It doesn't help when the scientific community reverses itself on fats, flossing, sodium, dietary cholesterol, and who knows what else. "Oops, we thought it was a good idea but we never had any data. Never mind."

Granted, that's the medical community, where the arrogance level is the highest. "We know best, don't expect us to be limited by mere data." Ironically to this discussion, weather forecasters are actually the least arrogant about their confidence. Why? Because they get daily feedback about how wrong they are.

 

It doesn't help when the scientific community reverses itself on fats, flossing, sodium, dietary cholesterol, and who knows what else. "Oops, we thought it was a good idea but we never had any data. Never mind."

Granted, that's the medical community, where the arrogance level is the highest. "We know best, don't expect us to be limited by mere data." Ironically to this discussion, weather forecasters are actually the least arrogant about their confidence. Why? Because they get daily feedback about how wrong they are.

You're right... remember the high fiber diet fiasco in the fight against colon cancer?

 

Is that another one they've reversed? I sort of remember hearing that not long ago but wasn't sure.

 

Is that another one they've reversed? I sort of remember hearing that not long ago but wasn't sure.

Yes they did (too lazy to google it now). But I remember that they said that a high fiber diet was good for you for other reasons. An I believe them.
The point is that it's not related to the prevention of colon cancer.

 

There's a great book called The Great Influenza, about the flu pandemic in 1918. A large part of the story is the state of medicine in the U.S. in the years leading up to it, around the turn of the century. I was shocked! It was completely unprofessional. Doctors were not much different than the guy selling snake oil out of a wagon. There was a time in this country – just a short century ago – that you could call yourself a doctor without anything more than a high school diploma. There was a professional medical community being developed at John Hopkins and other locations, but they were not the majority.

Anyway, the acceptance of science as the driving force for medical treatment was resisted. The more common practice was the doctor using his ... intuition? ... to diagnose a patient and then to propose a treatment. If it made sense, that was good enough. No need to bother collecting data to see if it really works. That mindset continues to this day. Cholesterol shows up in heart blockages? Quit eating eggs! Only years later does the science catch up – collecting data is hard, after all – and show that the hypothesis was flawed.

 

There was a time in this country – just a short century ago – that you could call yourself a doctor without anything more than a high school diploma.

Yeah, I know that story too... scary, ain't it? And to think that most of us feel that governments impose too many regulations on the population... I guess this is the other side of the coin.

Only years later does the science catch up – collecting data is hard, after all – and show that the hypothesis was flawed.

And then again, you have to interpret the data correctly for it to be of any use!

 

I got this off npr a few days ago. Some recent "scientific consensus" about birds:

1. They fly to the moon in the winter.

2. Small birds like the humming birds hitch a ride on the back of bigger birds.

3. Humming birds cannot flow too far non stop.

4. Feeding rice to birds kills them as the rice expands in the birds stomach. Somewhere scientists actually lobbyed to make rice tossing at weddings illegal for that reason.

......

Quite interesting but nothing surprising.

 

Recent leaks include emails linking AL Gore to Soros open society where Gore was given millions of dollars by Soros to push for global warming.

Gore is likely the first global warming billionaire.

Keep that in your mind next time you listen to him preaching about global warming. Or anybody else for that matter.