E-Skeptic #21 For May 25, 2004
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http://www.skeptic.com/: Where Nothing is Certain...But We're Not Sure About That...Contents
Prayer Study Flawed
The Day After Tomorrow
Dawkins Did Not Endorse Astrology
New Astrology Theory Debunked
Astrology Star Sign Bunkum
Microbiologists Murdered'
The environmental disaster film "The Day After Tomorrow" opens this Friday. I have not seen it, but my friend Keay Davidson, the science writer and journalist, asked me:
"Are filmmakers in general justified in manipulating the laws of science any way they like for purposes of entertainment, even if the film is related to a topic of urgent public and political concern'"
Here is my answer:
We live in the age of science, and the age of mass communication. Wed these two and you've got a deadly cocktail when the latter distorts the former, which happens all too frequently. Television producers and film makers especially have an obligation to try to get the science right. We cannot expect them to be perfect. Gene Roddenberry, for example, hired scientists to consult his Star Trek scripts; nevertheless, so many errors crept in that there is now a minor literary genre of "Star Trek Science Bloopers." But at least Gene tried. Most producers don't even bother trying, and here is where mass media has contributed to the deadly cocktail of distorting one of the most powerful institutes we have--science. To expect people in a free society and liberal democracy to make rational decisions about science and technology issues that could change their lives, not to mention the course of history, and simultaneously feed them distorted views of what science is, how it operates, and especially its conclusions, is a recipe for disaster. Film makers and television producers have a moral obligation to at least try to get the science right.
--Michael Shermer
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Dawkins Did Not Endorse Astrology Claim!
In e-Skeptic 20, we reprinted an article from the (London) Sunday Times on British Royal Astronomical Society astronomer Dr. Percy Seymour, about his book presenting a new theory to explain astrology. Richard Dawkins was referenced as if he endorsed the claims of Seymour:
"Richard Dawkins, professor for the public understanding of science at Oxford University, who once suggested that astrologers be prosecuted under the trades descriptions act, said that although he had not read the book Seymour's ideas sounded interesting."
It will not surprise skeptics that the truth is something different. Here is Dawkins' response to the Sunday Times piece:
"What I actually said on the telephone was something like this: 'Well, that's all very interesting, no doubt, but what the hell does it have to do with astrology'' This was reported as support from an unexpected quarter: I was said to find it “interesting”! I am furious. Please publicize the truth of what happened."
A Few Points about Astrology and 'Written in the Stars'
Astrology expert and long-time Skeptic and e-Skeptic reader Ivan W. Kelly, kelly52(at)shaw.ca,
in response to the Seymour's new theory of astrology, sent us the following analysis:
I read the article by Ian Sample 'Written in the Stars' (The Guardian, UK) and there are several points to be made.1. Seymour argues that he does not believe in Horoscopes, which means he does not believe in what the majority of astrologers believe. They, unlike him, contend that the moment of one's birth is related to all one does in the future. The next sentence in the article by Sample says "Could it be that countless devotees ranging from Charles de Gaulle to Ronald Reagan had it right when they kept one eye on the stars?" But Reagan and the others were involved with horoscopes, which Seymour criticizes!
2. All Seymour's theory would illustrate is that the position of the moon and some planets are another factor to be taken into account in explaining some human behavior. Note also, unlike astrology, any influences or not would be open to refutation and revision with new scientific discoveries. This is not the case with astrology. Astrology is not based on causal relationships at all. It is based on symbolic connections that are not amenable to refutation. For example, when Chiron was discovered, how did astrologers determine what it represented in the horoscope? They consulted mythology and found that Chiron was a satyr associated with healing. So Chiron symbolizes healing among other things (also not determined by scientific research) in the horoscope.
3. The article mentions studies about season of effect findings. But these have nothing to do with astrology. Once again these are the result of scientific research and are (unlike astrological claims) modifiable with future research. Talk of summer effects, etc is different from talk of zodiac signs which have specific cut-offs not alienable with the seasons. The reader might also remember that the seasons are reversed in the southern hemisphere but the zodiac signs of people remain unchanged.
4. The article neglects to mention as well that there is no one thing called astrology. There are many schools, each with very different views about the relationships between the cosmos and human behavior. So talk of 'proving' or supporting astrology leads to the question: Which astrology? And no astrologers whose Seymour's results are at variance with are going to drop their tenets on the basis of scientific findings anyway.
