I’m a runner, and have been actively running for over a decade. Since I started running, I’ve consumed Gatorade Lemon-Lime almost exclusively as my as my rehydration fluid of choice. Whenever my run will last over about an hour, I carry and consume Gatorade to offset fluid loss and give me some carbohydrate. The formulation is basic: sugar, salt, and potassium. There are a hundreds of electrolyte products out there, and even Gatorade makes versions with exotic ingredients now. But I’ve been faithful to the original: It’s cheap, I don’t mind the taste (even when its warm), you can buy it nearly anywhere, and it’s a common beverage (besides water) offered at races. Plus, I’ve never been that convinced that it matters all that much – I focus on the engine, not the fuel. After exercise I usually stick with water, preferring to get my electrolytes and carbohydrates from food, rather than liquid sources. But now I’m seeing advertising me that sports drinks are both artificial and inferior. Is it time to upgrade my fuel?

Coconut water isn’t just at the West Indian roti shop anymore: From the grocery store to the yoga studio to the running club, it’s everywhere. The excellent Planet Money podcast recently did a feature on the skyrocketing sales of coconut water, so I decided to take a closer look. Is coconut water a fad beverage, like Vitamin Water was last week, and pomegranate juice the week before? It’s positioned as a superior product for rehydration. The marketing and packaging rely heavily on the naturalistic fallacy, and it’s clearly an appeal to nature: Coconut water naturally contains sugars and electrolytes. Natural is believed to be better than unnatural, therefore coconut water is a better beverage choice. Or is it?

What’s in coconut water?

Don’t confuse coconut water with coconut milk, which contains a lot of coconut “meat”, the white solid we might refer to simply as coconut. Coconut water is the 2-4 cups of fluid inside a young coconut, which declines as the “meat” grows. Depending on when the water is withdrawn, the electrolyte levels may vary, but have been reported in the following ranges [PDF]:

• sodium 0.7-0.9 mEq/L
• potassium 35-82 mEq/L
• glucose 1.2-2.8 grams/L
• calcium 5-17 mEq/L
• magnesium 5-25 mEq/L

There are also small amounts of amino acids, vitamins and minerals present. Compared to a beverage like Gatorade, there’s more potassium, and less sodium and sugar. And unlike Gatorade, coconut has even been directly injected into veins.

Rehydration

As effective as water

The science of treating dehydration has been well evaluated – particularly in the treatment of diarrhea. In most cases, mild diarrhea is a bother. Severe, sustained diarrhea, however, particularly in children, can become life threatening without treatment. Diarrhea kills millions in the third world each year, mainly children under the age of 5. The treatment is simple, but not always available. The World Health Organization’s Oral Rehydration Solution (ORS), which is 6 level teaspoons of sugar and 1/2 level teaspoon of salt dissolved in 1 litre of water, is the considered optimal ratio of sugar and salt to support rehydration. Why sugar and salt in the water? It’s because plain water is not absorbed as well as a solution of salt and sugar. The journal The Lancet called this discovery “potentially the most important medical advance of this century.” The concentration of sugar and sodium will impact on how effectively a beverage will hydrate. How effectively are do the concentrations in a coconut support rehydration? Poorly. Coconut water appears to be inferior for hydration caused by diarrhea. Its electrolyte levels are inadequate – there’s not enough sodium.

So is this information relevant to exercise-induced dehydration? Here there have been some preliminary studies as well. I found three relevant to the question.

• Coconut water was compared to a carbohydrate/electrolye beverage, and plain water, in subjects who exercised in the heat. After exercise subjects drank 120% of their fluid loss. There was no significant difference in the amount of hydration achieved, electrolyte levels, or fluid balance.
• Another study compared plain water, sports drink, coconut water, and sodium-enriched coconut water. Again, subjects exercised in the heat and then rehydrated with 120% of their fluid losses. Here, sports drink and both coconut waters rehydrated to a similar extent and all were slightly superior to water. The sodium-enriched coconut water was reported as better tolerated than other beverages.
• Finally, in an article just published, Comparison of coconut water and a carbohydrate-electrolyte sport drink on measures of hydration and physical performance in exercise-trained men, coconut water was compared with sports drink and plain water, following exercise-induced dehydration. Yet again, no differences were noted between groups.

So what’s best?

There’s no convincing evidence to suggest that coconut water is a measurably superior beverage for hydration. Coconut water has no magical properties which make it more effective or superior than water or sports drinks when rehydrating. Having said that, many love the taste of coconut water. As a low calorie option, it may be preferred by some over sports drinks with more carbohydrate. Or you can stick with zero-calorie water, and eat something to replenish your electrolytes. Coconut water, or any other beverage, it doesn’t seem to matter for hydration.

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As longtime readers may know, I have a relative that’s a holistic nutritionist, and she sometimes touts the supposed benefits of certain foods to members of our family. One of these is coconut oil, which, so we’ve been told, is one of the healthiest things we can eat.

Now I try to stay out of these conversations unless asked directly what I think. But some time ago my mother wanted my opinion on what our relative was saying, and I told her that I was skeptical since coconut oil is very high in saturated fats, but admitted I hadn’t really looked closely at it. Fast forward a year or so and Mom sends me this for a followup opinion:

Where, oh where to begin? It’s pretty much a textbook case of the credulous reporting we frequently see with alt-med, and my initial inclination was to simply write “bollocks” in the reply email and have done with it. But instead, I decided that – since I was asked directly for my opinion — it might be of more value to explain the things about this video that made me skeptical, while also speaking directly to what the research says. Having done so (and received positive feedback from Mom for it), I thought it might also be worth sharing with our readers here.

Warning Sign #1: Who’s Selling What To Whom?

Mary Newport, the woman they spend Act 1 of the story interviewing, experimented on her husband. Let’s forget the ethics of this for a moment — we’ll give her the benefit of the doubt and assume she’s a loving wife using her medical training genuinely to try to help her husband. Let’s instead focus on her ostensibly positive results.

Normally, when researchers see something promising, they try to replicate and improve the quality of their findings. They add rigorous controls to avoid bias, and increase the sample size to reduce the impact of randomness on the results and ensure that they’re significant. In short, they try to validate that the effect they’re seeing is not a fluke, and is actually related to the putative cause.

But Mary Newport didn’t do any of this. Instead, she wrote a book. Her “evidence” is in the letters that those who purchased her book sent her. Which are merely more uncontrolled, unscientific anecdotes no more valuable than the first.

Warning Sign #2: That Slippery Elipsis…

But hold on – Act 2 of the story focuses on researchers in the UK doing just this kind of research, doesn’t it? Well, not quite -– they’re not researching coconut oil at all, but rather a ketone ester that’s 10x more powerful. The narrator (not the researchers) suggest that coconut oil is an acceptable substitute until this ester is commercially available, but why should we assume a lower-powered version will work? That’s a pretty big jump. In my email to Mom, I asked her whether she thought 1/10th of her prescription dosage would work for her.

Warning Sign #3 – Special Pleading

The researchers go on to admit that their findings are preliminary, and that what they really need is money for research. In doing so, they wheel out the tired trope about their being no money for research in natural remedies because no one can profit from it.

