Science & Society « Biofortified

Fooling yourself to better fool others

by David Tribe on 7 February 2012

The biological study of human behaviour can teach us a lot about ourselves, and Robert Trivers has just written a book Deceit and Self-Deception: Fooling Yourself the Better to Fool Others (Allen Lane, Penguin Books 2011) from which we can all learn deep insights about ourselves and our fellow humans.

Yes fellow humans, some of us — including even myself –can be very difficult and tricky to deal with.

The first chapter of Robert Trivers’ book gives an overview of the evolutionary logic of human self-deception. It picks out nine categories of self-deception, but three in particular caught my mind:

The Derogation of Others Is Closely Linked
Moral Superiority
The Construction of Biased Social Theory

Do OTC Head Louse Treatments Work? Part 2: Questionable treatments

by Joe Ballenger on 1 January 2012

Editor’s note: Thanks to Joe for Biofortified’s first post of 2012! Here’s to a great year of science blogging!

I like to think of myself as a skeptical blogger. I like to engage in critical thinking about scientific issues because this is an important aspect of my job as a graduate assistant. When I move into the workforce, I’ll still need some basic skills to parse evidence because this is my job as a scientist. Mythbusting is a great opportunity to do this, and I enjoy discussing things which may help people who read my posts whenever I can. Being an entomologist gives me some rather interesting opportunities to do this, which is leading me to discuss head lice of all things.

In my last post, Do OTC Head Louse Treatments Work? Part 1: Mechanisms, I explained how the most commonly used FDA-approved treatments worked. In addition to those science-based products, there are many products that have no evidence of efficacy behind their claims, and that rely on fear to make a sale. What I’ve seen deeply concerns me not only as a scientist trying to make the world a better place, but as a parent trying to raise my daughter the best that I can. In this post, I’ve taken a few commonly sold products and listed some ways in which I think they play fast and loose with their claims.

Do OTC Head Louse Treatments Work? Part 1: Mechanisms

by Joe Ballenger on 23 December 2011

I think it’s safe to say that most folks have had experiences with lice. Every entomologist I’ve ever met (including myself… buy me a few beers and I’ll tell you) has at least one entertaining pubic louse story. Head lice are a childhood rite of passage, with most kids being infested at one point or another. They’re generally harmless with the occasional secondary infection, but infested kids are prone to teasing and other forms of exclusion by classmates. Distraction due to constant itching can also be a problem. Since schools don’t want children being infested for obvious reasons, kids are sent home because of infestation, resulting in parents missing work. Even though lice are mainly nuisance pests, they’re still a pretty big economic pest and account for billions of dollars per year in lost productivity.

When lice strike

Head lice are something almost everyone has to deal with, and head lice treatments are something someone buys every once and awhile. These are big business in and of themselves. Because they’re big business, many firms have started popping up offering louse treatments with varying degrees of effectiveness.

A while back, I went through my own head louse ordeal with my daughter. Treatment was complicated by a family member who didn’t realize they were infested. We originally thought the lice were resistant to treatment, so I had to get a second treatment. Since then, I’ve become curious about what is for sale in stores for Over The Counter (OTC) head louse treatments and generally take a look at whatever treatments I can when I get the chance. Over the years, I’ve become surprised at how many dubious treatments are offered for sale (although perhaps I shouldn’t be) and how many of these use questionable advertising techniques mostly built upon fear rather than science. Many treatments offered for sale over the counter are either unproven, or have been proven not to work.

First, let’s discuss some headlouse biology. Then, let’s discuss how the treatments currently FDA approved work. In Do OTC Head Louse Treatments Work? Part 2: Questionable treatments, I’ll discuss the dubious treatments.

Is Genetic Engineering Kosher?

by Ariela Haro von Mogel on 21 December 2011

Hi, I’m Ariela. I am studying nutrition sciences (dietetics) at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. I have a bachelors in sociology from UC Davis, and I am interested in the sociological aspects of people’s lives, especially food and culture. Hanukkah started last night at sundown, and I thought it was particularly relevant to talk about a project I worked on the last academic year.

As part of an Undergraduate Research Scholars program, I gathered research for Professor Jordan Rosenblum. He is interested in how the slow food and local food movements, as well as the biotechnology revolution relate to Kosher Laws. He is working on writing a book about ancient Jewish dietary practices, and the various arguments for or against it. He is a well-versed scholar on the subject of biblical and rabbinical literature. My role was to help him find modern arguments concerning Jewish dietary laws and culture, and how they are interpreted in the 21st century. I have read and analyzed over a dozen books, journal articles and web links to focus on two modern debates concerning Jewish dietary laws. I wanted to find out how Jewish beliefs influence their views on genetic engineering, and whether there was evidence for the modern argument that certain Kosher laws were based on health considerations.

Lit search failures and hazards

by Anastasia on 16 December 2011

On Twitter yesterday, @seekblunttruth shared a link with @franknfoode that I thought deserved greater scrutiny. The link is to an ISIS post* titled Bt Crops Failures & Hazards.

Others may spend some time criticizing ISIS itself, and that criticism may be worthy, but here I’d like to focus on the post. I’ll let you check out the post content yourself, but I want to focus on the works cited list.

There are 29 citations. We find 11 sources that are by ISIS authors. It’s ok to refer to your previous work, we do it on Biofortified all the time, but having almost 40% of the citations be self-citations feels like an attempt to pad the citations list. Many of the rest of the sources are either by biased organizations or have been previously debunked either in the literature or in the blogosphere.