and why are we 'fundamentalist' in our outlook? His arguments can be summarised as:

1. We are 'economical with the truth' and we 'propagate porkies'. Straight up, we are liars.
2. Modern medicine is 'deadly' and we are ignoring this fact.
3. We lie when we say there is no good evidence for homeopathy. We cling to 'discredited' meta-analyses, such as Shang at al.
4. We ignore 'developments' in material science that shows water has a memory.
5. We are philosophically naive in our demands of 'proof' for homeopathy and that we are challenged by 'Popperian and Kuhnian' views of science. Hence, we are 'unscientific'.

In Milgrom's own words,

New Fundamentalism’s hallmarks include the denial of evidence for the efficacy of any therapeutic modality that cannot be consistently “proven” using double-blind, randomized controlled trials. It excludes explanations of homeopathy’s efficacy; ignores, excoriates, or considers current research data supporting those explanations incomprehensible, particularly from outside biomedicine: it is also not averse to using experimental bias, hearsay, and innuendo in order to discredit homeopathy. Thus, New Fundamentalism is itself unscientific.

Let's examine these charges.

Liars?

It is not clear what untruths Milgrom is accusing the critics of uttering. He uses the example of Nick Cohen's article in the Observer where he said that "To its fans, homeopathy is the ultimate cure-all. In fact, its effects can be positively deadly". Milgrom does not make clear what is a lie here. Cohen's article argues that if homeopaths pretend they can cure AIDS and other dangerous diseases with magic water then there beliefs are undoubtedly deadly. As with all homeopaths, Milgrom is ignoring the charge and instead labeling those that point out the obvious as just liars. Homeopaths like to pretend that this criticism is a lie. It is easier than policing their own trade.

It is an odd accusation to make since we are now accustomed to high profile homeopaths being 'economical with the truth'. We have seen Neal's Yard Remedies misrepresent themselves after being caught out selling illegal homeopathic products and the Society of Homeopaths have never been straightforward over their role in pushing sugar pills for malaria.

Modern medicine is 'deadly'

This is a common homeopathic trick: to point out how many people are harmed by medical treatments, often using highly suspect figures. The argument is meaningless because homeopaths never put any of their charges in context - that medicine is often about taking risks and that the benefits need to be weighed against the risks.

The emptiness of this argument was recently demonstrated by Harriet Hall in a article called 'Death by Medicine' where she takes this common homeopathic whine and substitutes 'medicine' for 'food'. It is worth quoting her at length:

Overweight is known to cause hypertension, heart disease and early death, as well as a huge number of other health problems. It is a major factor contributing to diabetes. Attempting to control weight (treating the symptoms instead of the cause) has led to a proliferation of dangerous diets and drugs such as the recent Fen/Phen scandal and the ephedra catastrophe. Unnecessary surgical procedures (again, treating the symptoms instead of the cause) mutilate the gastrointestinal tract of these unfortunate victims of food. Concerns about food lead to anorexia nervosa and bulimia. More money is spent on food than on any other class of products; just think how much more good that money could have done if it were spent instead on valuable research into things like homeopathy, acupuncture, and therapeutic touch! Frequent automobile trips to grocery stores and restaurants cause accidents, depletion of fossil fuels, and contamination of the atmosphere. Thousands suffer from indigestion, constipation, and diarrhea. Certain foods are deadly for those with allergies. Wheat is poison for those with celiac disease. Phenylalanine in foods causes mental retardation in children with undiagnosed PKU. Food may not contain all the vitamins and minerals and trace nutrients required for good health; people who depend on diet and refuse to take supplements can be seriously harmed. If you add up all the years of life lost due to overeating, obesity, allergic reactions, contaminants and toxic chemicals in food, deficiency syndromes, botulism, food-transmitted diseases like hepatitis, salmonella and E. coli, etc. etc. you will quickly come to the conclusion that food is the leading cause of death and injury in the United States. In fact, it is the ONLY cause: no illness has ever developed without previous food ingestion.

Of course, the ultimate parody of this form of thinking was achieved at DHMO.org, the campaign body that has shown that water is a deadly chemical that needs to be banned NOW! Yes, water, food and medicine all carry risks: intrinsic, political, technical and commercial. By only examining risks without balancing benefits, you can condemn any activity in life. And in all cases, delusional alternatives are never the answer.

We lie when we say there is no good evidence for homeopathy.

Over the past two decades there has been a steady increase in the number of trials of homeopathy. In turn, various authors have looked at the accumulation of evidence and performed 'meta-analyses' where all the evidence is drawn together to try to come to an overall conclusion. The early meta-analyses tended to show a small but positive effect for homeopathy but acknowledged the poor quality of evidence available. Later and better analyses have shown smaller effects until the latest and most definitive, Shang et al, was able to conclude that homeopathy is just a placebo therapy.

Homeopaths have a number of strategies to cope with this hammer blow:

1. Only cite the earlier, cruder and more positive studies.
2. Attack the Shang study as discredited and unscientific.
3. Make up ad hoc meta-analyses and hope no-one notices what you are doing.