This is pure nonsense. As I showed in an article last year, natural health products are an $85B industry that can certainly afford to fund research. More to the point, if there were a promising cure for Alzheimer’s, government research agencies facing an aging population and rising healthcare costs would be lining up to fund it. In the US alone, the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine (NCCAM) has spent $1.4B of public money researching natural health products, and continues to do so despite not really finding much of value so far.

Warning Sign #4 – Bucking the Consensus

Coconut oil is almost entirely saturated fat – one ounce has 24g of sat fat, or 120% of your RDA. Now it’s true, as they suggest, that saturated fat isn’t as bad for you as a trans fat, but it’s also a false dichotomy. Saturated fats raise LDL (bad cholesterol). It seems extremely unlikely that coconut oil is the magic oil that defies the behavior of every other saturated fat. Not impossible mind you, but I’d want to see evidence as strong as the consensus view that saturated fats are bad for you before accepting the claim, and I’m not seeing that laid out in the piece.

Warning Sign #5 – The Wonder Food

This is the point that Mom most responded to. Just look at the list of things coconut oil is also allegedly good for in addition to Alzheimer’s: Parkinson’s, ALS, Epilepsy, Dementia, Schizophrenia, Autism, Herpes and HIV. If this were true, they’d be clearing out Orange County to plant coconut groves.

That is if THEY weren’t in the pocket of Big Pharma, which just wants to keep us sick. Wake up Sheeple!

So my skeptical bells are ringing, but…

What about the evidence? I’d answer that, if only I could find any. I did a Pubmed search on the researcher in Act 2 of the story, and she’s published only one study on the effects of esters on the brain…of rats, not humans.
Then I searched for research connecting coconut oil and Alzheimer’s, and got zero results.

So I checked NCCAM for any articles related to coconut oil and found one reference, which found no association between cognitive decline and saturated fats.

Finally, I checked the skeptical search engine to see if any science bloggers had taken a look at the evidence. Orac at Respectful Insolence refers to making similar attempts to find any evidence on this topic, equally unsuccessfully. In another article, Steve Novella has the same experience over at his Neurologica blog. At least it’s not just me.

So what do we take away from all this? That coconut oil is simply the latest health fad to feature that lethal combination of overblown claims and extremely thin science. That there’s no magic food, despite the marketing hype to the contrary. That our best defense is our ability to pick up on the warning signs that something’s amiss, which hopefully prods us to look at the actual evidence or lack thereof. And that every once in a while, skeptics can actually help someone spot those warning signs and question the bogus claims — even if that someone is only their Mom.

Image courtesy of TigerPuppala via Flickr under Creative Commons.

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After about an hour of bringing us up to speed on who King was and the beliefs of the Aetherius Society, Jaggard got into the “irrefutable evidence”. Alas, it was nothing like an alien body or parts of a saucer. Jaggard admits he believes the existence of alien-piloted UFOs is a given. Me, I’m not so sure. Anyway, his evidence was, basically, three anecdotes. For anyone who follows Michael Horn, Billy Meier‘s acoly … errr authorized American media representative, this kind of so-called evidence is familiar. It runs like this: George King is on record for knowing x before anyone else could have possibly known. Since King could not have gotten x from any conventional terrestrial source, it could only have come from the Cosmic Intelligences. (Hi, Michael. Welcome to the comments section!)

Anecdote 1: The Russian Incident

On April 18, 1958, an alien called Mars Sector 6 informed King that there was a nuclear accident in the Soviet Union and hundreds of people were killed. It would have been worse but the aliens used some kind of technology to suck up large amounts of the radiation (enough to kill 17 million people). No one but those in the Soviet Union knew about the accident. The world did not find out until Zhores Medvedev defected to the west and exposed the story in the New Scientist in 1976. As it turns out in September of 1957 there was a nuclear accident in the Soviet Urals. How could King have known about something the world was clueless about until a couple decades later?

In laying out this evidence, Jaggard appeared to be reading the “prediction” (well, it’s technically a revelation of something that happened in the past) from King’s book You Are Responsible! I have a copy before me and found the section he appeared to be reading from. The most obvious problem is the prediction gives no specifics. No dates, times, or locations. The USSR is (or I should say “was”) a pretty big place. Is getting a hit on “at some point the Soviets will have a nuclear accident or maybe have had one” really a remarkable hit? It’s a pretty safe bet the Soviets had a few nuclear disasters as they entered the atomic age.

The major problem is the New York Times and other papers carrying UP stories were abuzz on April 13-14, 1958 about a possible nuclear accident in the USSR:

Soviet Catastrophe Reported
Copenhagen, Denmark, April 13 UP — Berlingske Tidende, Denmark’s biggest newspaper, said today the recent Soviet nuclear tests had to be broken off because of a “catastrophic accident”. The newspaper, quoting information reaching Copenhagen through diplomatic channels from Moscow, did not define the nature of the reported accident, but said it caused radioactive fallout over the Soviet and many neighboring states to increase to the danger point.

I remind you King made his prediction April 18, 1958 (four or five days later). It seems plausible to me that King (or Mars Sector 6) was simply able to read the day’s headlines about such speculation. Did King get this information from an alien or newspapers? Hmmm.

Jaggard touched upon one backstop. Someone from the Aetherius Society showed Medvedev the original account and Jaggard claimed Medvedev claimed the report was stunningly accurate. Jaggard didn’t highlight what was so accurate about the report. We also have to assume Medvedev was quoted accurately. That’s not an assumption one makes in Ufology (or creationism or holocaust denial, et al.) Let me see the full quote. For example, the alien autopsy film proponents claimed a report by Kodak verified that authenticity of the film. Wow! But Kodak offered no such validation.

Oddly, Medvedev makes no mention in his New Scientist interview about the miraculous containment of massive amounts of radiation. Wouldn’t he have mentioned it then? I find it difficult to believe Medvedev would stamp the King claim as amazingly accurate with the claim about the massive release of radiation vacuumed up by space aliens present.

Anecdote 2: The Windscale Accident

In October of 1957, England’s first nuclear power plant (Windscale) had a fire. The government claimed the accident was not serious. King, however, claimed the Cosmic Intelligences told him (on October 29)  the government was not giving a true account of the accident. Documents released in 1989 showed the government, in fact, did not give a true account of the accident. The government’s 1957 secret report was prepared the day before King’s Cosmic Intelligences report.

In the late 1950s, the UK wanted the US to see it as a responsible nuclear partner. It did not want to seem like a nation that doesn’t know what it’s doing with nuclear technology. And it wanted access to US research instead of having to recreate it from the ground up. Of course the government wasn’t going to give a true account to the public and seem like it was an irresponsible nuclear partner. You don’t need to be in contact with all-seeing space aliens to suggest any government in any nuclear disaster, especially relating to a weapons program, isn’t going to tell the full story. Water is wet.

Jaggard, when laying out the evidence, noted people were reporting isotopes as far away as Australia and the radiation evidence was not jibing with the government report. Clearly there was already skepticism among the public. It sure seems to me King was merely echoing public skepticism. Would the British tabloid press not question the government account during the course of the accident? Would non-government scientists not go “well, if they’re detecting this amount of radiation in Australia then it’s an educated guess the disaster is worse than the government is letting on.”

A page here gives a couple transcripts of contemporary news reports. The Whitehaven News on October 11 reported some troubling findings. The paper reported there “…came disturbing reports from the monitoring vans which were touring the  district testing vegetation and air “.  This was 18 days before King’s supposed message from the Cosmic Intelligences.

