Science Wooseum Revisited

Time for an update on the Science and Art of Medicine – Living Medical Traditions exhibit in the Science Museum, London!

If you’re not familiar with the backstory, do check out these posts or listen to my report in the Pod Delusion live 2nd birthday episode – go, make some tea and a sandwich while it’s on or something

Briefly, we’ve been trying to improve the Science Museum’s alternative medicine exhibit as there were some serious problems with it. It largely came across as promoting alternative treatments, even advertising practitioners and generally being worryingly uncritical, with no reference to the results of reliable studies (i.e. that most of the ‘treatments’ are no better than placebo and many carry serious risks) – and indeed no mention of the wonderous placebo effect at all.

I’ve highlighted some of the original displays and issues in this photo gallery, now with some new photos – though a lot of them are appallingly blurry, apologies – in this new set.

Important statement

We are extremely glad that the Science Museum has chosen to listen to these complaints and do something about them. To take a second look at something (that people have worked hard on and are likely proud of) with an objective eye, receive criticisms, consider them and make some changes – that is admirable, it’s scientific and what we might expect from such a great institution.

I think in summary, some very important changes have been made, which is excellent. But more could (and should) be done as it’s still far from the resource it could be (I’ll come back to this at the end*).

Proposed Changes

Last year the museum proposed some changes, based on discussions with Simon Singh and the rest of us. They decided the main sections to focus on were homeopathy and acupuncture – while I agree these were the ‘main offenders’, the whole gallery exudes quite a credulous vibe, but I am completely accepting that a total overhaul would take a lot of time and money so let’s look at these two sections for now.

Homeopathy

From the correspondence:

As you know, we are already proposing to make some changes, on the advice of trustees, to make it quite clear that we are describing specifically the Indian context. In general, as far as I can see, you share the sense of what changes out to be made. You have nonetheless expressed two concerns that we should like to address. We will therefore follow your suggestion and add a parenthetical observation:

Homeopaths believe that ‘like cures like’. This means that homeopathic practitioners will give a remedy – often highly diluted (to the point that a bioscientist would say it contains no active substance at all) – that produces the same symptoms as the illness.

I presume the focus is on India because of the resources available for the exhibit. I’m not sure why otherwise, given that homeopathy was invented in Germany and is used worldwide, to varying degrees of disaster (I’m not exaggerating – keep an eye out for Martin Robbins’ experiences of homeopaths in Africa for more in that vein).

The other strange thing here, for me, is bioscientist. What does that mean? Also, chemists, physicists and mathematicians all agree that the very idea of homeopathy is ridiculous and scientifically meaningless.

The homeopathic travel kit was proposed to be removed entirely but as you can see only the caption has gone – so now people just don’t know what it is. I suppose it would be odd if it were just an empty space? Some text has been removed from the panel and now simply describes the image of a woman preparing her ‘homeopathic treatments’ at a ‘baby clinic’ – which makes me sad in itself.

They have also, as Alex suggested, changed their wording – all cases of doctor have now been replaced with practitioner. This is a good thing.

Acupuncture

From the correspondence:

You have also raised the issue of acupuncture. Taking on board all the advice we have been given we cannot agree with David Conquhoun‘s suggestion that the advice of NICE should simply be dismissed. NICE set the national standard estabilishing whether a “clinical treatment [or set of clnical procedures] is considered highly effective, cost effective and safe, as well as being viewed as a positive experience by patients.” Whilst there may be good reasons for overturning their conclusion about the efficacy of acupuncture this process has to be achieved by debate in the public arena, and that has not yet happened.

Obviously I, and no doubt David, would dispute this, but I’ll just leave that there and move on.

The old board:

New text:

Painkillers alone just weren’t helping Stephen’s knee pain caused be osteoarthritis, so his general practitioner [GP] recommended acupuncture. Here’s his story.

Stephen is a retired clinical psychologist, but still enjoys walking and travel. His knee pain was severely restricting his day-to-day activity and he was considering a joint replacement. But he was anxious to avoid surgery of that kind because of concerns about complications and the variable success of the procedure.

His doctor recommended acupuncture – this is offered by his NHS GP surgery and administered by biomedically trained medical and nurse acupuncturists.

Fine needles were inserted into acupuncture points around Stephen’s knee and areas of local tenderness and left in place for up to 15 minutes. Each treatment led to greater and more prolonged relief of Stephen’s symptoms.

After four weekly treatments at first, Stephen now comes to the acupuncture clinic every 6-8 weeks for a ‘top-up’ which keeps his symptoms under control. Aside from reducing pain and the need for painkillers, the acupuncture has allowed Stephen greater mobility, which itself is important in managing the symptoms of osteoarthritis. As a result Stephen thinks his quality of life has improved.

The last sentence no longer says ‘…his quality of life has improved enormously‘. Finally, a new caption underneath:

Acupuncture has been rigorously tested by medical researchers for a variety of ailments. These tests have shown that acupuncture can relieve pain and this is why it is available as a treatment on the NHS. The NHS summarised its current judgement in a review published in 2010 on the internet at:

www.nhs.uk/conditions/acupuncture/pages/evidence.aspx

So osteoarthritis of the knee is cited as a condition for which positive evidence exists. Rheumatoid arthritis, on the other hand, has been shown to be unaffected by acupuncture treatments. What’s important to note is the qualification on this page:

this evidence does not allow us to draw definite conclusions…More research is needed to investigate whether acupuncture works for these conditions.

So I’m still not sure the exhibit expresses the weakness of the current evidence – but at least there’s a link.

Most pictures have been removed, as have captions suggesting GPs endorsed the treatment as effective. For some reason the (presumably fictitious) patient’s name has been changed from Ian to Stephen and he’s now suffering from osteoarthritis in the knee instead of shoulder/neck pain, presumably due to a quick read of the above link.

Mention of Stephen being a retired clinical psychologist is interesting. To me this would suggest an attempt to legitimise his choice of acupuncture as he was involved in medicine himself. Appeal to authority?

While Jonathan Freedman (top right of the old panel) no longer appears in the upper part of the new display, sadly the advertising for the St Albans clinic below remains.

Introductory Panel

Finally, another change that was accepted to be important was the wording that greets visitors on the first explanatory panel. The new is on the left (bit small, sorry) and the old on the right.

Thankfully, the following statement was added:

Contemporary research shows that many of the practices are, from a scientific point of view, ineffective.

And an important clarification has been made:

even today 40% of the population of China use Traditional Chinese Medicine clinics as their first (and often only) choice for healthcare.

Whereas before it was simply an argumentum ad populum – that loads of people use it, ergo it must work/be acceptable (bottom of the right-hand photo).

Other changes made & suggested

Most importantly, the awful interactive video display has been removed completely.

What is disappointing is that some of the things I would consider to be quite dangerous are still there. For example, this description of the herbal product Masturin, about which I can find no actual research, but oft-repeated claims of this nature:

DESCRIPTION

Uterotonic, specific for female disorders. Prepared from herbal ingredients like Saraca indica, Withania somnifera, Abroma augusta, Berberis aristata, Rauwolfia serpentina and iron acting solely on female reproductive system.

INDICATIONS

• Uterine tonic
• very effective in P.I.D.
• Relieves pain in Dysmenorrhoea

A herbal uterine tonic it tones up the nerves and ensures pain free and regular periods. Made from herbs

It worries me that this product is on display along with the claim that Joshanda ‘treats colds and flu’ – it’s this kind of uncritical exposure I take issue with. I know the anthropologists want to claim it’s about looking at culture but I really think you can do that in a safer, more informative way.

Also I was disappointed to see no changes to ‘Professor’ Shi Zaixiang’s board, relating to the claim that he was diagnosing and treating Ménière‘s disease. Also the acupuncture model at the start has not been adjusted so that it no longer claims ‘point BL-60 can be used to treat headaches‘.

*I’m not saying that it should all be a total bloodbath (which is what many ‘skeptics’ might want) but it should reflect what the research has shown – more obviously and comprehensively. It should explore negative sides to these traditions (and more recent inventions) – for example, as my friend pointed out, the devastating impact of TCM on wildlife, making many species endangered and even extinct. Also, ideally (and for me most importantly), tieing in the placebo effect with modern medicine and how the discovery and development of the randomised controlled clinical trial has revolutionised healthcare.

The main thing that drives otherwise rational and caring people to submit themselves and others to quackery when they are vulnerable is ignorance – not of the wilful kind, but most people just don’t know how medicine works. Juxtaposition of alternative ineffective treatment modalities with confirmed effective medicine is the perfect teaching tool.

I’m not trying to be patronising. I am frequently upset by hearing of parents dragging terminally ill children around the globe chasing false hopes and subjecting them to invasive, pointless treatments that often cost them their life savings and cause the child a lot of pain when they could be doing fun things and enjoying what life they have with their loved ones.

What’s a shame is that available expertise hasn’t been utilised. I find this puzzling:

The suggestion that we consult Edzard Ernst is of course a valuable one. However there seems to be little disagreement about the facts (beyond the discussion in which we turn to NICE as an authority). Instead the issue which has been very helpfully brought out in these debates is whether the exhibit can be misconstrued.

I would say that consulting an expert in alternative medicine in constructing an exhibit about alternative medicine would be useful in tackling clarity and factual issues alike.

If anything can be done to make the general public more aware of what they can and can’t trust, medicine-wise, I’m for it. I think this gallery could play a part in that – but at the moment it isn’t. To be noted is that they are planning a ‘radical overhaul’ of medicine in the museum generally so more input from funders and visitors would no doubt be useful.

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To finish, there’s this hilarious comment in the TCM section:

You don’t have to be ill to need treatment

Well that just sums up alt med perfectly, doesn’t it!! (Also, lifestyle is important in medicine and wellbeing full-stop. Any doctor worth his salt will tell you that, and we hear it all the time; medicine IS holistic. Why do people think otherwise?!)

