"MDs have extensive training on the importance of nutrition, lifestyle,"
Citation needed. How many hours out of their medical training does the average MD have in these topics? Factoid for you to start with if you want to talk BS: http://www.ajcn.org/content/83/4/941S.full "A total of 106 surveys were returned for a response rate of 84%. Ninety-nine of the 106 schools responding required some form of nutrition education; however, only 32 schools (30%) required a separate nutrition course. On average, students received 23.9 contact hours of nutrition instruction during medical school (range: 2-70 h). Only 40 schools required the minimum 25 h recommended by the National Academy of Sciences. Most instructors (88%) expressed the need for additional nutrition instruction at their institutions. "
That's 25 hours out of how many thousands?
Anyway, I could go point by point though the rest of this, but I won't.:-)
But a few comments anyway.
First off, the lung cancer may be more from vegetable deficiency disease and iodine deficiency disease and vitamin D deficiency disease and other messed up social processes leading to distress than from smoking. I'm not saying smoking is good for you generally, of course, but consider: "Why I Recommend to NOT Stop Smoking" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9DZBzKppHQ
Ask your wife, outside of an initial patient intake interview, how many minutes can her practice let her spend actually with a patient per visit? I doubt the average is higher than ten minutes. How can that result in good outcomes? It's like schools. No matter how well the staff means, the overall institutional dynamics prevents really good stuff from happening for most people most of the time.
Contrast with: http://www.patchadams.org/ "The Gesundheit! Institute is a project in holistic medical care based on the belief that one cannot separate the health of the individual from the health of the family, the community, the world, and the health care system itself."
I'd just suggest you, your doctor, and your wife read "Eat To Live" by Dr. Joel Fuhrman, MD and you'll see why sending a patient to the hospital for heart disease may someday be considered malpractice.:-) http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx "Trying to figure out how to pay for ineffective and expensive medicine by politicians will never be a real solution. People need to know they do not have to have heart disease to begin with, and if they get it, aggressive nutrition is the most life-saving intervention. And it is free."
I feel 20% of what most MDs do is miraculous (e.g. burn care, reattaching severed limbs, therapies for genetic defects, etc.), even if much of the other 80% is probably misguided (the part mostly about treating the symptoms of malnutrition, and where a good alternative practitioner probably does better). The problem is being able to learn which is which... So, this is not to disagree with that aspect of your point about homeopaths.
By the way, strep throat may be a sign of vitamin D deficiency and other nutritional deficie
"[I wrote: The placebo effect is real, it is actually getting stronger, and MDs regularly use it. So how can you say homeopathy, even if it were to be nothing more than the placebo effect, does not work?] Hence the importance of the double blind experiment in medicine, which can control for the placebo effect...."
You totally miss my point. It is like I say, here is a design for an airplane made out of cheap easily available materials that can many people can use to fly across country (the placebo effect does heal some people, as you admit). And you say in reply, no, you can't use that airplane design because it is not made out of the right materials sold by official people in white coats who can patent it and make money off it and where it works a little more often (ignoring how many people have no access to that other form of medicine, or how that form of medicine may also introduce its own iatrogenic problems).
Consider the history of US medicine: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report "One of the consequences of Flexner's advocacy of university-based medical education was that medical education became much more expensive, putting such education out of reach of all but upper-class white males. The small "proprietary" schools Flexner condemned, which were contended to be have been based in generations-old folk traditions rather than relatively recent western science, did admit African-Americans, women, and students of limited financial means. These students usually could not afford six to eight years of university education, and were often simply denied admission to medical schools affiliated with universities. While many such doctors continued to practice, they did so under proscribed circumstances and for less pay. It also made it more difficult for people of color, residents of rural areas, and for those of limited means generally to obtain medical care in any form."
And these college educated rich white men used to recommend cigarettes and infant formula and all kinds of other stuff... And then persecute those who suggested otherwise, like Herbert Shelton.
Right now, US dermatologists have caused one of the greatest health disasters in US history by decades of telling people to avoid the sun without telling them how to get the right amount of supplemental vitamin D, causing untold cancers, heart attacks, autism, and probably much worse. They could cite studies, but they missed the big picture. http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/news-archive/2006/professor-barbara-gilchrest/
"If you understood the nature of the double blind experiment, the statistically suspect nature of marginal or anecdotal results, and the need for plausible hypotheses to fit somehow into the framework of what we already know or be supported not by even ordinary evidence, but rather extraordinary, incontrovertible, reproducible evidence that has passed the most rigorous of public scientific skeptical scrutiny, you wouldn't be so quick to grasp at the straws of implausible, almost certainly incorrect ideas."
If you research the topic, you'd see that very few medicines are much better that placebos (a few like antibiotics or phage therapy are big exceptions). Even treatments that show a statistical difference often in absolute terms may help very little more than a placebo (think of anti-cancer drugs that extend life a couple months on average). This is especially true in the entire field of psychiatry. A 1% difference in outcomes for a treatment over a placebo can be statistically significant with a large population size and so enough to get a drug approved as better than a placebo (especially if you throw out the disconfirming studies), but it may still be not worth the trouble (or side effects).
"That you are so eager to do so says more about you and your penchant for wishful thinking and confirmation bias than it does abo
It is certainly reasonable to be skeptical of such claims; all I ask is you keep an open mind and do some research for yourself.
Again from Marcia Angell, an editor of the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine: http://pdfernhout.net/to-james-randi-on-skepticism-about-mainstream-science.html#Some_quotes_on_social_problems_in_science "The problems I've discussed are not limited to psychiatry, although they reach their most florid form there. Similar conflicts of interest and biases exist in virtually every field of medicine, particularly those that rely heavily on drugs or devices. It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine."
Places to start on how much of modern medicine has been a scam for a century: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report http://www.soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/shelton.bio.bidwell.htm "At this time in 1927, Dr. Shelton is already being harassed in his Hygienic practice by advocates of The Medical Mentality and by the police. In 1927, Dr. Shelton is jailed for the first time for "practicing medicine without a license" and is fined $100.oo. This same year of 1927, a second arrest takes place, under similar circumstances and with charges of $300.oo. His money is so tight this second time, he has to borrow to be released. Also, in 1927, the New York Evening Graphic lets Dr. Shelton go because he will not co-operate with their advertisement policies and insists on running an anti-smoking article. Still, during this time, Dr. Shelton's Hygienic practice grows; he is respected and admired for his efforts. The third arrest also occurs, all in New York, for "practicing medicine without a licence." The great irony is that Dr. Shelton would never "practice medicine"! Still, that is what the authorities call it when someone tells people how to live, how to sleep, how to eat, and how not to take medicines!"
Did you know MD doctors used to recommend smoking? And infant formula? And they essentially beat to death the guy who suggested handwashing would save the lives of all the patients they were killing? And so on? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis
So, given that, is this really surprising, even now? http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx "Interventional cardiology and cardiovascular surgery is basically a scam based on a misunderstanding of the nature of heart disease."
Of course, many other institutions have similar problems as they focus on self-perpetuation and profits and job creation. We need to move beyond that somehow (perhaps starting with a basic income, home 3D printers, a gift economy, better planning, etc.) to at least reduce the profit motive for giving harmful but profitably self-serving advice that is potentially driving our society off a cliff.
"I was having a heart attack, a 100% blockage of the lower anterior decending artery. It was a killer heart attack. Without angioplasty and a stent I was dead. Cardiac intervention is corrective medicine. When you need it, you need it."