It certainly sounds like there was enough alarming news to make anyone with a strong anti-nuclear stance consider the reality on the ground wasn’t matching the government account. So, like Anecdote 1, King could easily have been repeating what he read in the newspaper. No slam dunk here.

To further support this astounding non-claim, Jaggard noted the timing of King’s revelation and the government document seemed too close to be mere coincidence. King was only one day off. Unfortunately, Jaggard doesn’t consider how many degrees of freedom are involved in suggesting a “hit” is too improbable to be coincidence. If King came up with it three days before or a month after, would he still be calling this a hit? If the publication date of the document wasn’t a good match, maybe the date the government experts first convened the panel is a hit. Or when they adjourned is a hit. It’s very easy, retrospectively, to find any two data points that correlate in some loose fashion.

Anecdote 3: Chernobyl Disaster Predicted

Aetherius members charging a spiritual energy battery (from a BBC Documentary "Out Of This World")

In April 1986, King was ostensibly told by the Cosmic Intelligences to take some unprecedented action in preparation for a disaster. Jaggard did not make it clear what they were actually doing. They were doing something with an unnamed device for several days, apparently several days longer than they had ever done before. I suspect he was referring to “prayer batteries” adherents believe they can charge up with karma energy or something. Jaggard seemed to avoid getting into some of the manifestly sillier claims of adherents, like the prayer battery notion or that King flew in a space ship with Jesus (god was literally his co-pilot!) and defeated aquatic space aliens. The upshot is King claims he received the message five hours before the Chernobyl disaster (April 26). The USSR didn’t officially admit the disaster happened until April 28. How did King know some five hours before the disaster happened and a couple days before the official admission?

The argument here seems to be “We were doing something we’ve never done before and something unusual happened in the USSR. So our unusual activity is evidence we knew that disaster was coming.”

Again, like Jaggard’s second anecdote, this is classic post-hoc reasoning. Something odd happened. So we look for something odd we might have done before, find something, and then make a connection. But we forget all the other times we were doing other odd things and nothing odd happened within some undefined space of time.

We also are asked to simply accept the truth of this account. Was this the first time they had run the machines for such a span of time? I don’t know. I don’t, for one, accept Scientology’s accounts of L. Ron Hubbard’s boyhood unquestionably. Perhaps this is all documented but if not properly documented, this claim is not irrefutable evidence. I need to take the word of someone with a vested interest.

Finally, the times don’t add up. They started charging up prayer batteries (or started working some device) two days before the Soviet announcement (and the day before reports of radiation that many assumed at first was a Swedish nuclear accident). But, and maybe I heard this wrong, going more than a couple days had never been done before. So it seems they were not into their record activity until they knew about the disaster. Since they believed it would help, they’d keep it going. And, sure, doing something with this device five hours before the accident seems like a hit but Jaggard gave us no information how often they “topped up” this prayer battery (assuming that was the unidentified gadget). Do they do it every other day? Every week at a regular schedule? I need a lot more information before I’m willing to call it a “hit”.

Summing Up the Evidence

So, what do we have? Three stories and all lacking prospective specifics. Lots of 20/20 hindsight claims and information that could have simply been known reading a newspaper. Combine this with what I described in part 1 (claims that don’t jibe with scientific evidence and space men stories that strongly parallel popular works of fiction), well, I see nothing irrefutable. There are many plausible explanations King followers have not considered or eliminated as sources of King’s knowledge.

His Master’s Voice

Near the end of the talk, Jaggard let us listen to a recording of one of the Cosmic Intelligences. I think it was supposed to be Aetherius, kind of the Gandalf the White of the space people. Technically it wasn’t Aetherius’s voice itself. It was King channeling Aetherius. The Aetherius Society has several archives of these recordings. Jaggard claimed the BBC had listened to several samples over the years and concluded the voice remained the same, something that was impossible with the normal human voice. That rings true. I used to do a comedy radio show back in the late 1980s when I was in my twenties. I still have the tapes. My voice is certainly different then as compared to my podcast voice at forty five. However, did the BBC really make that claim? I’d like to see the BBC’s full report. If you tell me you have a unicorn in your backyard, I might not just take your word for it…

Even if the BBC claim is accurate, one needs to have the BBC’s methodology peer reviewed. As well, the claim a voice can’t remain the same over years might be true for someone speaking in their own voice. King might just be doing a voice, like a comedian might do an impression of Christopher Walken. If you’re purposely trying to do a voice that’s not your own, can you be reasonably consistent over the years? Did Mel Blanc’s Bugs Bunny voice change over the fifty years he did it?

The recording itself was, charitably, painful to listen to. I’m rather glad King’s adherents have never adopted Aetherius’s staccato speech pattern. You can listen to a sample via this Youtube video (at the 8 minute mark). This is not the sample we were allowed to listen to. However, in the sample we listened to I noticed one thing. Aetherius kept referring to earth people as “Terrans”. If you recall from part 1, Jaggard stressed the space parliament wasn’t quite a space parliament. That was just a term the Cosmic Intelligences were using so King might have a better understanding; language he was familiar with. But now the space aliens were using “Terrans” instead of “Earthlings” or “humans”. Who calls themselves Terrans? Who calls Earth “Terra”? You would expect someone trying to sound space alien-y to refer to humans as Terrans and to Earth as Terra. It reminded me of a quip the cast of Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe made a long time ago. They were watching someone who claimed to channel the spirit of an Indian warrior. The channeler sounded just like an American except every now and then she’d throw in namaste just to sound Indian.

Putting the Lack of Evidence Aside

What do these Aetherius Society people do? They seem entirely pleasant. Not the stereotypical Heaven’s Gaters. Jaggard stressed several times that their group’s philosophy was about service to your fellow human beings. Service to family isn’t enough. You need to help your neighbor shovel his drive way or help a homeless person. Also the message was one about deep personal responsibility. An evil cabal isn’t out to harsh your life. Your failings are frequently your own. Success is going to be a lot of hard work and a lot of self-sacrifice.

Jaggard wasn’t offering the Shamwow of new age spiritualism. I really liked him. I think he’s found a belief system to anchor his life. Atheists and Christians find belief systems as well and do just as fine. That does not argue for the truth of the underlying claims. That an ancient civilization’s calendar works well is not evidence its idea that gods move the planets is true.

Terry notes: “I have always wondered why religionists will jeopardize a perfectly good message by trying to prove something totally unrelated and usually unnecessary about their faith. It’s as if they’re implying their values are not persuasive on their own, therefore they must compel us to submit via use of proofs.”

I don’t particularly agree with the rationalizations he marshals to justify his life philosophy of service. There’s some good advice behind Jaggard’s spiritual dress. Sometimes you need to take a long, hard look at yourself in the mirror. Your socks might need a long way to pull up. But you don’t need space men to tell you that.

And I’m sure after the Fukushima disaster, any kind of consciousness raising group that combines an anti-nuclear stance with yoga has some game with the kids. That is, if the kids can overlook the old-school sci fi Venusian hokum…

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Aetherius Society's Logo

My best friend Terry has, for the want of something to occupy his time, decided to become the leading expert on the Betty and Barney Hill UFO abduction case. I keep promising the listeners of my Conspiracy Skeptic podcast that I’m going to have him on as a guest and blow the lid off the claims of many of the prominent Ufologist who have built careers around the idea the Hill Case is a slam dunk for Ufology. (Note, this “blow the lid off” claim is my hyperbole, not Terry’s.) Terry is “still working on it”. Every time he thinks he’s got the full skinny he discovers the onion has another layer. Terry is a perfectionist. I have learned in my 30+ years of friendship with him it’s impossible to rush him. Genius eventually tumbles out of his brain.

