Lies, Damned Lies, and Medical Science

Atlantic

In 2001, rumors were circulating in Greek hospitals that surgery residents, eager to rack up scalpel time, were falsely diagnosing hapless Albanian immigrants with appendicitis. At the University of Ioannina medical school’s teaching hospital, a newly minted doctor named Athina Tatsioni was discussing the rumors with colleagues when a professor who had overheard asked her if she’d like to try to prove whether they were true—he seemed to be almost daring her. She accepted the challenge and, with the professor’s and other colleagues’ help, eventually produced a formal study showing that, for whatever reason, the appendices removed from patients with Albanian names in six Greek hospitals were more than three times as likely to be perfectly healthy as those removed from patients with Greek names. “It was hard to find a journal willing to publish it, but we did,” recalls Tatsioni. “I also discovered that I really liked research.” Good thing, because the study had actually been a sort of audition. The professor, it turned out, had been putting together a team of exceptionally brash and curious young clinicians and Ph.D.s to join him in tackling an unusual and controversial agenda.

Introduction to Volume II of Child & Domestic Abuse

Volume I is a contemporary overview and summary of the topic of abuse. However it was derived and developed from more basic sources which were not directly concerned with the modern concept of abuse. These derivations were not relevant when presenting the "bottom line" and thus were either just alluded to or not mentioned at all. However these basic sources also need to be studied. Thus Volume II is an encyclopedia of these classic Rabbinic sources (translations as well as the original Hebrew) related to the topic abuse. The material is arranged conceptually according to topic and subtopic. Thus material which on the surface might not appear related – is grouped together by its underlying conceptual relationship to abuse.

This material needs to be carefully studied and understood to be able to   deal properly with the complexity of the issue of abuse and the  interaction of halacha, psychology and secular law. Merely knowing the  conclusions, without understanding where they come from makes it  difficult to deal with different situations or more complex ones.

However this conceptual organization is not simply an efficient means of   finding a particular Talmudic citation or verse in the Torah for the purpose of study. The framework in which I have placed these sources is important for another reason. The title headings and subheadings are there to suggest what use might be made of these ideas.

While the Torah clearly says not to harm others, it also says that it is necessary to do something to prevent harm from happening. This conceptual framework shows that not only is it explicit that Judaism requires that harm not be done to anyone, and that it should be prevented – there is another lesion to be learned. Because the Torah is so concerned about the issue of harm and prevention, actions are also required to ensure that measures intended to protect from harm – are in fact working! In other words, one does not fulfill his full Torah obligation just by keeping the mitzva of not harming (e.g., not hitting) or the mitzva of preventing harm (e.g., putting up a guard rail on your roof). The Torah not only requires that one try and anticipate the consequences of actions and provide preventative measures – but also requires one to monitor whether these measures work to protect the members of society. There is a need to obtain feedback as to how well the safeguards are working in reality and to act on this feedback. That has been the missing factor in much of the discussion of abuse up until recently.

Thus we have four critical elements – not to harm, take measures to prevent harm to others, monitor whether these preventative measures are actually working and modify accordingly. Another things which is apparent from these sources – there is no exclusive responsibility for rabbis and community leaders to monitor whether the preventative measures work and to suggest corrections. It is obligatory for every single individual to see what can be done to make society safe for everyone.

Scientific heresy - Life experiences of grandparents can affect offspring

Newsweek

Michael Skinner has just uttered an astounding sentence, but by now he is so used to slaying scientific dogma that his listener has to interrupt and ask if he realizes what he just said. Which was this: “We just published a paper last month confirming epigenetic changes in sperm which are carried forward transgenerationally. This confirms that these changes can become permanently programmed.”

OK, so it’s not bumper-sticker-ready. But if Skinner, a molecular biologist at Washington State University, were as proficient with soundbites as he is with mass spectrometry, he might have explained it this way: the life experiences of grandparents and even great-grandparents alter their eggs and sperm so indelibly that the change is passed on to their children, grandchildren, and beyond. It’s called transgenerational epigenetic inheritance: the phenomenon in which something in the environment alters the health not only of the individual exposed to it, but also of that individual’s descendants. [...]

Danger in believing in Science and danger in not believing in it

New York Times

Will sprinters one day break the sound barrier? Do Olympic athletes win more medals if they wear red? And can a simple formula predict happiness?