The third trick is interesting and common. You will find homeopaths saying things like, "81% (insert high number here) of clinical trials into homeopathy show a positive effect. Critics ignore these trials.' Homeopaths are performing their own on-the-hoof metaanalysis - assessing lots of disperate data to come to an overall conclusion.

Now, this is not true that these positive trials are ignored. Science is not a democracy where the majority result wins. What researchers like Shang do is look at all the trials and then weight them by quality. Poor quality trials are either discounted or given low weight. When this is done it is seen that high quality trials show little or no effect. This is truly taking into account all the evidence, including the evidence of quality. What homeopaths are doing is pre-selecting trials on their result (positive) and then drawing conclusions from only those trials regardless of the quality of those trials - cherry picking. It is at best poor meta-analytical technique; at worst, entirely dishonest.

Milgrom chooses to use technique 2 - discredit Shang et al. Now, as with all scientific papers, Shang has flaws. It is publicly published so that other researchers can pick over those flaws and hence give the original researchers and others chances to address the flaws or do more work. If after this criticism, sufficient corrections can be made without the whole work collapsing then we can be sure that the work is solid. Homeopaths pick out the original flaws in the Shang paper, but then completely ignore how those flaws have been dealt with. They then call the paper 'discredited'. AP Gaylard discusses this in an article - Shang’s secret - the hydra of homoeomythology. In short, the weaknesses of the Shang paper do not invalidate or distract from its conclusion - homeopathy is an inert therapy.

We ignore 'developments' in material science that shows water has a memory.

Milgrom believes that critics are unduly dismissive of research in material science that shows water has a 'memory' and hence there are plausible mechanism for homeopathy. Milgrom highlights several papers that claim such a thing. However, as of yet, there are no repeatable experiments that have been done that can show a consistent difference between two ultramolecular homeopathic remedies. Rao et al, published in Homeopathy (July 2007), is the study that come closest and is often brought up by homeopaths such as Milgrom.

This paper is excoriatingly bad. In the next issue of the journal, a response was published that tore it apart. The major concerns are:

1. Despite being used as good evidence for the memory of water, all experiments were done on ethanol.
2. There were no controls to ensure that different samples came from the same stock bottle of ethanol. Hence, different contamination levels could account fo differences seen.
3. There were no data to show that the differences were consistent.
4. Graphs presented in the paper were clearly not what they said they were.

They concluded,

It is clear that the data presented are wholly inadequate to support the authors’ assertion that UV spectroscopy can differentiate between the two remedies, and between different potencies of the remedies. If the authors wish to test their assertion so that it can be substantiated it will be necessary to repeat the work from the beginning, ensuring that all samples used in the study are sourced from the same bottle of stock solvent, that all duplicate preparations for precision assessment are separately prepared de novo from the mother tinctures, and that sufficient data are generated to allow robust and valid statistical analysis of the results.

That Milgrom and others have completely ignored this devastating critique speaks for itself. It is noteworthy that it is critics of homeopathy who published this analysis in Homeopathy. Rather than critics ignoring the work in material science, they have fully engaged with it and show how it is lacking. It is the homeopaths who then fail to engage and ignore these arguments. Homeopaths have not published critical appraisals of Rao - instead it used as a tool of propoganda.

The 'memory of water' is a holy grail for homeopaths that will be forever out of their grasp. Water does cluster in memory-like ways, but only over picoseconds. Not a good shelf-life. And, has been pointed out numerous times, even if water did have a memory, it is only one of the difficulties amongst many that make homeopathy so implausible.

Milgrom also likes his own work on the 'quantum theory of homeopathy' to show that critics are 'stuck in an old paradigm of science'. Now it is true that Milgrom's work has almost entirely been ignored by other quantum physicists and that is because it is utter meaningless bafflegab. If Milgrom had wanted to be taken seriously then he would have published in a physics journal. Instead he chooses to play to the gallery and publish in Homeopathy again. It is a thoroughly confused paper that cannot decide whether his ideas are real or just a metaphor. It is just a metaphor then it fails on two levels: firstly, it is not clear what it is a metaphor for; secondly, metaphors are supposed to enable insight into difficult ideas by comparing them with familiar ideas. Does he believe that quantum mechanics is a familiar idea for homeopaths? Pure bafflegab.

It is true that such musing are largely ignored by physicist because they are obvious nonsense. At least one has taken time out to show us why.

We are philosophically naive in our demands of 'proof' for homeopathy

Here Milgrom descends into more bafflegab, this time of a philosophical nature. His intention is to show that critics of homeopaths are simplistic in their views of science (people like Richard Dawkins no less) and that our demands for 'proof' are naive.

I will not fully deconstruct Milgrom's views on paradigms and the philosophy of science: the work is done much better by AP Gaylard here.) What I will say is that Milgrom is essentially setting up a straw-man.

