The M&B Approach

This week's selected article from the West Australian newspaper's Mind&Body supplement (from the September 26, 2006 edition) is "Not so sweet smelling?" which not only alerts its readers to the dangers of deodorants, but also illustrates the standard format of these misleading articles.

The first step is to get the reader worried about something (chemicals or anything "artificial" are always a good candidate for this):

Well, some scientists are now asking: are antiperspirants protecting us in the short-term and harming us in the long-term?

The second step is to find some scientific studies that might support these assertions:

A handful of studies has suggested a tentative link between the use of antiperspirant deodorants and breast cancer.

This second step also gets extra points for bringing in the scare factor of cancer.

In this case a 2003 study published in the European Journal of Cancer Prevention is presented, which showed cancer being diagnosed at a much younger age in those who used antiperspirants and shaved their underarms, as opposed to those who didn't. It's also clear the newspaper knows what sort of target audience is going to be reading these articles since, for some reasons, the journal is prefaced by the adjective "non-government". This obviously raises its veracity in the mind of the conspiracy-theory believing alties.

The researchers in the study postulated that parabens in the antiperspirants may seep into the body through small cuts from the shaving. A second study, published in 2004 in the Journal of Applied Toxicology (is this a government publication? the article doesn't provide the same reassurance for this journal) which found 18 of 20 tissue samples from human breast cancers contained parabens.

The article now loses substantial points, since it fails to follow the standard game plan and actually quotes some people who might know about how these studies are not as clear cut as they are presented to be. The acting director of the National Industrial Chemicals Notification and Assessment Scheme details a number of problems: the small sample size, no analysis of healthy tissue, no proven link between parabens and cancer, no established source of the parabens (which are found in a number of sources, including naturally - and doesn't that mean they're good for you?). The education officer of the Cancer Council WA refers to these ideas as "cancer myths" commonly circulated through email and which are generally false.

After this, however, it's back to normal business: get in some specialist to reaffirm the possibility of the scare. Someone who writes regularly for Nova would be ideal...

Leading Perth toxicologist Peter Dingle agreed with the NICNAS and the Cancer Council on the nonexistent cancer link. However, he is suspicious of antiperspirants. "I believe that antiperspirants are, without doubt, harmful to general wellbeing," Dr Dingle said. "They stop you perspiring by clogging up the underarms with aluminium - a process that is supposed to eliminate toxins from the body. If this is occurring, then where are the toxins going?"

Can you follow the logic of that? Yes, there is no link between antiperspirants and cancer. Nonetheless, they're destroying our health and, somehow, building up "toxins" somewhere (could it, possibly, be in the breasts?).

EoR would like to know just which toxins Dr Dingle is referring to, and why he thinks that the only place these "toxins" are expelled is in the armpits. EoR's understanding is that sweating was a cooling response for heat control, and that it also occurs as a reaction to fear or anxiety.

Having reestablished the woo belief, the article finishes with its rapid decline into magical science and illogic in admirable fashion:

Aluminium-free deodorants were available as an alternative for people who want to reduce toxins, without stinking out the office.

So, somehow you can still release the underarm toxins, but without sweating. These toxins appear to be invisible. Nonetheless, if aluminium-free deodorants can do this, maybe you never need to go for another liver cleansing detox?

The article concludes ambivalently:

The experts agree that the link between antiperspirants and cancer appears to be circumstantial.

That one's easy! Even EoR can work it out:

1) The experts say there's no link between antiperspirants and cancer;
2) Dr Dingle says antiperspirants are harmful to our wellbeing and could be causing all sorts of half-hinted-at evils;
3) Ergo, Dr Dingle is not an expert.

Rural Woo

The September/October 2006 issue of The Journal of Complementary Medicine discusses the issue of "Rural Integrative Medicine".

Interest in natural therapies is not confined to cities and suburbs - rural GPs face as many, if not more, queries on CM. How do they manage?

While rural GPs generally face a lot of issues, not the least being the remoteness of many communities, lack of facilities and higher workloads (and the communities themselves often have no local GP for these reasons) it seems woo is doing quite nicely in the outback, thank you very much:

One study, conducted by the Royal Australian College of General Practitioners in 2000, found rural patients had slightly more personal experience with complementary therapies (45 per cent) than urban patients (43 per cent). Rural patients were also significantly more likely to use chiropractic services than their city counterparts (42 per cent vs. 35 per cent). In 2003, a paper published in the Medical Journal of Australia showed that rural women were more likely than urban women to use complementary medicine (CM) though they did so in parallel with conventional health services.

EoR would be interested to know the reason for the higher usage (of chiropracters - does this also apply to kinesiologists, reikiists, acupuncturists etc etc)? Since medical services are very often limited in rural areas, could it be a case of the only therapy available?

The Journal of Complementary Medicine chatted to four doctors who have "travelled the CM path".

The first is a doctor in Victoria's south east who also practises "nutritional medicine". For the life of him, EoR can't really see what the "complementary" aspect of this is (unless you agree with the alties that doctor's know nothing about nutrition and diet, are not "holistic", and only "treat the symptoms").

