Forum:Brasov said something

Alkaline diet - yes, it affects pH[edit]

From Talk:Fad diet

The article scorns: "Alkaline diet - Foods affect the blood pH level, really, really, they do.". Ignorance is daring. A simple search in PUBMED reveals that a high protein diet poor in alkaline elements (fruits and vegetables) is often associated to a low urine pH, which can lead to osteoporosis: Variations of the urinary pH values in a population of 13.000 patients addressing to the National Health System.. -- Brasov 00:40, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

There is no credible evidence that eating high pH food or drinking alkaline water materially affects blood pH, not least because it all passes through a vat of hydrochloric acid on the way in. Common claims of alkaline diet peddlers, including the purported effects against cancer, lack any credible evidential basis. Whether medically diagnosed pH imbalance can be affected by diet is another question, the alkaline diet is pseudoscientific bullshit, and the people promoting it are, to a man, woman and small furry creature from Alpha Centauri, quacks. In evidence I offer Errol Denton. JzG (talk) 10:01, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Do you actually read these things? That abstract says pH values in urine differ, therefore they should be fed food to change their diet - in fact, "men usually eat foods rich in proteins and acidifiers" in brackets? Jeeze. Nothing in it is actually saying that this food woo works.

^{d hominem}

11:04, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

And indeed there is no significant connection between urinary pH and blood pH. JzG (talk) 11:57, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

If you had reached at least the 2nd line of the abstract you wouldn't be making such ignorant statements. RationalWiki is a place for ultraconservatives whose idea of Science is anything that doesn't threat their petty life routines. --

Brasov 23:29, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

There is no credible evidence that eating high pH food or drinking alkaline water materially affects blood pH. Yet aother guy hear chimes but can't figure out where they came from. Alkaline diet is one rich in alkaline elements, independently of their pH. Citrus fruits are part of an alkaline diet, so go figure. Study more! --

Brasov 23:35, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

A recent paper on alkaline diet: A higher alkaline dietary load is associated with greater indexes of skeletal muscle mass in women. But let's just deny what goes against our cherrished habits and call it quackery, we feel better doing that. -- Brasov 23:43, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Correlation is not causation. JzG (talk) 07:22, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

Correlation is necessary for causation. Where there are no plausible confounding factors, correlation = causation. --

Brasov 11:49, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Necessary, but not sufficient. There are plausible confounding factors, including the documented fact that everything passes through a vat of acid on the way in and there is a well documented acidity homeostasis mechanism in the body. JzG (talk) 00:10, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

Paleo diet - genes vs memes[edit]

From Talk:Fad diet

The article scorns: "Paleo diet - Obviously, modernity sucks. We should live like our caveman ancestors and we will all lose weight.". Eating like cavemen does not imply living like one, you can even shop for your Paleo food on the internet. Also, the purpose of this diet is not "losing weight" but to avoid health problems related to chronical lack of certain nutrients. The Paleo diet is scientific in that no assumptions are made about "good" or "bad" food other than what Evolution by Natural selection has encoded in our genes. The point being that genes take geological time to adapt to new conditions and can't possibly keep up with memes (culture) which evolve at a much faster pace. Since the emergence of Homo sapiens 200,000 years ago, our genes have spent 199,950 years eating like hunter-gatherers and only 50 years consuming processed, denatured foods in random combinations of limited variation. No extraordinary intelligence is required to conclude which of the two diets suits our physiological needs best.-- Brasov 01:10, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Our genes developed a digestive system to take advantage of a wide range of possible food sources, our scavenging omnivore ways, it specialized in utilizing as much as possible as efficiently as possible. Overly restricting our diet based on what little data we have on a paleo diet is counter to our evolutionary history. See, I can make up random just so stories too. Its a fun game. Tmtoulouse (talk) 01:56, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Overly restricting our diet is the exact opposite of what the Paleo diet does. Look it up. Look up "diet" as well, beside the meaning "deliberate selection of food to control body weight" it can also mean "the sum of the food consumed by an organism or group" and it's the latter that applies to Paleo diet, not the first as you pretend. So indeed, you were making up nonsensical stories because of your ignorance of the subject you talk about.--

Brasov 08:34, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

The paleo diet is not thought to offer sufficient carbs or calcium, and the use of uncooked foods introduces a material risk of infection and disease. The life expectancy of paleolithic man was less than half the 20th Century Western average and the idea that paleolithic man was not subject to diseases prevalent in 20th Century Western humanity is largely based on the fallacious assumption that had they lived long enough they would not have contracted the diseases we now die of. Last time I checked, we all die some time, and the chances of the cause of death being cancer rather than being eaten by a sabre-toothed tiger are strongly age dependent. The paleo diet also ignores the fact that we have provably evolved lactase persistence since paleolithic times, so the idea that a paleolithic diet is uniquely appropriate to the human condition due to exclusion of "modern" dairy foods is provably wrong. As with most diet fads, the paleo diet is based on a hodge-podge of ideological nonsense shored up with cherry-picked factoids taken out of context from the scientific literature. JzG (talk) 10:11, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

The paleo diet is not thought to offer sufficient carbs or calcium. Compared to what? what is your reference of a balance diet and how was it determined?

