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American Institute for Technology and Science Education Newsletter
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May, 2011
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Greetings!
"Just a spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down." Most of you will recognize this as a line from Mary Poppins, the movie about that famous British nanny. But, have you ever considered that there is a disturbing amount of truth in that phrase? If one mixes a little truth with the lies, they are a lot easier to swallow. Not sure if the "truth" is the medicine or the sugar!
Regardless, scientific and medical claims that are presented to the public often contain a bit of truth mixed with a bit of--well--not truth. This is one of the things that AITSE is trying to ferret out. How can you know what is true and what is not, what is healthy and what is not, what is safe and what is not, even what is worth spending your hard-earned dollars on and what is not?
Obviously, the AITSE scientific consortium are not the sole bearers of all truth and wisdom, but you can be assured that this team of scientists, physicians, and engineers are committed to integrity in science and will do all in their power to ensure that they let you know which is the sugar and which is the medicine.
Read on for information on disastrous technology, tummy sleeping, vitamins, quack medicine, and more. For other timely articles on relevant issues where it appears that the sugar and the medicine have been mixed, to the detriment of the public, be sure to keep abreast of our AITSE member updates. And let us know what you think.
If you benefit from the information contained therein, help keep us going--donate!
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Vitamin Supplements Necessary, Indulgent or Even Harmful?
 The Color Atlas of Human Poisoning and Envenoming by James Diaz contains an astonishing statement, "With the exception of folic acid for women of childbearing age, there are no indications for empiric vitamin therapy in developed countries." That is, despite the fact that use of vitamin D is recommended for prevention of osteoporosis, C is given for colds, and E for prostate cancer, this reference used in medical schools throughout the country states that there is no scientific evidence that vitamin pills are necessary or helpful.
Currently about 30% of our population take a daily vitamin supplement and annual sales exceed 25 billion dollars ( Jerome-Morais et al.). But, according to this peer-reviewed article by scientists at the University of Illinois at Chicago, clinical trials show that taking antioxidants such as vitamin E, C, carotenoid, selenium, and polyphenol supplements is not beneficial and may be detrimental to your health. Whereas consuming these vitamins through a balanced diet (containing fruits and vegetables) does reduce the risk of chronic disease, taking multivitamins increases risk of melanoma and prostate cancer, high dose vitamin E increases "risk of all-cause mortality" and high dose vitamin C and E in pregnant women increases risk of low birth weight babies. The pros and cons of vitamin D supplements have already been covered in the February AITSE newsletter. A balancing viewpoint comes from nutritionist Dr. Elaine Fleming of Loma Linda University, who has advised AITSE that people who are not in optimal physical health may benefit from some vitamin supplementation. After all, she points out, many of our food staples come fortified with B12, omega 3 fatty acids seem to have desirable advantages, and the FDA has recently recommended that people over 50 take vitamin D (in contrast, the Diaz book points out that vitamin D is the most commonly used type of rat poison). What is the take home message? There are no short cuts to good health. The best source of vitamins and antioxidants can be found in the produce aisles of your grocery store, not the endless rows of pills in the "health food" store. Selling pills makes the manufacturers wealthy, but the purpose of AITSE is to educate the public about good science, based on evidence, not financial benefit.
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 Technology Causing Disasters
Of course
In a fascinating article in the Economist, technology is compared to a sea urchin with "long spines of ability [radiating] out towards specific needs..." However, because these spines grow unevenly and there is little between them, technological catastrophes are inevitable. Therefore, they suggest that it is important for companies that develop and use new technologies to accept and acknowledge that things will go wrong. The firms also need to develop technologies that can remediate potential damage should it occur. Finally, there should be sensors in place that can detect when systems fail in some way.
These measures make sense, but are they likely to be implemented on a wide scale? After all, industrialists may not welcome costly regulations that assume they may not be completely in control or may even make mistakes. But, to acknowledge the fact that, when we are working at the forefront of our knowledge base, mistakes and even disasters are inevitable is a part of integrity in science. And that will benefit us all.
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Alternative Medicine
Quackery?
 Dr. David Gorsky, MD, who has been practicing as a physician for over thirty years, is disgusted with his alma mater, University of Michigan Medical School--with good reason. Although this school used to teach anatomy, histology, physiology, pharmacology, pathology, and the like, it now also offers all kinds of training in alternative medicine. Medical students in this school, and in many others throughout the country including Yale, Harvard, Stanford and Columbia Medical Schools, are currently taught what Dr. Gorsky calls "quackademic medicine". The schools themselves call it Integrative or Anthroposophic Medicine.
