I have been recently reading about Flat Earthers. These are individuals who claim that the real shape of the Earth is flat. If you go to social media outlets such as Twitter and type in hashtags such as #flatearth you will see the accounts of a number of these people. One thing that struck me about Flat Earthers is that quite a number of them are sophisticated individuals who are well versed in technical jargon and can argue with you forever or outpost you on a discussion board. There is even a society called the Flat Earth Society dedicated to promoting the “truth” of the flat earth. It held the first International Flat Earth conference in 2017. But you may ask: how do Flat Earthers explain all the pictures of Earth taken from space that show it’s a sphere? The short answer: a conspiracy! Flat Earthers believe that the public is being deceived by the government which has bribed or coerced astronauts into lying, faked the moon landing, and created bogus pictures of a spherical Earth. Admittedly, the case of Flat Earthers is an extreme example. You could even say that they are at the fringe of antiscience groups such as climate change deniers, antivaxers, or creationists. But from their rhetoric, I think we can draw one valid question that is worth addressing: How do we know there is no conspiracy? The government has been shown to have lied in the past, as well as have many other institutions and organizations. How do we know they are not doing it in these cases? The answer is diversity: diversity in scientists, and diversity in methodology. I have mentioned in a previous post the famous case of N-rays, the mysterious radiation discovered by the French scientist René Blondlot, and confirmed by other French scientists, that turned out to be nothing but a case of self-delusion. During the course of the investigation of N-Rays, at one point it became evident that almost all of the positive results were coming out of French labs. When all the positive results originate from one state, or organization, or lab, we should be concerned. Diversity in the scientists that practice science is a safeguard against bias and mistakes. In another post I have also mentioned the case of polywater, a seemingly new form of water with many potential applications. Many scientists set to work on polywater and they were able to obtain the same results reported by other scientists (the results were reproducible). Nonetheless, polywater was eventually demonstrated to be false. The positive results were due to the fact that all the scientists were using the same methodology and making the same mistake! When all the positive results come from scientists using the same methodology, and these results can’t be supported by any other methods, there may be a problem. Diversity in the methodology employed in research is also a safeguard against bias and mistakes. Thus when many scientists from different nations, ethnicities, religions, political beliefs, scientific traditions, etc. study a problem employing different approaches and methodologies and come up with the same results, you can infer not only that the chance that there is a conspiracy going on is vanishingly small, but also that there is a very good chance that the theories they have generated have grasped important aspects of reality. For the conspiracy that the Flat Earthers claim to exist to be true, it would have to involve not only the government of the United States and astronauts, scientists, and private contractors involved in the space program, but also similar numbers of people in the other 5 space agencies that possess launch capabilities (those of India, Europe, China, Japan, and Russia), as well as those of the 50 plus countries that have satellites in space, not to mention individuals involved in space research in all these countries. Additionally, the roundness of the Earth has been demonstrated by many methods. If you want to argue for a flat Earth, you might as well argue that we are all living in The Matrix. However, in their conspiracy claims Flat Earthers are in good company. The theories that the global climate is warming and that humans are responsible for it, or that vaccines do not produce autism, are the product of science involving a diversity of researchers and methods, and yet they are also rejected by many people claiming that they are part of massive conspiracies. To all individuals out there espousing these conspiracy theories about science and scientists, I want to suggest that you consider a radical and revolutionary idea. This is that maybe, just maybe, the vast majority of scientists are interested in the truth, they act in good faith, and that the theories they have generated are correct! The image of a flat Earth by Trekky0623 was modified under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license. The image of the real Earth from NASA is in the public domain.