The life expectancy of paleolithic man was less than half the 20th Century Western average. How would you know that? What factors other than food can determine the life expectancy? You mentioned predators, for one. Nothing to do with man's diet (rather the predator's diet).

Bottom line is, man lives in captivity - self imposed - and the Paleo diet is what man eats in the wild, the food and feeding frequency man has evolved upon. How can you possibly beat that?--

Brasov 13:09, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Actually, the "Paleo Diet" is not what man eats 'in the wild'. This is a popular misconception based on, well I don't know where this came from. The paleolithic people were hunter-gatherers and scavengers, but their primary hunting technique was to fucking chase animals 15 to 30 miles until the animal died of exhausted. That is not a hunting style that lends itself to a high protein diet, and from experience: carbohydrates are what you need to going after the first few miles. Infact, while the "Paleo Diet" is based on a high animal protein diet with some supplementation from fruits, vegetables, legumes, and little to no grains, the actual diet of the paleolithic peoples would have been almost the opposite: high in fruits, vegetables, legumes, grains, and supplemented with animal protein.

It's also strange to me that the overwhelming majority of people on the "Paleo Diet" are bodybuilders, who (as a sport) focus almost exclusively on developing the upperbody, while our actual paleolithic ancestors would have been built like marathon runners, and would have been totally lost on the idea of looking Teh Arnold. This probably goes more into the mentality of the people who are on the "Paleo Diet" though. Since the "Paleo Diet" is not actually based on what are paleolithic ancestors actually ate, it can be loosely related to other high protein/low carbohydrate diets in the high association with certain conditions, as mentioned in the appropriate RW article. Likewise, the exercise almost exclusively associated with people who use the "Paleo Diet" are actually not the greatest for your body, highly associated with long term joint damage.

As a final thought, if you define the "Paleo Diet" as simply eating little to no processed food, sugars, and other junk, then yes, that is a good diet. That's probably why it's what is always recommended by doctors, but the thing that people mean when they say "Paleo Diet" is a load of bullshit not based on history or science.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 13:51, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

their primary hunting technique was to fucking chase animals 15 to 30 miles until the animal died of exhausted.. You've got a caricature representation of the paleolithic feeding habits and the weight of game in the human diet. Go visit any of today's remaining jungle or savannah tribes and find out how deluded you've been by Disney. Check out other hominid's feeding habits to get a clue. --

Brasov 14:07, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

when they say "Paleo Diet" is a load of bullshit not based on history or science. History is not necessary, Anthropology has the answers as there are paleolithic men living today. Together with biology (other hominids) there are enough elements to make an educated guess of what the evolutionary stable human diet looks like, and it's something like this: http://img171.imageshack.us/img171/7921/paleodiet1.jpg Beat that! --

Brasov 14:07, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

It may be worth mentioning which one of us has some background in anthropology. I'll give you a clue, it isn't you.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 14:09, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Dick waving, peeing contest and so on... if you can't contribute at least STFU and look good. One needs not be an expert in plumbing to recognize an plumbing problem. I said Anthropology should have part of the answer, not that I'm an anthropologist. --

Brasov 14:27, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Anthropology has the answer, and the answer is you are wrong. Deal with it.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 14:32, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, because so-called "primitive people" exist outside of history, don't experience change over time, and all behave the same way regardless of geographical setting. Theory of Practice "Now we stand outcast and starving 'mid the wonders we have made." 14:50, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Change as in genes or memes? The point keeps flying high above your head indeed. There's so much sceintific illiteracy here. --

Brasov 16:13, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

When talking about "paleolithic peoples" they almost exclusively mean the peoples in central Africa from about 2.6 mya to 10,000 years ago, and they did have a fairly consistent diet. Outside of Africa (and with the advent of certain hunting tools), things changed yes, but anthropologists (as far as I'm aware) are in pretty close agreement about hunting technique and diet.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 15:12, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

The problem is our genes are still mostly african, and the european "emergency diet" was not on for long enough to radically change our africen heritage. Arthitis was the plague among european cavemen - game diet - and it's still a plague in Western culture today. --

Brasov 16:17, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

And the "Paleo Diet" remains unfounded in history, anthropology, and science based medicine.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 16:21, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Apparently Evolutiuon is not scientific enough for you, or at least it isn't what it tells you your favourite junk food is just stupid. --

Brasov 23:23, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

Can you give some specific examples of a nutrient we consume in modern times that was not consumed in any form in paleolithic times? And after that can you show me which enzymes are used to break down that nutrient into a usable form? Ideally I would also like to know the genetic sequence(s) and the various regulator genes and any epigenetic factors that produce that enzyme, both during the paleolithic time period and modern day. If you could show me just one example like that it would help. Being able to see how that enzyme has not evolved or changed at all, and how inefficient it is as breaking down this modern day food stuff, or maybe even producing a deadly byproduct, that would make your random assertions into an actual argument. Tmtoulouse (talk) 17:12, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