Burzynski II

Sorry for the unimaginative title, but I get the feeling number 2 won’t be the last and at least this makes it easily searchable.

In this post, I want to talk about people’s online behaviour regarding this issue, think about it a bit and hopefully get others to do the same. It’s not a sciencey one (lots of links at the end for that, though), but I hope people will read it nonetheless.

I would say that the general acceptance of alternative medicine by the general public (and indeed the NHS, having walked past the ‘Hospital for Integrated Medicine’, formerly the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital, again the other day) creates a dangerous accepting background for these kinds of situations and media coverage of them (the BBC as well), and is a huge contributing factor in people’s choices. So that’s where raising awareness of the dangers and lack of evidence behind alt med as a whole comes in.

With the recent publication of an ‘apology’ from the Observer – actually it’s not an apology, it’s a hamfisted justification for their worryingly positive portrayal of the Burzynski clinic in the previous article that drew all the attention in the first place – it is unfortunately time to step back and really think about what’s going on here. Andy wrote an excellent post in reply the same day over at Quackometer and Josephine Jones is collating responses here.

Today Keir Liddle has also written a good post at the 21st floor starting to address the question of how the anti-Burzynski crowd (let’s call it that, to avoid ambiguity and meaningless labels) is coming across. In addition, upon hearing about people tweeting directly at patients enrolled at the clinic, Hayley Stevens posted her thoughts.

The issue

I am very concerned about this. A very small number of people are thinking it sensible/acceptable/useful to send tweets to people, one account in particular which I won’t link to here, who are paying for Burzynski to treat them. Let’s call them patients.

Let us set the scene.

These people are very ill. They have cancer; most of us have experienced family members and/or friends dealing with various types of cancer (it’s important to remember it’s not just one thing, just as virus isn’t – measles is a specific disease, as is pancreatic cancer, but cancer alone is an umbrella term) and do try to bear in mind how big an emotional toll that takes.

Generally if they have made the decision to spend their life savings and more on a last-ditch attempt to find a cure, you can be sure they have been giving a certain amount of time to live. They know they are dying and, while we all are, when your mortality is thrown in your face by something like a diagnosis of terminal cancer, your perspective is likely to change.

Also, having made said decision to spend thousands on a certain strategy attempting to prolong your life, some strangers shouting at you is unlikely (to say the very least) to change your mind.

The effects

Next, let’s think about what Twitter is. For those of us that use it, this really shouldn’t be difficult to get our heads around, however I’m finding that it actually can be.

Twitter is a bit like your text inbox, or ceefax if you really aren’t an internet person (though in that case you’re unlikely to end up here… anyway). It’s a stream of events coming to you from out in the ether, you read it when you feel like it, unless you have alerts set up as well (like a text notification noise and/or vibration), in which case you’re more aware of each time you get a message through.

Imagine you are one of these patients and your twitter feed starts lighting up with messages from concerned skeptics. They’re telling you that the man you’re giving all your money to is a fraud, a liar and a quack. They’re telling you you’ve been conned, duped, you’re wasting your money and your time.

Now, one reasonably polite message from you, you think, surely won’t come across badly?

I’m just concerned. Surely it’s better they know the truth?

Normally, yes, I prefer the truth over a dangerous lie any day. But again, these are very vulnerable people who have already made a commitment. What possible benefit do you think your attempt to enlighten them will bring?

Imagine your twitter feed/inbox filling up with messages from people you don’t even know, have never met and will never meet, telling you these things – insinuating that you’ve made a horrible decision so close to the end of your life (for yourself or family members). One message from you, one message from someone else… how many hundreds of people are following? If they all decide to raise their concerns, do you think this is positive?

Think about it

Here’s my problem.

I do believe the vast majority of skeptical types and everyone who is following and contributing to this story are good people, people who are concerned for their fellow human beings, who don’t like to see an unscrupulous, ethically blind man take advantage of the sick and dying. I like to think most people I engage with in any case are that kind of person.

But if you think it’s ok to force your voice into the world of the people mentioned above, in this context, then I am concerned. I am concerned that you are being selfish.

Why? Because, as I said, telling people whose minds are made up about all this evidence for Burzynski being a conman is going to make no difference to them, except make them feel horrible, and they don’t need any more of that.

Aren’t you just going directly to them because you want to absolve yourself? You have information, important information, that you feel everyone should know about. Informed decisions are the best kind. People are ill, you don’t want them to do the wrong thing – that’s understandable. But it’s too late. As much as you want them to listen to you and change their minds, that won’t happen, so don’t approach them in the first place, please.

Harsh truth

You want people to accept an awful reality, but I’m afraid you must do the same. We cannot help everyone. The patients are not the target here – nor are the generous fundraisers who have already made commitments to give their time and money (even if we feel it is misdirected, again, you cannot ask people to go back on their well-meaning promises) – because no amount of data and facts will convince them that what they’ve committed to isn’t right. They have access to all of the things coming to light, which they can read if they wish. Directing your otherwise well-intentioned concerns at them will not help.