A solo practitioner, Dr van Leerdam is not averse to prescribing pharmaceuticals. But her journey towards CM saw her questioning the pharmaceutical model. "There is a place for them but there are often better ways of dealing with things," she says.

Which, EoR expects, the vast majority of GPs (CM or non-CM) would wholeheartedly agree with.

The second GP uses "integrative medicine" in the form of two naturopaths and two osteopaths in his practise in Byron Bay. Apparently, the team "share consultations" and "take a consensus approach" though they "don't always agree on everything" and "tend to stick to their respective roles". It must be hell in those meetings... This GP also loves acupuncture, and uses it in his Aboriginal community clinic.

He says Aboriginal patients are very open to acupuncture, although he doesn't use it for many of their chronic health problems, such as diabetes.

No, such chronic health problems need an "integrative and holistic approach" with a team of specialists: the GP, a physician, podiatrist, eye specialist and scientist. The scientist's speciality isn't stated, but it appears no homeopaths are on the team.

The third GP case study practices four hours out of Brisbane, using chiropracty, acupuncture and massage as he "tries to get inside their [the patient's] head".

The final GP is EOR's pick of the bunch, however. Dr John Gillett "is regarded as a specialist in the UK but a quack in Australia" because, yes, he's a homeopath. Eor would be prepared to compromise here, and call him a specialist in quackery.

Dr Gillett says the field is far more accepted [in the UK] because of patronage by the Royal Family. 'Charlie and Queenie have their own naturopaths,' he says.

Strangely, he suspects his colleagues believe there's a "little bit of quack in him" but, luckily, he knows "normal medicine" as well. And he doesn't get to use his special not-quackery-at-all speciality as often as he'd like:

But the rigours of country practice mean you have to 'get a handle on the life-saving things' before you can even contemplate new horizons. Such demands mean the CM component of even his practice is restricted.

So, use the real medicine first, and then start applying the woo?

Jesus-San

This may come as a shock to True Believers, but that wellknown textbook The Da Vinci Code is wrong. Yes, Jesus didn't die on the cross, but he actually wandered over to Japan, settled down, became a rice farmer and, presumably, a Buddhist.

The cross is a confusing symbol because according to the local legend, Jesus did not die at Calvary. His place was taken by one of his brothers, who for some reason is now buried by his side in Japan. The story goes that after escaping Jerusalem, Jesus made his way across Russia and Siberia to Aomori in the far north of Japan where he became a rice farmer, married, had a family and died peacefully at the age of 114.

The reporter certainly understands what religion is all about:

Churchy-looking buildings have other entertainment purposes too.

Science And Pseudoscience

Last weekend's edition of The Philosophers Zone looked at Imre Lakatos, at his name changes, his persuading a woman to commit suicide, his escape from Hungary, his swinging between Marxism and right wing politics, and his relationship with Karl Popper. In between, the philosophy of science is discussed and, specifically, the difference between science and pseudoscience:

What Kuhn's saying is not at all surprising. Nobody should ever say that if you've got a theory that involves 15 assumptions in order to derive an observational consequence and that observational consequence turns out to be false, that you've always got a hit, and that's what sometimes it looked like Popper was saying, that anything else would be defensive, dogmatic. But nobody should really say that it should always hit what we might refer to as the central theory, Newton's theory or Maxwell's theory, Einstein's theory. It's perfectly reasonable to say No, it's one of these other assumptions that might be wrong, it's not really denying the Popperian method which at its simplest is completely undeniable, that if you've got a logical deduction of a consequence from a set of assumptions and that consequence is false, then you'd better regard at least one of the assumptions that you derived it from as false. But there's nothing that says it's got to be the central assumption.


But then you've got to say, well, that's also what people do in terrible cases we intuitively put on the wrong side of the line. I don't know if Uri Geller is caught cheating, he says that he had to cheat because although he does have genuine psycho-kinetic powers, he had to cheat because there were sceptics around and the sceptics affect his powers of spoon-bending. Well that looks exactly like the sort of ad hoc defence of a central theory that we all intuitively regard as pseudo-scientific. So there has to be a difference between holding on to a central theory by rejecting some auxiliary assumption in a scientific way, and doing so in a non-scientific way. And all that Imre really suggested, and I think this is to a good degree accurate, was that the scientific way is when you don't just absorb the initial difficulties, so you've got an initial theoretic framework that yields a false observation, you move to a new theoretical framework which gives you the correct version of that false observation. That's easy to do, that's true also in the unscientific cases. What distinguishes the good shifts from the bad shifts is extra independent predictive power. So you work back, Adams and Everier worked back from the details of Uranus's orbit, assuming that Newton's theory is correct, and say what do we need to assume about this other planet in order to give us the correct account of Uranus' orbit. Well naturally then, they get the correct account of Uranus's orbit from the revised system. But it also makes the extra prediction that there is another planet, that there is something that you've misidentified as a fixed star that is in fact moving, and if you look you'll see it, and that's exactly what happened with the discovery of Neptune. So taking away all the arcane terminology, progressive problem shifts are just shifts in which you get some independent testability and the new theory survives that test, whereas degenerating problem shifts are cases where you only absorb previously negative observations in an ad hoc way without any further means of testing.

