Category: quackery

A bizarre paper in an Elsevier journal suggests that Covid 19 is a geological/magnetic-like phenomenon and can be prevented by wearing jade amulets. Elsevier defends the paper.

October 30, 2020 • 12:30 pm

A really insane paper was just published in an Elsevier journal, Science of the Total Environment, a paper that connects the outbreak of covid with serpentinization phenomena known in geology, as well as the Earth’s geomagnetic fields. At the end, the authors (who hold respectable jobs) suggest that putting nephrite jade amulets on rats may protect them from getting coronavirus.  And maybe it would work for us, too!  It’s gonzo. Of course, we can’t blatantly dismiss it out of hand without at least reading the paper (which I did, and it was PAINFUL), but this nonsense comes about as close to being dismissible as a paper can from just reading the title and the abstract. Click on the screenshot to read the paper, get the pdf here, and see the reference at the bottom.

The “highlights”:

I’m not going to go through the results in detail, which are both experimental and correlational, but even the “experimental” results are correlational: the authors observed, in rats afflicted with a “COVID-19 like disease” (they don’t know its relationship to genuine virus), that dissected rats had deposits of “silicate/glasslike structures in the lungs and kidneys”, which they associate with serpintinization. There was no experimental manipulation; they just saw some of the rats in their colonies get sick (17 out of 92), and cut them open.

The rest of the paper is speculation based on correlations of the disease in humans with geological phenomena, leading them to their Big Hypothesis:

Here, we propose that the emergence of COVID-19 outbreaks resulted from the generation of LWMAs [long-wave magnetic anomalies] that exhibit resonance with ferromagnetic-like iron stores in humans, thus enabling the magnetic catalysis of iron oxides-silicate-like minerals and the associated SARS-CoV-2.

And so iron is important, and so is water and geology, so they support their hypothesis with statements like this:

Terrestrial water storage dynamics also account for the disproportionate deaths in populations with African ancestry in the United States during the vernal phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. Individuals with African ancestry disproportionally reside in basins within the coastal belt of the Greater Appalachian-Ouachita orogenic belt that spans the South to the Northeastern United States (the so-called Black belt). This so-called Black belt region has been experiencing increased terrestrial water storage over the past decades and experienced increased terrestrial water storage during the vernal phase of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Of course that doesn’t explain why, in a single area, blacks are more liable to get infected than are whites.

It goes on:

In the proposed hypothesis, ferromagnetic-like/superparamagnetic iron stores (i.e., ferrihydrite) in humans  is critical for resonant LWMA-mediated magnetic catalysis in COVID-19 pathologies. Iron stores are low in children and increases with age, with the highest levels in the elderly. Males have significantly higher iron stores compared to females. Consequently, COVID-19-induced morbidity and mortality risk are directly proportional to age, and male sex is also a significant risk factor for COVID-19-induced morbidity and mortality.

Yes, it smacks of quackery, but I’ll let someone like Orac go after the paper as a whole, for life is short.  Oh, there’s one more test they propose:

Furthermore, we propose that Nephrite-Jade amulets (a calcium-ferromagnesian silicate) developed by Neolithic Chinese Medicine to prevent thoracic organ disease, may prevent COVID-19.

. . . It is posited that Jade (including Nephrite) amulets protect the wearer against unseen nefarious forces that cause disease in thoracic organs. Indeed, the romantic language word, piedra de ijada (from which the English word Jade is derived) translates to the stone that prevents disease in organs in the side/flank of the body (thoracic organs). Additionally, the English word Nephrite is derived from the Greek word lapis nephriticus, which translates to the stone that cures kidney disease.

Future experiments and analysis in support of this hypothesis will determine 1) the genomic sequence of the polynucleotide molecules producing the SARS-CoV-2-like antigens in the laboratory rats using next-generation sequencing technology, 2) the ability of Nephrite-Jade amulets to prevent lethal COVID-19-like disease and associated SARS-CoV-2-like infection in laboratory rats in our colony during the equinoctial period. . .

Check out the paper’s bizarre “graphical abstract”, which is reproduced below.