We have to accept that however much we would like everyone to suddenly see the light and embrace the truths that have been unearthed, that’s not going to happen.

This information must be shared so that fewer people in future, when faced with such a terrible situation, will go down this path. What we don’t need is people coming across as insensitive and rude with no concern for people’s situations – because then things like that nasty Observer editorial will happen, and as a minor point – the reputation of the ‘skeptical community’, whatever that is, is tarnished. That can really have a negative impact on whatever good we can glean from these kinds of occurrences now and in the future.

It’s similar to politics; it’s the fence-sitters and undecideds, not the safe seats, on which attention needs to be focussed, if you actually want to make a difference.

Philosophies and ethics

Today a friend shared this excellent article about how doctors tend to deal with death. They don’t fight for every last second they can muster, they realise what can and can’t be done, what’s inevitable and what’s important. Quality of life over quantity, in the case of many terminal illnesses.

A friend of mine who is a doctor recently told me of a patient who had had very serious strokes and was not going to recover. She had got to know her and the family well, and they were arranging for her to go home to spend her last few days with her loved ones. However, a senior doctor who was rarely on the ward decided to come in and instead override that decision, recommending her instead for rehabilitation – keeping her in the hospital, trying to get her to restart, essentially. She died in hospital, without her family, and my friend was, understandably, incredibly angry. There are serious questions about prolonging life, which are beyond the scope of this post, however.

A major finding that Sense About Science has is that people who spend their last months chasing hopes around the globe, spending their money and time exhausting themselves – when it’s all over and done with, loved ones will wish they had just spent time together, enjoying what life they had left.

That is the real crime; that people like Burzynski and all the other quacks we will continue to attempt to expose are exploiting people’s desire for life to continue, and in doing so, they rob them of it.

I haven’t written about it before, but when a good friend of mine died of an incurable form of brain cancer, in addition to the loss, pain and anger, I was also relieved. Relieved that her family was so strong and dealt with it so well – she spent her last time in a hospice, with wonderful care (the amount of respect I have for end-of-life carers cannot be expressed in words), with family around. We, her old friends, were also allowed to visit her, for which I am very grateful.

Unfortunately, children cannot generally make sense of such a situation and cannot make their own decisions; their parents will make them instead. The act of dragging a child across oceans for invasive medical procedures that cause them pain and impede their ability to enjoy the life they have is seriously questionable in ethical terms. Again a bigger issue, but something else that should be considered if you are thinking about engaging families of patients directly.

Do you want to accuse people of causing their children pain? Again, the hope is to prevent people from taking such decisions in future, but addressing those who cannot be swayed is simply pointless and brings no benefits.

Don’t be a Dick

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again.

I think the number of people who would send such messages because they are just dickish, want to spread their correct opinion around and care not for the feelings of others is very small.

The rest of the people, I expect, are well-meaning but are directing their concerns the wrong way. Your anxiety for their situation is not the point, your desperation to tell everyone you find who is doing something you consider stupid or wrong – in this case, you must keep it to yourself.

There are factors that make this particular case distinct from, say, homeopaths trying to treat illnesses for which effective medical treatments are available. It’s different from people who want to take their baby to the chiropractor. If you can’t see why, read slower, think more – leave a comment? I’m finding that some people get it, some don’t. If you don’t, at least refrain from saying things before you’ve asked a few people.

This is important – for this case and how it could turn out, for the people involved (also, who must remain anonymous wherever possible, for the above reasons), for the skeptics.

Links

Here are a few links, stuff that’s been happening in the #Burzynski tag, for those who aren’t following.

Science-Based Medicine addresses the fact that Burzynski is often using cocktails of chemotherapeutic drugs on his patients. Drug combinations that are not approved for the types of cancer in question. Drugs that some patients are unaware they’re signing up for. Drugs people are specifically hoping to avoid in many cases. Sadly this is common with a lot of alt med; especially TCM. Actual drugs are often included, at unknown levels and from unverifiable sources, making the treatment even more dangerous than if it were just harmless.

An important analysis of what’s really going on with Burzynski’s claims of approved treatments, publications and specific types of cancer patients they recruit, from the Ministry of Truth.

The clinic issued a Press Release suggesting their ‘representative’ Mr Stephens had been fired*, but we bloggers would still be pursued for libel. *Though he is still listed on the Patient Group website as the “Marketing & Sponsorship” contact  (noted by @writerjames ).

Some hard reading showed the list of publications in said press release to be, bluntly, crap.

Martin Robbins has also been in touch with the clinic about Stephens and received a response.

Even the BMJ have picked up on the story now.

Skeptical Humanities is researching patient outcomes. Sadly they are overwhelmingly worst-case-scenario, with only a handful of survivors.