The Hill case is usually described as the first UFO abduction case and created the template for what is consider legitimate features of the abduction mythos: grey aliens, invasive medical experiments, and missing time. The 50th anniversary of the Hill case actually passed in September 2011 with little fanfare. This was not too surprising as much of North American culture was concerned with the 10th anniversary of a demonstrably real and more terrifying event that took place on Sept 11, 2001.

Contactees

Previous to the rise of the UFO abduction myth, 1950s Ufology was populated with “contactees”. Contactees were people who claimed to have been contacted by space aliens and were usually given a very contemporaneous message. The 1950s was the start of the Cold War and to many in the West, it seemed a war the godless Soviets were winning. The Soviets seemed to be winning in the race to space and in nuclear weapons development. No doubt many people would take solace in a belief that benevolent space aliens were up there, standing ready to enforce the peaceful use of space and save us all from nuclear madness.

Many skeptics are probably vaguely familiar with the contactee movement via the seminal work on cults and cognitive dissonance called When Prophecy Fails. A UFO cult formed around a contactee who predicted the end of the world on a specific date. When Prophecy Fails documents what happens to the members when, as the researchers suspected, the world didn’t end. How did they rationalize it?

One of the biggest names in the contactee movement was American George Adamski. Adamski had some pretty far out claims:

1) In 1952, a space alien from Venus contacted Adamski and warned him about the dangers of nuclear war.

2) Adamski was taken on a UFO and given a tour of the solar system.

3) People were being reincarnated onto other planets, notably Venus.

Remember this list because it’s going to sound familiar shortly.

The idea that planets within our solar system support advanced intelligent life seems quaint today. We know Venus is hot enough to melt lead and is not a jungle planet. Mars is not a Dune-like world with sword-wielding Amazons riding lizards. But in the 1950s, intelligent life within our solar system was a feature of sci fi literature, TV shows, and movies. The contactee movement well parroted it.

Ufology has largely moved beyond the contactee movement, probably somewhat embarrassed by their unsophisticated claims later proven false by real space exploration. Adamski today is the poster child for the silliness of the times. Modern contactees are largely shunned by “serious” Ufologists. Even as early as 1965, Ufologists Jacques Vallee commented (according to wiki) “No serious investigator has ever been very worried by the claims of the ‘contactees’.”

Surely, no one adheres to these 1950s contactee myths today?

UK Contactee George King

Well, yes. Yes, people still do. My friend Terry pointed out to me an alternative Toronto bookstore called Origo Books was hosting on January 21, 2012 a talk by Allan Jaggard called “A True UFO Contactee”. It was subtitled “The Irrefutable Evidence of the Claims of Dr. George King”. Not many people on this side of the pond have ever heard of King. The wiki page on contactees doesn’t feature King beyond merely listing him among dozens of claimants. King has fallen so far off the skeptical radar, there’s little online skeptical content about him. Randi’s skeptical dictionary seems to be the main source, offering a few brief passages on him and his Aetherius Society.

Although George King is not a ready name on the lips of many skeptics, Terry is what record collectors would call a “completionist” and he had heard of him. Terry suggested we attend the lecture. It could be interesting. The lecture promised:

“…overwhelming irrefutable evidence that will show to any logical, open‐minded thinker, that the claims of this true cosmic channel are valid and of the utmost importance to all upon Earth.”

Proof! Irrefutable evidence! Sounded like a fine way to spend a Saturday afternoon in January. I was also particularly intrigued to meet someone who, in this day and age, actually still believes there’s an advanced civilization on Venus. My own bias had me imagining someone not unlike Mork & Mindy‘s Exidor. (Exidor, like so many UFO contactees of the 1950s, was hung up on the notion of Venusian saviors.)

The Talk

Speaker Allan Jaggard in "the loft" at Origo Books

Jaggard turned out not to be a guy in a dirty cassock. Jaggard, one of the founding members of the Toronto Aetherius Society, was an extremely dapper man in his mid-fifties. Jaggard wore a nicely tailored dark suit, blue shirt, and a perfectly coordinated tie. Your classic Harry Rosen man. George Hrab could take sartorial lessons from him. His public persona was as polished and pleasing as his dress. The talk ran about 3 hours with a short break. If this had been a university night course, it would have been agony but Jaggard was such an engaging speaker one barely noticed the passage of time.

The talk began with a history of King and the beliefs of the Aetherius Society. King, now deceased, was a British yoga practitioner back in the 1950s and a pacifist during World War 2. Yoga today might be all the rage but I’m sure in the 1950s it was considered as alien as, well, space aliens. Jaggard alleged that King had achieved such an advanced yogic state that he (and he alone) was worthy of being contacted by “Cosmic Intelligences”. (This is a ready-made counter to the common objection “why are contactees housewives and farmers and not Einstein?” Wouldn’t Einstein better understand an alien message and reach more people instantly? Clearly the answer is Einstein just needed to spend more time on a yoga mat instead of in front of a blackboard.)

In 1954, the Cosmic Intelligences contacted King. These Cosmic Intelligences are ostensibly aliens from Mars and Venus who spoke to King telepathically. The Cosmic Intelligences represent a cosmic parliament and warned him about the dangers of nuclear energy. Humans can reincarnate onto other planets in our solar system, like Venus. And, BTW, Jesus was from Venus. Jaggard made a side note that the “parliament” concept might sound kind of funny but the space aliens were just trying to explain things to King in language he might understand, being he was British. This aside will become relevant in part 2.

Reviewing the above, we can see King and Adamski both had the same message: nuclear energy is bad, Venusian reincarnation, and both claimed to have been flown around the solar system on space ships. Adamski’s contactee story, however, preceded King’s by two years (1952 vs 1954). Both had a message contemporaneous with the times and, oddly, the plot of The Day the Earth Stood Still which came out in 1951. My friend Terry noted another similarity with The Day the Earth Stood Still. During the talk Jaggard read a prophesy about the Aetherius Society messiah who will replace the late King. We would recognize him, partially, by his dress. He would wear “a single garment of the type now known to you. His shoes will be soft-topped, yet not made of the skin of animals.”

“Oh, exactly what Klaatu wears in the movie,” quipped Terry.

I came to the talk hoping to point out to Jaggard we’ve actually been to Mars and Venus with landers and found conditions quite inhospitable to humanoid life. It was naive of me to think Jaggard had never heard of this objection before. Yes, Jesus was from Venus. Yes, there’s intelligent life on Venus. Yes, Venus has a poisonous crushing atmosphere. But these are not corporeal beings. They’re kind of spirit beings, they live on a different “vibrational” plane of existence. I guess. But it made me wonder was that King’s original claim or was that a retcon to adapt knowledge gained from landers? Examining King’s book You Are Responsible! (1961) where he records many supposed conversations with these Martians and Venusians we see passages like:

“What is the temperature of those on Venus who use a physical body?”