"Can you give some specific examples of a nutrient we consume in modern times that was not consumed in any form in paleolithic times". Red herring. Your question is like challenging the rationalie of a house by asking what piece can't be found in a building materials store. An evolutionary stable diet is a balance of nutrients and non-nutrients acquired at an optimal pace, such that it maximizes a species chances of thriving in a given environment. Caretakers in the zoo know what happens when animals outside their environment (captivity) are fed non-evolutionary diets http://www.enn.com/wildlife/article/42383 This is what's happening to man. It's so onvious it hurts the eyes, yet all of you wannabe rationalists here are waiting for Science to prove apples are good for you before eating one, duh! --

Brasov 23:23, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

As has been pointed out above, the paleo diet is not "evolutionarily stable", whatever that might mean, it's a modern synthesis, a caricature of what people think a paleolithic diet might have been, and not a terribly accurate one at that. It also ignores the fact that the human body has provably evolved to eat different foods since paleolithic times. JzG (talk) 07:25, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

The paleo diet is an informed approximation to the actual human evolutionarily stable diet, the caricature is your biased distortion of the way it was inferred. Evolutionarily stable = "once the (feeding) strategy is fixed in a population, natural selection alone is sufficient to prevent alternative (mutant) strategies from invading successfully.". Our current genome was forged via natural selection in an ancestral natural environment which was stable for hundreds of 1000s of years. That determines what's our optimal food supply, eating rythms and level of physical activity. Civilization has occurred recently in evolutionary time scale, there's been no time to re-adapt the genome.--

Brasov 11:46, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

No it's not, it's bullshit diet woo. But I am confident that you will forever remain impervious to reason. JzG (talk) 12:21, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Yes, the paleo diet is an informed interpretation derived from Paleonutrition studies, as is the whole of of Archaeologic Anthropology. If the paleo diet is woo then so are all the interpretative subdisciplines of Archaeology. You can't have the barrel full and the wife drunk...--

Brasov 13:47, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Dead boy not killed by chelation therapy[edit]

From Talk:Chelation therapy

The aticle says: in August 2005, a 5 year old autistic boy named Abubakar Tariq Nadama died while receiving his therapy But the story seems another case of opportunistic use of a dead body as a throwing weapon. In fact, the child was given Disodium EDTA instead of Calcium Disodium EDTA. It was a case of mistaken medication, like there are 1000's happening every single day: http://www.casewatch.org/board/med/kerry/complaint.shtml -- Brasov 00:52, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you're saying. Did "Dr. Kerry" reach onto the shelf containing his supply of calcium disodium EDTA to find the ONE bottle of disodium EDTA and administer this to the soon to be deceased boy. If the "good" Dr had chosen wisely the boy would not have died? Would the "therapy" have gotten rid of the heavy-metal "infestation"? 01:14, 19 December 2012 (UTC) C®ackeЯ

The article is about chelation therapy, not "good" or "bad" doctors which can be found in all branches of medical practice. The premise of "medical error" does not lead logically to the conclusion "dangerous therapy", but this is what the article tries to imply. --

Brasov 19:10, 19 December 2012 (UTC)

Chelation is not a zero risk procedure. Known complications include renal failure, calcium depletion, thrombosis, fluctuations in blood pressure and cardiac problems. Using it for medically worthless treatments is unjustifiable. Obviously chelation quacks will fall back on the classic SCAM argument that "you can't prove that this (medically useless) treatment caused this effect", an argument which of course is doubly fallacious as they themselves can't prove that their medically useless treatment provides any benefit to offset the documented risks. JzG (talk) 12:02, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

classic SCAM argument that "you can't prove that this (medically useless) treatment caused this effect". That's the argument used by deniers of mercury poisoning causing any cognitive impairments. The same argument used by vaccine pushers to deny adverse events. If you have the recipe to spot a SCAM don't use it so selectively. If you look for medically worthless treatments with high risk check out cancer chemotherapy quackery: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15630849 --

Brasov 13:42, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

I am not aware that anybody denies that mercury poisoning causes cognitive impairment. Obviously people deny that organomercury thiolate compounds cause autism, because there is fuck all evidence that they do, despite a very long-standing attempt at policy-based evidence making by the antivax crowd who will try any trojan horse to peddle their crackpot ideas, but mercury itself is well known as a toxin, which is why cinnabar is now rarely used as a pigment and there are strict regulations around the disposal of fluorescent tubes. You are falling into the classic SCAM fallacy of X is toxic at some dose, Y is a compound that contains X, therefore Y is toxic at any dose. That chain of illogic is broken in at least two fundamental ways, both of which are obvious. Chemotherapy, on the other hand, is well supported by evidence for some indications; the main problem with chemo is people clinging to life and insisting on aggressive treatment regimes with only a small chance of success.