Saul Green had researched in the past Burzynski’s claim of having a PhD, which seems to be false.

Josephine Jones is still updating the Burzynski-topic post Master List

On charging to enrol people in his trials. Interestingly, if one wishes to donate donate to clinic, one writes cheques to him personally!l

The clinic on Facebook – where the wall was shut down and many people came out with ‘this isn’t a place for negative comments’ type comments. Worrying.

The cancer act is rarely enforced – but it is illegal to claim you can cure cancer when in fact you cannot. @jon_S captures such a claim.

Some of the costs of a course of treatment at the clinic are described here by some people who went there.

Interacting on the Interweb

The latest furore surrounding the ‘potentially damaging’ nature of things like Facebook and Twitter is in swing, with the Daily Mail (safe to click! Minus images) interpreting a scientist’s views as social networking turning your kids’ brains to mush. Note that Martin does of course disagree – as do I.

Sciencepunk has taken the time to speak to Susan Greenfield herself to try to get a clearer idea of exactly what her concerns and suggested solutions might be, under all the media distortion and so on. He’s written up the interview for New Scientist. I take up her invitation to join the debate.

Unfortunately, listening to her speak I still find myself vehemently disagreeing with most of what she says for various reasons, including the fact that she clearly has very little or no personal experience of what she talks about, is missing some key issues and appears to wilfully ignore positive outcomes in favour of potentially negative ones.

That’s not very scientific!

So, let’s get ranty.

Context is everything

First I recall a comedy sketch (apologies for forgetting whose, do say if you know!) based on the occasions when Facebook is suddenly down/unavailable, in which the bereft individual wanders the streets shoving photographs in people’s faces and shouting “DO YOU LIKE THIS??”.

I laughed, because it’s absurd, we don’t do that… but hang on! We kind of do. I quite often show people pictures I’ve taken, be it on my camera, my phone, downloaded to my computer or even (omg old!) albums with pictures on actual photo paper!

Important to remember is that we behave differently in some situations compared to others; it’s a ridiculous fear that online behaviour is going to replace offline behaviour. They’re different things that don’t translate. Just as you don’t put your feet up on the table in a meeting vs. in the lounge, or take your shirt off and sit on your friend’s shoulders at a posh indoor concert at a swanky theatre.

We like to share our experiences with our friends, and sometimes if we’re a bit more serious about photography, get people’s input on our creative endeavours. That’s not a fault, it’s perfectly normal behaviour and taking feedback/constructive criticism/praise onboard is a good way to improve ourselves if that’s the goal.

Small-talk, seeking approval and helpful suggestions, presenting an image of ourselves – this is what we do in life, not just online. Does she also have a problem with in-person small-talk? Should we only ever be having super-meaningful conversations?

Sorry, but after our lab meeting we like to go and have lunch, talk about the weather, take the piss out of each other and show holiday photos, for example. We don’t spend all day talking about work or the latest world crisis; that would be draining and rather unhealthy, I’m sure most would agree.

In the same way, not all of my tweets or facebook status updates are serious. I share articles, I have a moan about things, we’ll have some discussions. But other times I’ll be swearing about a minor injury, taking a photo of the mouthwatering foods/lovely scenery I see before me or friends/pets making tits of themselves. Because life is a mixture of these things and if it weren’t, it’d be bloody boring.

Greenfield seems to want to make a connection between things like increasing autism rate and internet use. I’m pretty sure it’s well-accepted that the ‘increase’ in rates of conditions like this is due to better diagnosis and a clearer definition of what the condition actually is – these are recent things. There’s no good evidence (that I know of) to suggest the perceived increase is due to vaccines or playing on computers or anything else (edit: Jon Brock says it is indeed demonstrably false); it’s likely always been there, we’re just picking up on it better now. Which is good, because it means more people get the help and support that they need.

Also there’s been a ‘shocking rise in things like happy-slapping’?? Well of course there has, because again this term applies to a phenomenon that’s only been able to exist since mobile phones got video cameras. That does not mean that people didn’t go around beating other people up for fun and to show off to their friends before this era. Sadly I know this from personal experience as I’m sure many do, but good for her if she’s never had to deal with such things.

I do not believe for a second that these kind of people only exist because the internets have created them, by eroding their empathy circuits. There have always been nasty ****s and there always will be, sadly. Don’t blame the internet, or video games, or whatever the latest demon-you-don’t-get is.

When pressed for evidence, instead of offering some, she instead asks if we want to wait and see what kind of evidence emerges? *Ominous sound effect* – That is not an answer, it’s just silly scaremongering. She’s even placing weight in parental concerns, on anecdotes.

Parents will always be concerned about what their kids are up to, it’s the generation gap – every generation is both very different from (in terms of technology in particular) and the same as (regarding concerns, ‘we never did such things!’ ‘you whipper-snappers without any respect’! etc.) the previous ones. Again this is nothing new. To me it just sounds like she’s scared of change and using popular fears as an excuse to criticise.