Maybe Gwyneth Paltrow’s jade vagina eggs had something to them after all! Well, I will let the experimenters fit the rats with tiny jade amulets and see if they work. I’m betting not. However, in support of their hypothesis, I sometimes wear pounamu (nephrite shapes on necklaces) that I got in New Zealand (they’re a traditional Maori decoration), and I haven’t gotten Covid yet. Maybe we could do the experiment now with the many people in New Zealand, both white and Maori, who wear pounamu. Those who wear amulets should get covid far less often.

Of course Retraction Watch had to feature this paper, and so it did in the article below (click on the screenshot).

The site reproduces some baffled tweets by other scientists, and then inquired of the paper’s first author, Moses Turkle Bility:

We asked Moses Turkle Bility, a Pitt professor who is listed as corresponding author of the paper, whether he in fact wrote it. He confirmed that he did:

…I kindly suggest you read the article and examine the evidence provided. I also suggest you read the history of science and how zealots have consistently attempted to block and ridicule novel ideas that challenge the predominant paradigm from individuals that are deem [sic] not intelligent enough. I [sic] not surprised that this article has elicited angry responses. Clearly the idea that a black scientist can provide a paradigm shifting idea offends a lot of individuals. I’ll be very candid with you; my skin color has no bearing on my intelligence.

If you have legitimate concerns about the article and wish to discuss, I’ll address; however, I will not tolerate racism or intellectual intolerance targeted at me.

Every quack fancies themselves a Galileo, though most quacks are simply quacks. And there was no racism.

We asked Bility for evidence that “Nephrite-Jade amulets, a calcium-ferromagnesian silicate, may prevent COVID-19,” and whether promoting non-evidence-based interventions during a pandemic was a good idea. His non-answer:

Dear Dr. Oransky, please read and understand the article in its entirety, before you make a hasty decision. If I may speculate, you neither understand quantum physics nor spin chemistry; you are making a hasting [sic] decision based on your knowledge of the classical theories that dominate the biological sciences. Also, certainly you being a white male offers you the privilege to think that you have the right to determine who can propose ideas that challenges a dominant paradigm. Other cultures are not primitive, and people of color and indigenous people are not intellectually inferior. Before you jump to conclusions about this article, I suggest you understand quantum physics, and spin chemistry, and how it differs from classical theories, and then read my article. 

The author, who is black, is clearly defensive, and is blaming criticism on his race. But the insanity of this paper has nothing to do with race; it has to do with whether good science is being done, and it doesn’t look like it to me.

Finally, Retraction Watch went to Elsevier, whom I don’t like anyway because they’re price-gougers. And they defended the paper!

We’ve also asked Jay Gan, of the University of California, Riverside, and co-editor-in-chief of the journal, how it came to be published. Gan told us that Damià Barceló, the other editor in chief of the journal, handled the submission. Barceló told us:

The paper went through our standard reviewing process. It was  reviewed by two expert reviewers and only after  several revisions with the agreement of the reviewers it was accepted.

Well, lots of dumb papers get published, though relatively more of them in the humanities than in the sciences. This paper won’t do much harm to science or medicine, but it may damage the careers of its authors unless, by a million-to-one chance, they’re right. And certainly Elsevier doesn’t come out looking good on this one.

_______________

Bility, M. T., Y. Agarwal, S. Ho, I. Castronova, C. Beatty, S. Biradar, V. Narala, N. Periyapatna, Y. Chen, and J. Nachega. 2020. Can Traditional Chinese Medicine provide insights into controlling the COVID-19 pandemic: Serpentinization-induced lithospheric long-wavelength magnetic anomalies in Proterozoic bedrocks in a weakened geomagnetic field mediate the aberrant transformation of biogenic molecules in COVID-19 via magnetic catalysis. Science of The Total Environment:142830.

Gwyneth Paltrow pays civil penalty for touting bogus “miracle vagina eggs”

September 9, 2018 • 10:00 am

Ah, some rare Schadenfreude. From Snopes (click on screenshot below) via the Associated Press.

