Genes and an Old Friend
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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -> > Another of his books, "Fads and Fallacies" (1956), debunked many > > of the alternative-medicine theories that have recently made an > > unfortunate comeback: homeopathy, naturopathy, zone therapy (now > > called reflexology), and others. > I’ve dug that one out too. I miss his columns in Scientific American…. > Check out the books by Ivars Peterson, the math editor for _Science > News_. Peterson covers similar topics to Gardner, and for my money > writes a lot better. I’ve enjoyed both _The Mathematical Tourist_, > which covers public-key encryption well, and _Jungles of Randomness_, > which is mostly about games of chance and statistical fallacies.
Thanks for the tip–I’ll check them out. Are they similar to Douglas Hofstadter’s Godel, Escher & Bach?
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>Note to Colin: I warned you in the subject line, ya curmudgeon.
?????? — "We are fighting today for security, for progress, and for peace, not only for ourselves but for all men, not only for one generation but for all generations. We are fighting to cleanse the world of ancient evils, ancient ills." Franklin Delano Rosevelt State of the Union Address – 1942
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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -> Steven Litvintchouk writes: > >Einstein made mistakes too. > I do not! > Sheldon Einstein Jr > "Life would be devoid of all meaning were it without tribulation." > I gotta admit, Sheldon–sometimes you zing one in that just makes me laugh > out loud. This was one of the good ones.
Don’t encourage him :O) He probably holds the record for being plonked in this newsgroup. Lane Ambition is a poor excuse for not having enough sense to be lazy.
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> > Another of his books, "Fads and Fallacies" (1956), debunked many > of the alternative-medicine theories that have recently made an > unfortunate comeback: homeopathy, naturopathy, zone therapy (now > called reflexology), and others. > I’ve dug that one out too. I miss his columns in Scientific American….
Check out the books by Ivars Peterson, the math editor for _Science News_. Peterson covers similar topics to Gardner, and for my money writes a lot better. I’ve enjoyed both _The Mathematical Tourist_, which covers public-key encryption well, and _Jungles of Randomness_, which is mostly about games of chance and statistical fallacies. Note to Colin: I warned you in the subject line, ya curmudgeon. — (650) 236-2231 [daytime] http://www.wsrcc.com/alison/ There are important differences between Milosevic and Sharon. For example, Sharon has better hair.
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– Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -> > To quote Martin Gardner: > > For every seeming quack who later turns out to be a genius, > > there are ten thousand seeming quacks who only turn out to be quacks. > > And the fact that a scientist has a proven track record of success, > > still does not mean that he is infallible and that everything he does > > turns out to be right. > > Steven D. Litvintchouk > I had forgotten that great quote from Gardner, and it made me dust off an > old book of his, "Science: Good, Bad & Bogus". It should be required > reading for the alt guys. > Another of his books, "Fads and Fallacies" (1956), debunked many of the > alternative-medicine theories that have recently made an unfortunate > comeback: homeopathy, naturopathy, zone therapy (now called > reflexology), and others. > — > Steven D. Litvintchouk
I’ve dug that one out too. I miss his columns in Scientific American….
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> To quote Martin Gardner: > For every seeming quack who later turns out to be a genius, > there are ten thousand seeming quacks who only turn out to be quacks. > And the fact that a scientist has a proven track record of success, > still does not mean that he is infallible and that everything he does > turns out to be right. > Steven D. Litvintchouk
I had forgotten that great quote from Gardner, and it made me dust off an old book of his, "Science: Good, Bad & Bogus". It should be required reading for the alt guys.
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> Steven Litvintchouk writes: >Einstein made mistakes too. > I do not! > Sheldon Einstein Jr > "Life would be devoid of all meaning were it without tribulation."
I gotta admit, Sheldon–sometimes you zing one in that just makes me laugh out loud. This was one of the good ones.