Royal Show - Charles not amused?

I dragged myself around the grounds this morning - mainly to see the horses.
Checked out the marketting pavilion for woo. Was less prominent than expected - suppose they usually hold their own psychic fairs and here they have strong competition from the likes of vege peelers, dog fur removers, termite exterminators and massage sofas.

Was a slick Chinese Acupoint Massage booth set up like a progressive dinner. A front row stool offered a taster: "squat for a free neck rub" which progressed to the middle row: "sit on the chair and pay for an upper body rub" then at the rear were couches for the "full deal and hand over all your money rub". I decided to sample the reflexology. It involved some pretty unnatural things with my feet - hammering, rotation, toe plucking etc. At the end I expected a diagnosis but it was just all honest hard work and no woo. The masseur said they had flown in from Sydney for quick cash.

However, was not entirely disappointed. Found an Acu-Pal stand selling little bottles of herbal magic lotion for $20 (or two for $30). It professed "it's not a miracle ... only natural" and dealt with shingles, anaemia, cold sores, varicose veins, toothache, thyroid problems, peptic ulcer, warts, stomach pain, asthma and ADHD. A sign stated "According to Eastern Medicine all ailments are resultant from a blockage in the lymphatic system". Aren't they taking liberties? What about the chakras and qi?

I searched in vain for a woo show bag. Closest were "Fairy Tales" (complete with wand and a pink tutu), Magic bag (with cards, fake poo and blood capsules), Natural Lollies, and best of all, Idiot Bag (plastic roaches and a Dr Fart).

Homeopathic Hospitals Diluted

We all know how homeopaths are so proud of being supported by elite scientific figures (such as Prince Charles) and also like to claim legitimacy since they have five whole "homeopathic" hospitals in the UK. Well, sadly, it's now four. A campaign to Save Our Magic Delusions has been started to preserve this bastion of alternative reality.

[A spokesman for the Primary Care Trust] explained that the hospital as a whole was not facing closure, just the homeopathy department. The hospital also houses community paediatrics and a child and adolescent mental health service. Mr Thallon said in future all patients referred for homeopathy would be considered by a special panel to ensure their treatment was appropriate. "Homeopathy has been around since the 18th Century and has got a large body of very convinced adherents, but in the era of evidence-based medicine it's beginning to struggle a little bit, so I'm afraid that we're reflecting this in our decision."

This is obviously terrible news. Closing down a whole department that relies on magical nonsense and nonexistent remedies in favour of that nasty stuff like paediatrics and mental health. How could they? EoR also enjoyed the Primary Care Trust's spokesman's none-too-subtle dig at homeopathy: belief is not evidence, and this is no longer the 18th century (only in the minds of homeopaths do these two statements still retain validity). How could anyone perpetrate this travesty solely because there's no evidence for homeopathy?

EoR hopes everyone will calm down. He can't even see what the problem is. For a start, the homeopaths should be happy they're getting less money. Doesn't homeopathy teach that diluted substances are more powerful? So less money should actually go further. And surely they never need to get any more supplies in until the heat death of the universe? They can just go on diluting all the ones they've already got. For ever and ever and ever.

SolarisCare - Evidence Based Woo

The Mind&Body supplement in the West Australian for September 19, 2006 contains two articles espousing the wonderful work being done at the SolarisCare Foundation. Apparently, this is the new name for the old Brownes Cancer Support Centre at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital (the linked website appears to have last been updated in 2004).

The first article is "Tackling Healing Feet First" about the wonderful magic of reflexology. Consider the logical impossibility of the following:

Maybe try reflexology, an ancient therapy that applies pressure to the feet and hands to promote natural healing within the body. Reflexology is considered a complementary, not alternative, form of therapy and was developed in the early 1900s.

It seems in altieworld that 1900 is "ancient".

The article doesn't claim reflexology cures anything, only that it is "used alongside" real therapies "to assist with symptoms of illness" (funny, EoR thought alties always lambasted real medicine because it only dealt with the symptoms, not the illness) such as migraines, back pain, arthritis, stress, hormonal imbalances and cancer. The Solaris support centre manager, David Oliver, is quoted as stating reflexology is not a cure, while the state director of the Reflexology Association of Australia (EoR imagines their AGM involves a lot of footsies under the tables) Anne Young claimed reflexology "was very successful in strengthening patients' spirits". Presumably, that's as measured on the ISO standard Acme^™ spirit-o-meter.

More of this fatuous propaganda appears in the second article, "REDUCING CANCER ILLS" with the subheading:

New WA research is showing the benefits of complementary therapies not only for cancer patients but for their carers too.

EoR is always pleased to see research providing new information about disease, and new ways of tackling them. Research such as that discussed recently by Orac where breast cancer patients (in an admittedly small study) who only used alternative therapies had vastly poorer outcomes than those using conventional treatments. So, what new research has SolarisCare come up with to prove the efficacy of their magic methods? Yes, it's the altie gold standard of a customer satisfaction survey, as bravely pioneered by desperate homeopaths.