It’s not so much the technologies in and of themselves that I’m criticising but how they’re used

Nail on the head. If your kid is spending 6 hours straight in front of the TV, damn well turn it off. Go for a walk. You can’t blame Nintendo for the people who spend their lives with the console running, you can’t blame Google for someone staying up until 5am looking at random websites. Discipline your kids and yourself and these things are like any other activity – perfectly healthy in reasonable amounts. Also if my child wanted to hug people for 6 hours, I’d be concerned at the level of clinginess they’d somehow developed.

Hi Ho Silver Lining

What gets me in a real rage about these attacks on social media, the internets and so forth, is that people (especially people who don’t even use it themselves, infuriatingly) are so very quick to not even bother considering the positive outcomes.

I’ve made similar points in the past but I’ll do so again ‘cos I can.

Some people aren’t comfortable in social situations. If you’re so concerned about the people on the austism spectrum, take a bit of time to learn what it is they struggle with, and what helps them. Even for those of us without personal experience of such things, sometimes we all have those days when we’d just rather not have to put on a smiley face and be around people.

For some, that’s more the default setting. That’s not because interaction with other people is completely off-putting, but sometimes the trappings that come with getting together ‘irl’ are just too much. If people are put off by the poking, liking and kind of sharing that happens on FB/Twitter then take a step back and look at what we do offline.

How should I dress? What should I say? What is the tone of my voice conveying? Is this rude? Will I upset them if I say that? What should I do in this situation? Do I have to smile now? Is eye contact creepy? No, if I look away, that’s impolite. Wait, I’m staring. Oh she thinks I’m a complete weirdo. I need to buy the next round? What are they laughing at?

Et cetera. You might not have ever thought these things, but many do, and social interaction can be a stressful experience – think of a time you just wanted to go home to the TV/a book/bed.

But most of us want to talk with people and share bits of our lives. If the above is a regular issue then the internet is an absolute godsend. Again I’m not going to waffle on about my personal reasons for thinking this but would encourage those who are scared of online things ‘replacing real life interaction’ to just stop and reconsider. Maybe, just maybe, the internet is actually a very fulfilling and stimulating environment that does give people a sense of identity and belonging in plenty of cases.

Of course, writing this on a blog isn’t the best way of conveying such a message, I know. So don’t whine at me about that!!

The wealth of information online, both factual things to learn and giving better access to ‘real life’ events and so on, it’s a huge resource that helps people immensely. Liaise with friends, make new ones, find a place to stay at short notice… the list is extensive.

People seem so hell-bent on discovering how damaging the interwebnets are for our brains, they don’t seem to be bothered about the good it’s doing. This happens with every technological leap, like television as she mentions herself; will it replace books?! No, of course not.

If you think Twitter is all people saying what they had for breakfast, I don’t want to talk to you about it. Either give it a try or listen to the people who explain it really isn’t, at least try to get a better idea, or shut up. Don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it, as they say.

If you only update your facebook page to broadcast your personal life then don’t complain it’s all about gossip and invasion of privacy. These experiences are user-driven, they are what we make them, and if I see more of this pointless demonising, I will shout louder.

My friends, whom I cannot refer to as ‘online’ or ‘offline’ because they are largely both (except when there are huge oceans in the way), have kept me afloat when I’ve been too upset to talk on the phone, too much of a mess to leave the house or present myself to people face-to-face.

Thank FSM for the internet because without it… well, imagine! Where would I get to see parrots dancing to horrible pop songs hilariously or cats in all manner of sickeningly cute predicaments. Or indeed hear first-hand accounts from countries descending into civil war, or kids getting beaten by police at legal protests.

Life is not simple, nor is our virtual world. Embrace it/keep your distance, whatever. But don’t be so quick to demonise what you have not even tried to understand or see good within.

That’s the remit of rags like the one that published the silly, distorted story in the first place.

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I’m not going to go into the video games criticism much; saying that actions don’t have consequences and this could affect how people think is just another I’ve-never-played-them sourced view, in my opinion, and I’ve had rants about all that before as well.

Edit: more people are irritated!

Dorothy Bishop has written an open letter to Greenfield regarding her comments. Edit (2): having received much support and thanks for her letter, one academic chooses to challenge her position. If you want to see how scientists fight, take a look.

Martin has a more serious piece addressing Greenfield’s somewhat shaky claim that she has never linked autism to internet use, following more high-profile individuals losing their rag with her, including Carl Zimmer – documenting the rise of the most amusing #greenfieldism hashtag.

It’s even made it to the Wall Street Journal!

Breaking!! Susan Greenfield causes autism!

16/8/11: More recently, Andrew Maynard (my fellow I’m a Scientist! 2010 contestant) has published an excellent analysis of Greenfield’s latest outing, which came in the form of a video statement published on the Guardian website.

Wooseum to Museum?

The saga of alternative medicine coverage in the Science Museum, London: an update!