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- Hide quoted text — Show quoted text -> To quote Martin Gardner: > For every seeming quack who later turns out to be a genius, > there are ten thousand seeming quacks who only turn out to be quacks. > And the fact that a scientist has a proven track record of success, > still does not mean that he is infallible and that everything he does > turns out to be right. > Steven D. Litvintchouk > I had forgotten that great quote from Gardner, and it made me dust off an > old book of his, "Science: Good, Bad & Bogus". It should be required > reading for the alt guys.
Another of his books, "Fads and Fallacies" (1956), debunked many of the alternative-medicine theories that have recently made an unfortunate comeback: homeopathy, naturopathy, zone therapy (now called reflexology), and others. — Steven D. Litvintchouk
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>> They ran Ignaz Semmelweis out of town for asking surgeons to wash >> their hands between patients and before surgery. >And then he proved it was a good idea. > Well, he had a little more trouble than you might think:
The hospital director feels his leadership has been > criticized. He’s furious. He blocks Semmelweis’s promotion. The > situation gets worse. Viennese doctors turn on this Hungarian > immigrant. >> And in our day, they >> hooted en masse at two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling, for >> showing that vitamin C helps with colds.
What you have demonstrated is that, like in every other human endeavor, there are politics and veniality. Semmelweis would have been just as correct if everyone had accepted his views with open arms. Sometimes even brilliant, successful people (as Pauling) get it wrong.
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> For your reading entertainment: > They ostracized William Harvey for saying that blood circulates. They > ridiculed Louis Pasteur for announcing that germs can cause disease. > They ran Ignaz Semmelweis out of town for asking surgeons to wash > their hands between patients and before surgery. And in our day, they > hooted en masse at two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling, for > showing that vitamin C helps with colds.
To quote Martin Gardner: For every seeming quack who later turns out to be a genius, there are ten thousand seeming quacks who only turn out to be quacks. And the fact that a scientist has a proven track record of success, still does not mean that he is infallible and that everything he does turns out to be right. Einstein made mistakes too. — Steven D. Litvintchouk
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>For your reading entertainment: >They ostracized William Harvey for saying that blood circulates. They >ridiculed Louis Pasteur for announcing that germs can cause disease. >They ran Ignaz Semmelweis out of town for asking surgeons to wash >their hands between patients and before surgery. And in our day, they >hooted en masse at two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling, for >showing that vitamin C helps with colds.
See tagline. "They laughed at Galileo. They laughed at Newton But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown." Carl Sagan
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>> They ran Ignaz Semmelweis out of town for asking surgeons to wash > their hands between patients and before surgery. >And then he proved it was a good idea.
Well, he had a little more trouble than you might think: In 1847 Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis’s close friend, Jakob Kolletschka, cuts his finger while he’s doing an autopsy. Kolletschka soon dies of symptoms like those of puerperal fever. That gets Semmelweis’s attention. Puerperal fever is killing 13 percent of the women who give birth in his hospital. The death rate is driving him nuts. He can’t figure it out. A nearby obstetric hospital, run by midwives, loses only two percent of its patients to fever. No one has connected germs with disease yet. The first hint of that connection will come from England six years later. Lister won’t show us how to kill germs for another 18 years. Semmelweis is a Hungarian doctor teaching medicine in Vienna. He notices that students move between the dissection room and the delivery room without washing their hands. On a hunch, he sets up a policy. Doctors must wash their hands in a chlorine solution when they leave the cadavers. Mortality from puerperal fever promptly drops to two percent. Now things grow strange. Instead of reporting his success at a meeting, Semmelweis says nothing. Finally, a friend publishes two papers on the method. By now, Semmelweis has started washing medical instruments as well as hands. As outside interest grows, we begin to understand Semmelweis’s silence. The hospital director feels his leadership has been criticized. He’s furious. He blocks Semmelweis’s promotion. The situation gets worse. Viennese doctors turn on this Hungarian immigrant. Finally, he goes back to Budapest. There he brings his methods to a far more primitive hospital. He cuts death by puerperal fever to less than one percent. He does more. He systematically isolates causes of death. He autopsies victims. He sets up control groups. He studies statistics. Finally, in 1861, he writes a book on his methods. The establishment gives it poor reviews. Semmelweis grows angry and polemical. He hurts his own cause with rage and frustration. In 1865 he suffers a mental breakdown. Friends commit him to a mental institution. There — as though to close the circle on his brief 47-year life — he cuts his finger. In days, he dies of the very infection that killed his friend Kolletschka and from which he’s saved thousands of mothers. That same year Joseph Lister begins spraying a carbolic acid solution during surgery to kill germs. In the end, it’s Lister who gives our unhappy hero his due. He says, "Without Semmelweis, my achievements would be nothing." >I would point out that in all of the above examples it really was not a case >of the lone scientist against the world. There were two camps, each with >their proponents, and we remember the guys who proved their camps right. For >each of these guys "they" also suported their work. It was just a different >"they." > And in our day, they > hooted en masse at two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling, for > showing that vitamin C helps with colds. >He also lost the race to determine the structure of DNA because he was >convinced it was a triple helix. Even Nobel laureates have their share of >blunders. When did he show this by the way?