Cancer patients who have undergone complementary therapies such as acupuncture, reflexology and reiki at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital's SolarisCare centre have reported a massive 50 per cent improvement in their symptoms. More than 800 WA cancer patients, who collectively received more than 2000 treatments at the centre (previously known as the Brownes Cancer Support Centre), were asked to respond to a research survey. David Joske, director of the SolarisCare Foundation and head of haemotology for Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital, said the five years of research data into the effects of using complementary touch-based medicine alongside standard medical treatment had shown it was an overwhelming success.

"Overwhelming success"! "50 per cent improvement"! It's like an advertisement for soap powder. Dr Joske, however, is no fool and knows his science:

"We are using a scientific approach to consider the possibility that within each of us lies a form of energy that can be harnessed to benefit our health," he said.

Like fairy dust, EoR presumes. Or perhaps he could investigate the possibility that the Flying Spaghetti Monster exists within all of us (it does, but science isn't going to prove it).

EoR would like to know: where has this customer satisfaction survey been published? How many surveys were not returned? What was the customer satisfaction level from those who gained no benefit or died?

The article is accompanied by a photograph of a Mind&Body regular, "Pranic healing therapist Rae Yorg treats carer Beth Douglas at the centre". Can you see the magic invisible undetectable woowaves?

Skeptical Australians Double In Number

Astute skeptics who like to look at the details will have noticed that the skeptical bloggers at The Second Sight have now doubled, with the addition of Lucy Jr. to the contributors.

(EoR would also like to apologise for yesterday's multiple postings. Blogger is just weird at times. Either that, or it's evil spirits).

44th Skeptics' Circle

The 44th Skeptics' (semi)Circle is now up for perusal at Salto Sobrius.

Faith in Dying

This Monday's Health Report dealt with the dying, rather than the living.

Dr Frank Brennan, who works in palliative care, shared some heart-rending stories - but his remarks along the way bothered me. Firstly, his admission that palliative care physicians tend to be opposed to euthanasia, and secondly, that this choice of vocation may be related to their faith.

Dr Brennan professed to humility: "there's a tremendous sense of professional humility really that comes over me often." But he also said: "because our confidence in dealing with so many of these difficult symptoms,"..."perhaps takes away the need then to, beyond the course of the ethics and the law relating to euthanasia, the need to even pursue that line of discussion."

Humility, or an overdose of confidence? Are palliative care doctors benevolent wardlords with the power to tease out rations of morphine, crumb by crumb - sufficient to maintain life, block bowels and induce dribble - but not for a dying wish? Wasted and desperate, the subjects linger on while their loved ones, pitifully coy, inquire after a "needle to end suffering". Did Dr Brennan not wonder why, if palliative care worked, this request for a needle was so familiar he had a rote answer "prepared and clear" ready to roll?

Eventually the dying are too weak to make requests, or too comatose. At this point euthanasia is no longer an issue, for, as Dr Brennan says: " the natural process of dying, already progressing, would inevitably lead to her death." Right-to-Lifers score again!

If hospices and their physicians in Australia are largely religious and keen to stifle debate, how is euthanasia to get a fair hearing whenever these experts are consulted? Is faith a barrier to humane solutions? Are vocations in palliative care sought opportunistically to indulge one's faith, defend one's faith (block euthanasia) and even to proselytize?

Lucy Jr.

Exclusive Manipulation

This week's edition of Four Corners dealt with the cult of the Exclusive Brethren. While their political machinations were mentioned in passing (even though they falsely profess to be forbidden from such worldly things) it was mainly about the controlling, manipulative nature of the sect and their successive leaders (including a recording of one leader giving an extremely drunken and incoherent "sermon"), as well as the terrible (and, one might say, unchristian) psychological damage they have done to families.

As evidence of the god-fearing, devout, wellspoken, holy christian people these cleancut demure souls are, take the example of a couple of devotees who noticed the camera crew filming in the street (as they had a perfect right to do):

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: As the Brethren have become politically more visible, Four Corners has been approached by former members, concerned that the real story of the sect's family values isn't being told.

YOUTH 1: Get out of here, or I'll boot the whole thing over.

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: Four Corners set out to uncover that story - but it wasn't easy. The Brethren wouldn't be interviewed, and their attitude to being filmed is hostile, as we discovered when we were quietly filming in a public Perth street.

YOUTH 2: We just realised that you're a camera crew, so we're just giving you crap.

YOUTH 1: So, who called you up here, who called you up here - opposers?

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: Are you supporters?

YOUTH 1: Supporters of what?

YOUTH 2: Mate, just by the way, I'll just warn you, in five minutes, if you don't get off, you'll be very, you'll be...

YOUTH 1: Have you got a fear of the government of God?

YOUTH 2: Are you believers?

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: You're threatening us?

YOUTH 2: No, we're not threatening you.

YOUTH 1: Are you believers?

YOUTH 2: We are not threatening you - you are threatening us.

