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Comment Re:Doctors != Scientists (Score 1) 737

by DrLudicrous (#26024123) Attached to: What the Papers Don't Say About Vaccines

I don't hate doctors. I think that the average person's opinion of a doctor is over-inflated when compared to other professions whose training is just as long and difficult, whose societal contributions are just as important, but whose financial reward is not as great.

This leads to greater trust being place in medical professionals, especially when in disagreement with scientific opinion. This can be a dangerous, even deadly proposition.

I know many, many physicians who are clinical researchers. I think much of the work that they do is very good. However, medical research often does not have a lot of science in it, from my own experiences, and those of my colleagues. I cannot speak for everyone, but only that from my own limited interactions with medical people, they have a tendency to oversimplify the science, at times missing rather important points. I believe this is a result of two things- their medical training in how to problem-solve, and a lack of technical knowledge in science. This leads to dangerous statements like MMR causes autism. Or releasing countless, unending and contradictory studies about diet. Not all clinical researchers are like that, but there is a large number that are, and they get a disproportionately loud voice in the national media.

Comment Re:Doctors != Scientists (Score 1) 737

by DrLudicrous (#26024029) Attached to: What the Papers Don't Say About Vaccines

Yes, and I am clear on their training. However, my opinion is that doctors come nowhere close to being scientists. Perhaps, yes, they are closer than a plumber, but that was hyperbole to lend to my point.

When I was in college, I had to take programming courses to demonstrate a basic competence in computer programming. I was tested repeatedly. That experience in no way qualifies me to say that I'm an expert at programming, or even that I am considerably more knowledgeable than a business person writing formulas in an Excel spreadsheet. In the same vein, IMO, doctors don't really qualify as scientists, or even being particularly knowledgeable about the subject. However, the belief among laypeople is that they are knowledgeable. This leads to false weighting of medical opinion versus scientific opinion. They are not one and the same, but many people do not distinguish between the two. I think they should do so.

Comment Re:Doctors != Scientists (Score 3, Insightful) 737

by DrLudicrous (#26022111) Attached to: What the Papers Don't Say About Vaccines
Right, I see some of what you are saying. However, the point I was trying to make was that doctors don't effectively use the scientific method on a day to day basis. The way they approach research is fundamentally different from how a scientist in biology, chemistry, or physics would approach the same research. Basically, IMHO, calling doctors scientists is an insult to real scientists, and denigrates the work that they do. If you are going to call doctors scientists, you might as well call a biologist a neurosurgeon because they know the science behind how the brain works.

Comment Doctors != Scientists (Score 5, Insightful) 737

by DrLudicrous (#26021811) Attached to: What the Papers Don't Say About Vaccines
I know this is going to be viewed somewhat as flamebait, but to put it bluntly, doctors are mechanics for the human body. No more, no less. The vast, overwhelming majority of doctors have little to no true scientific training, any more so than a business person or Joe the Plumber. Even those doctors doing active medical research have limited scientific faculties IMO, having heard about this stereotype from others, read about on the internet, and dealt with it myself. Therefore, when it comes to scientific interpretation, anything coming from a doctor's mouth should be taken with at least a grain of salt, if not a shakerful.
Earth

Machine Condenses Drinking Water Out of Thin Air 438

Posted by timothy from the LED-bulbs-or-klieg-light-specials? dept.
longacre writes "A new $1,200 machine that uses the same amount of power as three light bulbs promises to condense drinkable water out of the air. On display at Wired Magazine's annual tech showcase, the WaterMill 'looks like a giant golf ball that has been chopped in half: it is about 3ft in diameter, made of white plastic, and is attached to the wall. It works by drawing air through filters to remove dust and particles, then cooling it to just below the temperature at which dew forms. The condensed water is passed through a self-sterilising chamber that uses microbe-busting UV light to eradicate any possibility of Legionnaires' disease or other infections. Finally, it is filtered and passed through a pipe to the owner's fridge or kitchen tap.'"
Government

Anti-Matter Created By Laser At Livermore 465

Posted by kdawson from the billions-and-billiions dept.
zootropole alerts us to a press release issued today by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, announcing the production of 'billions of particles of anti-matter.' "Take a gold sample the size of the head of a push pin, shoot a laser through it, and suddenly more than 100 billion particles of anti-matter appear. The anti-matter, also known as positrons, shoots out of the target in a cone-shaped plasma 'jet.' This new ability to create a large number of positrons in a small laboratory opens the door to several fresh avenues of anti-matter research, including an understanding of the physics underlying various astrophysical phenomena such as black holes and gamma ray bursts." The press release doesn't characterize the laser used in this experiment, but it may have been this one.
Biotech

Scientists Discover Proteins Controlling Evolution 436

Posted by samzenpus from the let-the-flamewar-begin dept.
Khemisty writes "Evolutionary changes are supposed to take place gradually and randomly, under pressure from natural selection. But a team of Princeton scientists investigating a group of proteins that help cells burn energy stumbled across evidence that this is not how evolution works. In fact, their discovery could revolutionize the way we understand evolutionary processes. They have evidence that organisms actually have the ability to control their own evolution."
Sci-Fi

