Over the last few months, I have spent quite a bit of time following up on the spurious claims made by the Tobacco Control Lobby regarding the supposedly dangerous effects of tobacco smoking, and posting the results on Facebook, to try to educate those few people who might be open to reason and who are not authoritarian followers. ( I hve also discovered how many authoritarian followers there out there and how hate filled and vicious they can be). My approach has been to read the article in question, then find and look at the research studies behind it, and dig into that research. Generally I find that there is a "management summary" at the beginning which summaries what they studied, how they studied it and their conclusions - perhaps 2 pages of summary in total. Then follows the detail of the research. The most interesting place to read is the appendices, where to my initial surprise, I find they qualify the research data and explain it's shortcomings. This data is not reflected in the summary conclusions, and would remain buried unless one has the fortitude to look for it and digest it. I suspect most people would at best read the management summary.
Here I discovered in one study on tobacco and lung cancer, that even using rats specifically bred to be genetically predisposed to cancer, they were not able to give those rats lung cancer, no matter what they tried. So being the good unbiased scientists they are, they immediately set out to try to come up with reasons why the rats didn't get cancer, rather than accepting that perhaps tobacco smoke doesn't cause lung cancer (of course they couldn't do that as their research funding would immediately dry up). They also reveal that they subjected their rats to the smoke rate 2 cigarettes an hour, this on a creature that weights 1/100th of an average human and who on its own would be struggling to smoke .1 of a cigarette in an hour
, still no cancer. In the end they managed to get single cells subjected to tobacco smoke to mutate, and this was the basis for their results, even though the appendices noted that the reaction of a single cell to tobacco might not be the same as when that cell was in a living body rather than a petrie dish.
The second and much more common study is based on questionnaires sent to a select group of people. The questions are framed to get the answers they want and also rely on people, many of whom find it hard to remember what they had for breakfast yesterday, to recall data from years ago, in many cases stuff they probably never knew. For example - how many cigarettes a day did your parent smoke when you were growing up, and how many hours were you exposed to their second hand smoke? How can a person accurately quantify that? From 20 to 30 years ago, when they had no idea what and when their parents smoked? It also plays to people's biases as their answers will be skewed by their opinion on smoking, whether they smoke, whether they hate the smell of smoke, whether somebody they know has some for of disease which has been blamed on smoking etc. However, once the data is in, they look for some correlation between smoking and disease, assume causation and then publish yet another study confirming the evils of tobacco. Yet correlation does not prove causation. For example, we study basketball and its players. We come up with the data that basketball players are tall. We could, if we were operating in the fashion of a Tobacco Control bigot, conclude that playing basketball makes you tall, and take our research to a sensational press release. And clearly that is not true. Yet this happens all the time in the world of tobacco control, and people accept it, not understanding that correlation does not equal causation, it merely provides a hypothesis to be tested for.
I am also very aware now that toxicity depends on the dose. "The poison is in the dose". Something that occurs naturally in small quantities can be toxic in a larger dose, something the anti-tobacco people ignore at every turn.
The point I am making here is that the supposed science behind these amazing claims really sucks and has no basis in reality, but still they churn it out and release it with sensationalist headlines which the public eagerly imbibe, as it proves further what everyone "knows", that tobacco smoking is nearly as dangerous as a nuclear explosion.
HOW THIS RELATES TO OTHER AREAS
By now, I have developed a healthy skepticism towards the whole idea of science by press release. I was amazed to find that this corruption is not confined to the anti-tobacco lobby. And this is where things start to get difficult for me. For years now, my wife and I have worked to remove toxic chemical based products from our lives, from cleaning products to beauty products to household cleaners etc, and to a large degree we have succeeded. So, I guess I have a distinct bias towards articles I see in the press and reported on Facebook, about the dangers of chemical based products on the market.
Yesterday I saw an article in the media, discussing the huge number of cleaning products which contain formaldehyde, a toxic carcinogen. My interest was pricked, because formaldehyde is on of the big boogie men used by the Tobacco Control people against tobacco smoking. So, as is my wont, I started to dig. Here is what I found:
1. Anti smoking position - formaldehyde is a toxic carcinogen in tobacco smoke which is toxic in the minutest quantities ( which after all are the quantities which appear in tobacco smoke)
2. Pro-vaccine Position: Some vaccines contain formaldehyde but in such minute quantities as to be harmless, typically .2mg. Formaldehyde of a dose up to 120mg has been injected into rats with no side effects or health risks, so .2mg is fine. (.2mg is also a dose magnitudes greater than occurs in tobacco smoke)
3. Public Works position: A sewage works in the US was giving off quantities of formaldehyde in fumes from the pond. Local health officials claimed no risk to the population as the levels of formaldehyde would need to be 2000 times stronger than what was present before they started to be of concern.
Then with further research I find that formaldehyde occurs naturally in the body as a byproduct of the metabolism of amino acids. It is also present in minute quantities in the fruit and vegetables we eat every day. So again, the toxicity is in the dose
So, when they are trying to stop smoking, formaldehyde is dangerous in minute quantities. When they want to justify its presence in a vaccine, or in the atmosphere, it is harmless unless in large quantities.
How can you believe anything these people say? They are freaking pathological liars who contradict themselves at every turn.
