Seth's Blog

• A good example of how misleading drug-company-sponsored analyses of drug trials can be. Independent reanalysis by Daniel Coyne, a professor of medicine at Washington University in St. Louis, reached opposite conclusions. Good work, Coyne.
• Coke contains a carcinogen.
• “I used sunflower seeds to lose weight.” Someone else used them to reduce addictions. The link between the Shangri-La Diet and reduction of non-food addictions (smoking, coffee) fascinates me. People start SLD to lose weight and say they become less addicted to smoking, coffee drinking, and so on. One possibility is that by reducing hunger, SLD reduces discomfort. Addictions gain strength from discomfort, often resemble self-medication.
• Steve McIntyre replies to Gavin Schmidt’s claim that McIntyre’s beliefs resemble “classic conspiracy theory”. I used to watch a lot of football — when the 49ers won most of their games. (I am a classic fairweather fan.) I get a similar pleasure reading Steve McIntyre’s posts as I did from watching 49er games.
• Congratulations, UCLA press office! A study that measured the effect of omega-3 by comparing two groups of rats — one gets omega-3, the other doesn’t — is called a study about the evils of fructose (both groups got a high-fructose diet). I am surprised the scientists involved didn’t object to this misrepresentation. The study supposedly shows — according to the press office — that fructose is bad because performance went down when the rats were switched from standard lab chow to a high-fructose diet. Let’s say you start with a diet (standard lab chow) that has a barely adequate amount of omega-3. You feed both groups lab chow for several months. Then you do an experiment in which both groups get 60% of their calories from the lab chow and 40% of their calories from a diet that contains no omega-3. Performance is likely to decline due to insufficient omega-3 no matter what the new diet contains.

Thanks to Tim Beneke.

After noting that James Hansen’s 1988 climate model predicted too much warming in the subsequent 22 years, someone at Skeptical Science concluded:

The main reason Hansen’s 1988 warming projections were too high is that he used a climate model with a high climate sensitivity, and his results are actually evidence that the true climate sensitivity parameter is within the range accepted by the IPCC.

There is no consideration of the possibilities that (a) one or more other parameters were wrong or (b) the model — aside from parameter values — is wrong (e.g., it oversimplifies). Surely you are joking, Mr. Skeptical Science.

Thanks to Phil Price.

• A “safe starch” lowers HDL.
• DIY clinical trials
• omega-3 content versus mercury content of fish: a handy guide.
• Predictions of climate models versus reality. I have only seen careful prediction-vs-reality comparisons made by AGW skeptics. Those who believe humans are dangerously warming the planet appear to be silent on this subject.
• UNESCO’s list of “intangible cultural heritage”. I like to think the items on the list are clues to human nature.

Thanks to David Cramer and Nadalal.

• more health, less profit?
• Long interesting review of Michael Mann’s new book. “The controversy is actually very simple. Mann’s papers give undue focus to a small amount of data.”
• excellent article in The Smithsonian about fermentation. “We’re trying to see if there’s a way to get more of that umami richness and less fishiness.”
• Flaxseed in Human Nutrition (1995 book).
• Spy magazine highlights.

Thanks to Tom George and Mark Griffith.

• Older eyes block blue light more than young eyes, which may cause sleep problems.
• Caroline Rodgers makes a case (29 slides) that autism is often caused by prenatal ultrasound. This link is from the comments on my previous post about the danger of prenatal ultrasound.
• Why did Deep Throat leak the secrets that brought down President Nixon?
• Do bitters make a difference? A taste test. A better test would have been simpler: to ask, many times in paired comparisons, which is better: Drink X with bitters or drink X without bitters?

Thanks to David Cramer, Jahed Momand and Nancy Evans.

• The advantages of raquetball self-education
• Nassim Taleb on British economic governance. I like the idea of a list of firms that will be bailed out.
• Lactofermented mayonnaise. “[Without fermentation this] will only last for about a week in the refrigerator. On the other hand, [if fermented (7-12 hours at room temperature), it] will last about 6-8 weeks or longer.”
• Cosmic rays and cloud formation. Does cosmic ray variation cause global temperature variation?
• Man the opportunist by Melissa McEwen
• WSJ anti-AGW letter writers respond to critics.

Thanks to Ryan Holiday, Matt Cassel, Tom George and Dave Lull.

Gleick might as well have signed the fake document. Mosher identified him as the author almost instantly. The fake memo, unlike the actual documents, put Gleick in a position of prominence in the climate debate, whereas, in his actual encounters with skeptic blogs, Gleick has come across as an erratic and even comic figure. The style parallels came afterwards.

From here. I sat next to Peter Gleick at a friend’s dinner party about five years ago. He seemed to me staggeringly accomplished, not erratic (or comic) at all. Yet recently I too found him to be comic. Remember that famous New Yorker cartoon — “On the Internet, no one knows I’m a dog”? The bitter truth is “On the Internet, no one knows I’m a nice person.” I don’t mean Gleick is not a nice person — if anyone is a jerk it is me for what I just quoted — I mean that his recent actions strike me as weirdly uninhibited.

• Big Pharma versus Parkinson’s disease — perfectly good non-Big-Pharma treatments (ECT, nicotine, caffeine) are neglected in favor of a much worse Big-Pharma treatment (L-dopa).
• Substances high in Essential Fatty Acids, such as evening primrose oil, used to treat  allergy-associated problems (case reports). From the 1980s. Other articles from the Foundation for Integrated Medicine.
• Artisanal sake survives the tsunami and makes an accidental discovery.
• Food tour of Tokyo by Jeffrey Steingarten.
• Should England’s Royal Society be taken seriously? Judging by their leaders’ certainty about global warming . . .
• 60 Minutes covers the Anil Potti scandal at Duke University.

Thanks to Allen Carl Jackson, Phil Alexander and Navanit Arakeri.

• no detectable association between heart disease and fried-food consumption
• tiny amounts of alcohol greatly lengthen worm’s life
• climate models fail to predict ocean heat content
• disgust and fermented food

Thanks to Aaron Blaisdell, Alex Chernavsky and Navanit Arakeri.

A few days ago the Wall Street Journal published a letter from 16 people saying what I say, that the case that humans are warming the planet is much weaker than you’d guess from mainstream media. An excerpt:

The number of scientific “heretics” is growing . . .  Perhaps the most inconvenient fact is the lack of global warming for well over 10 years now.

Here is a rebuttal by a biological anthropologist named Greg Laden:

Shameful. . . . . Out and out lie, easily falsified  . . . So bad that this is what we can say about the “16 scientists” who signed this letter: They are idiots. . . . . Their ability to make even the simplest of judgements is now in serious question. . . . Let Google forever know who these jokers are.

Peter Gleick, MacArthur “genius” Fellow, also wrote a rebuttal. What about the lack of warming for the last 10 years? Here’s Gleick:

The authors claim there has been a “lack of warming” for 10 years. The reality? 2011 was the 35th year in a row in which global temperatures were above the historical average and 2010 and 2005 were the warmest years on record.

I have not omitted quotation marks. Here’s how Peter Fromhoff at the Union of Concerned Scientists made the same point:

The authors claim there has been a “lack of warming” for 10 years. Here’s what we know: 2011 was the 35^th year in a row in which global temperatures were above the historical average and 2010 and 2005 were the warmest years on record.

I went to the link given to support the “35th year in a row” claim. Here is the only global temperature graph at that link: