Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

reuters.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 421 posts

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#191

Post by PACE-trial »

This article seriously misrepresents matters. Not that there's no mention of the substance of the science.

David Tuller has written on this topic in publications like the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/18/opinion/sunday/getting-it...

There are some summary pieces from science blogs:

https://sciencebasedmedicine.org/treating-chronic-fatigue-sy...

https://senseaboutscienceusa.org/pace-research-sparked-patie...

There are also important political aspects to this, particularly in the UK, eg: https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/dr-simon-duffy/the-misleadi...

Cochrane commissioned a report which confirmed that Courtney's complaints about Larun's work were well justified: http://www.virology.ws/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Cochrane-R...

If anyone has any questions, I'll try to answer them. This Reuters piece is more spin and BS from powerful people who want to avoid engaging in debate about the problems with their work.

The Journal of Health Psychology published an entire special issue on the PACE trial: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/13591053177223...

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#192

Post by nathan_long »

fenomas wrote: post #187
zzocn wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Whether you are white or black or have epicanthic fold or stuff like that is 100% encoded in your genes. Someone saying "in terms of IQ, asians > whites > blacks", which is easily provable, will get in big trouble.

> Whether you are white or black or have epicanthic fold or stuff like that is 100% encoded in your genes. Sure, but that doesn't mean your race is. Race is a subjective classification based on objective characteristics.

> Race is a subjective classification based on objective characteristics.

Perhaps more subjective than you think? Please read about the "one drop rule".

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#193

Post by bunderbunder »

mcv wrote: post #95
nateberkopec wrote: post #10

Over the next 20 or so years, expect a lot of syndromes/conditions to be reclassified, as Michael Sharpe puts in the article, as "biological condition[s] that can be perpetuated by social and psychological factors.". I struggled with RSI for a couple of years until I read John Sarno's "The Mind-Body Connection" on the recommendation of someone from HN. Sarno's thesis is that many chronic pain conditions (those withou…

> those without a clear physical mechanism, such as RSI or chronic back pain But RSI has a clear physical mechanism. I don't know as much about chronic back pain, but considering how much physical stuff there is in our back, I'd assume it's similar. Or does "physical mechanism" mean something other than it seems to mean?

What is a person, if not a whole bunch of physical mechanisms under the control of a central nervous system that is itself another physical mechanism?

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#194

Post by llamaz »

tomp wrote: post #184
llamaz wrote: post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The purpose of your circumlocution is to remain ambiguous enough to fall back to a less controversial position when called out. Just say what mean, which is that skin colour correlates with IQ. I hate it when your ilk make race vs IQ seem like an edgy new opinion that is being suppressed. It used to be mainstream globally, but we moved past that through dialectics. When the "bell curve" book was published, we resurre…

> The purpose of your circumlocution is to remain ambiguous enough to fall back to a less controversial position when called out. Just say what mean, which is that skin colour correlates with IQ. No, parent is rightfully pointing out that it's IQ in general , not any specific trait X. X could stand for race/skin color, but it could also stand for ancestry (e.g. Askenazi Jew, which IMO have same skin color as the rest…

You're right, maybe I should have said race instead of skin colour and added sexism to my list of accusations.

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#195

Post by jacobolus »

mcv wrote: post #95
nateberkopec wrote: post #10

Over the next 20 or so years, expect a lot of syndromes/conditions to be reclassified, as Michael Sharpe puts in the article, as "biological condition[s] that can be perpetuated by social and psychological factors.". I struggled with RSI for a couple of years until I read John Sarno's "The Mind-Body Connection" on the recommendation of someone from HN. Sarno's thesis is that many chronic pain conditions (those withou…

> those without a clear physical mechanism, such as RSI or chronic back pain But RSI has a clear physical mechanism. I don't know as much about chronic back pain, but considering how much physical stuff there is in our back, I'd assume it's similar. Or does "physical mechanism" mean something other than it seems to mean?

Yes, there’s some physical mechanism, but triggered by emotional responses.

Speaking for myself, I don’t have serious back pain, but when I occasionally experience momentary strong anxiety my back muscles get noticeably tight/strained, especially while sleep deprived. Drinking 1 beer typically alleviates that, or I’m sure some other anxiolytic medicine could.