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: No, we're not threatening you.

YOUTH 2: Yes, you are.

YOUTH 1: What are you doing here?

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: In what way?

YOUTH 2: Yes, you are.

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: In what way are we threatening you?

YOUTH 2: Do you believe in God?

QUENTIN MCDERMOTT: Do you believe in God?

YOUTH 1: Get a real job, earn a wage, mate.

YOUTH 2: Yes, I do. I do believe in God.

YOUTH 1: Waste your film, mate. Poor cunts.

If you're in any doubt that some of the most evil acts in this world have been perpetrated by those professing the highest motives, you only need to watch this program.

Of course, the EB haven't neglected their duties to meddle in worldly things. They recently hired a private investigator to "dig up dirt" on the New Zealand Prime Minister, and rumours that her husband might be gay were bandied about. Now, while it might be smallscale political manipulation to suggest that the Australian Greens do obscene things with native animals (or whatever ungodly, un-christian-family thing it was they were suggesting had upset their holier-than-thou cherry-picked bibble wisdom), it isn't wise to go after the leader of a country.

Initially reluctant to distance himself from the EB (and their cash - another example of how uninvolved the EB are in the world and politics), the leader of the NZ opposition has now caved into pressure:

The New Zealand Opposition has cut its ties with the Exclusive Brethren. The Exclusive Brethren's fall from grace has been swift and dramatic. Just two days ago Opposition Leader Don Brash said he was not about to sever ties with the secretive sect, which helped bankroll the National Party's last election campaign. "Quite often I bump into those people... they normally simply say 'we're praying for you'," he said. Mr Brash says he now wants nothing to do with the Brethren or the underhand tactics he says they have used to influence the New Zealand political process. His colleagues say they have done more harm than help to the conservative cause. It is also likely they will also lose their exempt status under the labour laws, which has kept trade union officials locked out of Brethren businesses.

Since the Australian government is a conservative, god-fearing lot, the EB are probably in no danger in this country.

Zhentong Han: Tosser Spammer

EoR is receiving comment spam from Dr Zhentong Han in the following form (all links removed so as not to further Dr Han's plan to destroy Google by replacing it with links only to his commercial activities):

Hi.very good site.so what do your think about the following things:

Seven " facts "about acupuncture .

Myth: Acupuncture is widely used in China

Truth: Acupuncture is not widely used in China

Acupuncture is not widely used in China as a part of traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) - TCM also being a phrase that originated in the 20th century (1954). Acupuncture declined in popularity once scientific medicine was introduced to China." In 1995 the Committee for Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP) went to China and found that around 15-20% of the population used TCM (not just acupuncture), and that those people used TCM in conjunction with scientific medicine: what we would term complementary medicine. This level of use is at the lower end of the scale compared to other countries with advanced healthcare systems and it falls well short of countries such as Germany, Canada, France and Australia where the use of alternative remedies is more than twice that of China. China's use of alternative remedies is actually lower than the UK population's - currently around 25%.

Myth:Acupuncture can stimulate the body's own healing response and help restore its natural balance by "Qi"

Truth: There is no evidence for the existence of this universal energy("Qi")

There are no scientific instruments that can detect it. It seemingly can only be detected and adjusted by practitioners. It is not a falsifiable hypothesis (it can't be tested) and as such is meaningless.

Myth: Acupuncture is an ancient Chinese cure that has existed, unchanging, for centuries.

Truth: acupuncture was formalized in a complex way over the past 100 years, mostly in Europe and France and after the Communist takeover in China. Before that time there was no consistent formalization of acupuncture points or what each place was supposed to do. It was largely regional, and the thinking varied from city to city."

Myth:Acupuncture offers specific cures

Truth: Acupuncture doesn't offer specific cure .

If it has the effect of, say, releasing endorphins through the application of needles, well, many things release endorphins -- a walk in the woods, a 5-mile run, a pinch on the butt."

Myth: Acupuncture can claim to have an effect many condition.

Truth: Acupuncture can only claim have an effect very few condition.

If there is one area that acupuncture can claim to have an effect it's in pain relief. Although most evidence supporting acupuncture can be dismissed as anecdotal, trials have been done where acupuncture does show a pain relieving effect above placebo. The effect is not large, of the same magnitude as taking Aspirin or Ibuprofen, but nonetheless it's there and cannot be ignored.That's not to say that there are not problems with such claims however. Pain is an entirely subjective experience; it cannot be directly measured and the severity felt depends to a large extent on the patient's state of mind; which can be influenced by the practitioner giving the treatment. This leads on to the problem of blinding procedures with acupuncture. The practitioner is always aware of whether he's giving real or sham acupuncture and which patients he's giving them to.The pain relief effect does seem to exist; however, it's not clear whether it's a real effect of acupuncture or a strong placebo effect that's induced in the patient by the elaborate procedure of an acupuncture treatment

Myth: Acupuncture is very safe:

Truth: Acupuncture is not inherently dangerous but being an invasive technique, it is not risk free.

