Revival - Ten Years and Counting

A few days ago marked 10 years since I had published the very first post on this blog. Yes, the blog did go into an extensive period of hibernation in the last two years, but I think, this anniversary gives me a great opportunity to make a REVIVAL! No, not religious kind, just the opposite!

I started this blog as a technical/geeky outlet of my ideas from the computer and electronics world. Slowly, as my own personal interests in skepticism and rationality evolved, I begun writing about issues in those areas of interest. In the late 2000s, the fight about childhood vaccines was raging and I felt it was important to get the scientifically correct information across to the wider audience. This also meant exposing cranks and scammers, who found their niche in the anti-vaxers movement. I did get burned a few times, I received my share of complaints and threats, but whenever I found some time, I kept writing. Then the Facebook came along and it seemed that the conversations moved to the social media realm. Not for long I think. Facebook is too noisy, too busy and too "emotional". Information comes fast, posts are reactive and unprepared, and the responses from your audience/friends are even more "in the moment". There is hardly any reasonable and skeptical discussion possible in such an environment. Twitter, on the other hand is too brief and too fleeting to have any meaningful exchange of ideas. However, both platforms might give you ideas for a more prolonged dissection of a particular topic.

So, I think it is rational to come back to the blogging scene. In the crazy political climate of an election year, in the time when rationality is needed more than ever, when hate, racism and bigotry seem to be on the rise on both sides of the pond, I think it is important to ensure that progressive and rational ideas are promoted and highlighted as wide as possible. Staying silent would be complacent and our history teaches us that complacency leads to tragedy.

Long Time...

This blog is not dead... just very slow, due to extensive commitments outside of the skeptical community.

Happy Earth Day

Happy Earth Day to all... enjoy it while it's still here:



Connerton Preserve - Florida





















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Vacation Time - Revisited

As you might have noticed, my on-line activities have been slow in the last month, mostly due to summertime slump and vacation travels. From my occasional "woo-woo" debunking, I switched to my additional passions, which always have been: travel, hiking and outdoor photography (fortunately, they go together well). This year was slightly different, since it was the first time we went on an extended "exploration" trip with our 5 year old son. The "exploration" trip in our book means renting a car and going on an extended road trip from one hiking destination to another. Most of the time it also means extensive driving in between strenuous hikes. I was very worried how he would like the long walks, early days, strange hotels, and general lack of "quality" kids entertainment (Sponge Bob, for example), but I was very surprised to find out he loved it and he wanted more.
Our trip this year took us to Central and Southern California, a place I always wanted to visit, but never had a chance. We started in San Francisco, visited Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park, Yosemite National Park, Mono Lake surroundings (including Lone Pine), Death Valley National Park, Joshua Tree National Park, made a quick stop in Legoland, explored Los Angeles a bit, and finally hit Big Sur on our way back to San Francisco.
We traveled in a fairly large group (three families, with kids around the same age), so it made it easier, but our various hikes stand as a testament, that kids can be introduced to nature at a very early age. In Yosemite for example, we managed to hike to the top of the Nevada Falls (hike descriptions here and here), a trail not easy to accomplish for most of the city dwellers of much more advanced age.
In addition to hiking, we managed to see a few gems that were worth every minute.
First one was the Alcatraz Island, with its famous prison. I was worried that it would be boring for my son, but he loved it and even managed to walk the whole personal audio tour by himself.
The second one was an unforgettable night at the Death Valley Junction's Amargosa Opera House Hotel. According to the management, it is one of the most haunted places in America, which I would believe, if only I'd been able to see anything out of ordinary... nope... not me. I did not see, nor hear, nor feel anything weird, and I suspect it is just a marketing plot (surprise, surprise!!!). However, the history of the place, the setting,  and the Opera House itself with its amazing paintings is really something to see, so don't miss it when you are exploring the Death Valley and its surroundings.
Now, you can tell that I have been doing mostly image processing for the last few weeks, as I managed to stack up 5000 shots on my old, trusty Nikon, but that's what digital photography is all about: cheap volume and selection.

Science and Pseudo-Science

This past weekend, I had a chance to have some really interesting discussions and debates about a number of scientific topics. As it happened in a social setting, I was not really able to make all my points very clear, due to "etiquette" restrictions, but despite this limitation, it was very interesting to see how others perceive science in general, and medical science in particular. It was also an amazing journey into the world of logical fallacies, with some of them piling up on top of the others.

It all started from an innocent mention of some "ghost stories", which led to a full discussion about ghost seances and communication with the world-out-there.

However, the really interesting part came from the discussion of frequency healing and thermography. Both modalities are in the realm of cams, and are firmly set in the pseudo-science: "Radionics" and "A Critical Look at Thermography". Both discussions led directly to a standard "FDA and all the doctors are paid by the big pharma" argument, which, of course, is not something you can debate or win, so I did not even try.

There were two very interesting points made during our debate that are worth mentioning.

First, it was said that the frequency therapy (along with the machine used in the practice) can be attributed with a success rate of around 50%, when treating stage one cancers. However, when I asked about real statistical data, it turned out there there is none, and it's all based on a "gut feeling" from the past years. In addition, it was very telling to find out that the diagnosis of the cancers in question (as I said, in phase one), is "better than the standard medical procedures", which means it must be taken on faith, since we have no independent way to verify that the cancer is really there. Oh, I failed to mention, that the diagnosis is made by "laying hands"!

What I found even more interesting is a general attitude towards science. When I asked for some proofs, or scientific studies done on any of the discussed topics, I got a standard runaround with a lot of  buzzwords (like a long explanation about how frequency therapy rebuilds little cell tails, so they can continue living - I assumed we were talking about telomeres) and some quantum physics, but nothing solid. When I kept pressing, I was told that modern physics, and science in general, is not ready for the new ideas. They can't be tested and reproduced because scientists execute their experiments in a constrained space-time and do not really understand what's outside of the modern science.

That's all I really needed. Pseudo-science, and alternative medicine is not something you can debate and discuss with true believers (especially, when they have they income invested in it, but that's no surprise). Their world view is constructed to ensure that real data has no place in it and can't enter it under no circumstances. And if you don't understand something, just place it outside of our current methods of gaining knowledge and you can be virtually sure that you can peddle any nonsense and be safe with it.

Summer Time

My vacation time now over, I'll be coming back to blogging with full force. On my recent trip to California, I had a chance to do some reading and visit some interesting places, including a haunted hotel. Irrationality is used all over the place for marketing and fun, but some of it goes a bit too far and makes people believe the most unbelievable things. I plan to write about it in the coming weeks.