Peace Through Partying At The Sorceror’s Wake
At the Hilazon Tachtit cave site, before it was Israel, before King David even fought the Philistines, the area north of Nazareth and west of the Sea of Galilee was populated by Natufians, an early settled people, and in 2008 archaeologists revealed details of a burial site unlike any other found in the Natufian period or the Paleolithic before it - instead of a mass grave, like those remains found nearby, it was a lone woman.Epidemiology Bogus Attacks: Now Diet Coke Causes Autism?
If you have been in science media for any period of time, you have seen a predictable pattern; epidemiologists look through columns and rows of foods people claim they eat and diseases or lack thereof and if they get enough to declare "statistical significance" they write a paper noting down at the bottom that they can't show a causal relationship but then send press releases to New York Times journalists who believe in acupuncture absolutely suggesting causation.Chewing Gum For Nausea: Science Or Hype?
During the COVID-19 pandemic, chewing gum had a bit of a resurgence. Though gum companies disavow any health benefits - they like being in the candy aisle - people have always used it off-label for various benefits and did so to generate a response against possible virus exposures. People have always had habits they like. If have a cold, for example, I like to eat a cheese sandwich. If I get nausea, I chew gum.We Know Very Little About Black Holes
Astronomers have speculated that black holes eat slowly. A recent paper argues that their computer simulation shows just the opposite.Don't get too excited, this is still a computer simulation about theoretical physics, which isn't out there with science-fiction but is limited by the fact that we know very little about black holes - including how fast they consume the universe around them. The new estimate is that a black hole can tear apart space-time and consume the accretion disk of material around it in months, rather than the hundreds of years that some believe.
‘Urine’ Group HHRA – 7 People, No Revenue, But Claims They Are Above Scrutiny
In the past, you may have seen various 'we detected X in urine' papers endorsed by suspect names like homeopathy believer Phil Landrigan and endorsed by organic industry apologist Chuck Benbrook.What do such claims even mean? In science, nothing. We can detect anything in anything now, but groups like Heartland Health Research Alliance Ltd are prized by litigators who sue "at the drop of a rat" and need any detection in humans - bonus points if they can claim pregnant women - of any chemical that can kill a mouse at 10,000 times a real-world dose. Any reason to send a teary press release sent to the New York Times.(1)
‘Scoping’ Is Why The IARC Controversy Will Never Go Away – And That French Group Needs Replaced
The International Agency for Research on Cancer(IARC) was once so heralded in a field so rigorous and methodologically conservative that epidemiologists were last to accept a hereditary aspect of cancer. That's right, they didn't see enough evidence to think family history of cancer mattered, and only agreed when overwhelming data were found. They were so thorough that when they declared smoking caused cancer, Big Tobacco was doomed.#MedEd: How Well Doctors Use Social Media To Combat Misinformation
If you go to social media, you can see a lot of suspect claims about fad diets, unapproved medical devices, therapies, and conspiracy theories. Many of them have names with "Dr." attached.How is the public to know a "Dr." may be a PhD or an EdD or an osteropath or someone else who didn't go to medical school and become an M.D.? How should physicians respond? From the years 1998 to 2021, coastal states in the US led America in vaccine denial, were doctors supposed to tell their patients they were stupid for believing vaccines cause autism?(1)