Remember a year and a half ago when Goop, Gwyneth Paltrow’s overpriced purveyor of quackery and “lifestyle” items, touted a jade egg that could, when inserted into a woman’s vagina, do this:

  • harnesses the power of energy work, crystal healing, and a Kegel-like physical practice
  • cleanses, clears, and detoxifies the vagina
  • removes negativity
  • increases chi, orgasms, vaginal muscle tone, hormonal balance, and feminine energy.

These claims were made on the Goop website by one “Shiva Rose,” whose arrant and misguided touting of this unhygienic mineral are still up. Yet at the end of her piece (the jade vagina egg sold—and still sells—for $66) was this disclaimer:

The views expressed in this article intend to highlight alternative studies and induce conversation. They are the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of goop, and are for informational purposes only, even if and to the extent that this article features the advice of physicians and medical practitioners. This article is not, nor is it intended to be, a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment, and should never be relied upon for specific medical advice..

Well, that didn’t fool the state of Californa, whose investigators found that yes, these were real health claims, and no, they didn’t stand up to scrutiny. And so. . . .

As the AP reports (my emphasis):

Prosecutors in eight California counties jointly announced the settlement on Tuesday after a task-force investigation found some of goop’s health claims were unfounded.

The settlement involves advertisements saying goop’s Jade Egg and Rose Quartz Egg could balance hormones, regulate menstrual cycles and improve bladder control.

In addition to the penalty, the company will provide refunds to customers who ask.

A goop statement says the settlement acknowledges no liability on the company’s part and addresses only advertising, not the products themselves. The statement says there is honest disagreement between the sides, but goop wanted to settle the matter quickly and amicably.

Honest disagreement? Does Gwynnie still think sticking a semi-porous hunk of nephrite in your nether orifice really detoxifies it and balances your chi to boot? No, there is disagreement between the sides, but it’s not honest at all—at least not if Gwynnie has two neurons to rub together. Or hasn’t she read the jade-egg criticism of Dr. Jen Gunter, who regularly takes apart Goop’s ridiculous health claims, another being coffee enemas, which can cause colitis, rectal performation, and death (see here)? Do not put coffee in your butt!

Paltrow’s continuing claim that this is “honest disagreement” shows that she’s not repentant at all, but is in fact continuing to endanger people’s health (mostly women, who are the targets of Goop). People could die following her advice. Of course you can also die following many physicians’ advice, but this is different: jade vagina eggs and coffee enemas have no known benefit.  Yet those jade eggs are still offered by Goop (click on screenshot):

And some claims are still there:

p.s. If you bought one of these things, get your refund immediately. And remember, kids, coffee is for drinking and jade is for wearing as jewelry or to look at as sculpture.

 

h/t: Su

The downfall of Theranos and Elizabeth Holmes

June 25, 2018 • 1:00 pm

Many of you will know about the downfall of Theranos, the Silicon Valley company started by Elizabeth Holmes, who claimed to have devised a machine that could do multiple physiological tests on just a single drop of blood. It never really worked, even though investors (including Rupert Murdoch) pumped hundreds of millions of dollars into Holmes’s startup. At one time Theranos was worth over 9 billion dollars on paper.  Then her chicanery was uncovered and published by The Wall Street Journal.

Now Theranos, and Holmes, are bankrupt. And ten days ago, both Holmes and Theranos’s former president, Ramesh Balwani, were indicted for wire fraud: for deliberately lying to investors and the public. (For a brief period Theranos partnered with the pharmacy chain Walgreen’s in a blood-testing collaboration.)

This 31-minute video is an interview of John Carreyrou by Nick Gillespie of ReasonTV; Carreyrou was the Wall Street Journal reporter who unmasked Holmes through dogged reporting.  It is an absolutely fascinating conversation, and Carreyrou is eloquent and thorough.