Background

My colleague (well, ex-colleague now he’s gone and emigrated!) Alex Davenport wrote a post for my blog describing an exhibit up in the Art and Science of Medicine section of the Science Museum that he’d taken issue with.

For good reason; it was full of advertising for alt med practitioners, a complete lack of scientific examination of beliefs and traditions of alt med types they’d chosen to present – but simply reiterating the beliefs and often presenting them ambiguously in a way that could easily be misinterpreted as promotion or at least uncertainty about their efficacy.

Simon Singh had resigned from the museum’s board of trustees partly due to this exhibit – fighting a lawsuit brought by the British Chiropractic Association at the time; it’s difficult to defend your stance of calling out baseless alt med claims as ‘bogus’ when the Science Museum is giving them time and you’re apparently supporting that!!

As a result of Alex’s post, the museum issued a response.

Then, Alex and I wrote a reply on the Guardian website and David Colquhoun published his own material on the exhibit. I wrote one quick update and a longer one going over the ‘Living Medical Traditions‘ exhibit in a bit more detail, with links to photos of some of the displays.

Amazingly, after all this, the Museum invited us (myself, Alex, Simon Singh and David Colquhoun) to a meeting with their Director and a couple of his colleagues to discuss some possible changes.

This was all very encouraging, as Alex summarised in this post. The director sent some proposed corrections to the three of us, we mused on it, added our points and got back to them, but as far as I was aware there were no further developments.

Some happy news?

So today, I got a comment on the original Wooseum post and the person who had informed David of the exhibit sent him an email.

John said: Its all been removed ! Hopefully in a skip.

From David’s blog:

“Visited Science museum yesterday , wonderful news – all offensive material gone, and different ok stuff there”.

So, if this is true, excellent! However, I wonder if this is a temporary change and the rest will return when they’ve made some minor amendments?

Time will tell. For now, we celebrate!

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Update

13/5/11 So DC visited the exhibit and apparently it is true!

3/6/11 Our good friend Jimbob had a quick look just at closing time and a lot of the stuff is actually still there – more when I can go and have a look myself. See photos 1, 2, 3 and 4.

5/7/11 Rhys checked things out on 3/7/11 and it is indeed the same, but apparently some proposed changes have been made and subsequently rejected on the grounds that they don’t go far enough. This is really positive so let’s hope for a real update meriting celebration in the near future!

IgNobel Awards 2011

Sorry for the silence of late! I’ve been in Florida for the AACR conference in Orlando, plus some R&R in Miami. Resuming semi-normal service…

Before that I attended the IgNobel Awards tour show (and the pre-event, Improbable Research After Dark, which was excellent) and would like to share some of it with you because it was entertaining and educational; the top two aspects we nerdy types hope for from events, of course.

Marc Abrahams (centre of the photo, left) hosted the evening, which consisted of some background on the IgNobel prizes, some selected highlights from the actual awards shows and talks from some of last year’s winners.

To keep talks to time, 4 ‘volunteers’ would quack after each minute, culminating with non-stop quacking when the speaker ran out of time. This will make more sense later.

The Annals of Improbable Research is a bi-monthly publication. It includes original research such as the somewhat hilarious ‘Kansas is flatter than a pancake‘ study.

Firstly, a selection of the main prizes awarded in 2010:

1. Engineering - Whale snot-sampling helicopter

2. Medicine - treating asthma with rollercoaster rides (my Welsh colleague would love this, he went on so many while we were away!)

3. Transportation Planning – Japan/UK; slime mold planning rail systems

4. Physics - wearing socks outside shoes causes fewer slips and falls on ice in Winter. It’ll catch on, wait and see.

5. Peace - Swearing relieves pain! I knew it!!

6. Public Health – experimentally determining that bacteria stick to beardy scientists! From 1967, this study set the basic standard for microbiological lab safety methods.

7. Economics - to the companies who got us where we are today.

8. Chemistry - disproving “oil and water don’t mix”

9. Management - random promotion would increase organisations’ efficiency! Dubbed the ‘Peter principle’

10. Biology - a study of  fellatio among fruit bats. Yes.

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6 days after the 2010 awards (also the 20th ceremony), in Stockholm, the Nobel prize for Physics was awarded to Andre Geim for graphene; 10 years previously he received an IgNobel for levitating a frog with magnets!

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During the ceremony itself, one can traditionally win a date with a Nobel prize winner! A happy 91 year-old indeed…

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We were treated to a selection of old winners (there are approximately 200 in total now)

- 2000: dog vs. cat fleas’ jumping ability (dogs fleas win)

- 2007: the emergency bra – more on this later!

- 1965: a very scary patent for a rotating birthing table.

- 2003: homosexual mallard necrophilia. A love of duck sex-related stories is an ongoing joke amongst such eminent science writers as Mark Henderson, Ed Yong (parental advisory warning for that post!!) and others… So the quacking-timer setup had particular comedy relevance when Mark read out some of the original study at the Improbable Research After Dark event. I’m sure you can imagine.