“On Venus…some of our younger ones eat and drink the juice from certain berries and the juice that’s given off by certain trees.”

That sounds to me like King believed there were beings on Venus in physical bodies and there were trees and other plant life.

King also claims to have traveled to Mars and described buildings, “longitudinal vegetation belts”, and Martian soil to be radioactive. As best I can tell, no lander has found radioactive regolith. And my good friend and semi-regular Conspiracy Skeptic guest Stuart Robbins has spent over five years staring at high resolution images of Mars and he’s never mentioned seeing vegetation. Or buildings.

I suggest King never went to Mars.

To be fair, the book does make a lot of references about the aliens being able to acquire new bodies as needed for the local conditions so there is a textual basis for claiming the aliens are in some kind of spirit form and ostensibly not subject to rather deplorable living conditions on Venus. But the book does seem to make it pretty clear there are trees on Venus.

Regarding the “vibrational plane” concept, Jaggard pulled out the Quantum Mechanics gambit to support it. The audience, mostly your energy healer types, nodded in agreement. For those still skeptical, Jaggard had a quip that made me nearly fall out of my chair.

“When you die, what does a scientist say? A scientist says you go to heaven! But you don’t!”

Really? Scientists say that?

The Asteroid Belt and Planet X

I really had to bite down hard on my tongue at the scientist quip. Remember: Don’t be a dick. And as a podcaster who doesn’t follow a script, I do realize when speaking freely with my guests I do say a lot of stupid things and make a lot of mistakes. Jaggard may not have actually meant scientists. He was answering an unexpected floor question and had to deviate a bit from his prepared talk.

But I did let out an audible “fah!” when Jaggard claimed humans came to earth from another planet that we destroyed with runaway nuclear technology. The planet was known as Maldek and became the asteroid belt after exploding. The idea that the asteroid belt was a destroyed planet (from a collision) was an early hypothesis about its origins but that hypothesis was abandoned as it is not supported by the evidence. The objects in the asteroid belt largely just accreted in place. The lines of evidence for this run:

1) The matter in the asteroid belt is about 4% of the moon’s mass. Nowhere near a planet’s size.

2) There’s not enough mass to have accreted into a planet.

3) The gravity from Jupiter prevents the matter from further accretion.

4) Asteroid chemistry is inconsistent with having once been part of a planet.

Jaggard claimed scientists have recovered material from the asteroid belt in the form of meteorites and have proven they came from a planet blown apart by a nuclear accident. He did not name the researchers.

Jaggard’s other astronomy claim was there’s a Planet X about five times the size of Earth in the solar system. He quoted a couple NASA scientists who claim data from Pioneer 10 and 11 and the irregularities in the orbits of Uranus and Neptune were evidence for a Planet X. I believe, he was quoting from news reports from 1987. Like the origin of the asteroid belt, Jaggard’s knowledge is out of date regarding the state of Planet X and the orbits of Neptune and Uranus. Measuring the mass of a distant planet isn’t easy. A small error in the mass can lead to incorrect orbits. The Voyager 2 mission eventually gave us a better measure of Neptune’s mass and therefore the orbits of Neptune and Uranus. This has been in the literature since 1993. Their orbits are fully explained . One does not have to invoke a Planet X.

Oddly enough, Jaggard didn’t seem to read the 1987 report correctly or the Reuters version he was using got its facts incorrect. He claims “Data from two US Pioneer Spacecraft point increasingly to the likelihood of an undiscovered 10th planet beyond the orbit of Jupiter.” According to the NYT article, “…two Pioneer spacecraft traveling far beyond the known planets have failed to find any evidence to support speculation that a 10th planet is out there somewhere…” The rest of the NYT article continues explaining how there could still be a Planet X despite a lack of confirming Pioneer data.

Jaggard also suggested we could not see this Planet X as it was in a strange orbit at a right angle to the solar plane. Since we can see the full 360 degrees of the sky from Earth, there’s no orbit where such a planet could remain hidden from optical telescopes, unless it were extremely far away. I was a bit confused about the significance of the Planet X comment although I think he was suggesting true Aetherius Society devotees will one day be reincarnated onto this planet.

After the talk I did get a chance to point out to Jaggard his astronomy seems to not have been updated in recent years. It was curiously redolent of 1950s ideas of the solar system. Terry pointed out people in these things tend to find the scientific evidence they think confirms their belief but don’t seem to understand science revises knowledge as we learn more. They don’t periodically check to see if 30-year-old evidence is still accurate.

It reminds me of HIV denialists who point to some of the early disagreement over the origin of HIV (was it related to a monkey virus or a sheep virus?) as evidence scientists are so in the dark about HIV origins that there’s a good chance it doesn’t exist. They don’t consider findings over the last quarter century have eliminated the disagreement.

To the asteroid belt claim, Jaggard suggested some scientists disagree with the current theory. He didn’t supply any names and I would not expect him to come so prepared. He might have been referring to the work of the late Canadian astronomer Michael Ovenden who hypothesized this in 1972. Ovenden’s idea hasn’t gained any traction in forty years. There appears to be no controversy about this among scientists. Sorry, it was never a planet.

A Maldeki...errr Mysterian from an astroid belt planet destroyed by nuclear weapons

Terry pointed out an interesting parallel between King’s Maldek claim and a 1957 Japanese sci fi movie called The Mysterians. The movie is about aliens who came from a planet that was in the current asteroid belt. Get this. The planet was destroyed by nuclear weapons! Familiar? According to this source, the Maldek “revelation” was transmitted to King on April 7, 1960. The Mysterians had its US release May 1959. I have no information if this movie had a UK release or whether or not King was in the USA or if King ever heard of this movie via press or letters from an American follower. But as Jaggard was given to say a few times, isn’t that an interesting coincidence? Hmmm.

To the Planet X claim he noted it wasn’t really a central tenet of Aetherius Society beliefs. I suggested to him if he gave the talk again, astronomy buffs might turn out (since he does claim to offer proof of UFOs). If he’s getting some basic astronomy wrong, they’re going to mentally shut down. Our conversation was friendly. Jaggard did not seem offended or taken aback by my pointing out he was wrong.

Okay, this is getting long. I’m going to break this into two parts. Next installment we’ll get into the irrefutable evidence.

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5. Deepak Chopra comes to Toronto

Hey there skeptifans. Here are the media Fails and Wins you sent me this week.

I like my ramen full of MSG and curly as Justin Timberlake's 90's hair.

How can I relieve my baby’s teething pain?
This doctor recommends homeopathic drops for teething pain, claiming many babies have benefited from them but more studies need to be done. How many homeopathy studies are enough? There are hundreds of them already, and the ones that are properly blinded show no effect beyond placebo. Why should we think that teething drops would work when all other homeopathic treatments tested have failed?

Jyuban: Where ramen purists get their fill
Art sent in this Fail from the Globe and Mail. This restaurant reviewer claims you can get expensive ramen that is “chemical free”. Don’t even get me started on how meaningless that term is. The funniest part of the article is where the author seems to say that she prefers cheap MSG ramen to this stuff, but she KNOWS this ramen is better and the problem is she’s become addicted to the taste of chemicals. It couldn’t possibly be the fact that MSG is freaking delicious. Anyways, if you’d like to drop $40 on a meal that I usually get out of a $0.69 packet, click the link to read more.