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Many snippets of wisdom that have permeated our culture are routinely quoted in social media such as the one from the Irish playwright George Bernard Shaw featured in the image above that states that all progress depends on the unreasonable man. Everyone seems to have an affinity with this particular trope. After all, who doesn’t love the story of the little guy fighting against the establishment? It seems that most of us, within reason, are programed to root for the underdog. The mavericks, the misfits, the fringe-thinkers, the outcasts: why do these characters have a place in our hearts? Is it perhaps because in the daily tedium of our lives, as we persevere overburdened by challenges at work, in our homes, and in society, we sometimes wish we could upturn the established order and restart anew? Perhaps we have considered going against the current, challenging the system, rocking the boat, but then deemed the risks of doing so too dire and just bowed our heads and kept on going. So maybe when one of these colorful characters that actually dares to challenge the powers that be comes along, we live vicariously through their plight a fantasy that we ourselves are too cowardly to bring to reality. Be that as it may, in the field of science many of these characters have captivated the public’s imagination. Take the case of Dr. Barry Marshall who proposed the hypothesis that stomach ulcers are not caused by excessive acid secretion due to stress, as was thought by most experts, but by infections with a type of bacteria called Helicobacter pylori. Dr. Marshall failed to convince the scientific establishment. He was not able to develop an animal model of the disease, and could not obtain funds to perform a human experiment. So what did he do? He experimented on himself! He drank a broth infected with the H. pylori isolated from a patient who had developed severe gastritis. Within days he developed the same symptoms the patient had, and he was able to cure himself using antibiotics. It took another decade of struggles, but gastroenterologists were eventually convinced of the truth of his claim, and Dr. Marshall won a Nobel Prize in 2005. Isn’t that a great story? And like this story, there are many other such stories of the unreasonable man battling the system and prevailing in the end. However, the popularization of these stories has generated several notions in the public consciousness that are not accurate. The first is the notion that the only way science makes progress is when one of these characters upends conventional wisdom and triggers a revolution. This is not true. Most of the time progress in science occurs incrementally as thousands of scientists perform vital work within the system developing new knowledge, methodologies, procedures, and applications. The backgrounds and expertise of these scientists are fundamental to driving any new or old area of science forward. Without these individuals working within the system there would be no science. The notion that ALL progress, at least in science, depends on the unreasonable individual is simply false. The second notion is that just because you are one of the unreasonable individuals you must be right, and the scientific establishment must be wrong. It must be understood that for every individual who has challenged the established order successfully, there have been dozens to hundreds of other individuals who have challenged the established order and were proven to be wrong. The stories of these individuals are normally not of interest except, if at all, to those whose write historical descriptions of the development of a given scientific field, and they are barely mentioned in the popular press. Finally, the last (and probably most troublesome) notion is that when the scientific establishment lashes out at one of these unreasonable individuals, this is taken as proof that there is a bias within the scientific community motivated at best by intellectual conformity and closed-mindedness, or at worse by corrupt influences tied to granting agencies or corporate interests. However, what the public may interpret as an unfair treatment of a scientist by the scientific community is more often than not due to the fact that science is a very conservative enterprise, and the bar to overturn or reinterpret established science is set pretty high. Science is biased towards established knowledge; as it should be! When you go against established science, you’d better have some exceptional evidence and arguments or else you are going to be given a very hard time! Even scientists with Ph.Ds. can propose things that are wrong, misguided, or just plain stupid. Not all ideas deserve to be treated equally, not all evidence is sound, and not all interpretations of the data are correct. What most individuals seeking to change the prevailing scientific paradigm do is address the criticism made by their peers, generate more evidence, and reformulate their ideas or their presentation. Convincing other scientists that you are right is the warp and woof of science. However, a disturbing phenomenon has emerged. Today those individuals who have been rebuffed by the scientific community can take their case to “the people” arguing that they are victims of a corrupt scientific establishment that is hell bent on silencing them and discrediting their ideas. Such is the case of Dr. Andrew Wakefield who, when his views that vaccination was linked to autism were rejected by the medical community, took his case directly to the public. He actually succeeded in convincing many parents to avoid vaccinating their children leading to a spike in infant deaths from some diseases that are preventable nowadays. Established science is called that for a reason. Scientific theories are constructs that have grasped important aspects of the realties they seek to explain, and they cannot be overturned on a whim. The quixotic quest of the unreasonable man must not be romanticized. These individuals are wrong most of the time, and established science must be protected from them. If you want to upend established science, the burden of proof is on you! The image of George Bernard Shaw was modified from a photograph in the George Grantham Bain collection at the Library of Congress and has no known copyright restrictions. When asked about what science has done for humanity