—Ivan Kelly , University of Saskatchewan, CANADA
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More Astrology Bunkum:
The Rich List Star Signs
From e-Skeptic reader Dick Jackson, dick(at)d-jackson.com:
This year's Sunday Times Rich List included an analysis of the star signs of Britain's 1,000 richest people--finding significant differences with 110 born under Gemini but only 73 under Pisces.
STAR SIGNS OF THE RICHEST 1000
Gemini 110
Taurus 104
Aries 95
Capricorn 92
Aquarius 91
Virgo 88
Libra 87
Leo 84
Sagittarius 84
Cancer 80
Scorpio 79
Pisces 73
Source: The Sunday Times Rich List 2004
This strikes me as a standard 'numeracy' issue. Someone may say that their analysis finds "significant differences" since there is a range of 73 to 110 in the star sign totals, but is there anything out of the ordinary here' First, let's note that the numbers add up to 1,067, being "Star signs of Britain's richest 1,000 (where known)" (from original source at http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2108-1067034,00.html, and note that
there are actually 1,100 people on the list in total)
If the birthdays of rich people were in fact spread across the calendar completely at random, what range of star signs would we see' This kind of simulation is easily done in any programming language, but here are the minimum and maximum star sign totals for a typical set of ten experiments:
77 102
69 119
73 105
68 103
70 106
74 105
77 107
72 112
76 100
64 111
Clearly, the range 73 to 110 as seen in the Rich List is in no way remarkable, being typical of the distributions seen when birthdays are picked entirely at random. These were found by a one-line program in the IDL language (see http://www.rsinc.com/idl) as follows:
IDL> for i=1,10 do print,min(histogram(randomu(seed,1067)*12),max=max),max
Dick Jackson, dick(at)d-jackson.com
D-Jackson Software Consulting, http://www.d-jackson.com/
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Murdered Microbiologists'
Here's an interesting thread sent to me by a reader, regarding the "mysterious" murders of microbiologists. Of course, we're not given any baseline data on how many physicists died in the same time frame, or how many accountants, or any other small cohort, so this is rather meaningless, but interesting nonetheless, as an exercise in pattern-seeking. Of course, I could be wrong...
The best summary of all this:
http://globeandmail.workopolis.com/servlet/News/fasttrack/20020504/UMURDN?section=Science
The second best:
http://www.stevequayle.com/C2C.index.dead.scientist.html
Other items on it:
http://www.americanfreepress.net/Conspiracy/11_02%20Who's%20Killing%20the%20World's.htm
http://www.rense.com/general18/five.htm
http://www.memphisflyer.com/MFSearch/full_results.asp?xt_from=1&aID=2521
Prayer Study Flawed and Fraud
Columbia University prayer study author pleads guilty to felony chargesThis important report from Skeptic Bruce L. Flamm, MD, Clinical Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology, University of California, Irvine, Bruceflamm(at)aol.com
In the horrible days following the destruction of the World Trade Center by Islamic zealots many Americans prayed for a miracle or a sign from God. Such a miracle apparently occurred and was widely documented in newspaper and magazine articles. On October 2, 2001 the New York Times reported that researchers at prestigious Columbia University in New York found that infertile women who were prayed for became pregnant twice as often as those who did not have people praying for them. The study's results were absolutely miraculous. In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) is the most advanced form of infertility treatment currently available and represents the last hope for women with severe infertility. Therefore, any technique that could increase the efficacy of IVF by even a few percent would be a medical breakthrough. Yet the Columbia University study claimed to have demonstrated, in a carefully designed randomized controlled trial, that distant prayer by anonymous prayer groups increased the success rate of IVF by an astounding 100%. Days later an article published in newspapers around the nation stated that Rogerio Lobo, chairman of the department of obstetrics and gynecology at Columbia and the study's lead author, told Reuters Health that, "Essentially, there was a doubling of the pregnancy rate in the group that was prayed for." ABC News medical editor and Good Morning America commentator Dr. Timothy Johnson reported that, "A new study on the power of prayer over pregnancy reports surprising results; but many physicians remain skeptical."
The following facts related to the Columbia University prayer study confirm that those physicians who doubted the study's astounding results had extremely good reasons to be skeptical. It will be interesting to see if ABC's Dr. Johnson, a medical doctor who also serves as an evangelical minister at the fundamentalist Community Covenant Church in West Peabody, Massachusetts, will report or ignore the following shocking information.