While those questions may sound absurd, various studies have found a way to prove them true through statistical manipulation of numbers and data. The tendency of academics, politicians and pundits to generate such numerical falsehoods from data — and the tendency of the public to believe the results — is a phenomenon cleverly explored in the new book “Proofiness: The Dark Arts of Mathematical Deception,” by Charles Seife.

Mr. Seife, a writer and professor of journalism at New York University, makes a compelling case that numbers have a unique hold on the human mind, and that we are routinely bamboozled by phony data, bogus statistics and bad math. I recently spoke with Mr. Seife, whose work has appeared in The New York Times, The Economist and elsewhere, about the role that proofiness plays in health and medical research. Here’s our conversation.[...]

Newsweek

This column is about science education, but teachers and curriculum designers should click away now rather than risk apoplexy. Instead of making the usual boring plea for more resources for K–12 science (or, as it is now trendily called, STEM, for science, technology, engineering, and math), I hereby make the heretical argument that it is time to stop cramming kids’ heads with the Krebs cycle, Ohm’s law, and the myriad other facts that constitute today’s science curricula. Instead, what we need to teach is the ability to detect Bad Science—BS, if you will.

The reason we do science in the first place is so that “our own atomized experiences and prejudices” don’t mislead us, as Ben Goldacre of the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine puts it in his new book, Bad Science: Quacks, Hacks, and Big Pharma Flacks. Understanding what counts as evidence should therefore trump memorizing the structural formulas for alkanes.

“People can be wrong in so many ways,” Goldacre told me—and by “people,” he includes scientists. All too many put too much credence in observational studies, in which people who happen to behave one way (eating a lot of olive oil, drinking in moderation) have one health outcome, while people who choose to behave the opposite way have a different health outcome. [...]

Black death & its role in the Middle East

New York Times

The great waves of plague that twice devastated Europe and changed the course of history had their origins in China, a team of medical geneticists reported Sunday, as did a third plague outbreak that struck less harmfully in the 19th century.

And in separate research, a team of biologists reported conclusively this month that the causative agent of the most deadly plague, the Black Death, was the bacterium known as Yersinia pestis. This agent had always been the favored cause, but a vigorous minority of biologists and historians have argued the Black Death differed from modern cases of plague studied in India, and therefore must have had a different cause.

The Black Death began in Europe in 1347 and carried off an estimated 30 percent or more of the population of Europe. For centuries the epidemic continued to strike every 10 years or so, its last major outbreak being the Great Plague of London from 1665 to 1666. The disease is spread by rats and transmitted to people by fleas or, in some cases, directly by breathing. [...]

PA upset over UNRWA official’s remark on refugees

JPost


The Palestinian Authority is extremely disappointed with a senior UNRWA official who recently said that Palestinian refugees should acknowledge that they will almost certainly not be returning to Israel, officials said last week.

Andrew Whitley, outgoing director of the United Nations Refugee and Works Agency's New York office, was quoted earlier this month as saying, "If one doesn't start a discussion soon with the refugees for them to consider what their own future might be – for them to start debating their own role in the societies where they are rather than being left in a state of limbo where they are helpless but preserve rather the cruel illusions that perhaps they will return one day to their homes – then we are storing up trouble for ourselves." [...]

Martin Gilbert - corrective history of Jewish-Islam "coexistence"

Jerusalem Post

Under Muslim rule, Jews have been a ‘protected’ group, but have nonetheless endured intolerable suffering.
 
Martin Gilbert’s In Ishmael’s House is a good corrective to all the ink that has been spilled to fabricate and deny history relating to the supposed coexistence between Jews and Muslims under Muslim rule. British-born Gilbert, a biographer of Winston Churchill and prolific writer on the Jews and the Holocaust, has only rarely directed his lens on the Jews who lived under Islam.

The subject has generally been left to Jewish Orientalists who, in the second half of the 19th and first half of the 20th century, wrote about the wondrous tolerance that Islam showed Jews in contrast to the brutality meted out to them in Russia and Europe.[...]

Child & Domestic Abuse Book - Almost there

The book is finished. Files need some technical corrections to pass
Amazon's test which should be next week.

The book is being published in two volumes. The second volume consists
of the halachic material (and Hebrew sources) that is the basis for the
conclusions presented in Volume I.