The Clin Oncol article you cite is actually making the point that early detection, improved surgical techniques and advances in radiotherapy have been highly successful in improving cancer survival, to the point that adjuvant chemotherapy may no longer be indicated for many patients. It takes a "special" kind of logic to twist that into the idea that chemotherapy is "quackery". It works, we have just become much better over tie at killing more of the tumour with more targeted methods.

Amusingly, the evidence against most uses of chelation (i.e. for anything other than medically diagnosed heavy metal poisoning) is much stronger than the evidence that paper provides against chemo. The TACT trial is large, has high statistical power, and shows that the most common SCAM claim for chelation is entirely bogus. I am sure you would denounce use of chelation for heart disease, with that solid evidence in front of you? JzG (talk) 20:31, 20 December 2012 (UTC)

"early detection, improved surgical techniques and advances in radiotherapy have been highly successful in improving cancer survival, to the point that adjuvant chemotherapy may no longer be indicated for many patients."

What is this interpretation supposed to mean? You're saying chemotherapy is less effective than surgical techniques and radiotherapy. Nothing new. The question is whether it was ever adjuvant at all or just killing the patients. Placebo-controlled trials are sorely missing.

Regarding early detection, two effects kcik in:

* early diagnosis ~ overdiagnosis

* healthy subject = improved survival

so any claim of improved survival by doing this is a joke, unless supported by evidence compensated for this confounding factor. "Healing" healthy patients is quackery does, and that's what "early detection" and vaccination do as well. Different collars for same dog. --

Brasov 15:31, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

"Obviously people deny that organomercury thiolate compounds cause autism, because there is fuck all evidence that they do"

I quote from Merck’s current European safety information:

* “Very toxic by inhalation, in contact with skin and if swallowed. Danger of cumulative effects. Very toxic to aquatic organisms, may cause long-term adverse effects in aquatic environment.”

* “Keep away from food, drink and animal feeding stuffs. After contact with skin wash immediately with plenty of water. Wear suitable protective clothing. In case of accident or if you feel unwell, seek medical advice immediately (show the label where possible). This material and its container must be disposed of as hazardous waste. Avoid release to the environment.”

A manufacturer’s safety data sheet (MSDS) for thimerosal from Amersham/US Bioscience mentions a long list of symptoms associated with autism:

* “Chronic ingestion or excessive dosage may cause numbness, tingling of hands, feet, lips, ataxia, painful joints, constriction of visual fields, impaired hearing, emotional disturbances, spastic movements, incontinence, groaning, shouting, dizziness, lacrimation, hypersalivation, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea and constipation.”

Parents of children with autism will recognize these symptoms at once, having to live with most of them. Far from thimerosal being an exceptionally benign format for mercury manufacturers’ safety advice suggests precisely the opposite. --

Brasov 15:47, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

Vaccinations contain these substances that you're complaining about in tiny amounts, while the warning is for much larger doses then any one person will ever be exposed to. Infact, if were to get all of your childhood vaccinations at once, you'd be getting less then one ninth the mercury you get from a tuna salad sandwich. And because people get vaccinations with those preservatives as adults as well (I've been stuck probably more as an adult then as a kid), you would expect that if these preservatives were causing autism, we'd see autism developing in people as adults, which we don't. And since everyone gets vaccinated, if the preservatives in them were causing autism, we'd expect to see it happening in a much larger percent of the population then we actually do.--Just relax, and stay funny (talk) 17:52, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

And we'd expect to see some sort of temporal association between usage of thiomersal and autism rates, but the increase in diagnosis turns out to vary with changes in diagnostic criteria and to be completely independent of the introduction and subsequent near-total withdrawal of thiomersal as a preservative. The antivaxers will drink any flavour of the kool-aid, it seems. JzG (talk) 11:12, 22 December 2012 (UTC)

I can see your problem here, Brasov. You are reading those papers with the agenda of finding text to support your pre-existing conclusions. It's a common fault with cranks. The thiomersal-autism link has been extensively studied and found not to exist, to a very high degree of confidence. And when you look at he claimed effected patients, you find evidence of autistic spectrum behaviour before the vaccinations and no temporal association between vaccination and onset of symptoms. Not only do vaccines contain only very small traces of mercury (or, more usually these days, none at all), it's not in a form that is likely to lead to significant risk. However, there is one provable effect of the vaccine-autism link: its proponents have been responsible for a decline in vaccinations which is directly responsible for outbreaks of measles and pertussis that have killed children. There have also been cases of polio and other vaccine preventable diseases. And let's not forget that thiomersal is only the latest of a seemingly endless succession of pretexts the antivaxers have used: for them it's always about the vaccines, and always has been. Vaccination has saved more lives than probably any other single medical invention, with the possible exception of antibiotics, but antivax cranks have been with us for a very long time and remain strongly resistant to repeated reality-based refutation of their claims. JzG (talk) 11:08, 22 December 2012 (UTC)