Haematoma may result from the accidental puncture of a circulatory structure. Nerve injury can result from the accidental puncture of any nerve. Brain damage or stroke is possible with very deep needling at the base of skull. Also rare, but possible, is pneumothorax from deep needling into the lung, and kidney damage from deep needling in the lower back. Needles that are not properly sterilized can transfer diseases such as HIV and hepatitis. There is also the danger, common to all alternative therapies, of not seeking proper medical treatment because of an over reliance on alternatives. Acupuncturists are not doctors and will not have the capability of diagnosing a serious illness from its typical symptoms.

Myth: Acupuncture is more effective.

Truth: Acupuncture is not very effective.

The practise is based on untenable principles and the small amount of evidence there is to support its use in pain relief can also be called into question. Although there are claims that it has a mild pain relieving effect, it probably does so simply because it's an elaborate placebo. Whether the mild pain relieving properties are of acupuncture are real or not, most claims for the efficacy of acupuncture are grossly over-exaggerated. If there is a use for Acupuncture, it can only be in mild pain relief. The question then becomes a matter of whether the cost of acupuncture for this mild pain relief can be justified

(Content from internet)

Bristol Chinese Pain relief Acupuncture

It was nice of Dr Han to admit he plagiarised his cut'n'paste essay from the internet even though he failed to credit its author (Wallace Sampson, editor in chief of the Scientific Review of Alternative Medicine).

Dr Han's website is a mess of bad english:

For a limited time, Dr Zhentong Han, the more powerful name in local alternative medicine circle, is offering an absolutely no-obligation FREE Initial Consultation (excluding treatment and advanced holistic exam). This is where you get to spent some time with Dr Han ,(former medical doctor and acupuncturist of 20 years), to discuss about the health concerns or to get a second expert opinion.

More altie lying: the consultation's FREE [sic] as long as you pay for only the treatment and exam (and how can a "holistic exam", by definition, be either advanced or basic? it's either "holistic" or it's not).

So take advantage of this limited time offer and come experience the natural benefits and results of time-tested of 3000 years of natural medical therapy from us. [...] I am dedicated to staying current with the latest advances in the profession.

Right: a "time-tested" (not the same as scientifically tested, incidentally) therapy that still has advances.

He appears to have started his own blog. Like all spammers, he seems to also have a fascination for sex (the blog is titled English Teacher in Shanghai but the URI is sexandshanghai.blogspot.com. Would you trust a man willing to use sex (at least in name) to promote himself to also lay his hands on you?

Elsewhere he spams comments presenting himself as the lonely unassuming misunderstood healer of lost souls (also at Dr RW and probably hundreds of other sites as well):

Dr Han claimed that he regretted deeply for the matter, but he didn’t want to get involved in this legal dispute, for the purpose of having a website is not to score high on the network, but to have more patients understand the most veracious Chinese traditional acupunctural techniques through his website, so to help more patients get rid of the pain.

Actually, google Dr Zhentong Han and see all the link sites and referral engines this man has posted his website to. EoR is amazed and wonders how this magical man gets any time to even see a single patient in between his spamming activities. Pretending that there's no correlation between search engine ranking and patient enquiries (and, hence, income) is either disingenuous, or indicative of an amazingly high level of idiocy.

He also appears to be quite happy posting anywhere he can, apparently encouraging people to bring their horses into his clinic to lie down on his couch and get a bit of needling, and quite happily and extremely accurately describing himself as a tosser spammer. Oh, the ignorance of the truly stupid and desperate...

EoR normally just deletes this sort of rubbish (and has done so in this case as well), but this man's stupidity and dullheaded doggedness deserves its own post. EoR cannot understand spammers (what sort of idiot markets his company by pissing people off, and by using a method favoured of illegal scams?), but a retarded spammer? Promoting his "service" by giving all the arguments why acupuncture is a load of bollocks? What does EoR think about this? EoR thinks Dr Han shows himself to be a prick in more than one sense of the word.

Dr Han failed to steal (sorry, provide an "unattributed quote") the following statement from Professor Sampson:

"I look at it this way: what if acupuncture didn't exist?" he says. "Would medicine or society be any worse off? If no one knew about it, nothing would change."

What if Dr Han didn't exist? Well, there'd be one less weasly unethical lying spammer (and tosser) and the world would be a happier place.

Thank you for asking, Dr Han.

print *,"Happy Birthday Fortran!"

Fifty years ago the first high level programming language, Fortran had its first manual issued in October 1956 (it was April 1957 before an actual compiler appeared). EoR first learnt to program in Fortran many years ago (specifically, a dialect called Miniwaft). Programming in those days involved coding punched cards using an unbent paperclip, sending them off to the West Australian Regional Computing Centre at the University of WA, hoping the card reader didn't chew the cards up, and waiting a week for the printout to come back with its list of compiler errors which prevented the program running.

Later computer users had it easy, what with cradle modems, teletypes and Basic's GOSUB statement. Then, of course, people started producing compilers that wouldn't even fit on a single 5¼" floppy disk.

And you try and tell the young people of today that... they won't believe you.