Rav Sternbuch: Considering others

4-Year-Old Can Be Sued, Judge Rules in Bike Case

New York Times

Citing cases dating back as far as 1928, a judge has ruled that a young girl accused of running down an elderly woman while racing a bicycle with training wheels on a Manhattan sidewalk two years ago can be sued for negligence.
The ruling by the judge, Justice Paul Wooten of State Supreme Court in Manhattan, did not find that the girl was liable, but merely permitted a lawsuit brought against her, another boy and their parents to move forward.
The suit that Justice Wooten allowed to proceed claims that in April 2009, Juliet Breitman and Jacob Kohn, who were both 4, were racing their bicycles, under the supervision of their mothers, Dana Breitman and Rachel Kohn, on the sidewalk of a building on East 52nd Street. At some point in the race, they struck an 87-year-old woman named Claire Menagh, who was walking in front of the building and, according to the complaint, was “seriously and severely injured,” suffering a hip fracture that required surgery. She died three weeks later. [...]

Breaking the Silence: Review by Jewish Star

Jewish Star

Has the Jewish community finally come to terms with sexual abuse? That is the question raised by the publication of a controversial new book, “Breaking the Silence: Sexual Abuse in the Jewish Community.” It is the first extensive treatment of sexual abuse among Jews aimed at a religious audience, and it faces the explosive topic head on — from advice on contacting police to filing abuse reports to halachic arguments about why reporting molesters is in keeping with Jewish law.

The editors, Dr. David Pelcovitz, the Straus Professor of Psychology and Education at the Azrieli Graduate School of Yeshiva University, and David Mandel, the CEO of Ohel, the largest Jewish social service agency, have no doubt about the book’s importance.

Eternal Jewish Family is now Tiferes Bais Yisrael of One Jewish Family

Eternal Jewish Family is now Tiferes Bais Yisrael and is holding a conference in Newark, New Jersey in December.

They state:The Role of Tiferes Bais Yisrael

           

                Well over half of all Jews worldwide choose to intermarry, yet some of these couples eventually decide to raise Jewish families.

                Proper guidance is crucial when a non-Jewish spouse sincerely seeks a halachic conversion.

                To assure full acceptance into any Jewish educational system or community throughout the world, including Israel, the conversion must adhere to the requirements and standards of Jewish law, as established by recognized Torah authorities.

                   

                TBY assists intermarried couples who display a sincere and strong commitment to live a Jewish lifestyle, in accordance with Torah and halacha.

                In this situation, the Jewish spouse is becoming a fully observant Jew while the non-Jewish partner is committed to become a sincere and fully observant convert.

           

Science Research- Dr. Hauser of Harvard - fraud or errors of judgment

New York Times

The still unresolved case of Marc Hauser, the researcher accused by Harvard of scientific misconduct, points to the painful slowness of the government-university procedure for resolving such charges. It also underscores the difficulty of defining error in a field like animal cognition where inconsistent results are common.

The case is unusual because Dr. Hauser is such a prominent researcher in his field, and is known to a wider audience through his writings on morality. There seemed little doubt of the seriousness of the case when Harvard announced on Aug. 20 that he had been found solely responsible for eight counts of scientific misconduct.

But last month two former colleagues, Bert Vaux and Jeffrey Watumull, both now at the University of Cambridge in England, wrote in the Harvard Crimson of Dr. Hauser’s “unimpeachable scientific integrity” and charged that his critics were “scholars known to be virulently opposed to his research program.” [...]

Obama claims political woes are result of neurological problem

JPost

In an increasingly desperate attempt to develop a narrative for their coming collapse, the Democrats have indulged themselves in what for half a century they’ve habitually attributed to the American Right – the paranoid style in American politics. The talk is of dark conspiracies – secret money, foreign influence, big corporations, with Karl Rove and, yes, Ed Gillespie lurking ominously behind the scenes. The only thing missing is the Halliburton-Cheney angle.

But after trotting out some of these with a noticeable lack of success, President Barack Obama has come up with something new, something less common, something more befitting his stature and intellect. He’s now offering a scientific, indeed neurological, explanation for his current political troubles. The electorate apparently is deranged by its anxieties and fears to the point where it can’t think straight. Part of the reason “facts and science and argument does not seem to be winning the day all the time,” he explained to a Massachusetts audience, “is because we’re hardwired not to always think clearly when we’re scared. And the country is scared.” Opening a whole new branch of cognitive science – liberal psychology – Obama has discovered a new principle: The fearful brain is hardwired to act befuddled, i.e., vote Republican. [...]