"The thiomersal-autism link has been extensively studied and found not to exist,". A rare effect can never be found through correlation studies on large populations, for obvious reasons, as the pro-vaccine quacks pretend. It is by looking at previously normal, vaccinated autism cases that the vaccine causality has to be established. Your problem too is pretending a negative can be proven, which reveals you as a quack. --

Brasov 11:55, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Pure sophistry. Extensive study has found no credible evidence (either temporal or mechanistic) of a link, and the loudness of the antivax bullshitters is such that if there was a link of the magnitude they claim then it would be obvious. Add to that the proven fact that most childhood vaccines no longer contain thiomersal, but the autism diagnosis rate remains unchanged, and you have a slam-dunk "STFU" for the antivaxers - not that they will, they never have, they will just move on to the next thing when it comes along, because for them it's always about the vaccines and always has been. By contrast, the link between antivax bullshitters and real dead children is 100% proven and unambiguous. Oh, and my doctor trained with Andy Wakefield and used to play rugger with him. He is not happy with what Wakefield has done. JzG (talk) 00:14, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

A rare effect can never be found through correlation studies on large populations, - which, last I checked, is empirically synonymous with "there is no link". You have never made your case for this blind assertion, even though I've seen you spunk it over talk page after talk page. Your alternative "method" certainly doesn't make sense, and indeed if I understand it correctly rests entirely on effectively anecdotal evidence (you seem to be saying "let's look at people who parents have said magically developed autism after vaccination"). Now, here we have a contradiction, because anecdotal evidence is all well and good... but only if an effect is very common so we can rely on the interpretations being true, rather than just misidentification and wrongly attributing cause and effect. But you've said it's supposedly rare, so you can't possibly test for it this way. If a link was there, correlation cohort studies would show it. It is as simple as that.

^pathetic

09:47, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

last I checked, is empirically synonymous with "there is no link. Then apply the same "check" to poliovirus as the presumed cause of poliomyelitis, for only a few rare cases among all carriers ever gets Flaccid Paralysis. According to your same logic, that denies any link and clearly points at a non-viral cause of the disease. What's good for the goose is good for the gander.--

Brasov 10:56, 11 January 2013 (UTC)

Evolution scapegoat[edit]

The article says: it's precisely due to evolution that the CDC releases a new round of flu vaccines yearly. The CDC does not release any vaccines, it's the industry, but anyway let's analyze the implications of the claim:

1) The new vaccine has to be developed in such a short period of time that precludes testing.

2) Whether the vaccine works or not is found out only after the fact.

3) The epidemic model assumes a "conspiracy" of the flu viruses all over the world, agreeing to mutate the same genes at the same time and then remaining stable until vaccination season is over.

All these factors pile up on the side of failure: haste, lack of scientific verification, guesswork and a ridiculously simplistic epidemic model.,, then the vaccine fails as expected, but it's Evolution to blame... Sorry, no refunds!-- Brasov 01:07, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

There's a remarkably relevant image to the right of your post Brasov.--Token Conservative (talk) 01:09, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

What would be relevant is a scientific experiment proving at least one vaccine failure due to "mutations" rather than to being an worthless homeopathic crap product. Got a picture for that? --

Brasov 01:34, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

Some stuff about cancer or AIDS or whatever[edit]

From Talk:Cancer During a decade as head of global cancer research at Amgen, C. Glenn Begley identified 53 "landmark" publications - papers in top journals, from reputable labs - for his team to reproduce. Begley sought to double-check the findings before trying to build on them for drug development.Result: 47 of the 53 could not be replicated. He described his findings in a commentary piece published in the journal Nature...""These are the studies the pharmaceutical industry relies on to identify new targets for drug development. But if you're going to place a $1 million or $2 million or $5 million bet on an observation, you need to be sure it's true. As we tried to reproduce these papers we became convinced you can't take anything at face value."

According to this study: 2013 - Bias in reporting of end points of efficacy and toxicity in randomized, clinical trials for women with breast cancer, published in January 2013 in Annals of Oncology, researchers from the University of Toronto found that in 164 randomized Phase III clinical trials that a third were reported positively despite not meeting the primary objective, by emphasizing other, less important outcomes: "These reports were biased and used spin in attempts to conceal that bias," the authors wrote. Some studies even changed the primary objective halfway through, possibly because early results suggested the trial would otherwise fail.

The researchers also found evidence of bias in the reporting of toxic side effects of drugs used in two-thirds of the trials. In these cases, high toxicity findings were omitted from the abstracts and conclusions, and instead buried in the "small print" of the article. Medical scientists have been caught painting an overly rosy picture of their drugs for their own ends, which means for the end dictated by the companies that pay their bills.

