The Venn Diagram of Irrational Nonsense

8 Comments

1. As good as this is I’ve been thinking about something simpler and punchier to put on a t-shirt that I’ve heard someone say before:

   Unfortunately that’s not the way the world works!

   I just cannot remember who that someone was…

2. I am going to have to challenge accupuncture being on there only because:
   http://archinte.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1357513

   In its place I would like to substitute “ear candling”.
   Which has been shown beyond doubt to be just as effective when it is stuck up your @&$#

   • Two things –

     1. Its a meta analysis so unless the science in each of the studies they examined is good all you have done is lump crap studies together in the hope that the good ones outweigh the bad. Meta analysis is a little like the scientific worlds version of a CDO – stick crap in something and hope that people dont notice.

     2. From there conclusion –

     Significant differences between true and sham acupuncture indicate that acupuncture is more than a placebo. However, these differences are relatively modest, suggesting that factors in addition to the specific effects of needling are important contributors to the therapeutic effects of acupuncture.

     They use the word significant but I do not think they know what it means because they then use the word modest to describe the difference between their significant results.

     • I agree with both your points. In this meta study however they got the raw data themselves from each study and did their own analysis.

       As to the raw data, I can’t acess that but there is a summary on the abc australia website with an interview with one of the research team. They reported the effect as well above no intervention, and above the placebo condition of sham accupuncture.
       Again not the actual paper unfortunately, but more on the methodology of their report and findings:

       http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-09-11/study-shows-acupuncture-works/4254244

       As always, appreciate your bollox detection radar.

       Tye

3. It goes without saying that all scientific research needs to be able to withstand rigorous scrutiny.

   But, now let’s step into life.

   Sometimes it is the process and the path travelled that is more important. Sometimes the outcome.

   In an instances like this, isn’t it the outcome that counts? If the individual feels better and subjectively experiences less pain that is what is important.

   • Meisha at a certain level yes. But the guiding principal to that has to be, “first do no harm”.

     And that is hard to meet when you are deceiving someone.So for really little things, like kissing my sons bump on his knee better, that is perfect. For much bigger than that, I would not like to go down that path too far.

     • Hi Tye,

       There are a few points here.

       There is actually a fair amount of evidence suggesting that a lot of medical intervention is not much better than placebo. Or indeed, possibly nothing but placebo.

       Who decides what is “harm”?

       Rather than “deception”, I think many problems arise when interpretations and/or intentions are misaligned.

4. I can’t fit any of these other comments on a t-shirt.:(

Comments are closed.