4BC with Meryl Dory, Chrys Stevenson and Myself!

Radio interview of Meryl Dory and Chrys Stevenson talking about vaccines and the Woodford Folk Festival. Yours truly makes an appearance. I was surprised when I tried calling the talkback line and got put straight thru.

Click here to download audio file

Enjoy,
Phil.

New Year’s Eve a woo promoting movie

Wifey and I just got back from seeing the new movie New Year’s Eve. As a movie it was boring. They spent the entire budget on the cast, which was extensive and included some of my faves. The plot was dull, the characters were not engaging, there were very few laughs and the ending was predictable.

For a skeptic though, the worst part was the shameless promotion of the Power Balance rubber bracelets. These things have been shown to be a scam of the worst kind and are a rip off.

Two characters in the film were show wearing them. Jensen, a famous musician played by Bon Jovi wore a black one, which kept flipping from inside out to right way out between scenes.  Elise, Jensen’s back up singer, played by Lea Michele wore a pink band.

The product placement in the film was not even subtle. At one point Elise is seen twisting the band in frustration, complete with close up showing the brand name clearly.  Later, her beau retrieves the band and returns it to her glass slipper style; complete with another close up.  Throughout the movie the bands are clearly visible.

Much to the annoyance of Wifey, I sat thru the entire credits to the very end to see if there was a statement of endorsement. Nothing was mentioned.

Once I noticed the bracelets, I did watch for other product placement. The only other obvious one was for another Warner Bros Film, Sherlock Holmes in the form of a Times Square bill board in one scene.

I have no issue with product placement if it feels natural and does not distract from the film. This film failed. It probably would not bother me so much if the product was ethical and the film was otherwise good; no such luck.

Bottom line, go see another movie.

UPDATE:
I tweeted about this and included @powerbalance. They replied:

This company sells a fraudulent product, should we believe them?

Moncktonation - a new word for skeptics

For a while I have been thinking about the dishonesty of some of the enemies of rational thinking, including climate “sceptics”, homeopaths and the like.

All of these types of people engage in a variety of dishonest behaviors. They cherry pick data, quote out of context, use anecdote instead of evidence and so on. Some of them outright lie.

I have been tweeting this frustration and have been looking for the word that best describes this behavior. I had been using disingenuous, but it turns out this doesn’t quite fit. Specious was suggested, but again it isn’t the right fit. Lie was another suggestion, but I would like a word with more subtlety.

Over the weekend, I tweeted that I wanted a word that means “to intentionally misrepresent another person's opinion/statements to support the opposite point of view”

Tanya Ha of Catalyst fame, tweeted “Moncktonation” as a suggestion.

"Moncktonation" to intentionally misrepresent another person's opinion/statements to support the opposite point of view

Mr Monckton is a well known climate change denier, who is guilty of all the tricks to try and deceive his audience into believing his point of view. He cherry picks, mis-quotes and all the rest.

So I propose that skeptics may now use the word Monktonation in reference to anyone who goes out of their way to misrepresent any information or other persons views.

CALL TO ACTION - Meryl Dorey at Woodford Fok Festival

CALL TO ACTION

OK Folks, it is time to get out of the arm chair and put your skeptic boots on.

As you have probably heard, Meryl Dorey of AVN infamy is booked to speak at the Woodford Folk Festival on Dec 29 and 30.  If you are not aware of the situation check out the @drunkenmadman blog and wiki for the facts and links.

What to do?

Step one:
Email, tweet and phone everyone involved to let them know your concerns. The wiki has links with contact details.

Comment on blogs and web articles. The Mamamia article by Peter Bowditch is a great place to start, with more info and comments.

Also spread the word to your twitter followers, facebook friends and so on.

Step two:
Get to Woodford. We need skeptics on site to record (if legally possible) Meryls talk, take notes and per haps hand out fliers.  I hope that someone very capable will be able to ask Meryl some tough questions in the Q&A.

I am thinking perhaps handing out fliers while wearing t-shirts that say “Vaccines Save Lives” or similar might be the way to go. Skeptics can then answer questions from the public in a calm and rational manner.

At this stage, I hope to be there for both days. I am happy to car pool from Brisbane northside, although I only have a two seater.

All feedback, comments and suggestions welcome.

Please get in touch @skeptimite or phil.kent at bigpond.com

My photos of the lunar eclipse Dec 11 2011

It was overcast all day and only cleared for a short while to get these shots.

Homeopathy for Aquariums

In the skeptical community sometimes the question is asked, “if you had no morals, what scam would you do?”. The question is just a bit of fun; an exercise in trying to see how the woo woo merchants think. 

My answer is that I would make homeopathic products for sale to the aquarium industry. Many aquarium products are hit and miss; often due to poor aquarium husbandry and sometimes bad information. Packaged into a harmless excipient  (just like real aquarium medication tablets are; a tiny bit of active ingredient with a lot of filler) the homeopathic fish products would do no harm. They would not help either. Homeopathy is well known to be completely ineffective for any ailments in humans or animals. Check this article for a brief introduction to homeopathy

I think such as scam would work quite well, especially in the chain stores which often have poorly trained staff selling the product that makes the most profit for the company. In many cases, a fish will die regardless of treatment. In the case of spontaneous recovery; perhaps by resolving the underlying problem, it will be claimed that my miracle cure saved the day. If the fish dies, then obviously nothing could have saved it. Ka’ching! If I were such a heartless bastard to do such a scam, I would not even bother to put the homeopathy in the pills. I would just order a bunch of blank pills and put them in bottles with different labels “Miracle Fungus Cure”, “No More Bloat” or “Fish Prozac”! I would even offer a money back guarantee, knowing full well most people won’t bother and with the super high profit margin I would be able to afford to give a fairly high percentage of refunds. Actually, being smart I would send the retailer a replacement bottle to put on their shelf; it would cost me bugger all.