AC, I can only plead with you to look into Dr. Fuhrman's approach. It is true the article says "almost" worthless, and maybe you were someone who benefitted from a stent for a time -- although were you really informed of all your options? But if you keep eating the same way that produced the first blockage, your stent and/or arteries will block again leading to another heart attack, possibly in six months to two years time, like happened to my own father and sister. I wish I knew before my loved ones died what I know now. This paper says the median survival time for people with stents in one study was something less than six months: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18766117 "The median survival time in patients treated with metal and plastic stent was 5.9 and 4.4 months (P = 0.074), respectively. "
You can most likely cure your heart disease by changing your eating patterns today following Dr. Fuhrman's approach or similar, and it will bring you as much joy or more than the way you now eat: "How to escape The Pleasure Trap !" http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article16.aspx
At least get your vitamin D level checked and try to stay away from refined starches and sugars. Idealy "make the salad the main dish" as Dr. Fuhrman says, and eats lots of fruits, vegetables, and beans.
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx "Interventional cardiology and cardiovascular surgery is basically a scam based on a misunderstanding of the nature of heart disease. Searching for and treating obstructive plaque does not address the areas of the coronary vascular tree most likely to rupture and cause heart attacks. If there was never another CABG or angioplasty performed or stent placed, patients with heart disease would be better off. Doctors would be forced to educate our citizens that their heart disease risk is determined by what they place on their forks. Millions of lives would be dramatically extended. To abandon the theory of stretching and cutting out areas with plaque would shut down interventional cardiology, nearly all cardiovascular surgery, and many suppliers of the biotechnology. In many cases, interventional cardiology is the major income generator to hospitals. The ending of this ill-conceived, out-dated and ineffective technology would dramatically downsize hospitals in the United States and free up over $100 billion annually in medical care costs. Besides being ineffective, interventional cardiology places the responsibility in the hands of the doctor and not the patients. When patients finally realize they must take control of their heart problems with aggressive dietary modifications (and when needed medications for temporary periods) we will essentially solve the health crisis in America.
The sad thing is surgical interventions and medications are the foundation of modern cardiology and both are relatively ineffective compared to nutritional excellence. My patients routinely reverse their heart disease, and no longer have vulnerable plaque or high blood pressure, so they do not need medical care, hospitals or cardiologists anymore. The problem is that in the real world cardiac patients are not even informed that heart disease is predictably reversed with nutritional excellence. They are not given the opportunity to choose and just corralled into these surgical interventions.
Trying to figure out how to pay for ineffective and expensive medicine by politicians will never be a real solution. People need to know they do not have to have heart disease to begin with, and if they get it, aggressive nutrition is the most life-saving intervention. And it is free."
A century of legal intimidation and scamming is slowly coming to an end (not to say non-MDs can't be scammers too, or that 20% of what MDs do is not a miracle): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report
But Drug Companies Object... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46_GInjBeQU "Joel Fuhrman MD has cured hundreds of people of diabetes using diet and lifestyle. The American Diabetic Association wanted him to write about his work -- but then objected because their sponsor, Eli Lilly drug company, might feel threatened by an MD promoting a cure which could destroy the market for their diabetes medications. This is an excerpt from Dr. Furhman's presentation at the Healthy Lifestyle Expo 2007."
It's sad that the non-profits that claim to be interested in helping people with a disease become invested in perpetuating that disease to perpetuate paying jobs for their staff etc..
We need something like a "basic income" to help move past that conflict-of-interest, where jobs only get done when they need doing.
He also envisioned in that story the internet, wireless mobile computing, a gift economy, groupware, nanotechnology, the open source movement, an abundance outlook on life, and more...
You could emphasize the fact that key aspects of solving problems with computers entail understanding customer requirements, building user interfaces, and providing technical support, all of which relate to understanding how people think.
You could also look for working situations that are the intersection of psychology and computers, like AI or cognitive science-related applications.
See also Dr. Fuhrman: http://www.drfuhrman.com/disease/Diabetes.aspx "The vast majority of my patients, who adopt my nutritional and exercise recommendation for diabetes, become thin and nonâ"diabetic. They are able to gradually discontinue their insulin and eventually other medications. They simply get well. I work with people who have diabetes who want to live a long and healthy life and enjoy the achievement and confidence that they have control this disease. The membership services offered here on this website, and the information in my book, Eat For Health, can get you started on this road to wellness. My hope is that the information below about diabetes will enable you to feel more confident that you or someone you care about can be motivated and work with me to recover their health."
I mentioned in my comment that group think could be related to both mainstream science and alternatives. As for the rest of your reply, I think you may want to consider a few key ideas; * The placebo effect is real, it is actually getting stronger, and MDs regularly use it. So how can you say homeopathy, even if it were to be nothing more than the placebo effect, does not work? * Nutrition and lifestyle choices are probably the major determinant of good health most of the time for most people, yet MDs have next-to-no training in understanding or discussing that, and they spend little time with patients counseling on those things in practice, and so if an alternative medical care provider like a homeopath spends an hour with someone and talks about those things, that customer is going to be way ahead in health compared to going to an MD in many (not all) situations. * in practice, the Reagans (US president and first lady) turned to Astrology to set US policies for many years; I'm not saying that made it better, but it is funny in relation to that cartoon. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Reagan
Rossi may indeed have fooled himself (it remains to be seen), but there are many other much more reputable and experienced scientific staffers who have found similar effects. These people are not yet right because the money dynamics of basic research (fraught with much uncertainty) don't work that way. Even Bell Labs probably never made a dollar directly on inventing the transistor. People rarely make money from basic research because any related patents tend to expire before the multi-decade commercialization process for any truly new technology gets going. What is evil about what happened is the way the hot fusion scientists did bad science to discredit the cold fusion ones and keep the public funding for themselves. Yet another LENR claim: http://www.e-catworld.com/2012/03/dr-george-miley-to-present-on-lenr-at-march-23-conference-will-awareness-of-new-energy-source-spread/ "Excess heat generation from our gas-loading LENR power cell (Figure 1) has been verified, confirming nuclear reactions provide output energy." That success is after having skeptics cut his approved funding over a decade ago: http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/1999/09/21-03.html
Perhaps the biggest issue is that you are looking at this situation very narrowly -- is there currently a reliable materialistic scientific explanation for a specific practice? Real treatments always exist in the context of a practitioner/customer relationship (or friend-to-friend, or parent-to-child, etc.), which can affect the outcome. I'd encourage you to look holistically at the issue of overall systemic outcomes for homeopathy (including the psychological benefits of people being listened to and informed about some basics by someone who is compassionate, even if that person they are paying may indeed believe in what may be a bunch of nonsense). If you look a bit more holistically, you will have to admit that mainstream MD doctors spending ten minutes with patients with diseases caused by nutritional and lifestyle issues and then proceeding to prescribe some medication as a "permission slip" to keep doing the bad behavior is the worst kind of harmful pseudoscience, and yet, in practice, that is the system you are defending.
How Evidence of the Paranormal is Bringing Science and Spirit Together http://www.paradigm-sys.com/ "Charles T. Tart is internationally known for his more than 50 years of research on the nature of consciousness, altered states of consciousness (ASCs) and parapsychology, and is one of the founders of the field of Transpersonal (spiritual) Psychology. His and other scientists' work convinced him that there is a real and vitally important sense in which we are spiritual beings, but the too dominant, scientistic, materialist philosophy of our times, masquerading as genuine science, dogmatically denies any possible reality to the spiritual...."
It's one thing to say you don't have good evidence about something; it is another to generalize from that lack of evidence that something does not exists or can never exist. A really good scientist knows the difference and so can acknowledge the limits of the scientific method as a way of appreciating the universe.
Thanks for the perspective. You might find of interest this book on cognitive dissonance (a chapter is on justice system): http://www.amazon.com/Mistakes-Were-Made-But-Not/dp/0151010986 "Their discussion of confirmation bias, one of the worst breeders of bad decisions is outstanding and undertandable. And the chapter on how the police get the innocent to confess is chilling.... Most terrifying: The justice system operates this way. Once someone is accused of a crime - even under the most bizarre circumstances - the police believe he's guilty of something. Even when the DNA shows someone is innocent, or new evidence reveals the true perpetrator, they hesitate to let the accused person go free."
"Tell some high-quality F/OSS dev to make a kickstarter project then and stop whining about it here."