This Wiki article says: "The danger is when Alternative Therapies turn into woo". I'd add that an even worse danger is when Official Therapies, whose toxicities are much deadlier, are actually woo.-- Brasov 11:45, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

“”Repeat after me: pharma being shit does not mean magic beans cure cancer.

—Ben Goldacre

--Krej^talk 16:46, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

You Ben Goldacre memorize this: pharma woo not only can't cure cancer either, but it goes one substantial step beyond magic beans by actively killing the patient. Get your priorities straight. -- Brasov 17:07, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Real medicine has risks. Not even herbal medicine is harmless. Chemotherapy is used only because it can cause some cancers to go into remission. It's not perfect, but it does work in some cases. If you have cancer, you can either take your magic beans and die (barring spontaneous remission), or use chemotherapy and take your chances. Some chance of living is better than nothing. Mainstream treatment can cause testicular cancer to go into remission in 90% of cases. [1]--Krej^talk 17:17, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Real medicine has risks.. This topic is about fraud, which is a concept totally different from treatment risk. Such an obvious red herring puts big question marks around your your motives.

It's not perfect, but it does work in some cases. That's a claim not supported on any placebo-controlled trial. You're on the same footing as "magic beans", that also report "success" without placebo-controlled studies. It's both New Age gurus and Big Pharma companies who actively engage in averting the scientific method. The result is woo in both cases, but the latter is a far more deadly sort of woo, because on top of deadly side effects it also enjoys unduly high credibility.--

Brasov 17:48, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Oh, I assumed you believed in alternative medicine as a replacement. Anyway, I think most people on this wiki are aware of the fraud committed by pharmaceutical companies. What is your point in creating this topic?--Krej^talk 17:56, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

"What is your point in creating this topic?". Giving some marginal credibility to your claim that "most people on this wiki are aware of the fraud committed by pharmaceutical companies" by not excluding Big Pharma deadly woo, as you seem to think we should do.--

Brasov 18:20, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Wait your saying that all those phase II and above treatment trials that use double-blind, placebo controlled study designs are a figment of our collect imaginations? Tmtoulouse (talk) 17:58, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

Regarding testicular cancer, Krej's claim did not link to a primary scientific source. Nowhere in the medical literature is there a comparison to be found between the survivabilities of treated vs. untreated testicular cancer. We only know the death rates of old treatments vs. new treatments. This cancer was deadly in the 60's, but then this is how it was (mis)treated in those days:

Testicular Cancer

"...In the 1960's dactinomycin alone or in combination with other drugs was the standard chemotherapy for testicular cancer..."

Here's a complete study on the deadly effects of dactinomycin treatment:

CLINICAL STUDIES OF ACTINOMYCIN D

"...Toxic side effects occur frequently, the more common include anorexia, nausea, vomiting, stomatitis, alopecia, and pancytopenia. These may have contributed directly or indirectly to the patients’ deaths..."

Therefore the claim that untreated cancer is deadlier than chemo is unsupported woo. The only supported claim is that today's chemo kills patients at a slower rate. This "less poison = less deaths" is being sold to the uneducated public as a "success" of the Big Pharma industry.--

Brasov 18:20, 29 January 2013 (UTC)

"Less poison = less deaths", eh? Tell me, is a 90% cure rate better than untreated cancer? Do you think more than 90% of untreated testicular cancer cases go away?---Krej^talk 15:41, 2 February 2013 (UTC)

"is a 90% cure rate better than untreated cancer?". What's the death rate of cancer without chemo? We might actually be able to answer your question if there were any placebo-controlled studies on chemo, but there aren't any. So chemo is is nothing but alternative medicine and a deadly form of woo. --

Brasov 22:53, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Except, by and large, alternative medicine does not work. Chemo and other main stream treatments do. Breast Cancer survival rate with treatment 77%. European study of a drug called Temodar had a 40% increase in survival rate than those treated only with radiation. They are tested. I'm not sure your problems, here.

Godot She was a venus demilo in her sister's jeans 23:04, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

European study of a drug called Temodar had a 40% increase in survival rate than those treated only with radiation This proves chemo is less deadly than radiation, but it leaves us in the dark on whether chemo is any better than no intervention at all. I thought you knew how Science works. --

Brasov 23:10, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

We might actually be able to answer your question if there were any placebo-controlled studies on chemo, but there aren't any[edit]

You are either a liar or an idiot, or both. You can be ignored. Sophie^Wilder 23:23, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

his game is saying "yes, but you didn't do any of those against people who got NOTHING PERIOD". Course we knwo about those. those are called "patients who die".

Godot She was a venus demilo in her sister's jeans 23:27, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Let's see who is the idiot... Your first link is a study that "... compared the safety and efficacy of darbepoetin alfa with placebo in patients with lung cancer receiving chemotherapy...". It's 'darbepoetin' (against anemia) that's being compared to placebo, but all patients received chemo. Read your links, dumbfuck.--

Brasov 23:31, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

Darbepoetin alfa: "is a synthetic form of erythropoietin. It stimulates erythropoiesis (increases red blood cell levels) and is used to treat anemia,". Dumbfuck!--

Brasov 23:33, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

I say, good for you, then. when you get cancer, you can just ignore the woo and go straight for the coffin.