It would be too easy. I know where to get the pills and the bottles pre-labeled. I used to be a sales rep in the aquarium industry, it would be all too easy to get the product on the shelves.  A slick brochure and a stand at the Pet Expo would go a long way.

Looking at my bank balance, it is sad that I am not a heartless bastard.

The fact is most problems with aquariums are due to water quality. Over feeding, not enough water changes, too many fish and on we go. If you are having problems with your aquarium get expert advice. Go to a reputable aquarium specialist or have a professional come to your home to check up on the aquarium. Do not trust your friends Uncle who had fish once. While there are exceptions, you should not expect to get the best advice from a general pet store and especially chain stores.

The fabulous Dr Rachel Dunlop (@DrRachie) brought to my attention that at least one homeopath recommends homeopathy for fish illness.

In that article, it is suggested to add one pill of treatment per liter of aquarium water. Even for a very small aquarium of 50 liters (60cm, 2’) that means adding 50 pills to the water. Homeopathic pills are made by adding a drop of liquid preparation to a “blank” excipient pill, usually containing sucrose.

OK, so now homeopaths want to flog their magic to fish keepers. What’s the harm? Apart from making your wallet lighter without any possibility of helping your problem? Good question. Based purely on conjecture, I have concerns about the contents of the excipient. In particular I am concerned about the effects of sugar in the aquarium.

Bacteria love aquariums; they are temperature controlled, have plenty of oxygen and have plenty of nutrients, like ammonia and fish poo. Even so the limiting factor for bacterial growth is usually nutrients. Overfeed your fish and watch the water go cloudy. The cloudiness is bacteria blooming. When this happens the bacteria use more oxygen for metabolism. This leaves less oxygen for the fish, which if bad enough can lead to fish death; especially if the fish are already suffering from disease or poor water quality.

In some cases, the exponential growth of bacteria can quickly lead to a situation where oxygen levels get so low that all the fish die; leaving you with a stinking mess. I have seen this too many times.

What does this have to do with homeopathy? Imagine adding sugar to your aquarium. This would be a lovely source of nutrients for bacteria. In a well established, properly care for aquarium that is not overstocked it would probably only cause a small blip. In the real world, you are adding pills because the fish are sick. Often sick fish equals poor water quality. Sounds like a risk to me.

Won’t the filter take care of the sugar? You can add activated carbon to some filters to polish the water, however they will also remove the active ingredient (if there were any). In a healthy aquarium dissolved organic compounds are broken down buy “good” bacteria, which grow on a surface such as your filter sponge or in the gravel. These bacteria are very slow growing, which is why it takes so long to establish a new aquarium. If you suddenly add an influx of new nutrients, such as fish food or sugar, the good bacteria are overwhelmed. Instead free living “bad” bacteria grow very rapidly, making your water cloudy.

I am not going to go into detail about the different bacteria and their life cycles, there are hundreds of articles on the web.

I know what you are thinking; “this is all conjecture”. True. Although I have some experience. Over the years I have tried just about everything you can do to an aquarium, including many methods of getting the new aquarium established. I have even tried adding sugar; which resulted in a cloudy mess of water. I know anecdote does not equal evidence or that table sugar does not equal homeopathic pills. So I am going to try a little experiment; sample size of one.

In my garage I have over 4,000 liters in various aquariums used for my business. I am going to put a few goldfish in an established, healthy aquarium and I am going to dose it with the recommended rate of Brauer Sleep and Insomnia Relief tablets at the recommended rate of one tablet per litre. The aquarium I am using holds approximately 160 liters, so I am adding 160 tablets, which cost me $32.  This NOT a cheap way to medicate an aquarium.

What will happen? Well, if homeopathy works on fish, then all the fish should go to sleep. I doubt that will happen, but we will see. I am curious to see what, if any effect there is on water quality. I am 50:50 which way it will go as this is a well maintained aquarium that has a partial water change every two weeks, has no gravel to trap waste and is powered by an excellent filter (Ehiem 2228) which is also regularly serviced.

I am reporting on my plans before I start the experiment and will report back once the results are in. This should only take a few days.

PS: I know my skills with Photopaint are not terrific, but you got the idea didn't you.

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Update: My little science experiment has been post-poned due to other commitments that have come up. I will get to it over the Xmas break.

Meryle Dorey in QLD

I have just heard via Drunken Madman that the lies of Meryl Dorey are coming to the Woodford Folk Festival. I have written the following email to the organisers of the festival. You can send your own email to qff@woodfordfolkfestival.com.  


For more information on the antics of Meryl take a look at:
http://danamccaffery.com/
http://www.hccc.nsw.gov.au/Decisions/Public-Statements-and-Warnings/Public-warning-against-Australian-Vaccination-Network--AVN-/default.aspx
http://www.olgr.nsw.gov.au/charitable_latest_news.asp
http://www.facebook.com/stopavn/

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Hello,

I have just heard the Meryl Dorey is attending your festival. I am very concerned for the health of the Woodford and surrounding community if Ms Dorey is given a platform to speak. In her home region, there has been an increased incidence of whooping cough. In 2009 Dana McCaffery died of whooping cough.

As you have no doubt been made aware by now, her opinions on vaccination are fringe at best. They are in fact, outrageous and dangerous. Meryl Dorey is a quack with no qualifications in the field who should never be given a free pass to spread her ignorance.

I urge you to carefully consider what is best for the patrons of your festival.

Thanks,

Phil Kent