I would not be surprised at all if chronic severe anxiety (e.g. taking care of a chronically ill child, working a high-stakes short-deadlines job, living with an emotionally abusive person, experiencing trauma and then suffering PTSD, ...) might cause me to develop a real back pain problem.

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#196

Post by mcv »

pjc50 wrote: post #175
mcv wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> those without a clear physical mechanism, such as RSI or chronic back pain But RSI has a clear physical mechanism. I don't know as much about chronic back pain, but considering how much physical stuff there is in our back, I'd assume it's similar. Or does "physical mechanism" mean something other than it seems to mean?

In practical terms, "physical mechanism" means something a GP can see or test for, rather than relying on asking the patient whether it hurts.

GPs aren't always sufficiently specialised to do a detailed diagnosis, but in my experience, a good physical therapist should be able to find the problem. (They have in my case, whereas the GP just asked some vague questions and decided it's probably some form of RSI.)

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#197

Post by vgoh1 »

The prevailing opinion is to just let the scientists do their work, and don't second-guess them. Well, there is a reason that they are being second-guessed. Look at all the harm that has occurred because of the old scientific consensus that we should be removing fats from our diet. The reasons for this consensus was not only shoddy studies, but there was a lot of politics involved, drowning out dissenting voices. Today, there are a lot of studies being funded by organizations that are influencing the results of those studies.

We should be questioning scientific studies. The problem is, people are going about it the wrong way. They are just throwing out the scientific method, logic, etc. Science is not flawed, but the studies are flawed, in that more than just science is being used to influence conclusions.

There has to be some blame put on the scientific community for why it is so popular to question their work in the modern era.

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#198

Post by nathan_long »

ddorian43 wrote: post #162
bryanlarsen wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is significantly more genetic variety in the single black "race" than all others put together. You could try dividing blacks into three or twelve different races but those lines are quite difficult to draw. Any statement which considers black a single race and white and Oriental distinct is automatically suspect.

Can you compare them after you split them ? Or are you saying you can't even compare them ? Can you compare "black races" with "asian races" ?

No. Go look at pictures of Melanesians. Are they "black"? Yet:

> Among Templeton's conclusions: there is more genetic similarity between Europeans and sub-Saharan Africans and between Europeans and Melanesians, inhabitants of islands northeast of Australia, than there is between Africans and Melanesians. Yet, sub-Saharan Africans and Melanesians share dark skin, hair texture and cranial-facial features, traits commonly used to classify people into races. According to Templeton, this example shows that "racial traits" are grossly incompatible with overall genetic differences between human populations.

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/1998-10/WUiS-GSRD-07...

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#199

Post by PaulHoule »

jimmy1 wrote: post #15
nateberkopec wrote: post #10

Over the next 20 or so years, expect a lot of syndromes/conditions to be reclassified, as Michael Sharpe puts in the article, as "biological condition[s] that can be perpetuated by social and psychological factors.". I struggled with RSI for a couple of years until I read John Sarno's "The Mind-Body Connection" on the recommendation of someone from HN. Sarno's thesis is that many chronic pain conditions (those withou…

> the pain is real, it's just caused by processes in your brain, I don't find this particular statement very revolutionary. We have known for a long time that physical pain is manufactured by the brain as an evolutionary tactic to help us prevent further harm to ourselves. If we didn't "feel pain" when we were on fire, we would burn to death.

That is true about acute pain.

It is not true about chronic pain. Acute pain will get better if you rest, chronic pain won't.

Most chronic pain sufferers will feel better if they behave as if the pain doesn't exist, increase their activities, get less depressed, feel less pain...

The core of fibro identity, however, is that fibros don't experience the benefits of exercise, they get the pain but they don't get the gain. That might be true. I have seen fibros try something new and get hurt even more quickly than heroin adicts.

Re: Online activists are silencing us, scientists say

#200

Post by ryukafalz »

pjc50 wrote: post #175
mcv wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> those without a clear physical mechanism, such as RSI or chronic back pain But RSI has a clear physical mechanism. I don't know as much about chronic back pain, but considering how much physical stuff there is in our back, I'd assume it's similar. Or does "physical mechanism" mean something other than it seems to mean?

In practical terms, "physical mechanism" means something a GP can see or test for, rather than relying on asking the patient whether it hurts.

That’s an ever-changing category, though, as medical technology improves. Bone fractures would have been more difficult to observe directly before the invention of x-ray machines, but that doesn’t change the underlying physical condition.
Post reply on HN