Patient Rejects Organ

In the quintessential "organ" transplant a man in China has successfully received a donor penis to replace the original which was damaged in an unspecified accident. Unfortunately, the offending organ has since had to be removed for psychological reasons.

Although the operation was a surgical success, surgeons said they had to remove the penis two weeks later. "Because of a severe psychological problem of the recipient and his wife, the transplanted penis regretfully had to be cut off," Dr Hu said. An examination of the organ showed no signs of it being rejected by the body.

The Gentle, Natural Alternative

As all EoR's readers know, herbal remedies are more natural and gentle, and safer, than those nasty pills and pharmaceuticals that the Evil Medical Establishment try to push at every opportunity, and which always come with terrible life-threatening side effects.

For example, for pain relief, there's marijuana. For gentle relaxation there's alcohol, and for a natural weight-loss solution, there's tobacco.

Guest Blogger

Today's guest blogger is Edgar Allan Poe, from "Never Bet the Devil Your Head".

Mr. Dammit lay particularly still, and I concluded that his feelings had been hurt, and that he stood in need of my assistance. I hurried up to him and found that he had received what might be termed a serious injury. The truth is, he had been deprived of his head, which after a close search I could not find anywhere; - so I determined to take him home, and send for the homœopathics. [...] He did not long survive his terrible loss. The homœopathics did not give him little enough physic, and what little they did give him he hesitated to take. So in the end he grew worse, and at length died, a lesson to all riotous livers. I bedewed his grave with my tears, worked a bar sinister on his family escutcheon, and, for the general expenses of his funeral, sent in my very moderate bill to the transcendentalists.

Dopes and Ponies

A pony doping scandal has rocked the insular equestrian world of Jersey according to metro.co.uk (Pony doping scandal shock - worth viewing just for the image of "A pony: note the vacant stare").

In some kind of crazed mash-up of Dick Francis novels and kids books about ponies, the world of junior showjumping was stunned today by claims that children's ponies were drugged at a national championship. It is believed that the ponies may have been fed a fast-acting sedative to ruin their chances at the the British Show Jumping Association's under-16s junior championships in Jersey. The mother of one eleven-year old competitor is thought likely to be questioned by police, after witnesses reported seeing her giving several ponies what appeared to be mints.

One of the ponies apparently didn't like the taste of his "mint" and spat it out, which it is claimed was found to be acetylpromazine, a common sedative in the horse industry.

EoR's a bit bemused by all the upset about this. Doping in the equestrian world is fairly widespread (so he hears - EoR wishes to make it clear that he has never shot up anything or imbibed anything illegal behind the stables). Usually, however, the doping is being done by the competitor on the competitor's own horse in order to hype it up or calm it down (as required). A lot of doping is performed "legally" in that the presence of banned substances is only an offence if they're detected during a competition. Use prior to competition and allowing the substances to clear the body is not an offence (but could certainly be considered questionable). Since different metabolisms excrete chemicals at different rates though, sometimes competitors get caught out at competitions. Just as in human sport, the pressure to succeed can be immense and even at Olympic levels there have been doping scandals in the equestrian events.

Doping other owner's horses is far less common however, simply because the other people tend to notice there's something wrong with their horses and complain about it.

The woman at the centre of this scandal, and who is alleged to have fed the suspect mints, has been forced to come out and explain herself.

Eight days after the event, 36-year-old Mrs Baudains is feeling understandably bruised. "I did not feed those ponies anything other than Polo mints," she insists, after emerging to give her first interview. "Instead of pointing fingers at me, they should find out what the real reason was for those ponies being lethargic." With her shoulder-length mousey hair and oversized lilac sweatshirt covered in dog hair, Kim Baudains does not look like a typical horse-doper.

Oh, tell us please, what does the "typical horse-doper" look like? Then we'd all know who to look out for (EoR suspects it's someone with a shifty look and hat pulled down low over his head, and who does a lot of skulking).

Mrs Baudains cries, pleads poor, and berates the "Pimms Parade" - all those well-to-do moneyed johnny-come-latelies whose only merit is the possession of money. Yet, strangely,

Wealthy parents, she says, will pay up to £25,000 for their child's horse in the hope of winning local tournaments. One mother bought a pony from Mrs Baudains and insisted on a receipt. "She left that receipt on the dashboard of her 4x4 for weeks, just so all the other mums on the school run could see exactly how much she paid", she says.

So, isn't Mrs Baudains the one with the money (and the excessively priced ponies?).

EoR would consider anyone at a competition wandering around feeding other people's horses (and it is claimed that Mrs Baudains only fed the ponies of people competing against her son) suspicious behaviour. At the very least, you'd be pretty stupid not to think you weren't leaving yourself open to accusations of various sorts.

Mrs Baudains has learnt her lesson:

"Well, I will never feed a pony a mint again. It will be carrots from here on in. So many awful things have been said about me, I'm afraid the mud will stick."

A common way to feed substances to horses (such as medication) is to hollow out an apple or carrot and put the substance inside. Perhaps Mrs Baudains knows about this as well? Or is she really the archetypal naif ingenue?