many people would probably mention medical advances. Indeed science has allowed us to create vaccines, antibiotics, drugs, surgical methods, and many other things to treat human disease and improve human health. There are millions of people today upon the face of the earth (including yours truly) who would not be here if it weren’t for these medical advances. But this is not the most important thing that science has done for us. Other people would allude to the technological advances that science has made possible that have improved our lives. Inventions like refrigerators, air conditioners, cars, planes, phones, computers, and many other things have greatly improved our lives and increased our freedom and abilities. But this is not the most important thing science has done for us. Even others will mention the way science has opened our eyes to the mystery and beauty of realms previously unseen by us such as when we contemplate images of faraway worlds relayed to us by the probes we have sent into space, or the images of the life of cells and other organisms in the microscopic world. But this is not the most important thing science has done for us. So what is it? Let me give you a hint. Recently millions of Americans watched an eclipse of the sun. By all accounts it was a festive event where people expressed amazement at the natural phenomenon. But here is the key thing. No one ran to hide in their basement during the eclipse. No one felt that the eclipse was a “bad omen”. No people were sacrificed to “prevent the moon from swallowing the sun”. The eclipse did not influence domestic or foreign policy. It was just a celestial body (the moon) transiting in front of another (the sun) and casting its shadow on the earth. Amazing? Fantastic? Incredible? Yes. Scary? Foreboding? No. Figured it out? This is the gift of science. It has given us information about what things are and what they aren’t; about what can happen and what can’t, and about how things work, and why. This allows us to live better lives free of the shackles of superstition. It allows us to act rationally in response to the changing world about us and optimize our lives. And why is this? Because ignorance in the face of occurrences that may have an impact on our lives generates fear and fear is the begetter of some of the most barbaric behaviors that humanity has ever witnessed. Ever read about when the black plague decimated most of medieval Europe? The best minds of the period could not get beyond explanations such as an “unfavorable conjunction of planets” or an “infected air”. Among other explanations was a divine punishment for sinfulness. The sheer panic and terror led family members to abandon each other, doctors and priests to desert their posts, and mobs of people to target those who were different such as gypsies or Jews, who were exterminated in many places. After hundreds of years and many outbreaks, it was finally worked out that the plague was caused by a bacterium (Yersinia pestis) which is transmitted by fleas, which in turn are carried by animals like rats. Scary? Yes, but just merely a natural occurrence that is well within our power to control. Today there are still cases of plague, but they can be kept to a minimum through sanitation and easily treated with antibiotics. When human beings are concerned (or made to be concerned) about threats real or imaginary, they will believe anything and do anything, and this weakness is often successfully exploited by those among the “powers that be” who want to implement their social or corporate agendas, further their standing or careers, or simply profit. Furthermore, because science is so successful at finding the truth, these “powers that be” have understood that a very important part of their plan has to be the delegitimization of science.
Thus the anti-vaccination movement claims that pro-vaccination scientists are controlled by the vaccine industry. The anti-climate change movement claims that climate change scientists are controlled by the liberal science funding agencies. The creationist movement claims that evolution science is part of the war on Christianity. The alternative therapies lobby claims that the medical establishment is preventing citizens from using inexpensive and equally effective treatments. The gun lobby has successfully prevented government funds from being used to study gun violence claiming that it would be part of a slippery slope towards the erosion of key constitutional rights. The above highlights a sad truth about a gift. A gift is a two part process. The first part occurs when it is given, but the second part involves receiving it. In our complex world where fantasy and folly can de facto become a reality if enough people believe them, science can be successful in transmitting us its gift only to the extent that its discoveries are accepted by individuals and societies. Eclipse: CCO Creative commons license “Free for commercial use. No attribution required”. The black death by Leo Reynolds, Attribution: NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0) license. The near eradication of many diseases by vaccination is one of the greatest scientific and public health achievements of the twentieth century. And this was not merely a result of better hygiene and sanitation as claimed by some. One by one, smallpox, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, polio, measles, mumps, rubella and other scourges of mankind were beaten back as scientists discovered how to coax our immune systems to make antibodies against the pathogens that cause these diseases. Among the chief beneficiaries of this improvement in the health of our population were children. If you go to old cemeteries and check the graves, you will find a much larger number of children’s graves compared to modern cemeteries. Therefore it seems somewhat paradoxical that nowadays in our society and others a significant group of parents have refused to vaccinate their children claiming among other things that vaccines cause autism. This in turn has led to a resurgence of some of these diseases such as the measles outbreaks in California in 2014, Arizona in 2016, and the recent outbreak in Minnesota. What is happening here? First of all, what is autism? Autism, or more accurately autism spectrum disorder (ASD), is a neurodevelopmental disorder where the afflicted children exhibit a lack of social