Based on this interview, I went to the library to get Carreyrou’s new book, Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup, and am reading it now. It’s a page-turner. Holmes was a sociopath but was so charismatic that she managed to dupe lots of investors and persuade famous people like Henry Kissinger to join her board of directors (big names lure big money). Meanwhile, the company was totally dysfunctional, with Holmes firing people right and left and lying to everyone about the ability of her “Edison” machine to test blood (it never worked, and she knew it).

You won’t be wasting your time if you watch this video. If you like it, get hold of Careyrou’s book.

If you don’t have the time, there’s a similar but shorter interview (6 minutes) here.

Woo from Dr. Oz and Everyday Feminism

June 7, 2018 • 10:45 am

Dr. Mehmet Oz was launched into public celebrity via promotions by Oprah Winfrey and Larry King. He still has a daily television show on Fox, “The Dr. Oz Show,” which I blessedly haven’t seen. But I have read about his various promotions of pseudoscience, including weight loss nostrums, alternative medicine, and even “reparative therapy” designed to turn gay people straight. He’s been called out for this many times, but now his wooish-ness has expanded, as the man is now into astrology and how it relates to your health.

Grania sent me one of Dr. Oz’s tweets yesterday, which was here, but somehow it’s mysteriously disappeared, maybe because Dr. Oz is taking a lot of flak for it. Fortunately, the Internet is forever, and there are screenshots online:

About our health? How can it be that the date and time on which we’re born gives us a propensity to this or that disease? Well, of course it wouldn’t, but that hasn’t stopped Dr. Oz, who has posted the article below on his t.v. show website. I’ve captured a screenshot in case he takes that down and linked it to the original site:

The “slideshow” goes through all the astrological signs one by one, so you can see how your stars affect your health. Here’s mine (I’m a Capricorn):

Well, I haven’t noticed any buckling or weakness in the knees, though I’m goal oriented (I’m sure many Capricorns are not). If you’re an Aries, you’re prone to migraines, the Taurus is liable to get a stiff neck, and Virgos can have gastrointestinal issues. Is there any research supporting these correlations? If there is, I’m not aware of it, and apparently neither is Dr. Oz or his astrologer factotum Rebecca Gordon.

The man is a fraud, and his show should be taken off the air. Sadly, many Americans like the kind of pablum he sells, so there’s no hope of that. All we can do is embarrass the hell out of him, as I will soon do on Twitter, and hope that he relents, as he has in part here. To call the man a quack is an insult to ducks.

UPDATE: I just heard from Grania that Dr. Oz has revised his astrology tweet, but it isn’t much better. There’s a video in it, too.

https://twitter.com/DrOz/status/1004332074319466501

*********

The ad below appeared on the execrable website Everyday Feminism, whose motto should be “Making you feel bad about yourself—24 hours a day.” You can find the full description of the course here. Thanks to reader Su, who added:

“As EvFem shows its true calling… making $.”

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, feminism has now incorporated the woo of tarot as a way of fighting the Patriarchy, and it will cost you a mere $35 to unlock your inner magic. Here’s some of the blurb from the website; the bolding is theirs.

As women, we’re often taught at an early age to ignore our intuition and to trust the wisdom of others. We’re told that we’re being too sensitive, emotional, illogical or dramatic when we operate off our intuition.

But intuition is an innate skill that’s accessible to everyone. Like a muscle, it can only be strengthened when used, but never lost. It’s the art of gaining knowledge without using any conscious understanding on how you got that information.

Tapping deeper into this ability and practicing daily, can help us to remove what blocks our abundance and success, clarify the energy that is going on around and within us, and bring an overall greater state of ease.

We’re naturally embedded with our own “gps” that shifts us toward where we need to be and how to best act, so that we can thrive and serve from a space of truth and integrity. We seldom trust our intuition because we’re used to thinking of it as figment of our imagination and quite often, our intuition speaks so softly that we ignore it.

Tarot cards are a phenomenal way to gain insight, guidance and clarity over feelings, actions and decisions to be. It serves as a tool to enhance self-awareness, intuitive/psychic abilities and self-trust.

Reading the Tarot and accessing your intuition is actually quite easy. You don’t have to rely on other spiritual guides for that information. With my help, after this webinar, you should be able to interpret energy and get those answers yourself.