Anthroposophic medicine is based on the idea that "health is a matter of mind-body-spirit balance" and "prescribes treatment for the whole being through conventional methods in combination with holistic methods." Treating the whole person sounds reasonable, so why is AITSE, an organization majoring on integrity in science, featuring a paper that calls this practice "quackademic medicine"? Because it is a typical, and very dangerous, example of a spoonful of sugar making the medicine go down, only in this case a little bit of truth is making the poison go down.
Of course, we want to see our bodies treated with medicine that is based on good science and most of us are aware that we are more than our bodies. Few would dispute that depression or long-term anger can have physical effects. So, how to treat that part?
The trouble with alternative medicine, which purports to bring all into balance, is that it is based on Eastern mystical philosophies rather than science and as such has no scientific validity. Examples of alternative medicine include homeopathy, reiki, chiropraxy, cleansing of toxins, reflexology, and the like. All have lots of the "woo factor" which makes them readily accepted by our new age culture, but no scientific basis.
In homeopathy alleged medicinal substances are diluted until nothing is left so that only the "vital forces" remain. In reiki the physician mysteriously waves his or her hands to channel "positive energy" that will heal the affected part--only "benefiting" the gullible. Acupuncture is said to balance the "vital energy" and "vital juices" of the body, but has not been scientifically demonstrated to have more than a placebo effect. Chiropraxy is based on the benefits of "vertebral subluxation", but is a combination of science and pseudoscience that may provide temporary relief of pain due to endorphin release, but will cause long-term damage to joints. What about "cleansing" of the body's toxins? Or "balancing" the body's systems and forces? Or even the administration of the useless and potentially toxic Iscador (a mistletoe extract) for treatment of cancer? Amazingly, this last one is based on the twisted reasoning that since mistletoe is parasitic on plants and cancer is supposedly parasitic on people, mistletoe should cure cancer. Clearly not scientific reasoning!
The problem is that alternative medicine therapists treat people who are desperate for better health--they are ripe for exploitation. And when this type of quackery is taught in medical schools, even the medical practitioners may not realize that there is no scientific basis for what they do. At the very least, this gives patients false hope. But, some of these treatments are also very expensive, robbing patients of funds that would better be applied elsewhere. This is not even to mention the travesty that insurance companies pay for some of these treatments, forcing all who pay premiums to support pseudoscience. Worst of all, many of the supplements are dangerous, causing untold health problems in themselves (see vitamin article).
This may not be a not a popular topic for AITSE readers. After all, some may be very wedded to their favorite alternative therapy. But, the fact is that good relationships and a healthy lifestyle, combined with good science, based on evidence, is the demonstrably best approach and AITSE is dedicated to good science, based on impartial evaluation of data, not Eastern mysticism.
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Tummy Sleeping
Is it Dangerous?
 | | Dr. Crocker's granddaughter! |
The pediatrician adjusted his tie and peered at the first time mother and her baby, "Be sure to lie him on his back when he is asleep, but give him tummy time when he is awake." This advice caught my interest--because it is the opposite of what I was told when I had my children "only" 25 years ago. Why the change?
In 1994 the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development launched a campaign to have all babies sleep on their backs instead of their tummies in an effort to reduce the incidence of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). Pediatricians became convinced that this was important because of the confluence of a number of factors. First, a paper from China suggested that their low rate of SIDS was directly attributable to the fact that the Chinese tend to lie their babies on their backs. In addition, it was found that African American babies were more likely to be put down on their tummies than white babies and also had a higher rate of SIDS. Whether the SIDS was connected to the sleeping position was not definitively determined, but inferred based on epidemiological data. The connection between SIDS and sleeping position was regarded as confirmed when SIDS rates decreased dramatically after the Back to Sleep campaign. However, simple logic tells us that a lot of other factors could also have changed in the intervening years.
On the other hand, there are physiological factors that have been hypothesized to link sleep position to some features of SIDS. For example, some suggest that SIDS may be a result of a brain stem defect whereby some infants are unable to rouse themselves from a deep sleep even when their noses are buried in their mattresses--a good reason for avoiding soft sleeping surfaces. Since tummy sleepers sleep more deeply than back sleepers, it is logical that tummy sleeping may be a contributing cause for SIDS.