He never did show it. He thought he had it, but like he said, "In order to have a great idea, you have to have alot of ideas." So I agree with you there. We all know he is the most well >known proponent of it but he has not convinced any signifant portion of the >scientific community the way Harvey, Pasteur, and Semmelweis did. Maybe he >will prove to be in the forgotten camp that was wrong. Maybe he already has >been. >Not that it has anything to do with asthma or genetic research. > Linus Pauling’s last inverview: ><snip – Who cares?>
As you said recently, "Pitty." Bob It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye. – Antoine de Saint-Exupery
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<stuff containing speculation about the future of genetic research and asthma snipped> > They ostracized William Harvey for saying that blood circulates.
And then he proved it did. > They > ridiculed Louis Pasteur for announcing that germs can cause disease.
And then he proved they did. > They ran Ignaz Semmelweis out of town for asking surgeons to wash > their hands between patients and before surgery.
And then he proved it was a good idea. I would point out that in all of the above examples it really was not a case of the lone scientist against the world. There were two camps, each with their proponents, and we remember the guys who proved their camps right. For each of these guys "they" also suported their work. It was just a different "they." > And in our day, they > hooted en masse at two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling, for > showing that vitamin C helps with colds.
He also lost the race to determine the structure of DNA because he was convinced it was a triple helix. Even Nobel laureates have their share of blunders. When did he show this by the way? We all know he is the most well known proponent of it but he has not convinced any signifant portion of the scientific community the way Harvey, Pasteur, and Semmelweis did. Maybe he will prove to be in the forgotten camp that was wrong. Maybe he already has been. Not that it has anything to do with asthma or genetic research. > Linus Pauling’s last inverview:
<snip – Who cares?> — CBI, MD "Believe those who are seeking the truth; doubt those who find it." -Andre Gide
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A recent exerpt from the JAMA journal: Future major advances in understanding, preventing, and treating lung disease will most likely evolve from focusing on gene expression in the lung in the context of the host and the environment. Genes involved in susceptibility to asthma will be defined and characterized. In the context that environmental stimuli play a significant role in triggering asthmatic attacks in susceptible individuals, asthma will be a prototype disease in which a DNA fingerprint will define susceptibility, and alert the individual to avoid interaction with the stimuli that are specific for their asthma. Identification of asthma susceptibility genes will also provide new therapeutic targets to prevent and treat this disorder. http://jama.ama-assn.org/issues/v285n5/ffull/jsc00351.html For your reading entertainment: They ostracized William Harvey for saying that blood circulates. They ridiculed Louis Pasteur for announcing that germs can cause disease. They ran Ignaz Semmelweis out of town for asking surgeons to wash their hands between patients and before surgery. And in our day, they hooted en masse at two-time Nobel Prize winner Linus Pauling, for showing that vitamin C helps with colds. Linus Pauling’s last inverview: http://www.internetwks.com/pauling/lastpinv.html I personally believe that these opinions can and will find a way to work together. Noted that more research is needed. Bob "On Monday we’ll eat Gil, then on Tuesday we’ll eat Bob! (laughs) No, that’s going too far!" Dr. Leo Marvin
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