What a shame that a good cause—women’s equality—has to be yoked to this kind of nonsense. But there’s always been a wing of feminism that touts the idea that women have “different ways of knowing” or even, as does postmodernism, claims that “objective truth” is a myth, sometimes perpetuated by white males. We’ll be talking about a new paper on the “female ways of knowing” canard in the next few days.

In the meantime, if you’re not game for tarot, you can always sign up for this social justice seminar.  Everyday Feminism is clearly hurting for money, as it’s announced several times before.

Chopra and Tanzi: Exercise will reprogram your genes in 60 days

March 3, 2018 • 3:00 pm

While eating my ribtips (I see the termites have already descended on that post), I turned on the PBS channel on t.v. (WTTW in Chicago, if anybody there is listening.) On the show, to my chagrin, appeared Deepak Chopra and Rudy Tanzi, On a show called “Brain, Body, Mind”, they were dispensing health advice to callers—and, of course, flogging their wares.

One older woman called in, worried about her lack of exercise.

Tanzi fielded the question (with support by Deepakity), urging her get some exercise regularly. That’s fine advice, though everyone knows it. But then Tanzi added that after two months of regular exercise, like walking for an hour a day, her genes would get “reprogrammed.”

That’s bullshit, of course, based on the unevidenced claim that human experience can, epigenetically, change your genome in a useful and permanent way.  But there’s not a scintilla of data showing that environmentally based adaptive methylation can occur in human DNA, so the Unholy Duo were talking out of their nether parts. Yes, relaxation, good diet, and exercise are good for all, but why do they drag this gene crap in?

To make themselves seem “scientific”, of course! Otherwise they’d just be telling you what anybody would, much less your doctor. And you wouldn’t buy their CDs and books, which are being flogged at this moment. There has to be a hook, and that hook is attached to your wallet.

This is quackery, pure and simple, and I’ve written about it before. Why, oh why, does PBS present these quacks as if they knew what they were talking about? They’re misleading people at the same time they’re filling their pockets.

It’s a pity, for at one time Tanzi seemed to be a reputable scientist. But the lure of Mammon was too great, and he sold his soul to Deepakity.

Evolutionary biology student discovers that UK water companies engage in dowsing

November 24, 2017 • 10:48 am

What is it with the UK? The National Health Service still subsidizes homeopathy in some parts of England, and now there are reliable reports (here and here) that a substantial number of British water companies—10 out of 12!—use dowsing (if you don’t know it, look here) to find water, in particular pipes and mains.

I’m proud to say that this ridiculous practice was discovered by an evolutionary biologist—Sally Le Page, a grad student at Oxford—and first published on her site at Medium. She got wind of this when she saw a man from a big Midlands water company, a company called in to install a pipe from the mains, walking around her parents’ yard dowsing. Further inquiries revealed that 83% of the 12 companies use a practice that has never been scientifically shown to work, and there have been plenty of tests. As Le Page notes:

Every properly conducted scientific test of water dowsing has found it no better than chance (e.g. here, here, and here, nicely described here). You’ll be just as likely to find water by going out and taking a good guess as you will by walking around with divining rods. And it’s not for lack of testing; there was even $1 million up for grabs for anyone who could provide rigorous evidence that you can find water using dowsing techniques.

Yes, a dude with a Y-shaped stick can have the stick suddenly point down, but as Le Page notes, that’s due to the ideomotor effect, the same subconscious wish-thinking that moves the cursor on a Ouija board. The main thing is that this movement has never shown any ability to find water in blind tests.

Le Page did what a good determined skeptic would do: she found out which companies used this ridiculous practice, and then tweeted them. Their replies are evasive and dumb; here are a few posted by the CBC:

Severn Trent:

Anglian Water:

Northumbrian Water:

Thames Water:

So they know this is happening and even seem credulous enough to believe that dowsing works. Now, as the BBC says, the companies don’t issue “divining rods” to their employees, but those companies are clearly (based on the above) aware that this practice is going on—on company time. The BBC adds this:

Ms Le Page said: “I can’t state this enough: there is no scientifically rigorous, doubly blind evidence that divining rods work.