The problem is that the social dynamics of Kickstarter don't work very well for F/OSS, given that pledges are generally tightly tied to specific rewards (and pledges are amplified by the project creating "artificial scarcity").
The big issue is that people need to wake up to the notion that they are supporting and even creating "artificial scarcity" with how they spend their time and money. Related by me: http://www.artificialscarcity.com/
AC had a good point. Creativity is generally not improved by rewards, and there are other ways to support people than linking the right to consume with an increasingly precarious income-through-jobs link. We could have had $2.5 million of free stuff, and now we are getting yet more proprietary stuff.
See also on why creativity diminished if done for material gain: "RSA Animate - Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc
Citation needed. If people believed as you did, there would never be any innovation...
Also, you raise a false dillemma. Vast amounts of financial capital in our society have tied themselves up into energy sources they can more easily control. It's a mindset that won't invest much in alternatives, and will invest in politics to keep their control in place (like preventing laws regulating coal pollution).
Actually, I live in a fairly energy efficient house (partially passive solar), so I am practicing that I preach to some extent (not perfectly). The state of the art in home construction these days in cold climates is to have lots of efficiency and no furnace: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/27/world/europe/27house.html?_r=1 "DARMSTADT, Germany â" From the outside, there is nothing unusual about the stylish new gray and orange row houses in the Kranichstein District, with wreaths on the doors and Christmas lights twinkling through a freezing drizzle. But these houses are part of a revolution in building design: There are no drafts, no cold tile floors, no snuggling under blankets until the furnace kicks in. There is, in fact, no furnace."
I provided lots of links to people putting time and money into alternatives, and they just continue to improve. The fact that GE is predicting solar will be cheaper that coal in five years despite how coal is subsidized so much (including by not having to pay for the health costs or environment destruction costs) just shows how good renewables are. http://cleantechnica.com/2011/05/29/ge-solar-power-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-in-5-years/
And that is what makes it so hard "economically" to sell alternatives.
So, it is indeed hard to compete against such a tilted playing field, true. That is a missing issue in your comment about "so you do it", unpaid externalities.
In fact, if you reread my comment, you will see I said "No one said it was going to be easy"... That is why it is now a socio-economic issue more than a technical issue. We have plenty of technology if we wanted to use it. And it would overall be cheaper to use it overall across our society, and then alternatives would be adopted faster when gasoline was $20 a gallon with externalities priced in (we'd all drive electric cars pretty fast) or when coal electricity was $0.50 a kilowatt-hour (we'd all switch to wind and other renewables plus energy efficiency real fast). But that does not happen because we don't pay up front. Instead we pay on our health insurance bills, or in national debt to fund a war machine, or future environmental destruction that needs to be fixed, and so on...
Or why not use the wind energy to run energy-intensive industrial processes that can run intermittently (like grinding up rocks for fertilizer or chilling nitrogen out of the air)? And so on. http://www.remineralize.org/
There are solutions for the lack of buffers for renewable energy. Put them all together, and you have a way to use wind.
The true cost of fossil fuels: http://www.treehugger.com/energy-policy/true-cost-fossil-fuels.html "For decades now, fossil fuel company executives and D.C. politicians have worked together to ensure that coal and oil prices stay low enough to keep the American people hooked. In his new book Greedy Bastards, Dylan Ratigan explains how "vampire industries" like oil and coal have forged "an unholy alliance with government based not just on the money that they contribute to political campaigns and spend on lobbying but on their ability to hypnotize us with false prices." Industry gets tax breaks, subsidies, military support in volatile regions, the right to use our air and water like a sewer, and assurance that the government will clean up its environmental messes. Politicians get campaign contributions, a steady flow of dirty energy, and a talking point to brandish about how they kept gas affordable. But the Ame
Something like that unfortunately actually happened to our old family station wagon (Oldsmobile?) around 1970. Basically, the car had issues on the trip (we might have even stopped for some repair) and the rear axle somehow eventually caused heating (sparks?) that caused the flammable rearmost seat to catch fire eventually, which happened overnight and smoked up and then burned much of the interior of the car. This happened on a long car trip to take my sister to college just after we had reached the destination. Fortunately, the car was parked outside in a hotel parking lot, and someone else at the hotel noticed the flames when they got going and they were extinguished quickly. Unfortunately, the car had all my sister's clothes and other items for starting undergrad college which had not yet been unloaded, essentially ruining them. That rough start was a contributing factor to ending her promising college career as a "doctor of tomorrow" pretty much before it got started at RPI's then new BA/MD program. http://www.rpi.edu/dept/bio/undergraduate/physician.html
Although I was told much later that some harassment by an administrator there who did not think women should be doctors was probably a bigger compounding factor. I'm sure RPI is much more progressive 40 years later now. Also, I think her roommates then and some others tried to help make up some for her losing all her clothes and belongings. I was pretty young then, so I don't know all the details. But in some ways, perhaps losing a career is much worse than losing a house?
And how medical programs got so bad in the first place that some women had to become pioneers again: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report "One of the consequences of Flexner's advocacy of university-based medical education was that medical education became much more expensive, putting such education out of reach of all but upper-class white males. The small "proprietary" schools Flexner condemned, which were contended to be have been based in generations-old folk traditions rather than relatively recent western science, did admit African-Americans, women, and students of limited financial means. These students usually could not afford six to eight years of university education, and were often simply denied admission to medical schools affiliated with universities. While many such doctors continued to practice, they did so under proscribed circumstances and for less pay. It also made it more difficult for people of color, residents of rural areas, and for those of limited means generally to obtain medical care in any form."
We were of "limited means" then ourselves, or so I was told, so my father had to keep old cars going as best as he could.
So, it can be true that we tend to ignore what goes wrong with older technology. Right now, people are all worried about the first time a "self-driving" car will kill someone in an accident, ignoring that 35,000 or so people are killed in the USA in car accidents every year, and maybe 1.2 million people die a year across the globe from car accidents, and self-driving vehicles will probably greatly reduce that number. One reason is especially because many accidents happen at night, and cars can use sensors to see better than people in the dark and won't fall asleep at the wheel. Also, self-driving cars can talk to each other and negotiate right of way, and so on.
I think you are right overall. Anyone pretty much has to assume any organization is compromised by informants. A related post by me: http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/ae28e8971f8f9669?hl=en "My advice to people here is to build movements in such a way that the CIA can be proud of them:-) as well as so Smari and Bryan and others here can be proud of them too.:-) And, given the CIA is hiring machinists, build a movement where, in a good way, you assume everyone in it is working for the CIA,:-) but where you still get important stuff done in moving the world towards a post-scarcity open future. Just like people should assume Google is a division of the NSA and/or CIA.:-) An impossible task? Well, consider it more like a creative challenge.:-) "
Also, one has to accept that there are legitimate needs sometimes for "security" thinking. The big challenge is the irony of the current system, and theft or vandalism does little to really address the root causes of dysfunctions in our security apparatus. To address the root causes, we need a new vision of security. Here are a couple of essays by me towards trying to create a new vision of mutual/intrinsic security.
