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A few years ago a magician friend dropped by the JREF with a very strange gift, a stack of bright red 12” x 8” x 2” books that would have taken up 19” of shelf space in the Isaac Asimov Library – if they’d been of any use other than door-stops. This was a set of Technical Bulletins from the Church of Scientology [COS] running from 1950 to 1979 – almost 7,000 pages of drivel that I now keep in a back cupboard to avoid being embarrassed. It had belonged to my friend’s mother, who bankrupted the family by her devotion to Hubbard and Scientology. However, I’ve found a use for this bound waste paper: when I’m interviewed on the subject, I trot out any volume – each some 5.5 pounds – to show a reporter just how vapid the contents are. I’ll give you an example of my having turned at random to one page in one of books, for a media visitor. To very slightly clarify the picture, I must translate a pair of the exotic terms used here.    

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Here is a recap of the stories that appeared last week at Science-Based Medicine, a multi-author skeptical blog that separates the science from the woo in medicine.  

Reassessing whether low energy electromagnetic fields can have clinically relevant biological effects (David Gorski) http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/index.php/reassessing-whether-low-energy-electromagnetic-fields/

There is no known mechanism by which cell phone radiation could cause cancer. Pasche’s research on cancer treatment with “tumor-specific” AM frequencies might possibly elucidate such a mechanism. It seems highly implausible, but his methods are those of good science. Rather than rejecting it as “impossible” we should wait to see where his results lead.  

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Here's a safety tip from your friendly skeptical doctor - don't wrap yourself in mud andChantal_Lavigne then stay in a sweat lodge for hours. You may or may not remember from your grade school health class that the body needs to regulate its own temperature to keep it within a fairly narrow healthy range.  

There are several mechanisms for regulating body temperature, but the most important is simply behavior. When you feel hot you take actions to get cool, like remove clothing or drink cold water. When you are cold you bundle up, seek out a warm location, and maybe drink some hot tea. There are also many automatic mechanisms of thermoregulation, such as adjusting metabolic rate, sweating, and shivering.  

You can, however, overwhelm the body's automatic thermoregulation with behavior. Stand outside in below freezing temperature with few clothes on (or just swim in very cold water) and you will quickly get hypothermia. Or cover yourself in some material that will reduce the radiation of heat from your skin and the removal of heat from evaporating sweat and stay in a very hot environment - you will quickly suffer from hyperthermia (also called heat stroke).  

This happens accidentally to people just from sitting in the hot sun during a long event without proper hydration. Once they become dehydrated their sweating is significantly reduced to conserve water, but then they cannot adequately cool down and they become overheated.  

This is the kind of basic health information everyone should know. It's mostly common sense and common experience. You can never underestimate, however, the power of belief to trump common sense and scientific knowledge, even when self-preservation is on the line.  

The latest such victim of pseudoscience to have their personal tragedy splashed across the headlines is Chantale Lavigne, a Quebec woman who recently died from pseudoscience. This is, of course, a sad story made worse by the fact that it has been made so public - but concerns of privacy are trumped by the need for such stories to serve as cautionary tales.  

Lavigne was apparently a member of a self-help cult, and had "completed 85 sessions and paid more than $18,900." According to reports:  

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Massage is an area of healthcare that is replete with pseudoscience. There are many legitimate practitioners, but the consumer needs to be careful when seeking a massage therapist  

Recently, I attempted such a search to treat shoulder aches from many hours spent at my desk. I’ve been feeling like those evolution spoofs posters showing hunched over primates evolving into homo sapiens hunched over a computer. 

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Sleeping with the Enemy  

I am in love with a conspiracy theorist. While this is a revelation for me, evidently I have for some time. While I hesitate to define my partner by the few irrational beliefs that she holds, the statement rings true.  

I began dating my partner; let’s just call her Jessica, while I was still in high school, long before I became active in the skeptical community. When I did become more skeptically active (blogging, reading, advocating, etc.), a mere two years ago, I realized that many of the controversial topics that we would discuss in passing had slants to them that were recognizable to me. I had heard their fallacies and discrepancies from my inflow of skeptical media (when I was just starting out, mainly The Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe podcast). While this generated the occasional fight between the two of us, nothing really ever came of it save an eyebrow raise from me.  

  1. Watch Richard Saunders at TAM 6 on Critical Thinking in Schools
  2. Last Week At Science-Based Medicine
  3. Trust Me, I'm A Doctor
  4. Randi Shares Stories From His Life in San Francisco and Hollywood