interaction. Autistic children are withdrawn as if living in their own world, and many exhibit mental retardation, hyperactivity, irritability and repetitive behaviors. The specific cause of ASD is not known but it seems to encompass both genetic and environmental factors. Now, how did autism ever become associated with vaccines? The strongest catalyst for this association was an article published in 1998 by Dr. Andrew Wakefield and 12 other researchers in the medical journal the Lancet which suggested a link between the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine and autism through a mechanism that involved a type of gastrointestinal disease. The study was small (only 12 children), did not include a control group, and the nature of the evidence was correlational without any evidence of causation. However, the study was picked up by the media and widely publicized. As a result of this vaccination rates against measles, mumps, and rubella began to drop due to parents being concerned about vaccines and autism. This led to an increase in cases of these diseases in children resulting in several deaths. In 2004, investigations by a journalist revealed that Dr. Wakefield had perpetrated fraud by altering the facts of the patients’ medical histories for what appeared to be financial gain. Ten of the original authors of the paper retracted the interpretation of the findings making it clear that they had not found any causal association with the MMR vaccines and autism. Also in 2004, the journal carried out an investigation that absolved the researchers of the paper of charges of ethical misconduct that had been levied against them only to retract the paper 6 years later when additional investigations by the British General Medical Council found evidence of scientific misconduct. As a result of these investigations, Dr. Wakefield was removed from the United Kingdom’s Medical Registry and he now cannot practice medicine. In response, Dr. Wakefield has claimed that he is being targeted by the medical establishment in collusion with vaccine manufacturing companies, and that he has never committed fraud. Wakefield has moved to the US where he has developed a following among anti-vaccination groups who consider him a hero. The whole autism/vaccine topic has become mired in endless controversy with one side accusing the other of ignoring scientific findings and the other side retorting that the truth is being manipulated by “the system”. What is a concerned person to do about this issue? How do we determine who is right and who is wrong without getting bogged down in technical details? The answer is: studies. Studies are the warp and woof of science. It is through studies that we determine the truth. But here is the thing; you need several of them. You can’t rely on just a couple, and you can’t quote selectively those studies that favor your pet theory. You also need the studies to have a large enough sample size. Small studies are notorious for producing erroneous results. Finally, some studies may be of greater quality than others. Therefore you need enough studies to accumulate so reviews of the studies can be performed (a study of studies if you will). This is normally a process that can take many years, but fortunately the issue of the MMR vaccine and autism has generated enough interest that many researchers have investigated it. So what are the results? An 2012 review as well as a more recent update of some of the best studies evaluating, among other things, any possible link between the MMR vaccine and autism reached the conclusion that there was no significant association between the two. These studies were conducted in many countries and, unlike Wakefield’s original study with 12 children, these studies all in all included hundreds to hundreds of thousands of children. Are these negative results part of a vast international conspiracy of scientist who have sold out to some sort of evil conglomerate of pharmaceutical companies spanning the whole world? Do you know about the “war” that scientists waged against the claims of the cigarette companies that smoking was not hazardous or that whether it was or not was not settled science when study after study demonstrated otherwise? Are you aware of the current struggle of scientists worldwide to counter the claims that there is no global warming when all evidence points in that direction? Why do we presume bad faith is involved on the part of all scientists that come to the conclusion that the MMR vaccine is not linked to autism? Do you think these scientists don’t vaccinate their children? Let me explain something. The history of science is full of individuals that, like Wakefield, discovered something and had to fight to get their voice heard. But, unlike Wakefield, these individuals discovered something real that other scientists were able to duplicate in their studies and became convinced. Paradigms and ideas switch all the time in science. Just consider the proposals or discoveries of evolution, deep time, deep space, plate tectonics, the germ theory of disease, the deficiency theory of disease, relativity, DNA, prions and many others. Very few scientists would walk away from being associated with discovering a solid causative factor for autism. The truth is that the available data has convinced scientists that the link between the MMR vaccine and autism is nonexistent. Scientists have lost interest in this theory and they have moved on to explore what other factors can be responsible for autism, and this is an important and active area of research nowadays. I understand that the autism issue can be a very emotional one, and it is really frustrating for parents to hear scientists say they don’t know what causes it. I also understand how in the midst of their despair many parents can be swayed by those who claim to have a simplistic answer along with an evil to fight against. If anything, the current political climate in the U.S. has demonstrated that this strategy works admirably well! However the best way to move forward is not to demonize scientists, but to join ranks with them and cooperate in finding the truth. This happens with many other diseases where families, clinicians, and scientists are actively involved in finding a cure and developing treatments. The photograph by the US army is in the public domain. |
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