Despite this, many mothers have reverted to placing their infants on their tummies. They report that their babies do not sleep well on their backs. In fact, studies conducted in 1998 showed that infants placed on their backs sleep 8.3% less than those who are placed on their tummies. The back-sleeping children tend to have more acid reflux and colic and thus wake up more frequently. They also get significantly less stage 3 and stage 4 sleep. Does this matter? Yes. It was also found, and has been confirmed in later studies, that back sleepers are significantly delayed in their motor skills and mental development. In an attempt to overcome this problem, mothers are now being told to be sure to give their babies tummy time when awake. Unfortunately, this does not overcome the problem of insufficient sleep, which is highly likely to be the cause of the delayed development.
How is the above related to integrity in science? Well, it is evident that the case for tummy as opposed to back sleeping is complex. In fact, the NICHHD recommends that most infants sleep on their backs, but they say that babies with symptomatic gastric reflux or Robin syndrome should sleep on their tummies. The verdict seems to be out on how premature babies suffering with respiratory issues should sleep. Basically, there are no easy answers and no guarantees against SIDS. Back sleeping may help, but it has significant drawbacks.
However, it is always important for the public to be educated so parents can make the best decision for their child. Otherwise, they will do as is reported in the NY Times article-- what seems best to them--but they will feel unsure and guilty about their decision. And that benefits no one. |
Cheating Pilots
A Scary Business
Did you know that the USA alone boasts of approximately 25,000 commercial airline flights per day? And, according to a Boeing website, there are 18 million per day worldwide. Each of these vehicles has at least one highly-trained pilot, or so we would hope.
But in shocking news from India, it appears that this is not always the case. After discovering "widespread fraud and corruption in the booming aviation industry," 18 pilots have lost their licenses. Apparently they were cheating on their flight exams, bribing the examiners, and falsifying flight records. Is this unique to India? We can only hope.
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Simplified diagram of the metabolic pathways
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f the Month
Dr. Richard Dawkins
"If you want to understand life, don't think about vibrant, throbbing gels and oozes, think about information technology."
This quote from The Blind Watchmaker is fascinating given Dr. Dawkins' much-publicized views that life evolved through a blind process of random mutation and natural selection. After all, few of us would believe that computers or other information technology came about through the same process. In fact, our experience of life tells us that information originates through the action of an intelligent being.
It is obvious that Dawkins' assertion that life is designoid (it looks designed but it is not) is a result of his worldview--a presupposition that has little if anything to do with the scientific evidence. The question is, does this worldview allow impartial evaluation of the biological evidence right in front of our eyes? |
Freedom to Think
An Aid to Learning
Do students learn better when taught by experienced lecturers in the traditional method or when given specific problems to solve in a small group setting? According to a study conducted with over 500 engineering students at the University of British Columbia, even if the teacher is inexperienced, students that are encouraged to read, solve problems, and bounce ideas off the teacher are more engaged, attend class more frequently, and achieve higher average exam scores (74%) than those who are forced to sit and listen to lectures (41%).
One of the best ways to help students learn is to teach them controversial subjects and allow them to be free to think. Students need to be stimulated to want to learn the subject matter rather than forced to memorize "facts". Controversy helps them to apply critical thinking skills to their new knowledge. A study at Ohio State University showed that test scores increased fourfold when students were allowed to be free to think in lab class. The Ohio State professor had a goal of helping his students to become "independent and objective thinkers." Yale University has also recognized the importance of this practice, releasing recommendations from a 2008 workshop on teaching controversial subjects and avoiding bias. They quote Dr. David Horowitz of Students for Academic Freedom, "You can't get a good education if they're only telling you half the story." The critical need for allowing argument and encouraging students to examine all sides of an issue to help them learn science is well recognized. We desperately need a return to integrity in teaching--that is, telling the whole story and encouraging students to think about the issues for themselves. |
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In closing, as always, thank you for your past gifts and support. It is a fact that AITSE cannot function in its efforts to educate to increase scientific understanding and integrity without contributions. Please consider helping us with a special donation or a commitment to give on a monthly basis. Please make checks payable to AITSE and send them to PO Box 15938, Newport Beach, CA 92659. Alternatively, you can donate on line through PayPal or credit card.
Sincerely, 
Caroline Crocker
American Institute for Technology and Science Education |
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