Deepak Chopra yoga centre opens in Vancouver
Vancouver loves its yoga and its woo. Now Deepok Chopra is putting his name on a centre that will provide both. This article pulls out terms like “healing arts”, “spiritual laws” and “Chopra wellness”. With phrases like that, who needs evidence?

The Truth About Epidurals
Anna sent in this Win from Slate about epidurals. The author presents some of the common claims from natural birth proponents and puts them up against the hard evidence. She thoughtfully reviews the available research, citing gaps in our knowledge and the difficulties with doing ethical studies in this area.

Did you spot a media Fail or Win? Send it to me at links@skepticnorth.com.

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While doing some digging into the quackery of a local acupuncturist, I came across a sentiment that I found more than usually appalling. In her story of why she became an acupuncturist, she tells a melodramatic tale about a positive Pap smear test result that changed her life*. There’s all the usual makings of an natural health anecdote, with convoluted tales about her life being out of balance and her needing to take control of her own health – all pretty par for the course. However, what dropped my jaw was this paragraph:

My research about cervical cancer at the time told me it was very rare and that it occurred most often in women who had multiple sexual partners, who also had multiple sexual partners. In other words, the nurse said, it’s mainly a disease of prostitutes.
Well, I said, “That’s not me!”

Although my gut instinct was horror that she would imply that women with cervical cancer are prostitutes or they deserve their illness, I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. Maybe she was simply recounting what this extraordinarily judgmental nurse had told her. Maybe she wasn’t actually implying that only whores** get cervical cancer as some sort of retribution for their immoral behaviour. (Though in my head I couldn’t help wonder if she also feels that AIDS is a “gay disease.”)
Or maybe she totally was. I watched her accompanying video, which basically repeats the information on the website for those of us too lazy to read.

So immediately I fell into research. And what I found out is that there’s a very specific profile of a person with cervical cancer. That person usually has many sexual partners. She’s very promiscuous. And her partners, in turn, also have very many different partners. What is really came down to was a description of a prostitute. And I knew that wasn’t me.

Considering this “advice” is coming from someone who is legally allowed to call themselves a doctor (of acupuncture) in the province of Alberta, I think these claims are worth examining.

1. Cervical cancer is rare
2. Cervical cancer happens to only very specific types of people.
3. Promiscuity or prostitution is necessary to develop cervical cancer.

First though, a few notes on cervical cancer.

What is cervical cancer?

The cervix is the lower part of the uterus that connects the uterus to the vagina. Cervical cancer occurs when some cells become abnormal and start to proliferate. However, not all abnormal cells will become cancer – many will die because they are too abnormal. Others will not be abnormal enough that they grow and divide out of control. The purpose of a Pap smear, where a doctor takes a sampling of cells from the cervix to be examined via microscope, is to detect these early abnormalities. Weird cells can happen for a ton of reasons, but when they do they are called dysplasia. Dysplasia ranges from “a little weird but will likely not cause issues” all the way to “not looking anything like they should and almost certain to become cancerous.” Most positive Pap tests are not actually cancer. The most common result is classified as Atypical Squamous Cells of Undetermined Significance (ASCUS). These cells only might be dysplastic and so they will ask you to come back in a few months for a repeat Pap before they do anything. However, screening for cervical cancer is extremely important, as it has few clear signs or symptoms (heavy periods and back pain could be anything or nothing) and without early detection has high rates of death. In 2004, the five year relative survival rate of Canadian women with cervical cancer as 74% – in other words, a quarter of women will die within 5 years of receiving a diagnosis of cervical cancer. Fortunately, this is a huge drop in mortality since the introduction of the Pap test, and the number continues to fall as provinces aggressively promote screening to groups of women who are less likely to get regular Paps.

Is cervical cancer rare?

There are many way to answer this question, but it’s easiest to just say… no. It’s not. Cervical cancer is the 3rd most common type of cancer worldwide, accounting for 10% of all cancers. In Canada, it is less common, ranking back in 12th, although it is still in the top three cancer diagnoses for women between the ages of 20-49. In 2011, there were approximately 1,300 new cases of cervical cancer in Canada, and 350 deaths. 1 in 150 women is expected to develop cervical cancer over a lifetime. In other words, cervical cancer is about as rare as some estimates of autism spectrum disorders.
In any case, although “rare” in the context of disease prevalence doesn’t have an official definition, Health Canada policy indicates it considers rare to be diseases that affect fewer than 1 in 1000 people. It’s also important to remember that Pap tests allow us to catch things before they become cervical cancer, and approximately 2% of all Pap tests are positive. Cervical cancer, then, is not rare.

Does cervical cancer only happen to certain types of people?

Cervical cancer only affects people who have cervices, so I suppose that’s a type.
What is implied by the “certain type” comment, however, is the association of cervical cancer with infection by sexually transmitted human papilloma virus (HPV). Some types of HPV can infect the cells of the cervix and can cause the cells to behave oddly, which can send them down the path to becoming dysplastic or even cancerous. Of course, only promiscuous women and prostitutes get HPV, right?

Well, barring the outrageous slut shaming which I cannot even begin to discuss here, it’s important to note that 70% of all sexually active Canadians will exposed to HPV over a lifetime. 70%! Even condoms are not fully protective since HPV can spread via any skin-to-skin contact. Plus, HPV infection is almost entirely asymptomatic, and there is no general screening test to look for it. In other words, for most people, until you are diagnosed with cervical cancer, you have absolutely no way of knowing if you or your partner are positive for HPV. Only in a world of strict, puritanical monogamy is this a disease for prostitutes and the promiscuous, and given that 70% of women are exposed, I think it’s fair to say that such an expectation is profoundly unrealistic. Either that, or 70% of Canadian women are whores! What a charming sentiment.

Realistically, if you want to prevent cervical cancer, then you should be advocating for the use of the HPV vaccines, which protect against many types of aggressive HPV infection and is now approved for males, as well as females. Maybe, if there is enough uptake in the community, we can dramatically reduce the rates of cervical cancer so that it is a rare thing.

Do only promiscuous women develop cervical cancer?

The ridiculous assertion that cervical cancer only happens to “promiscuous” women works on the assumption that HPV is the only cause of cervical cancer. This is also not entirely true. Smoking, for example, doubles your risk of cervical cancer. Other things that put you at risk for cervical cancer include taking immunosuppressants (people with organ transplants or auto-immune diseases), the use of oral contraceptives, giving birth to many children, or having taken a synthetic estrogen called diethylstilbestrol to prevent miscarriage, or being the daughter of a woman who had taken diethylstilbestrol. There also may be a genetic component. And, of course, even if all of these happen through an HPV-mediated mechanism, you cannot control whether your partner has ever had other partners in the past (or may have them in the future).

On another level, this sort of attitude is profoundly damaging since it blames the individual with the disease. Women will have portions of their cervix removed, and may even be going through chemotherapy and radiation. They are facing the possibility of infertility. They are dealing with a potentially life threatening illness that they in no way invited into their body, particularly since there was no way for them to know the HPV status of their sexual partner(s), and furthermore, HPV is not necessarily the cause. To call them prostitutes simply for being sexually active is degrading, insulting, and incredibly cruel, to say nothing of being profoundly hypocritical.So, I guess we can say there is a type of person who doesn’t get cervical cancer: the type that never has sexual contact of any kind, never smokes, never requires an immunosuppressive drug, and isn’t born predisposed to it.