"On dealing with social hurricanes (like the US CIA) " http://www.pdfernhout.net/on-dealing-with-social-hurricanes.html "This approximately 60 page document is a ramble about ways to ensure the CIA (as well as other big organizations) remains (or becomes) accountable to human needs and the needs of healthy, prosperous, joyful, secure, educated communities. The primarily suggestion is to encourage a paradigm shift away from scarcity thinking & competition thinking towards abundance thinking & cooperation thinking within the CIA and other organizations. I suggest that shift could be encouraged in part by providing publicly accessible free "intelligence" tools and other publicly accessible free information that all people (including in the CIA and elsewhere) can, if they want, use to better connect the dots about global issues and see those issues from multiple perspectives, to provide a better context for providing broad policy advice. It links that effort to bigger efforts to transform our global society into a place that works well for (almost) everyone that millions of people are engaged in. A central Haudenosaunee story-related theme is the transformation of Tadodaho through the efforts of the Peacemaker from someone who was evil and hurtful to someone who was good and helpful. Another theme is exploring the meaning, if true, of a allegation by Wayne Madsen about President Obama's deeper connection to the CIA than was otherwise known. "
"Recognizing irony is key to transcending militarism" http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html "Likewise, even United States three-letter agencies like the NSA and the CIA, as well as their foreign counterparts, are becoming ironic institutions in many ways. Despite probably having more computing power per square foot than any other place in the world, they seem not to have thought much about the implications of all that computer power and organized information to transform the world into a place of abundance for all. Cheap computing makes possible just about cheap everything else, as does the ability to make better designs through shared computing.... There is a fundamental mismatch between 21st century reality and 20th century security thinking. Those "security" agencies are using those tools of abundance, cooperation, and sharing mainly from a mindset of scarcity, competition, and secrecy. Given the power of 21st century technology as an amplifier (in
And it gets even worse: http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx "Interventional cardiology and cardiovascular surgery is basically a scam based on a misunderstanding of the nature of heart disease. Searching for and treating obstructive plaque does not address the areas of the coronary vascular tree most likely to rupture and cause heart attacks. If there was never another CABG or angioplasty performed or stent placed, patients with heart disease would be better off. Doctors would be forced to educate our citizens that their heart disease risk is determined by what they place on their forks. Millions of lives would be dramatically extended. To abandon the theory of stretching and cutting out areas with plaque would shut down interventional cardiology, nearly all cardiovascular surgery, and many suppliers of the biotechnology. In many cases, interventional cardiology is the major income generator to hospitals. The ending of this ill-conceived, out-dated and ineffective technology would dramatically downsize hospitals in the United States and free up over $100 billion annually in medical care costs. Besides being ineffective, interventional cardiology places the responsibility in the hands of the doctor and not the patients. When patients finally realize they must take control of their heart problems with aggressive dietary modifications (and when needed medications for temporary periods) we will essentially solve the health crisis in America.
The sad thing is surgical interventions and medications are the foundation of modern cardiology and both are relatively ineffective compared to nutritional excellence. My patients routinely reverse their heart disease, and no longer have vulnerable plaque or high blood pressure, so they do not need medical care, hospitals or cardiologists anymore. The problem is that in the real world cardiac patients are not even informed that heart disease is predictably reversed with nutritional excellence. They are not given the opportunity to choose and just corralled into these surgical interventions.
Trying to figure out how to pay for ineffective and expensive medicine by politicians will never be a real solution. People need to know they do not have to have heart disease to begin with, and if they get it, aggressive nutrition is the most life-saving intervention. And it is free."
And: http://www.pdfernhout.net/to-james-randi-on-skepticism-about-mainstream-science.html#Some_quotes_on_social_problems_in_science "The problems I've discussed are not limited to psychiatry, although they reach their most florid form there. Similar conflicts of interest and biases exist in virtually every field of medicine, particularly those that rely heavily on drugs or devices. It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine. (Marcia Angell)"
Much of the path to better health was known 100 years ago by the natural hygienists. See: http://soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/shelton.bio.bidwell.htm "At this time in 1927, Dr. Shelton is already being harassed in his Hygienic practice by advocates of The Medical Mentality and by the police. In 1927, Dr. Shelton is jailed for the first time for "practicing medicine without a license" and is fined $100.oo. This same year of 1927, a second arrest takes place, under similar circumstances and with charges of $300.oo. His money is so tight this second time, he has to borrow to be released. Also,
Until then, please look into these issues for yourself and your wife (since you may be at risk as well if you eat in similar ways or have a similar lifestyle without immense amounts of sunlight).
Thanks. Please also see my point on four interwoven economic alternatives (gift, exchange, subsistence, planned) in reply to someone who disagreed with you.
Slashdot Mirror
"MDs have extensive training on the importance of nutrition, lifestyle,"
Citation needed. How many hours out of their medical training does the average MD have in these topics? Factoid for you to start with if you want to talk BS:
http://www.ajcn.org/content/83/4/941S.full
"A total of 106 surveys were returned for a response rate of 84%. Ninety-nine of the 106 schools responding required some form of nutrition education; however, only 32 schools (30%) required a separate nutrition course. On average, students received 23.9 contact hours of nutrition instruction during medical school (range: 2-70 h). Only 40 schools required the minimum 25 h recommended by the National Academy of Sciences. Most instructors (88%) expressed the need for additional nutrition instruction at their institutions. "
That's 25 hours out of how many thousands?
Anyway, I could go point by point though the rest of this, but I won't. :-)
But a few comments anyway.
First off, the lung cancer may be more from vegetable deficiency disease and iodine deficiency disease and vitamin D deficiency disease and other messed up social processes leading to distress than from smoking. I'm not saying smoking is good for you generally, of course, but consider:
"Why I Recommend to NOT Stop Smoking"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9DZBzKppHQ
Ask your wife, outside of an initial patient intake interview, how many minutes can her practice let her spend actually with a patient per visit? I doubt the average is higher than ten minutes. How can that result in good outcomes? It's like schools. No matter how well the staff means, the overall institutional dynamics prevents really good stuff from happening for most people most of the time.
Contrast with:
http://www.patchadams.org/
"The Gesundheit! Institute is a project in holistic medical care based on the belief that one cannot separate the health of the individual from the health of the family, the community, the world, and the health care system itself."
Or read the last chapter of:
"Why Our Health Matters: A Vision of Medicine That Can Transform Our Future" by M.D. Andrew Weil
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Our-Health-Matters-Transform/dp/B004KAB3U2
I'd just suggest you, your doctor, and your wife read "Eat To Live" by Dr. Joel Fuhrman, MD and you'll see why sending a patient to the hospital for heart disease may someday be considered malpractice. :-)
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx
"Trying to figure out how to pay for ineffective and expensive medicine by politicians will never be a real solution. People need to know they do not have to have heart disease to begin with, and if they get it, aggressive nutrition is the most life-saving intervention. And it is free."
Here are a collection of links I put together about wellness:
http://www.changemakers.com/discussions/discussion-493#comment-38823
See especially this on losing weight:
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article16.aspx
I feel 20% of what most MDs do is miraculous (e.g. burn care, reattaching severed limbs, therapies for genetic defects, etc.), even if much of the other 80% is probably misguided (the part mostly about treating the symptoms of malnutrition, and where a good alternative practitioner probably does better). The problem is being able to learn which is which... So, this is not to disagree with that aspect of your point about homeopaths.
By the way, strep throat may be a sign of vitamin D deficiency and other nutritional deficie
"[I wrote: The placebo effect is real, it is actually getting stronger, and MDs regularly use it. So how can you say homeopathy, even if it were to be nothing more than the placebo effect, does not work?] ..."
Hence the importance of the double blind experiment in medicine, which can control for the placebo effect.
You totally miss my point. It is like I say, here is a design for an airplane made out of cheap easily available materials that can many people can use to fly across country (the placebo effect does heal some people, as you admit). And you say in reply, no, you can't use that airplane design because it is not made out of the right materials sold by official people in white coats who can patent it and make money off it and where it works a little more often (ignoring how many people have no access to that other form of medicine, or how that form of medicine may also introduce its own iatrogenic problems).
Consider the history of US medicine:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report
"One of the consequences of Flexner's advocacy of university-based medical education was that medical education became much more expensive, putting such education out of reach of all but upper-class white males. The small "proprietary" schools Flexner condemned, which were contended to be have been based in generations-old folk traditions rather than relatively recent western science, did admit African-Americans, women, and students of limited financial means. These students usually could not afford six to eight years of university education, and were often simply denied admission to medical schools affiliated with universities. While many such doctors continued to practice, they did so under proscribed circumstances and for less pay. It also made it more difficult for people of color, residents of rural areas, and for those of limited means generally to obtain medical care in any form."
And these college educated rich white men used to recommend cigarettes and infant formula and all kinds of other stuff... And then persecute those who suggested otherwise, like Herbert Shelton.