- 2000: Australian patent office awards someone an innovation patent for… the wheel.

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The IgNobel institution has even been converted into a Manga story! Called ‘Geniuses without the glory’: Marc Abrahams points out that perhaps it should be the other way around?

Included is the inventor of karaeoke, who was awarded the Peace Prize for inventing ‘a new way for people to learn to tolerate each other’ – he didn’t patent it and has made no money from it!

Left: the infamous slime mold. Right: karaeoke action (Can’t Take My Eyes Off You) and the creator overwhelmed with emotion!

In 1995 there was a British IgNobel winner, and according to Marc:

Britain is the finest natural producer of IgNobel prize winners in the world

Research from Norwich on how cereal flakes get soggy in milk achieved the honour and the authors sent a video acceptance.

The Chief Scientific advisor to the government at the time telephoned Marc telling him not to give the award; he thought perhaps it was an ‘example of the famous subtle British humour’. Lots of other scientists cited a reputation for him being a nice guy. So Marc, assuming it was a joke, wrote him a letter.

This included (valid) points such as the fact that IgNobels can help get the public interested in and curious about science; plus scientists enjoy it!

The advisor wrote back angrily, telling him to stop giving the awards!! Even if the scientists do want them!

Marc then started talking to people, including Nature, The Times, Guardian, Reuters… stories started cropping up everywhere. A government official’s reaction like this could perhaps go some way to explaining public discomfort with science? It turned out to be a good controversy!

Now his ire is immortalised in Manga. He’s probably not too happy about that either.

The Speakers

1. Dan Bebber – slime molds and the Japanese rail system

Can we make use of biological networks to improve our network design? Is the simple combination of Mold, Agar and Oats better/more efficient than engineering companies?

Slime molds have been honed through evolution to make efficient networks. So the short answer is yes, they are at least as good at planning sensible routes from A to Z and all stops along the way.

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2. Elena Bodnar – on the super-innovative bra-mask, for which the UK is apparently a top customer! And the new male counterpart device, the emergency shirt.

We were even treated to a demonstration, in which one volunteer pleaded

If any of my students are here, don’t take photos!

When she was asked “Who would you save?” she considered it, made her choice and said “well, he is my boss”.

Sid donated his shirt for a demonstration of the Emergency Shirt (the actual specimen having mysteriously disappeared). He even wore the bra to preserve his modesty. For a while…

So far it’s available only in red and for cups B-D on ebbra.com – it’s just idea for now, but should expand to all sizes and more designs eventually!

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3. Matija Strlic and his chemical analysis of old book smell.

There’s also a ‘New Book Smell’ airfreshener for kindle! More than 200 chemicals (some toxic!) form these odours, as determined by Headspace analysis of 80 books.

Particularly due to volatile organic compounds that together produce a smell of vanilla ice and caramel! The actual use of this kind of research is in development of an artificial nose to assess and predict the rate of paper decay.

He passed around some ‘old book smell’ in a Duran bottle (sturdy branded lab glass)! It was surprisingly spot on.

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4. John Hoyland at New Scientist (who edits the Feedback feature)

Frootloopery is a favourite subject at NS; including ridiculous medical claims such as trinfinity8 that ‘transmits algorithms into body to combat ageing!’ for a mere $8,000.

Also the Denon AKDL1 cable, allegedly marketed at some point for $9,999.

Winner of the Amazon most-sarcastic-reviews! Highly recommend a read, very amusing.

Apparently it generated such comments as:

I put it in a glass of water, that started to turn a dark sort of colour.., my friend and I agreed it was the best red we’d ever tasted‘

Questionable marketing is also covered, including the use of ‘free’ (e.g. FREE TEXTS when you top up £10/month!),internet speed claims (Up to 8Mb/s! = 3 if you’re lucky), amusing signs (“simulated Virtual Reality” – eh?) and so on.

Chronic Woman Disease got the most lols. The fire extinguisher thing is probably an inflammatory translation phenomenon of some sort.

Also there is a Private Eye Colemanballs-style section for silly things people have said, such as one commentator’s gem:

time seemed to stop for 3/4 of a second

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5. Gareth Jones – fruit bat fellatio!

This article climbed to the 2nd most-viewed video on the PLOSone video site. They found that every 1 second of fellatio led to an extra 7 seconds’ copulation time! Also in some species, in terms of size, testicles > brain!

Science and Nature covered it as well (but didn’t publish it, he not-at-all bitterly pointed out).

Good point well made in the HuffPo

Question: What was the first most-viewed paper? Answer: a PLOS Medicine article about “why most scientific research is false” – fair enough then.

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Finally we were ‘treated’ to McGonagalls’s Tay Bridge Disaster poem, again, having read it at  Improbable Research After Dark as well.

The poem has probably ended up ranking as, a greater tragedy than the bridge incident itself.

Billy Connolly reads:

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Links:

The founder of the Irish skeptics explores the importance of the IgNobels in science communication in the Irish Times.