FINALLY
Anyway, I guess the point I am coming to , is that I can no longer accept statements made about the great harm caused by certain chemicals in products, (much as I want to as it conforms to my worldview) because even the people I considered the good guys, the people pushing for organic food and products, are just as quick to use junk science if it advances their agenda, as the tobacco control and public health puritans.
I am utterly disillusioned. I will continue to challenge junk science results as presented by anti-tobacco bigots, but I am also going to have to challenge statements made by the organic guys,rather than accepting everything they have to say at face value .
Here I discovered in one study on tobacco and lung cancer, that even using rats specifically bred to be genetically predisposed to cancer, they were not able to give those rats lung cancer, no matter what they tried. So being the good unbiased scientists they are, they immediately set out to try to come up with reasons why the rats didn't get cancer, rather than accepting that perhaps tobacco smoke doesn't cause lung cancer (of course they couldn't do that as their research funding would immediately dry up). They also reveal that they subjected their rats to the smoke rate 2 cigarettes an hour, this on a creature that weights 1/100th of an average human and who on its own would be struggling to smoke .1 of a cigarette in an hour
, still no cancer. In the end they managed to get single cells subjected to tobacco smoke to mutate, and this was the basis for their results, even though the appendices noted that the reaction of a single cell to tobacco might not be the same as when that cell was in a living body rather than a petrie dish.The second and much more common study is based on questionnaires sent to a select group of people. The questions are framed to get the answers they want and also rely on people, many of whom find it hard to remember what they had for breakfast yesterday, to recall data from years ago, in many cases stuff they probably never knew. For example - how many cigarettes a day did your parent smoke when you were growing up, and how many hours were you exposed to their second hand smoke? How can a person accurately quantify that? From 20 to 30 years ago, when they had no idea what and when their parents smoked? It also plays to people's biases as their answers will be skewed by their opinion on smoking, whether they smoke, whether they hate the smell of smoke, whether somebody they know has some for of disease which has been blamed on smoking etc. However, once the data is in, they look for some correlation between smoking and disease, assume causation and then publish yet another study confirming the evils of tobacco. Yet correlation does not prove causation. For example, we study basketball and its players. We come up with the data that basketball players are tall. We could, if we were operating in the fashion of a Tobacco Control bigot, conclude that playing basketball makes you tall, and take our research to a sensational press release. And clearly that is not true. Yet this happens all the time in the world of tobacco control, and people accept it, not understanding that correlation does not equal causation, it merely provides a hypothesis to be tested for.
I am also very aware now that toxicity depends on the dose. "The poison is in the dose". Something that occurs naturally in small quantities can be toxic in a larger dose, something the anti-tobacco people ignore at every turn.
The point I am making here is that the supposed science behind these amazing claims really sucks and has no basis in reality, but still they churn it out and release it with sensationalist headlines which the public eagerly imbibe, as it proves further what everyone "knows", that tobacco smoking is nearly as dangerous as a nuclear explosion.
HOW THIS RELATES TO OTHER AREAS
By now, I have developed a healthy skepticism towards the whole idea of science by press release. I was amazed to find that this corruption is not confined to the anti-tobacco lobby. And this is where things start to get difficult for me. For years now, my wife and I have worked to remove toxic chemical based products from our lives, from cleaning products to beauty products to household cleaners etc, and to a large degree we have succeeded. So, I guess I have a distinct bias towards articles I see in the press and reported on Facebook, about the dangers of chemical based products on the market.
Yesterday I saw an article in the media, discussing the huge number of cleaning products which contain formaldehyde, a toxic carcinogen. My interest was pricked, because formaldehyde is on of the big boogie men used by the Tobacco Control people against tobacco smoking. So, as is my wont, I started to dig. Here is what I found:
1. Anti smoking position - formaldehyde is a toxic carcinogen in tobacco smoke which is toxic in the minutest quantities ( which after all are the quantities which appear in tobacco smoke)
2. Pro-vaccine Position: Some vaccines contain formaldehyde but in such minute quantities as to be harmless, typically .2mg. Formaldehyde of a dose up to 120mg has been injected into rats with no side effects or health risks, so .2mg is fine. (.2mg is also a dose magnitudes greater than occurs in tobacco smoke)
3. Public Works position: A sewage works in the US was giving off quantities of formaldehyde in fumes from the pond. Local health officials claimed no risk to the population as the levels of formaldehyde would need to be 2000 times stronger than what was present before they started to be of concern.
Then with further research I find that formaldehyde occurs naturally in the body as a byproduct of the metabolism of amino acids. It is also present in minute quantities in the fruit and vegetables we eat every day. So again, the toxicity is in the dose
So, when they are trying to stop smoking, formaldehyde is dangerous in minute quantities. When they want to justify its presence in a vaccine, or in the atmosphere, it is harmless unless in large quantities.
How can you believe anything these people say? They are freaking pathological liars who contradict themselves at every turn.
FINALLY
Anyway, I guess the point I am coming to , is that I can no longer accept statements made about the great harm caused by certain chemicals in products, (much as I want to as it conforms to my worldview) because even the people I considered the good guys, the people pushing for organic food and products, are just as quick to use junk science if it advances their agenda, as the tobacco control and public health puritans.
I am utterly disillusioned. I will continue to challenge junk science results as presented by anti-tobacco bigots, but I am also going to have to challenge statements made by the organic guys,rather than accepting everything they have to say at face value .
The article/press release is also available at the American Cancer Society I believe, but was quicker to locate just now on Forbes.