Right now, US dermatologists have caused one of the greatest health disasters in US history by decades of telling people to avoid the sun without telling them how to get the right amount of supplemental vitamin D, causing untold cancers, heart attacks, autism, and probably much worse. They could cite studies, but they missed the big picture.
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/news-archive/2006/professor-barbara-gilchrest/
"If you understood the nature of the double blind experiment, the statistically suspect nature of marginal or anecdotal results, and the need for plausible hypotheses to fit somehow into the framework of what we already know or be supported not by even ordinary evidence, but rather extraordinary, incontrovertible, reproducible evidence that has passed the most rigorous of public scientific skeptical scrutiny, you wouldn't be so quick to grasp at the straws of implausible, almost certainly incorrect ideas."
If you research the topic, you'd see that very few medicines are much better that placebos (a few like antibiotics or phage therapy are big exceptions). Even treatments that show a statistical difference often in absolute terms may help very little more than a placebo (think of anti-cancer drugs that extend life a couple months on average). This is especially true in the entire field of psychiatry. A 1% difference in outcomes for a treatment over a placebo can be statistically significant with a large population size and so enough to get a drug approved as better than a placebo (especially if you throw out the disconfirming studies), but it may still be not worth the trouble (or side effects).
"That you are so eager to do so says more about you and your penchant for wishful thinking and confirmation bias than it does abo
It is certainly reasonable to be skeptical of such claims; all I ask is you keep an open mind and do some research for yourself.
Again from Marcia Angell, an editor of the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine:
http://pdfernhout.net/to-james-randi-on-skepticism-about-mainstream-science.html#Some_quotes_on_social_problems_in_science
"The problems I've discussed are not limited to psychiatry, although they reach their most florid form there. Similar conflicts of interest and biases exist in virtually every field of medicine, particularly those that rely heavily on drugs or devices. It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine."
Places to start on how much of modern medicine has been a scam for a century:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report
http://www.soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/shelton.bio.bidwell.htm
"At this time in 1927, Dr. Shelton is already being harassed in his Hygienic practice by advocates of The Medical Mentality and by the police. In 1927, Dr. Shelton is jailed for the first time for "practicing medicine without a license" and is fined $100.oo. This same year of 1927, a second arrest takes place, under similar circumstances and with charges of $300.oo. His money is so tight this second time, he has to borrow to be released. Also, in 1927, the New York Evening Graphic lets Dr. Shelton go because he will not co-operate with their advertisement policies and insists on running an anti-smoking article. Still, during this time, Dr. Shelton's Hygienic practice grows; he is respected and admired for his efforts. The third arrest also occurs, all in New York, for "practicing medicine without a licence." The great irony is that Dr. Shelton would never "practice medicine"! Still, that is what the authorities call it when someone tells people how to live, how to sleep, how to eat, and how not to take medicines!"
Fuhrman learned from Shelton (who cured him of a leg injury that would not heal -- probably in part from vitamin D deficiency), and then went beyond him.
http://bruisedfruits.net/3050/joel-fuhrman-fasting-story-world-class-athlete.html
Did you know MD doctors used to recommend smoking? And infant formula? And they essentially beat to death the guy who suggested handwashing would save the lives of all the patients they were killing? And so on?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Semmelweis
Medicine has a very weird history...
See also:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Groupthink
So, given that, is this really surprising, even now?
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx
"Interventional cardiology and cardiovascular surgery is basically a scam based on a misunderstanding of the nature of heart disease."
Of course, many other institutions have similar problems as they focus on self-perpetuation and profits and job creation. We need to move beyond that somehow (perhaps starting with a basic income, home 3D printers, a gift economy, better planning, etc.) to at least reduce the profit motive for giving harmful but profitably self-serving advice that is potentially driving our society off a cliff.
"I was having a heart attack, a 100% blockage of the lower anterior decending artery. It was a killer heart attack. Without angioplasty and a stent I was dead. Cardiac intervention is corrective medicine. When you need it, you need it."
AC, I can only plead with you to look into Dr. Fuhrman's approach. It is true the article says "almost" worthless, and maybe you were someone who benefitted from a stent for a time -- although were you really informed of all your options? But if you keep eating the same way that produced the first blockage, your stent and/or arteries will block again leading to another heart attack, possibly in six months to two years time, like happened to my own father and sister. I wish I knew before my loved ones died what I know now. This paper says the median survival time for people with stents in one study was something less than six months:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18766117
"The median survival time in patients treated with metal and plastic stent was 5.9 and 4.4 months (P = 0.074), respectively. "
See also:
http://www.fatsickandnearlydead.com/
You can most likely cure your heart disease by changing your eating patterns today following Dr. Fuhrman's approach or similar, and it will bring you as much joy or more than the way you now eat:
"How to escape The Pleasure Trap !"
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article16.aspx
Success stories:
http://www.drfuhrman.com/success/stories.aspx/heartdisease
At least get your vitamin D level checked and try to stay away from refined starches and sugars. Idealy "make the salad the main dish" as Dr. Fuhrman says, and eats lots of fruits, vegetables, and beans.
Good luck if you happen to see this.
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx
"Interventional cardiology and cardiovascular surgery is basically a scam based on a misunderstanding of the nature of heart disease. Searching for and treating obstructive plaque does not address the areas of the coronary vascular tree most likely to rupture and cause heart attacks. If there was never another CABG or angioplasty performed or stent placed, patients with heart disease would be better off. Doctors would be forced to educate our citizens that their heart disease risk is determined by what they place on their forks. Millions of lives would be dramatically extended. To abandon the theory of stretching and cutting out areas with plaque would shut down interventional cardiology, nearly all cardiovascular surgery, and many suppliers of the biotechnology. In many cases, interventional cardiology is the major income generator to hospitals. The ending of this ill-conceived, out-dated and ineffective technology would dramatically downsize hospitals in the United States and free up over $100 billion annually in medical care costs. Besides being ineffective, interventional cardiology places the responsibility in the hands of the doctor and not the patients. When patients finally realize they must take control of their heart problems with aggressive dietary modifications (and when needed medications for temporary periods) we will essentially solve the health crisis in America.
The sad thing is surgical interventions and medications are the foundation of modern cardiology and both are relatively ineffective compared to nutritional excellence. My patients routinely reverse their heart disease, and no longer have vulnerable plaque or high blood pressure, so they do not need medical care, hospitals or cardiologists anymore. The problem is that in the real world cardiac patients are not even informed that heart disease is predictably reversed with nutritional excellence. They are not given the opportunity to choose and just corralled into these surgical interventions.
Trying to figure out how to pay for ineffective and expensive medicine by politicians will never be a real solution. People need to know they do not have to have heart disease to begin with, and if they get it, aggressive nutrition is the most life-saving intervention. And it is free."
Similar is said elsewhere by others (even Bill Clinton).
"From omnivore to vegan: The dietary education of Bill Clinton"
http://www.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/08/18/bill.clinton.diet.vegan/index.html
A century of legal intimidation and scamming is slowly coming to an end (not to say non-MDs can't be scammers too, or that 20% of what MDs do is not a miracle):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report
But Drug Companies Object ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46_GInjBeQU
"Joel Fuhrman MD has cured hundreds of people of diabetes using diet and lifestyle. The American Diabetic Association wanted him to write about his work -- but then objected because their sponsor, Eli Lilly drug company, might feel threatened by an MD promoting a cure which could destroy the market for their diabetes medications. This is an excerpt from Dr. Furhman's presentation at the Healthy Lifestyle Expo 2007."
This is the cure, and it is free to look at:
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/foodpyramid.aspx
(Most diabetics need to take vitamin D and some other supplements too, probably.)
You can watch that in action in relation to other diseases, too:
http://www.fatsickandnearlydead.com/
It's sad that the non-profits that claim to be interested in helping people with a disease become invested in perpetuating that disease to perpetuate paying jobs for their staff etc..