“Isn’t it a bit silly that big companies are still using magic to do their jobs?”

In a statement issued later, Severn Trent said: “We don’t issue divining rods but we believe some of our engineers use them.”

All the companies emphasised they do not encourage the use of divining rods nor issue them to engineers, and said modern methods such as drones and listening devices were preferred.

Northern Ireland Water, Northumbrian Water, South West Water and Wessex Water said their engineers do not use them.

If you’re a patron of one of the following water companies, you may want to write or email them asking why your money is being used to subsidize superstitious woo (I could find only nine of the ten companies that dowse).

  • Anglian Water
  • Thames Water
  • Scottish Water
  • Southern Water
  • Welsh Water
  • United Utilities
  • Yorkshire Water
  • Severn Trent Water
  • Northumbrian Water

You go, Ms. Le Page. Here’s our latest hero, and a tweet showing she has a sense of humor:

Sally Le Page

And she works on Drosophila!

Here’s Sally, who has a YouTube channel, enthusing about her new fly paper in Proc. Roy. Soc.—her first publication. I well remember when I got my first paper published, as an undergrad. I carried a reprint around in my back pocket for a week—not to show anyone, but to take it out repeatedly and look at it.  I well understand her glee. When I sent it to my folks, they asked me how much I got paid for publishing it. When I responded that it was the opposite—I had to pay them to publish it (page charges—they were completely flummoxed.

I have landed. . . to find quantum quackery

November 16, 2017 • 4:00 pm

. . . in Houston, that is. The George Bush airport is HUGE and not pleasant. Next I have a 2-hour flight to Puebla.

I have no time for posting, but here’s something to examine very critically. The famed physicist Roger Penrose, over at the Daily Galaxy, says he has a reliable physical mechanism for producing a soul. Have a look at the piece and then have at it. I’m told by a friend that this stuff is all over social media, since it has the imprimatur of a genuine Famous Scientist.

One quote:

While scientists are still in heated debates about what exactly consciousness is, the University of Arizona’s Stuart Hameroff and British physicist Sir Roger Penrose conclude that it is information stored at a quantum level. Penrose agrees –he and his team have found evidence that “protein-based microtubules—a structural component of human cells—carry quantum information— information stored at a sub-atomic level.”

Penrose argues that if a person temporarily dies, this quantum information is released from the microtubules and into the universe. However, if they are resuscitated the quantum information is channeled back into the microtubules and that is what sparks a near death experience. “If they’re not revived, and the patient dies, it’s possible that this quantum information can exist outside the body, perhaps indefinitely, as a soul.

Not only that, but others (who are unnamed) agree:

Researchers from the renowned Max Planck Institute for Physics in Munich are in agreement with Penrose that the physical universe that we live in is only our perception and once our physical bodies die, there is an infinite beyond. Some believe that consciousness travels to parallel universes after death.

Well, all I can say is that there is no evidence I’m aware of that quantum-mechanical phenomena operate in the brain, much less that they play a role in consciousness and memory. And even if they did, how does any “information” in the brain stay together as a coherent unit after death? In what form does it exist? (It can’t be particles or forces, as Sean Carroll has shown.)  And how does it get into another body?

Oy gewalt! How does a renowned physicist who did important work get involved with this stuff? But I’m just a poor country biologist. I wish I had Sean Carroll here behind this sign. . .

Dara Ó Briain on science, quackery, and creationism

November 13, 2017 • 6:15 pm

I’m sure I’ve posted this video at some time in the past, but it must have been long ago, and it’s worth seeing again.( Besides, I just watched it.)

Here Irish comedian Dara Ó Briain defends science against various species of quackery. He reminds me a bit of George Carlin, and I love the “get in the fooking sack” bit, which should become part of every skeptic’s vocabulary.

. . .and here he is on creationism. Note the accurate characterization of evolution by natural selection: “The whole point of evolution is that random things just happened, and the useful ones hung around.”