The study's three authors were Kwang Cha, Rogerio Lobo, and Daniel Wirth. Dr. Cha, has left Columbia University and refuses to return phone calls or letters about the report. Dr. Rogerio Lobo, identified by the New York Times and ABC News as the report's lead author, now claims to have not been involved with the study until after its completion and to have provided only, "editorial assistance". Dr. Lobo also refuses to return phone calls or letters about the study. If the report's lead author did not conduct the international prayer study, who did'
The remaining author is a mysterious individual known as Daniel Wirth. Mr. Wirth has no medical degree but does have a long history of publishing studies on mysterious supernatural or paranormal phenomena. Many of these studies originated from an entity called, "Healing Sciences Research International" an organization that Mr. Wirth supposedly headed. This entity's only known address was apparently a Post Office Box in Orinda California. Wirth holds an MS degree is in the dubious field of "parapsychology" and also has a law degree.
In October 2002, Mr. Wirth, along with his former research associate Joseph Horvath also known as Joseph Hessler, was indicted by a federal grand jury. Both men were charged with bilking the troubled cable television provider Adelphia Communications Corporation out of $2.1 million by infiltrating the company, then having it pay for unauthorized consulting work. Police investigators discovered that Wirth is also known as John Wayne Truelove. FBI investigators revealed that Wirth first used the name of Truelove, a New York child who died at age 5 in 1959, to obtain a passport in the mid-1980's. Wirth and his accomplice were charged with 13 counts of mail fraud, 12 counts of interstate transportation of stolen money, making false statements on loan applications and five other counts of fraud. The federal grand jury concluded that the relationship between Wirth and Horvath extended back more than 20 years and involved more than $3.4 million in income and property obtained by using the names of children who died more than 40 years ago.
Incredibly, at the time of the indictment, Horvath was already in jail charged with arson for burning down his Pennsylvania house to collect insurance money. The FBI investigation revealed that Horvath had previously gone to prison after being convicted in a 1990 embezzlement and false identity case in California. Interestingly, the investigation also revealed that he had also once been arrested for posing as a doctor in California. It appears that the "doctor" who performed biopsies on human research subjects in Wirth's paranormal healing studies may have actually been Mr. Horvath impersonating a doctor. Horvath was a co-author on another of Wirth's bizarre studies in which salamander limbs were amputated and found to grow back more quickly when "healers" waived their hands over the wounds.
Both Wirth and Horvath initially plead innocent to the felony charges and over the next 18 months their trial was delayed six times. However, on May 18, 2004, just as the criminal trial of the United States v. Wirth & Horvath was finally about to begin, both men pled guilty to conspiracy to commit mail fraud and conspiracy to commit bank fraud. Apparently a plea bargain had been made and many of the charges had been dropped. Wirth and Horvath will be sentenced in September and they each face a maximum of five years in federal prison.
In summary, one of the authors of the Columbia University prayer study has left the University and refuses to comment, another now claims to have not actually participated in the study and also refuses to comment, and another is on his way to federal prison for fraud. Fraud is the operative word here. Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of this entire sordid saga can be summed up in one question: How did a bizarre study claiming supernatural results end up in a peer-reviewed medical journal? We may never know because the editors of the Journal of Reproductive Medicine also refuse to answer calls or respond to letters about this study. Worse yet, the entire study remains posted on their internet site and the public has been given no reason to doubt its validity. It must be emphasized that, in the entire history of modern science, no claim of any type of supernatural phenomena has ever been replicated under controlled conditions. The importance of this fact can not be over emphasized. One would think that medical journal editors would be keenly aware of this fact and therefore be highly skeptical of supernatural claims. In any case, the damage has been done. The fact that a "miracle cure" study was deemed to be suitable for publication in a scientific journal automatically enhanced the study's credibility. Not surprisingly, the news media quickly disseminated the miraculous results.
In reality, the Columbia University prayer study was based on a bewildering study design and included many sources of error. I have already summarized many of the study's potential flaws in two critiques published in the Scientific Review of Alternative Medicine. But worse than flaws, in light of all of the shocking information presented above, one must consider the sad possibility that the Columbia prayer study may never have been conducted at all. It remains to be seen if the news media will find the above information to be newsworthy.
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