We need something like a "basic income" to help move past that conflict-of-interest, where jobs only get done when they need doing.
You can look up multiple other cases where most type 2 is cured, and type 1 is greatly improved. Another example:
http://www.rawfor30days.com/index4.html
Look and you will find plenty more.
Anyway, you can take the red pill or the blue pill, Neo. Or better yet, no pill. :-)
by Theodore Sturegon from the 1950s: http://books.google.com/books?id=wpuJQrxHZXAC&pg=PA51&lpg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false
He also envisioned in that story the internet, wireless mobile computing, a gift economy, groupware, nanotechnology, the open source movement, an abundance outlook on life, and more...
You could emphasize the fact that key aspects of solving problems with computers entail understanding customer requirements, building user interfaces, and providing technical support, all of which relate to understanding how people think.
You could also look for working situations that are the intersection of psychology and computers, like AI or cognitive science-related applications.
See also Dr. Fuhrman: http://www.drfuhrman.com/disease/Diabetes.aspx
"The vast majority of my patients, who adopt my nutritional and exercise recommendation for diabetes, become thin and nonâ"diabetic. They are able to gradually discontinue their insulin and eventually other medications. They simply get well. I work with people who have diabetes who want to live a long and healthy life and enjoy the achievement and confidence that they have control this disease. The membership services offered here on this website, and the information in my book, Eat For Health, can get you started on this road to wellness. My hope is that the information below about diabetes will enable you to feel more confident that you or someone you care about can be motivated and work with me to recover their health."
"These people are not yet right" should have been "These people are not yet rich", sorry.
I mentioned in my comment that group think could be related to both mainstream science and alternatives. As for the rest of your reply, I think you may want to consider a few key ideas;
* The placebo effect is real, it is actually getting stronger, and MDs regularly use it. So how can you say homeopathy, even if it were to be nothing more than the placebo effect, does not work?
* Nutrition and lifestyle choices are probably the major determinant of good health most of the time for most people, yet MDs have next-to-no training in understanding or discussing that, and they spend little time with patients counseling on those things in practice, and so if an alternative medical care provider like a homeopath spends an hour with someone and talks about those things, that customer is going to be way ahead in health compared to going to an MD in many (not all) situations.
* in practice, the Reagans (US president and first lady) turned to Astrology to set US policies for many years; I'm not saying that made it better, but it is funny in relation to that cartoon.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy_Reagan
To substantiate one other of those points:
"Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why."
http://www.wired.com/medtech/drugs/magazine/17-09/ff_placebo_effect?currentPage=all
Rossi may indeed have fooled himself (it remains to be seen), but there are many other much more reputable and experienced scientific staffers who have found similar effects. These people are not yet right because the money dynamics of basic research (fraught with much uncertainty) don't work that way. Even Bell Labs probably never made a dollar directly on inventing the transistor. People rarely make money from basic research because any related patents tend to expire before the multi-decade commercialization process for any truly new technology gets going. What is evil about what happened is the way the hot fusion scientists did bad science to discredit the cold fusion ones and keep the public funding for themselves. Yet another LENR claim:
http://www.e-catworld.com/2012/03/dr-george-miley-to-present-on-lenr-at-march-23-conference-will-awareness-of-new-energy-source-spread/
"Excess heat generation from our gas-loading LENR power cell (Figure 1) has been verified, confirming nuclear reactions provide output energy."
That success is after having skeptics cut his approved funding over a decade ago:
http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/1999/09/21-03.html
Perhaps the biggest issue is that you are looking at this situation very narrowly -- is there currently a reliable materialistic scientific explanation for a specific practice? Real treatments always exist in the context of a practitioner/customer relationship (or friend-to-friend, or parent-to-child, etc.), which can affect the outcome. I'd encourage you to look holistically at the issue of overall systemic outcomes for homeopathy (including the psychological benefits of people being listened to and informed about some basics by someone who is compassionate, even if that person they are paying may indeed believe in what may be a bunch of nonsense). If you look a bit more holistically, you will have to admit that mainstream MD doctors spending ten minutes with patients with diseases caused by nutritional and lifestyle issues and then proceeding to prescribe some medication as a "permission slip" to keep doing the bad behavior is the worst kind of harmful pseudoscience, and yet, in practice, that is the system you are defending.
Examples:
http://www.drfuhrman.com/disease/BloodPressure.aspx
Great link on skeptics who won't ever question the "mainstream", thanks: http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Page30.htm#RealSkeptics
To amplify it:
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/
http://www.debunkingskeptics.com/Contents.htm
And see also my: http://www.pdfernhout.net/to-james-randi-on-skepticism-about-mainstream-science.html#Some_quotes_on_social_problems_in_science
And check out Charles Tart writings about the limits of "scientistic" and materialistic thinking:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Tart
http://www.paradigm-sys.com/
He has a new book out: "The End of Materialism: How Evidence of the Paranormal Is Bringing Science and Spirit Together"
How Evidence of the Paranormal is Bringing Science and Spirit Together http://www.paradigm-sys.com/ ..."
"Charles T. Tart is internationally known for his more than 50 years of research on the nature of consciousness, altered states of consciousness (ASCs) and parapsychology, and is one of the founders of the field of Transpersonal (spiritual) Psychology. His and other scientists' work convinced him that there is a real and vitally important sense in which we are spiritual beings, but the too dominant, scientistic, materialist philosophy of our times, masquerading as genuine science, dogmatically denies any possible reality to the spiritual.
And see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_G._Jahn
See also, on group think (could apply either way):
http://www.princeton.edu/~rbenabou/papers.html
http://disciplined-minds.com/
And on LENR / Cold Fusion as another example:
http://nickelpower.org/2011/12/30/replicators-as-if-december-30-2011/#more-227
And:
"From www.lenrforum.eu / How is it possible so many scientist be wrong ignoring LENR"
http://184.171.250.170/~lenrforu/lenrforum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=40#p48
Also:
http://medicine-science.com/as-cold-fusion-events-demonstrate-modern-science-is-ruled-by-conformity-not-the-search-for-scientific-truth/
And my:
http://www.pdfernhout.net/to-james-randi-on-skepticism-about-mainstream-science.html#Some_quotes_on_social_problems_in_science
It's one thing to say you don't have good evidence about something; it is another to generalize from that lack of evidence that something does not exists or can never exist. A really good scientist knows the difference and so can acknowledge the limits of the scientific method as a way of appreciating the universe.
Thanks for the perspective. You might find of interest this book on cognitive dissonance (a chapter is on justice system): http://www.amazon.com/Mistakes-Were-Made-But-Not/dp/0151010986 ... Most terrifying: The justice system operates this way. Once someone is accused of a crime - even under the most bizarre circumstances - the police believe he's guilty of something. Even when the DNA shows someone is innocent, or new evidence reveals the true perpetrator, they hesitate to let the accused person go free."
"Their discussion of confirmation bias, one of the worst breeders of bad decisions is outstanding and undertandable. And the chapter on how the police get the innocent to confess is chilling.
"Or we could use the money to cure cancer!"
Read this to prevent much cancer and even maybe cure a bit of it: http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article24.aspx
"Tell some high-quality F/OSS dev to make a kickstarter project then and stop whining about it here."
The problem is that the social dynamics of Kickstarter don't work very well for F/OSS, given that pledges are generally tightly tied to specific rewards (and pledges are amplified by the project creating "artificial scarcity").
The big issue is that people need to wake up to the notion that they are supporting and even creating "artificial scarcity" with how they spend their time and money. Related by me: http://www.artificialscarcity.com/
AC had a good point. Creativity is generally not improved by rewards, and there are other ways to support people than linking the right to consume with an increasingly precarious income-through-jobs link. We could have had $2.5 million of free stuff, and now we are getting yet more proprietary stuff.