Even if we can blame HPV solely for the development of cervical cancer, to place blame squarely on the women who have it is to point a finger at just one piece in a larger puzzle. For the purposes of sexually transmitted infections, you are having sexual contact with every sexual partner your partner has ever had. A woman could be as chaste as they come until her traditional one-man-one-woman marriage and only have sex for procreation, and still contract HPV because her husband had sexual contact (with or without penetration, with or without protection!) with someone who was infected in the past.

Oh, that whore, having sex with her husband and having multiple children. When will she ever learn?

What’s her professional recommendation?

I continued my annual PAP tests for a few years after that. But since I no longer have a conventional medical doctor for many years now, I can say that I don’t need one. I don’t do PAP smears anymore. I don’t do anything that conjures up unnecessary fear. Instead I rely on what I know today, real preventive measures.

Yes, you eschew actual knowledge about your body because it’s scary. You hide from reality because it might hurt your feelings. I mean, you will almost certainly die if you do actually have untreated cervical cancer, but hey, at least you’ll die happy. Sorry, that’s not the word I was looking for. I believe what I was looking for was “in agony and far too soon.”

I sincerely hope nobody with cervical cancer ever has the misfortune of entering this woman’s office. Nobody deserves to die of cancer. If you can look into the eyes of a woman dying of cancer and tell her that she deserved it, well, let’s face it. You have bigger problems than false positive Pap smears.

Does not deserve this.

*I’ve had an abnormal pap test, and unlike Freak-out McMelodrama, I talked to my doctor about what it meant and why it wasn’t particularly concerning, but worth monitoring. It wasn’t a cancer scare, it was a “huh, that’s weird.” Maybe I’m just used to my body doing strange things, but I really can’t fathom using it as the impetus to quit my job and go to an unaccredited college to get a unrecognized 4 year TCMD (Traditional Chinese Medicine Doctorate) diploma for $40,000. If you’re worried about an abnormal Pap test, or just the potential to exposure to HPV and the risks of cervical cancer, talk to your family physician. And if they tell you that only prostitutes get HPV, find a new physician, and then talk to them.

**In case this is not perfectly clear, throughout the article, my use of the word “whore” is satirical and in no way passes judgement on the sexual activity of women. If you don’t know why you shouldn’t be calling women whores/prostitutes/sluts/tramps etc, check out this awesome video by a 13 year old girl who is better spoken and more informed than most 30 year olds.

Images from euthman and Offbeat Photography on flickr.

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Last January, Marketplace took on homeopathy, a frequent topic among skeptical circles — for good reason. This past Friday they looked into Cold-Fx with somewhat more mixed results.

On the positive side, they correctly point out a relatively major concern with natural health products (other than the glaring lack of evidence for efficacy) — poor regulatory practices. Although Health Canada has regulations in place to ensure the safety of products like Cold-Fx, there is no guarantee that the company will follow them or that Health Canada will be aware of infractions.

CBC explained that certain batches of Cold-Fx were contaminated with various bacteria, including E. coli in their liquid formulation. However, many of the contaminants they found were within safety regulation levels. They were nevertheless presented in a somewhat sensationalistic “guilt by association” manner, along with the E. coli issues. I felt this was an unnecessary tactic, as the poor conditions of the China-based manufacturing plant and the failure to report the E. coli issues to Health Canada in a timely manner were damning in themselves.

I also question the point of having Don Cherry on the show other than to get viewers; either because they are fans of him, or because they wanted to see him skewered. Yes, he was the major spokesperson for Cold-Fx, but they did not touch on the issue of the responsibilities (or not) of spokespersons (to my recollection) and he is not a drug expert nor has nothing to do with the production of or research for this product. However, he did demonstrate a common argument among users of products such as Cold-Fx, laying either his ignorance of confirmation bias or his Stockholm Syndrome out for all to see by stating that he didn’t care what scientists had to say, because he uses Cold-Fx regularly and dammit it works. This is despite evidence demonstrating no practical effect of taking this very expensive product. Another point missed by Marketplace, the majority of Canadians do not have Don Cherry’s disposable income to spend over $700 on the recommended dosage. A dosage that, by the way, isn’t supported in the literature.

Marketplace also highlighted another issue with the natural health industry — lack of regulation compliance regarding advertising and the complete lack of punishment for it even after warnings from Health Canada. The Cold-Fx packaging claims to stop a cold in its tracks and provide immediate relief, though it was never approved for that claim. When was this noticed? 5 years ago. When was it taken care of? Never. Cold-Fx reported that they were in the process of “phasing out” the packaging. Meanwhile, for the past 5 years consumers have been lied to with no punishment.

Though in general I found the episode to be very good at highlighting the lack of evidence, regulatory non-compliance, and the general risks of products such as Cold-Fx, I was turned off by the typical “confrontation TV” drama they included. In addition to speaking to Don Cherry, they cornered the co-founder of Cold-Fx outside a store to grill her with questions about the claims on the Cold-Fx packaging. What is anyone supposed to say in that situation? I’m sure others feel differently, but this is the kind of thing that makes me feel sympathy for the person being accosted, rather than highlighting whatever point is being made. I don’t think Marketplace honestly believed she had anything to do with the marketing language on the box of the product, it just makes “good TV” to have a camera crew and journalist shove a mic in someone’s face and have them be uncomfortable and cagey about it. But frankly I don’t see what value there is in saying “aha!” about a person who is completely surprised and unprepared to properly respond to some very direct and serious accusations about their employer.

Marketplace, when you have a good point, you don’t need to resort to that nonsense.

Also, I have a question for Marketplace: Where have you been for 10 years? Skeptics have been calling nonsense on Cold-Fx since forever ago and you’re just getting on this now? Nevertheless, thank you for taking this on and I hope to see more issues on Marketplace that highlight the supreme inadequacies of the consumer protection process in Canada, even when a company has been demonstrably in violation of regulations.

Note: Anyone who missed the original airing of the episode can watch the full episode here (only read the comments when properly fortified with the tinfoiliest of tinfoil hats).

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5. Ginseng: Made of Pure Magic?

Hey there skeptifans. Vancouver finally got some snow. And not just the light dusting that disappears an hour later, but the kind you can roll up into a snowman. This of course means that we are all trapped inside our houses because we don’t know how to operate in these wild conditions. Luckily the power is still running and the wifi is still…wifi-ing, so I am able to report the Fails and Wins you sent me this week.

What FX?
Several of you sent in this episode of CBC’s consumer protection show, Marketplace, and the related news article. Cold-FX is advertised as a remedy that you should take at the first sign of a cold or flu to “stop it in it’s tracks”. However, there is no evidence that the product can do this at all. Cold-FX has been shown to reduce the duration of colds by taking it every day for months. This would be rather expensive, and is not how the product is marketed. Kudos to Marketplace for exposing this, and the fact that many pharmacists are recommending it. You can watch the episode online here.

Friday the 13th: the superstitions and the skeptics
Martin sent in another Win from the CBC, this one is about the Friday the 13th myth. It’s a great article touching on origin theories for the myth and it includes some great quotes from skeptic Joe Nickell. I was really surprised to learn how much money is lost due to people not doing business on Friday the 13th. Check it out.