Godot She was a venus demilo in her sister's jeans 23:46, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

The whining method is no substitute for the scientific method. No evidence = woo, full stop. --

Brasov 23:52, 4 February 2013 (UTC)

In order for you to have an argument you (Brasov) would have to provide some reason for us to think that modern cancer is somehow different from cancer in the 1910s, which had a 100% fatality rate.--Token Conservative (talk) 00:00, 5 February 2013 (UTC

Several points:

1. Statement not backed up by primary reference (to put it politely).

2. Healthy patient effect: "early diagnosis" means treating people that have actually no cancer at all, so they can never die of cancer (They can still die of chemo).

3. Certainly not from untreated prostate cancer: High 10-year survival rate in patients with early, untreated prostatic cancer.

4. Certainly not from untreated tyroid cancer: Treated or untreated, common thyroid cancer unlikely to cause death

5. Certainly not from untreated ovarian cancer: The Prognosis For Ovarian Cancer | LIVESTRONG.COM

... and so on and so forth. You come back with mythology, not facts. --

Brasov 00:11, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Cool Story, bro. --Revolverman (talk) 00:28, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

I'll continue READING Sophie's "evidence" (chemo vs. placebo, really?):

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22529265

Let's see: "..placebo-controlled trial undertaken to determine if the Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor (EGFR) inhibitor erlotinib (Tarceva) prolongs survival in NSCLC patients after 1st or 2nd line chemotherapy...". All patients had received 1st or 2nd line chemotherapy. It's not a study of chemo vs. untreated cancer. Another FAIL. --

Brasov 00:27, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

These four are one and exactly the same study, namely: Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled, phase III trial of chemotherapy with or without bevacizumab...

Let's see. "..This phase III study compared the efficacy and safety of bevacizumab (BV) when combined with several standard chemotherapy regimens versus those regimens alone...". Comparison between different chemo regimes (with or without bevacizumab in the mix) not between chemo and untreated cancer, Another FAIL. --

Brasov 00:30, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

What exactly is your point?--Token Conservative (talk) 00:36, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

There are no placebo controlled studies of chemo vs untreated cancer, therefore chemo is on the same footing with Alternative Medicine, except that chemo (cytotoxic) is actively killing the patient. --

Brasov 00:40, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Cool Story, bro. --Revolverman (talk) 00:28, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Yo! Revolverman!--

Brasov 00:46, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Untreated cancer, for the majority of cancers, has a 100% fatality rate. This is something we know. We don't need to do a double blind trial with chemo because any survival rate is an improvement, except for a handful of specific forms of cancer that are unlikely to be fatal. The papillary thyroid cancer has a 97% survival rate untreated. Good for those with that kind of cancer. Notice that that is a lower survival rate then the 99% with treatment. The article on prostate cancer (in context) is that prostate cancer takes awhile to develop and can be delayed with estrogen treatment. And the article on ovarian cancer does not specify with or without treatment, but considering Livestrong is usually on the pro-science side of things, I'm willing to bet that they are assuming treatment. Come back when you have evidence that untreated lung cancer isn't fatal. --Token Conservative (talk) 01:47, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Untreated cancer, for the majority of cancers, has a 100% fatality rate. This is something we know.. OK. I don't usually discuss articles of faith. For all the rest: PUBMED. --

Brasov 01:51, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Your stupidity is fairly impressive. Going to talk about how we don't know AIDS is deadly next?--Token Conservative (talk) 01:52, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

AIDS? Look up Long Term Non Progressor and then tell me what they all have in common. --

Brasov 02:05, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Yeah, because, of course, a one in 500 condition means that untreated AIDs isn't deadly for the other 499. Innocent Bystander (talk) 14:59, 5 February 2013 (UTC)

Alternative medicine isn't quite the underdog it's usually made out to be.[edit]

Who is usually saying that? Is not being an underdog criticism or praise? I can't follow your line of argumentation. --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:06, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Maybe I should say the "altmed industry".--Krej^talk 17:07, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

(EC) "Big Pharma is suppressing ______ with their FDA cronies! Big Pharama has all of congress in its pockets!" etc. Ty^{Carnival time.} 17:08, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