See my essay on that theme (though it is directed more at tax-exempt non-profits):
http://www.pdfernhout.net/open-letter-to-grantmakers-and-donors-on-copyright-policy.html
Longer version: http://www.pdfernhout.net/on-funding-digital-public-works.html
See also on why creativity diminished if done for material gain:
"RSA Animate - Drive: The surprising truth about what motivates us"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc
From 1964 on the strained income-through-jobs link.
http://www.educationanddemocracy.org/FSCfiles/C_CC2a_TripleRevolution.htm
Alternatives:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_guarantee
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gift_economy
http://books.google.com/books/about/The_dictionary_of_alternatives.html?id=IKZVKMPEQCEC
Citation needed. If people believed as you did, there would never be any innovation...
Also, you raise a false dillemma. Vast amounts of financial capital in our society have tied themselves up into energy sources they can more easily control. It's a mindset that won't invest much in alternatives, and will invest in politics to keep their control in place (like preventing laws regulating coal pollution).
Actually, I live in a fairly energy efficient house (partially passive solar), so I am practicing that I preach to some extent (not perfectly). The state of the art in home construction these days in cold climates is to have lots of efficiency and no furnace:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/27/world/europe/27house.html?_r=1
"DARMSTADT, Germany â" From the outside, there is nothing unusual about the stylish new gray and orange row houses in the Kranichstein District, with wreaths on the doors and Christmas lights twinkling through a freezing drizzle. But these houses are part of a revolution in building design: There are no drafts, no cold tile floors, no snuggling under blankets until the furnace kicks in. There is, in fact, no furnace."
I also eat pretty low on the food chain, that saves lots of energy and water and medical costs and pollution and animal suffering and so on.
http://www.westernwatersheds.org/watmess/watmess_2002/2002html_summer/article6.htm
I provided lots of links to people putting time and money into alternatives, and they just continue to improve. The fact that GE is predicting solar will be cheaper that coal in five years despite how coal is subsidized so much (including by not having to pay for the health costs or environment destruction costs) just shows how good renewables are.
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/05/29/ge-solar-power-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-in-5-years/
Coal did not pay its true cost in 1993:
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1993/12/the-true-cost-of-coal/4566/
Coal does not pay its true cost now (perhaps half a trillion dollars a year):
http://www.skepticalscience.com/true-cost-of-coal-power.html
http://www.desmogblog.com/true-cost-coal-half-trillion-dollars-year
And that is what makes it so hard "economically" to sell alternatives.
So, it is indeed hard to compete against such a tilted playing field, true. That is a missing issue in your comment about "so you do it", unpaid externalities.
In fact, if you reread my comment, you will see I said "No one said it was going to be easy"... That is why it is now a socio-economic issue more than a technical issue. We have plenty of technology if we wanted to use it. And it would overall be cheaper to use it overall across our society, and then alternatives would be adopted faster when gasoline was $20 a gallon with externalities priced in (we'd all drive electric cars pretty fast) or when coal electricity was $0.50 a kilowatt-hour (we'd all switch to wind and other renewables plus energy efficiency real fast). But that does not happen because we don't pay up front. Instead we pay on our health insurance bills, or in national debt to fund a war machine, or future environmental destruction that needs to be fixed, and so on...
Why not use the wind energy to make hydrogen, and store the hydrogen (as a gas, as a liquid, or in metal hydrides)?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_storage
Or why not use the wind to make compressed air, and store the compressed air?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compressed_air_energy_storage
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuel_cell
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_economy
Or why not use the wind to charge batteries?
http://arpa-e.energy.gov/ProgramsProjects/GRIDS/ARobustandInexpensiveIronAirRechargeableBat.aspx
Or why not use the wind to heat up molten salts, and use a steam turbine to make power? Solar does it, but so could wind:
http://grist.org/solar-power/2011-07-05-groundbreaking-solar-plant-in-spain-generates-24-hours-of-power/
Or why not use the wind energy to produce liquid synthetic fuels from carbon from the air?
http://www.staxera.de/announcement.105+M5320325207d.0.html?&L=1
Or why not use the wind energy to run energy-intensive industrial processes that can run intermittently (like grinding up rocks for fertilizer or chilling nitrogen out of the air)? And so on.
http://www.remineralize.org/
There are solutions for the lack of buffers for renewable energy. Put them all together, and you have a way to use wind.
That said, LENR and cheap solar panels seem more likely to succeed, one because it is compact (if it really works) and the other because it has now moving parts and requires little maintenance.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/12/01/15/0226219/can-nasa-warm-cold-fusion
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/05/29/ge-solar-power-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-in-5-years/
"A Road Not Taken: Solar Panels, Jimmy Carter, and Missed Opportunities for Change "
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2010/06/a-road-not-taken-solar-panels-jimmy-carter-and-missed-opportunities-for-change
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2010/09/obama-no-thanks-to-carter-solar-panels
The true cost of fossil fuels:
http://www.treehugger.com/energy-policy/true-cost-fossil-fuels.html
"For decades now, fossil fuel company executives and D.C. politicians have worked together to ensure that coal and oil prices stay low enough to keep the American people hooked. In his new book Greedy Bastards, Dylan Ratigan explains how "vampire industries" like oil and coal have forged "an unholy alliance with government based not just on the money that they contribute to political campaigns and spend on lobbying but on their ability to hypnotize us with false prices." Industry gets tax breaks, subsidies, military support in volatile regions, the right to use our air and water like a sewer, and assurance that the government will clean up its environmental messes. Politicians get campaign contributions, a steady flow of dirty energy, and a talking point to brandish about how they kept gas affordable. But the Ame
Free Google Books preview of that book by Nordenstrom: http://books.google.com/books/about/Biologically_closed_electric_circuits.html?id=zb-3YzIn4ZcC
There might well be something to it, but please also look into vitamin D and vegetables as a way to prevent or minimize cancer:
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/health-conditions/cancer/
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/article24.aspx
Something like that unfortunately actually happened to our old family station wagon (Oldsmobile?) around 1970. Basically, the car had issues on the trip (we might have even stopped for some repair) and the rear axle somehow eventually caused heating (sparks?) that caused the flammable rearmost seat to catch fire eventually, which happened overnight and smoked up and then burned much of the interior of the car. This happened on a long car trip to take my sister to college just after we had reached the destination. Fortunately, the car was parked outside in a hotel parking lot, and someone else at the hotel noticed the flames when they got going and they were extinguished quickly. Unfortunately, the car had all my sister's clothes and other items for starting undergrad college which had not yet been unloaded, essentially ruining them. That rough start was a contributing factor to ending her promising college career as a "doctor of tomorrow" pretty much before it got started at RPI's then new BA/MD program.
http://www.rpi.edu/dept/bio/undergraduate/physician.html
Although I was told much later that some harassment by an administrator there who did not think women should be doctors was probably a bigger compounding factor. I'm sure RPI is much more progressive 40 years later now. Also, I think her roommates then and some others tried to help make up some for her losing all her clothes and belongings. I was pretty young then, so I don't know all the details. But in some ways, perhaps losing a career is much worse than losing a house?
BTW, more reasons to be cautious about tying your hopes in life to college:
http://p2pfoundation.net/backups/p2p_research-archives/2009-October/005379.html
And how medical programs got so bad in the first place that some women had to become pioneers again:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flexner_Report
"One of the consequences of Flexner's advocacy of university-based medical education was that medical education became much more expensive, putting such education out of reach of all but upper-class white males. The small "proprietary" schools Flexner condemned, which were contended to be have been based in generations-old folk traditions rather than relatively recent western science, did admit African-Americans, women, and students of limited financial means. These students usually could not afford six to eight years of university education, and were often simply denied admission to medical schools affiliated with universities. While many such doctors continued to practice, they did so under proscribed circumstances and for less pay. It also made it more difficult for people of color, residents of rural areas, and for those of limited means generally to obtain medical care in any form."
We were of "limited means" then ourselves, or so I was told, so my father had to keep old cars going as best as he could.