Retreat From Reason

EoR discovered the Yemaya Horse Retreat while researching brain laterality in horses.

Have you ever felt that you and your horse should be able to form a better partnership? Do you want the horse to look at you as someone he can trust his life with, as well as a buddy, partner, and a creative individual who does "fun stuff?"

Stevi Weissbach, the author of this site, has some profoundly interesting ideas about achieving this goal. Unfortunately, most of them seem to be fictional ideas at best.

This means that if the horse is uncertain or feels threatened, he or she will do everything possible to leave the situation, by either leaving physically or dissociating emotionally. What dissociation means is that something traumatic has occurred so part of the animal’s soul has left its body for a period of time. Have you have ever seen a horse with a "glazed over" look, or they are completely panic stricken? A part of their soul will have left its body because it is no longer safe, given the situation. [...] Offer them your heart and with it, tell them of your spirit, your dreams, and what you want from the relationship, and they will tell you what they want if you are listening quietly. Horses are meant to be equals, as another spirit journeying in a world we have to share.

EoR has seen panic stricken horses. They are definitely not soul-reduced entities requiring chatting about dreams and so on. They are dangerous, thrashing masses weighing up to half a tonne expressing quite vividly their survival instincts.

In the article on "Intuitive Horsemanship" Stevi asks in the very first paragraph whether horses are telepathic. By the third paragraph (with no digression to explore any evidence) the 'reason' for their telepathy is being given:

The reason horses can communicate through telepathy is because they are honest with each other when they are scared, upset or content.

EoR could discuss lack of logical rigidity, the ability for horses to respond to subtle body language cues as a survival strategy, or wishful thinking on the human's part, but he'll just respond with the much simpler: bullshit. But wait a minute, the true believer says, you can prove this for yourself!

If you believe your horse can listen to your thoughts, try this.
Think of a task you want him or her to do.
For example: Walk on, or go forward.

Apparently this won't work if you don't "believe" in it, but any horse watched in a paddock for any length of time (usually quite short) will walk forward. It's not natural grazing behaviour, it's proof of telepathic powers! Try it - but make sure you believe in it really and truly and deeply, and trust wholly in the power of the magic fairy dust, and you'll see precisely the results you came to see). Of course, if this were really possible, predators have had more than enough time to develop their own horse-controlling telepathic powers: "Dinner time! Come over here!"

In the magic kingdom of Yemaya, telepathy (which is a given) works through the agency of auras (another given, of course):

Everything and everyone has an energy field. Some would call it an auric field. To "see" where this field starts on your horse, walk up to your horse from a distance. There will be a point in which you will notice your horse responds. Whether he twitches his ears, drops his head, or makes a "be-line" for the hills, he is showing you where this zone starts. Each being’s space is at different lengths, and everyone responds differently when their "energy field" is entered. When you know you have reached your horse’s auric field, you want to have permission to cross it. Stop approaching when you are on the edge of his or her energy field. You want to wait for a positive feeling that invites you to approach.

May the force be with you ;)

Telepathy. Auras. Energy fields. All much more likely answers than something so mundane as personal space and a survival instinct.

No! If you give out the right "vibes" then

He will understand that you are truly here to help him.

At least this claim gets supporting references. To Quantum and Subspace Biology (EoR's always wanted to meet a "subspace biologist" but, alas, never has). And a "crop circle research" site. Oh dear.

Meanwhile, Andrew McLean (The Truth About Horses, Viking Books 2003, pp20-21), who is not quoted on Stevi's inspirational site, says

The truth is that the horse has simply grasped the correct response during trial-and-error learning. The failure of horses to comply with the aids is often seen as a moral failing on the part of the horse, not a failure of the training system. [...[ Horse training is not a magical process; it is a systematic science.

Unless you happen to be Dr Weissbach-Doolittle, and can talk to the animals.

Letter From An American Ghoul

EoR always enjoyed listening to Alistair Cooke's longrunning radio essay Letter from America which was broadcast up until the presenter's death in 2004. Then news started coming out that Cooke's body had been involved in an illegal body parts harvesting scheme. And the saga continues, with claims of all sorts of fudging of details of his death to facilitate the scam (cause of death was wrong since the body parts of those who die from cancer - which Cooke did - are not considered suitable, age was fudged, authority was fudged). The company in the middle of this fiasco, Regeneration Technologies Inc, is denying all responsibility. True, they didn't fake the documents or steal the body parts, but it seems they certainly weren't very interested in verifying where the body parts were coming from.

Mastromarino, Aldorasi and two other BTS employees were charged in an indictment February in a Brooklyn court. All four have pleaded not guilty to charges of enterprise corruption, body stealing and opening graves, unlawful dissection, forgery and other counts.

It sounds like an awful 19th century horror story, but it isn't.

Flat Out Laughing

Probably old news to American readers, but EoR has just discovered Flat Daddies via The Guardian.

Americans. Always thinking up something new to keep the rest of the world amused and bemused.

Wouldn't it make more sense to send the cardboard cutouts off to war, and keep the real daddies at home?