To illustrate this, we can see how he treats the recent challenge by Ernst and Singh to homeopaths to show some good evidence for homeopathy. Milgrom uses his sophistry to suggest that Ernst, Singh and indeed Randi will never pay out their prize money because they know full well that science can never provide 'proof' of anything. What Milgrom fails to tell his audience is that Ernst and Singh do not use the word 'proof' in their challenge. Has Milgrom even read their challenge? It does not look like it. What they ask for is evidence. And they state exactly what sort of evidence they require. I do the same in my own simple challenge. I do not ask for proof. What I am looking for is strong evidence that would be clear and unambiguous to anyone. No sophisticated philosophy required. Ernst and Singh are not naive in their views of science - what they ask for is simple - good evidence, that we can all debate and assess.

Milgrom says that there is evidence, but that it is rejected because people like Ernst are somehow stuck in an 'old paradigm' of science and that such evidence does not fit in with their 'currently held theory'. This is nonsense.

Image that your partner rushes into the room and says there is a tiger in the garden. Do you believe them? Probably not - despite them being normally truthful. If your partner had said nothing, the chances of there being a tiger in the garden are near zero. What does this new information add to the probability of their being a large carnivorous cat there? The chances are still near zero as it is far more likely that your partner is mistaken, playing a joke or had one too many margaritas. If however, you partner rushed in with pictures on the digital camera and half the street were running down the road screaming, you may wish to re-assess you beliefs about garden-feline interactions. There is a mathematical formulation for assessing the importance of new evidence like this - Bayesean analysis of prior probabilities. It can be summed up as 'extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence'.

Such is the same for homeopathy. Weak evidence will not change the 'scientific paradigm' when the new theory is so highly implausible. There is nothing 'unscientific' about this and nothing 'subjective' in the rejection of such evidence that does exist for homeopathy.

Will the real fundamentalists please stand up

So, has Milgrom convinced anyone apart from the cock-headed homeopaths that critics are the 'new fundamentalists'? No. What Milgrom is doing is best summed up by Steven Poole in his book, Unspeak. Poole tells us that 'words are weapons'. The idea is to stop thought and make dissent impossible - to shut down debate before it happens. Anti-abortionists are 'pro-life'. How can you be against them? Are you 'against life'? Friends of the Earth - how can you criticize them? Are you an enemy of the Earth? Bush has been a master of using upspeak. The War on Terror - are you with us or not? His administration describes the beating to death of Iraqi prisoners as ' the repeated administration of legitimate force'. Bafflegab. Milgrom is using upspeak to allow homeopaths to ignore the serious criticisms being made of them by allowing them to dismiss their critics as just simple minded fundamentalists who are not open to new ideas.

Milgrom has failed to prove his point, not least because he fails to consider what a fundamentalist is. Usually, fundamentalism is used in a religious context and means,

a deep and totalistic commitment to a belief in the infallibility and inerrancy of holy scriptures, absolute religious authority, and strict adherence to a set of basic principles (fundamentals), away from doctrinal compromises with modern social and political life.

And of course, you only have to look to homeopathy for similar views. Another prominent homeopath George Vithoulkas confronts a similar question to Milgrom in the journal Homeopathy again, and comes to a thoroughly fundamentalist conclusion.

Vithoulkas asks "British media attacks on homeopathy: Are they justified?". His response is to blame 'progressive' homeopaths from straying from the teachings of Hahnemmann in his 'bible' the Organon. He condemns new homeopaths for having new 'dangerous ideas' on vaccination and provings.

He attacks the heretical homeopaths and blames them for the critical onslaught. He says,

With all these irrational and arbitrary ‘‘new ideas’’ the ‘‘modern teachers’’ are defaming homeopathy and demolishing the corner stones that constitute its scientific edifice. So it is not without reason that scientists reacted badly, that the media launched a war against homeopathy and the opponents of homeopathy are at this moment celebrating.

His call is for homeopaths to fall back to the 'rational' teachings of Hahnemann. He concludes,

There are today enough sane homeopaths who can turn the [homeopathic] craziness, disorder and confusion into order and sanity, but they must speak out. This journal should be part of such a proactive movement defending the essence and substance of the theories and principles bequeathed to us by Samuel Hahnemann.

The parallels with religious fundamentalists are obvious. Substitute Jesus or Mohammad for Hahnemann and you see a call to a strict interpretation of the scriptures and a rejection of progressive thought. The reasons for Homeopathic fundamentalism and religious fundamentalism may be similar: the feeling of being under attack from a powerful degenerate hegemony and a strong belief in holding the keys to the truth of the universe.

So, Lionel Milgrom. Who are the new fundamentalists? Those that seek evidence and insight? Or those that want to hide in their beliefs and sacred texts and are too afraid to allow them to be subject to criticism and enquiry?

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An analysis of another presentation made at Jayney Goddard's fun day by Dr Alex Tournier has now been taken to bits by gimpy.

Labels: BPSDB, homeopathy, Lionel Milgrom