So, it can be true that we tend to ignore what goes wrong with older technology. Right now, people are all worried about the first time a "self-driving" car will kill someone in an accident, ignoring that 35,000 or so people are killed in the USA in car accidents every year, and maybe 1.2 million people die a year across the globe from car accidents, and self-driving vehicles will probably greatly reduce that number. One reason is especially because many accidents happen at night, and cars can use sensors to see better than people in the dark and won't fall asleep at the wheel. Also, self-driving cars can talk to each other and negotiate right of way, and so on.
I think you are right overall. Anyone pretty much has to assume any organization is compromised by informants. A related post by me: :-) as well as so Smari and Bryan and others here can be proud of them too. :-) And, given the CIA is hiring machinists, build a movement where, in a good way, you assume everyone in it is working for the CIA, :-) but where you still get important stuff done in moving the world towards a post-scarcity open future. Just like people should assume Google is a division of the NSA and/or CIA. :-) An impossible task? Well, consider it more like a creative challenge. :-) "
http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing/msg/ae28e8971f8f9669?hl=en
"My advice to people here is to build movements in such a way that the CIA can be proud of them
Also, one has to accept that there are legitimate needs sometimes for "security" thinking. The big challenge is the irony of the current system, and theft or vandalism does little to really address the root causes of dysfunctions in our security apparatus. To address the root causes, we need a new vision of security. Here are a couple of essays by me towards trying to create a new vision of mutual/intrinsic security.
"On dealing with social hurricanes (like the US CIA) "
http://www.pdfernhout.net/on-dealing-with-social-hurricanes.html
"This approximately 60 page document is a ramble about ways to ensure the CIA (as well as other big organizations) remains (or becomes) accountable to human needs and the needs of healthy, prosperous, joyful, secure, educated communities. The primarily suggestion is to encourage a paradigm shift away from scarcity thinking & competition thinking towards abundance thinking & cooperation thinking within the CIA and other organizations. I suggest that shift could be encouraged in part by providing publicly accessible free "intelligence" tools and other publicly accessible free information that all people (including in the CIA and elsewhere) can, if they want, use to better connect the dots about global issues and see those issues from multiple perspectives, to provide a better context for providing broad policy advice. It links that effort to bigger efforts to transform our global society into a place that works well for (almost) everyone that millions of people are engaged in. A central Haudenosaunee story-related theme is the transformation of Tadodaho through the efforts of the Peacemaker from someone who was evil and hurtful to someone who was good and helpful. Another theme is exploring the meaning, if true, of a allegation by Wayne Madsen about President Obama's deeper connection to the CIA than was otherwise known. "
"Recognizing irony is key to transcending militarism" ... There is a fundamental mismatch between 21st century reality and 20th century security thinking. Those "security" agencies are using those tools of abundance, cooperation, and sharing mainly from a mindset of scarcity, competition, and secrecy. Given the power of 21st century technology as an amplifier (in
http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html
"Likewise, even United States three-letter agencies like the NSA and the CIA, as well as their foreign counterparts, are becoming ironic institutions in many ways. Despite probably having more computing power per square foot than any other place in the world, they seem not to have thought much about the implications of all that computer power and organized information to transform the world into a place of abundance for all. Cheap computing makes possible just about cheap everything else, as does the ability to make better designs through shared computing.
Sad, but true...
And it gets even worse:
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/PCI_angioplasty_article.aspx
"Interventional cardiology and cardiovascular surgery is basically a scam based on a misunderstanding of the nature of heart disease. Searching for and treating obstructive plaque does not address the areas of the coronary vascular tree most likely to rupture and cause heart attacks. If there was never another CABG or angioplasty performed or stent placed, patients with heart disease would be better off. Doctors would be forced to educate our citizens that their heart disease risk is determined by what they place on their forks. Millions of lives would be dramatically extended. To abandon the theory of stretching and cutting out areas with plaque would shut down interventional cardiology, nearly all cardiovascular surgery, and many suppliers of the biotechnology. In many cases, interventional cardiology is the major income generator to hospitals. The ending of this ill-conceived, out-dated and ineffective technology would dramatically downsize hospitals in the United States and free up over $100 billion annually in medical care costs. Besides being ineffective, interventional cardiology places the responsibility in the hands of the doctor and not the patients. When patients finally realize they must take control of their heart problems with aggressive dietary modifications (and when needed medications for temporary periods) we will essentially solve the health crisis in America.
The sad thing is surgical interventions and medications are the foundation of modern cardiology and both are relatively ineffective compared to nutritional excellence. My patients routinely reverse their heart disease, and no longer have vulnerable plaque or high blood pressure, so they do not need medical care, hospitals or cardiologists anymore. The problem is that in the real world cardiac patients are not even informed that heart disease is predictably reversed with nutritional excellence. They are not given the opportunity to choose and just corralled into these surgical interventions.
Trying to figure out how to pay for ineffective and expensive medicine by politicians will never be a real solution. People need to know they do not have to have heart disease to begin with, and if they get it, aggressive nutrition is the most life-saving intervention. And it is free."
And:
http://www.pdfernhout.net/to-james-randi-on-skepticism-about-mainstream-science.html#Some_quotes_on_social_problems_in_science
"The problems I've discussed are not limited to psychiatry, although they reach their most florid form there. Similar conflicts of interest and biases exist in virtually every field of medicine, particularly those that rely heavily on drugs or devices. It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine. (Marcia Angell)"
Much of the path to better health was known 100 years ago by the natural hygienists. See:
http://soilandhealth.org/02/0201hyglibcat/shelton.bio.bidwell.htm
"At this time in 1927, Dr. Shelton is already being harassed in his Hygienic practice by advocates of The Medical Mentality and by the police. In 1927, Dr. Shelton is jailed for the first time for "practicing medicine without a license" and is fined $100.oo. This same year of 1927, a second arrest takes place, under similar circumstances and with charges of $300.oo. His money is so tight this second time, he has to borrow to be released. Also,
Please have your wife talk to her doctor about a blood test for vitamin D deficiency (which is related to the immune system). Related:
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/news-archive/2010/vitamin-d-regulatory-hormone-of-immunity-and-inflammation/
Please also look into the work of Dr. Joel Fuhrman, who is his first "Healthy Times" newsletter has an article about people coming into his office related to Lyme disease and feeling much better after they improve what they eat (much more vegetables and fruits and omega-3s and so on).
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/newsletter.aspx
http://www.drfuhrman.com/library/foodpyramid.aspx
Even if the issue is Lyme disease, vitamin D and phytonutrients help build up the immune system so it can fight of pathogens.
Also look into the book "The Lyme Disease Solution" by Kenneth B. Singleton M.D., which has sections about how sunlight and a better diet help with Lyme disease.
http://www.amazon.com/Lyme-Disease-Solution-Kenneth-Singleton/dp/1934812005
I agree about the computer-aided diagnosis. I hope some day we will have cheap tests people can do at home for nutritional status and vitamin D levels from a drop of blood, perhaps involving cell phones, as described here:
http://www.ted.com/talks/george_whitesides_a_lab_the_size_of_a_postage_stamp.html
Until then, please look into these issues for yourself and your wife (since you may be at risk as well if you eat in similar ways or have a similar lifestyle without immense amounts of sunlight).
Thanks. Please also see my point on four interwoven economic alternatives (gift, exchange, subsistence, planned) in reply to someone who disagreed with you.
By the way, "disruptive" energy technology is just around the corner:
http://cleantechnica.com/2011/05/29/ge-solar-power-cheaper-than-fossil-fuels-in-5-years/
And if that was not enough, maybe even "cold fusion" which is becoming understood as actually just a proton plus a metal-surface electron becoming a neutron and being absorbed by nearby matter, leading to standard radioactive decay:
http://www.lenr-canr.org/News.htm
http://pesn.com/2012/01/13/9602010_NASA_LENR_endorsement_spin_cycle_to_clear_past_suppression/
Thorium power (being pursued by the Chinese and Indians) is another energy alternative, too.