(EC) The argument I'm trying to make is that it's not a case of small, powerless, CAM vs the all-mighty Big Pharma conspiracy, but of two corporate giants, one of which is unregulated and can do whatever it wants.--Krej^talk 17:09, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Your comaprison misses the point. "Placebo" involves small companies (so it's not "Big Placebo" at all) while "Big Pharma" describes a few gigantic corporations. Then you pretend the lobbying capability of both groups on honest congressmen are the same. You're biases and flaws are coming in like a tsunami. --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:14, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Right, because the evil Big Pharma companies really want to be regulated, while supplement companies are totally altruistic and want to be free to sell their "cures". Supplement companies had absolutely no say in their being forced to be free. Damn politicians.--Krej^talk 17:18, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

in 2010 The Carlyle Group, the US private equity group, agreed to buy NBTY in July 2010 for $55 a share, estimated to be about $3.4bn to $3.8bn. - $3.8bn. Yep, that's a small mom and pop company all right. Innocent Bystander (talk) 17:20, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Big Pharma needs FDA approval to cover their asses when a patient drops dead. All companies dealing in dangerous products do the same, it's business survival. --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:30, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

The big difference[edit]

"Big Pharma is regulated, to make sure its products work and don't endanger millions of lives, while Big Placebo is free to sell whatever it wants." You compare apples to pears: active vs non-active substances. Then you get bananas as the conclusion: both should have the same level of regulation. The logic of this discourse escapes me. --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:10, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

I clearly say that Big Placebo sells both active and inactive substances, and that the inactive substance companies would be driven out of business.--Krej^talk 17:14, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Besides, Big Placebo isn't all just placebos. I do say that herbs are drugs.--Krej^talk

Wow! you shift targets and namings at your convenience. Big Placebo is inert when it fits your argument and active when it contradicts it, so you always win! Pure genious! --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:21, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Oh, ffs... Big Placebo contains many different kinds of CAM, some of which are possibly effective, and some of which are complete crap. Get it now?--Krej^talk 17:22, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

I got it before, you call it Big Placebo to deform reality into a caricature that suits your goals. --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:28, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Big Placebo isn't a monolith. It's several types of companies. (Or at least I think it's several. The only ones that come to mind are Big Supplement/Herb and Big Homeo.)--Krej^talk 18:28, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Also, "Then you get bananas as the conclusion: both should have the same level of regulation." Are you saying that there should be an unregulated billion-dollar industry that sells pills that do absolutely nothing except line the pockets of corporate business executives? That says a lot about your motives. Do you work for Big Placebo?--Krej^talk 18:37, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

"not having the same level of regulation" means "a different regulation", not "unregulated". Again, your distort your opponent's statements at your convenience, but your manoeuvre is transparent. As a bonus you claim a Big Placebo Conspiracy to fool the public, when most AM remedies/placebos were extracted from popular medicine, that is, the public. --204.124.83.131 (talk) 19:16, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

I see you have absolutely no sense of humor. Anyway, answer my question: Do you believe there should be an industry that sells pills that do absolutely nothing?--Krej^talk 20:21, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Fallacy[edit]

"Big Pharma, on the other hand, is forced by government regulation to show its products are effective. The double standards of CAM supporters make no sense.". If this were so, and from your premise that The purpose of every company is to make money, then why doesn't Big Pharma sell their products as "supplements"? Could it just be that they're really more dangerous? --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:18, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Possibly because the market for science-based medicine is much bigger?--Krej^talk 17:20, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

The size of the market is determnined by the client list of the company. To market AZT as a flu "supplement" just send the folder to the usual doctors under the "Roche" logo. When peole start dropping like flies the FDA won't say nothing, as it doesn't when other supplements kill their patients, right? --217.12.115.90 (talk) 17:26, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Um, they don't 'sell their products as supplements in order to make more money' because real doctors with actual medical practices, with actual medical degrees, can't prescribe supplements because supplements are officially not intended to cure or treat any illness whereas actual medicine sure as hell IS intended to do those things. ±

KnightOfTL;DR^{garrulous en guerre} 17:44, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Official approval is not directed at achieving a "cure", but a "treatment". Te proof is scores of "antiviral" drugs are being prescribed with very nasty effects despite no viral disease being curable. Approval is based on providing or fabricating FDA-pleasing evidence of achieving "effect X" with probability "P". Effect X doesn't even need to have a clinical meaning, see for example "viral load". Because of the extensive use of non-specific surrogates there's a proliferation of meaningless "treatments" that cause more harm than good. --187.2.146.37 (talk) 18:11, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Read [2] for why AZT could not qualify as a "new dietary ingredient." Hipocrite (talk) 19:15, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

Great find! FDA says: "THE FACT THAT A NEW DIETARY INGREDIENT IS LISTED IN THIS TABLE DOES NOT CONSTITUTE A FINDING BY FDA THAT A NEW DIETARY INGREDIENT OR A DIETARY SUPPLEMENT THAT CONTAINS A NEW DIETARY INGREDIENT IS SAFE", then Big Pharma names follow: Monsanto, Roche, Merck... the very same companies AM bashers claim are being subject to "double standards". I suppose the shills if sincere, need to get a job and learn what doing business is all about --204.124.83.131 (talk) 19:24, 7 February 2013 (UTC)

There are several supplement/herb companies in that list, you cretin.--Krej^talk 20:24, 7 February 2013 (UTC)