Paul Krugman Awarded Nobel Prize For Economics 425

Posted by kdawson from the too-smart-fr-government dept.
zogger writes in his journal, "The guy who put together the concept of geographical location combined with cheap transportation leading to 'like trades with like' and the rise of superindustrial trading blocs has won the Nobel economics science prize. He's a bigtime critic of a lot of this administration's policies, and is unabashedly an FDR-economy styled fella. Here is his blog at the NYTimes." Reader yoyoq adds that Krugman's career choice was inspired by reading Asimov's Foundation series at a young age.
Government

President Signs Law Creating Copyright Czar 555

Posted by kdawson from the ip-con dept.
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "President Bush has signed the EIPRA (AKA the PRO-IP Act) and created a cabinet-level post of 'Copyright Czar,' on par with the current 'Drug Czar,' in spite of prior misgivings about the bill. They did at least get rid of provisions that would have had the DOJ take over the RIAA's unpopular litigation campaign. Still, the final legislation (PDF) creates new classes of felony criminal copyright infringement, adds civil forfeiture provisions that incorporate by reference parts of the Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and Control Act of 1970, and directs the Copyright Czar to lobby foreign governments to adopt stronger IP laws. At this point, our best hope would appear to be to hope that someone sensible like Laurence Lessig or William Patry gets appointed."
Science

Nobel Prize For Medicine Awarded, Physics Soon To Follow 135

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the tis-the-season dept.
Nobel Prize season is here again, and the first award for Physiology or Medicine was split between two virologists who discovered HIV and one who demonstrated that a virus causes cervical cancer. Coming soon is the announcement for Physics. Look to the right for a chance to pit your selection wit against the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences with a poll for which scientific achievement deserves the prize. Front runners, according to Reuters, are; Andre Geim and Kostya Novoselov, discovers of graphene, Vera Rubin, provider of the best evidence yet of dark matter, and Roger Penrose and Dan Shechtman, discoverers of Penrose tilings and quasicrystals.
Software

Stallman Says Cloud Computing Is a Trap 621

Posted by kdawson from the head-out-of-the-clouds dept.
stevedcc writes in to tell us about an interview with RMS in The Guardian, in which he gives his views on cloud computing, with a particular focus on user access to data and the sacrifices made for convenience. "'It's stupidity. It's worse than stupidity: it's a marketing hype campaign,' he told The Guardian. 'Somebody is saying this is inevitable — and whenever you hear somebody saying that, it's very likely to be a set of businesses campaigning to make it true.'" Computerworld has a summary of some of the blogosphere's reaction to RMS's position.
Government

Senate Judiciary Committee Approves Copyright Cops 483

Posted by kdawson from the keystone-of-the-law dept.
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "The Senate Judiciary Committee has approved the EIPA (the Enforcement of Intellectual Property Rights Act of 2008), which would create copyright cops. And these cops would take over the RIAA's War on Sharing by filing civil lawsuits and using civil forfeiture laws to take any and all computers engaged in infringement. Worse, they would even seize computers (such as servers or database farms) that house the data of innocent people, and these people would not have any right to get their data back. At best the 'virtual bystanders' who happened to have data on a computer used for infringement could get a protective order saying that no one should go rummaging through their stuff. Perhaps the only good thing in the bill is that they've excluded DMCA circumvention from the list of grounds for seizure. So while the Senators believe this is needed to combat foreign copyright infringement cartels, it's entirely likely that innocent people will be harmed by this law."
Government

Senator Questions Rise In US Texting Prices 592

Posted by kdawson from the competition-what-competition dept.
vimm writes "Senator Herb Kohl (D-Wis.) has started an inquiry on the rising prices of text messaging (up 100% since 2005) that has occurred almost in sync with the consolidation of 6 major carriers down to 4. In a letter sent to Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel, and T-Mobile, Kohl said the increase 'does not appear to be justified by rising costs in delivering text messages.'"
Privacy

Submission + - Eyeing Co-workers' E-mail? You Could Be Arrested (computerworld.com) 1

Submitted by
CWmike
CWmike writes: "While it might seem like a practical joke or a harmless, e-mail snopping could land you in more hot water than you'd ever expect — you could be charged with a federal crime. The recent case of a Philadelphia TV news anchor charged with breaking into his co-anchor's e-mail accounts shines a light on the seriousness of such snooping. Scott Christie, a former federal prosecutor who headed up the computer hacking section at the U.S. Attorney's Office, said: "You look over someone's shoulder and read a personal letter and that's not a crime, so how can it be a crime to access someone's e-mail? It's not the same thing, of course... What you're dong when you're accessing e-mail is affirmatively exceeding your access to electronic documents and systems." He adds: "Usually, you're doing that by pretending to be that person to break into their account.""
Privacy

Submission + - DHS: We can seize laptops for an indefinite period (cnet.com)

Submitted by
mytrip
mytrip writes: "The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has concocted a remarkable new policy: It reserves the right to seize for an indefinite period of time laptops taken across the border.

A pair of DHS policies from last month say that customs agents can routinely — as a matter of course — seize, make copies of, and "analyze the information transported by any individual attempting to enter, re-enter, depart, pass through, or reside in the United States." (See policy No. 1 and No. 2.)

DHS claims the border search of electronic information is useful to detect terrorists, drug smugglers, and people violating "copyright or trademark laws." (Readers: Are you sure your iPod and laptop have absolutely no illicitly downloaded songs? You might be guilty of a felony.)

Sen. Russell Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat, called the DHS policies "truly alarming" and told the Washington Post that he plans to introduce a bill that would require reasonable suspicion for border searches."

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