No evidence cell towers damage health, industry says
Frank sent in this story. St. John’s city counsel has denied a request by Bell to put up a new cell tower due to fear of health risks. Perhaps when wireless service begins to decline because the system gets too stressed, St. John’s city counsel will change their minds.

Did you spot a media Fail or Win? Send it to me at links@skepticnorth.com.

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A few weeks ago I talked about a strange hockey-skepticism convergence on Radio Freethinker. That convergence of course is about the goaltender for the Montreal Canadiens in particular.

Carry Price, the BC born goalie who currently plays for the Montreal Canadiens is a spokesperson for the homeopathic product Oscillococcinum produced by the Boiron company in Quebec.

Carry Price in net

What is Oscillococcinum you might ask? Some sort of herbal remedy or natural product? Nope. It’s homeopathy. And that means it’s a form of alternative medicine wherein the ingredients are diluted repeatedly in water over and over again transferring via supernatural means its “essence” into the memory of the water.

Oscillococcinum is in reality, duck liver. As explained by Dr. Joe Schwarcz on his blog and podcast “The Right Chemistry”

“Take the carcass of a duck and place 35 grams of its liver and 15 grams of its heart in a one liter bottle filled with a solution of pancreatic juice and glucose.  Wait forty days until the liver and heart have disintegrated and then dilute the solution to 100 liters.  Then take one liter of this solution and dilute it again to 100 liters.  Repeat this dilution process another 199 times, shaking the solution in a specific fashion each time.  Then take a small pellet of milk sugar and moisten it with the resulting solution.  Package the pellets in a box labeled as “Oscillococcinum” and market it to consumers who wish to prevent or treat the flu homeopathically. ”

As with all homeopathy the end result is you have a sugar pill that been exposed to a drop of water that supposedly contains this active ingredient but instead has been diluted so much (diluted to 200C—a ratio of one part duck offal to 100²⁰⁰ parts water)  that you would need to consume an amount of the remedy roughly 10³²¹ times to get one molecule of the active ingredient.  For reference the number of atoms in the observable universe is about 100⁴⁰

Boiron, the company that produces Oscillococcinum recently partnered with the Montreal Canadiens to promote their products.

One might ask what the harm could be with such an arrangement. Surely the Montreal Canadiens are not a medical organization and their endorsement of Boiron is not the same as a medical establishment. But if we consider the implications of what message this sends to the public, we see where this can become harmful.

As a professional sports team the Montreal Canadiens do have considerable sway on what is considered healthy or at least, what helps athletic performance. Consider how coaches for children base coaching methods on what is taught at the professional level. Or consider how athletic training equipment used by professional sports teams is likely to be used by local gyms and college teams. We are talking about organizations and athletes who are not just role models, but also measuring sticks that many in the public use for determining how to stay in physical shape and have a healthy lifestyle.

Boiron has also been in the skeptical news cycle recently. In California the company was being sued for fraud and unfair competition because of their homeopathic remedy Coldcalm, which contains no active ingredients.

The healing power of duck liver

Boiron was also threatening to sue an Italian blogger claiming his posts about Oscillococcinum are defamatory. However their attempts to intimidate this blogger backfired. It simply drew more attention to what he wrote and resulted in more criticism against Boiron for selling a product that contains no active ingredient. The situation eventually came to the attention of the British Medical Journal at which point, Boiron backed down and apologized.

Listeners may recall when I was on CBC’s consumer protection show CBC Marketplace where a group of Vancouver skeptics overdosed on homeopathy. The producers of Marketplace talked with Boiron but received some pretty unsatisfying answers. They suggested that the idea that not having an active ingredient was just the “point of view” of science, and not important.

The producers of Marketplace also asked us what we thought about the Montreal Canadiens partnering with Boiron, although that part didn’t make the final cut of the episode, we all agreed as Canuck fans, if the Montreal Canadiens wanted to be silly that was up to them. However they should be honest with their fans at least.

During our second homeopathic overdose in Vancouver, which we did during the international 10/23 event, I consumed a case of Oscillococcinum in under 10 minutes. Had I done that with medicine that contained an active ingredient I may not be here today.

One of the ways that alt-med has gained popularity is by infiltrating popular culture. A surprising amount of progress can be made if your products are mentioned on famous talk shows, endorsed by celebrities or appear in TV shows and movies. The current trend, as it seems to be, is to distance oneself from the reach of “Big Pharma” and embrace a more holistic health approach. What people are often not aware is that the holistic approach isn’t any more independent of big business than drug companies are.

“Big Placebo” as its come to be known in skeptical circles, is a massive multi-billion dollar empire that sells products to anyone willing to buy. Homeopathy is only one example of this. Consider the value of this endorsement deal Boiron has lined up with the Montreal Canadiens, one of the most valuable franchises in sports entertainment.

It’s obviously disappointed to see the Canadiens endorse this. I was somewhat surprised that I didn’t hear more from this from our skeptical community. Perhaps we can change that and make this a bit more front in centre when it comes to encouraging science based medicine in our popular culture.

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Hey there skeptifans. I hope you are surviving the winter. The new year is rung in with lots of new woo.

My calendar ends at December....why didn't the world end?

Cleanse-crazy
We all overeat during the holidays which prompts a lot of articles on losing holiday pounds, and where there is weight loss, there is woo. A slough of holiday detox articles came out this week. Here are a few of them.
Handled properly, a cleanse can encourage healthy eating
This is one epic Fail. They found a doctor who says that detoxing probably won’t hurt you too bad so he’s not too worried about it, and they take that and use it as an endorsement. The worse part is that it starts out by debunking the concept behind cleansing, but before the end of the article it manages to twist that back on itself as some sort of proof that it will help you lose weight. Really? Not eating for a week will cause you to drop a few pounds? Who knew. And of course, you won’t put them right back on when you go back to food.
Winter detox: How to incorporate cleanses into your social life
Are you on a cleanse, but still want to go to all of January’s dinner parties? Well, make sure the host will be offering boiled vegetables, or graciously offer to bring a bland, mushy dish of your own for everyone to pretend to enjoy. That’s what Gwyneth Paltrow would do.
Liver Detox
CBC Radio Morning Edition had a win of an interview about detox. Click the link to listen, the interview starts about 10mins in. Fatty foods do affect your liver, but herbal fasts aren’t the way to help it. A healthy, sensible diet is the way to go.

Does WiFi pose health risks?
Art spotted this link in Maclean’s. It’s been covered to death, but the media keeps beating this horse. I’m going to call this article a Win for methodically going through the existing research, but it does raises the fear that the risk could live in what we don’t know. This is always possible, but the same could be true of almost anything we do. Still, the article didn’t resort to hysterics, or quote “experts” who don’t base their opinions on hard evidence. This is nice to see.

What You Should Know About 2012: Answers to 13 Questions
Lorne sent in this link from Psychology Today that thoroughly debunks the 2012 end-of-the-world nonsense. Of course, this has already been debunked and we shouldn’t still be hearing about it, but that is too much to ask. The article goes into some really interesting history on the Mayan calendar, various people who have studied and interpreted it, and the source of the end of the world theory. It’s a very interesting read. Let’s just hope that 2012 will be the last year people will be obsessed with this. Somehow I think the end-times obsessed will still find a way to keep it going.

Did you spot a media Fail or Win? Send it to me at links@skepticnorth.com.

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