Tag Archives: skeptics

SciencePunk – A critique of skepticism

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And so it is the beginning of another month, which means it’s time again for Westminster Skeptics in the Pub. This month, it was the turn of the SciencePunk, Frank Swain, to address us with a talk entitled “A critique of skepticism”. Here, he basically told us where skeptics (or the skeptic “movement”, if that exists) are going wrong in engaging with others. I think most of us probably have an uneasy feeling about things we have seen done in the name of skepticism and how we are perceived by “non-skeptics”, such as my first thoughts on skeptics insular nature last month.

In a way, I think Frank was putting out there our own “inconvenient truth”, that we dimly recognised before. The genius was in his delivery, which was a well-illustrated, persuasive and coherent argument. I’ve said this before, but it is a mark of great speaker at SitP, when we carry on discussing their talk long after fact, because it has been that thought-provoking.

What follows is just a few of my favourite quotes from the presentation. I never take enough notes for a full round-up and there are many who are better at it than I anyway.

What are the KPIs of skepticism?

  • Who are you talking to?
  • Who is listening?
  • Whose mind is changed?

I’m pretty sure anything I’ve written hasn’t changed any minds. Why? I write for those who already think like me. Not on purpose, but because actually challenging someone’s opinion, in writing, is difficult. What is worse is that I hadn’t even considered this until last night.

“A Facebook group or Twitter hashtag is not a campaign.”
It shows a groundswell of support from those already in the know, but it doesn’t change minds or engage. It is people agreeing with their mates.

Undeniably true.

I think this is also the time that Frank introduced the “Mum” test: how would you explain it to your mum and would she care? A useful teaching technique that should be applied to skepticism more. To me, that indicates a danger of talking down to people and coming across as superior – a point that is later addressed.

Facts do not speak for themselves. We have a fetishism for facts.
How many people have heard or used “the plural of anecdote is not data”? *many hands go up* – “instead it’s a convincing argument”.

Whilst we can ask for evidence until we are blue in the face, it only convinces people that make evidenced-based decisions. Anecdotes persuade a lot more people. Frank’s example here was; user reviews on Amazon – many of us use them to make purchasing decisions based on anecdote, because we trust others. Also, how many of us can prove that the Earth orbits the Sun? I guess anecdotes/non-first hand evidence is more pervasive that we’d like to think.

Arguing from facts is cowardly. You’re going in with the knowledge that you’re right. Arrogance will show. (I didn’t note this verbatim, so relied on a tweet for wording)

I struggle to agree with this, because people don’t go into arguments knowing they are wrong. Each party tends to believe (to the extent that they know) they are right. However, I can definitely buy the idea that arguing arrogantly doesn’t work.

This is why I have a problem with the concept that skeptics are teaching or enlightening people. It implies a hierarchy where skeptics are above those they are talking to, who are in turn in some way stupid or primitive.

That leads on to what I think was the take-home message; just because you have evidence, doesn’t mean you are better, or even right.

In no way was that a complete report of the talk. It is only the bits I found most interesting and challenging (and the bits I had notes for). Most notably I missed out all of the coverage of the recent Twitter mess regarding Gillian McKeith and the level of skeptic vitriol that was shown.

I will link here to any more complete reports as they become available:

Preaching to the choir

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Last night, I attended my first British Library Talk Science event: “Science in UK Government: Where’s the Evidence?”, and made it to the second half of the night’s Westminster Skeptics. A bumper night for science, evidence and critical thinking, one might think.

Actually, I think we have a bit of a problem. Of the many people tweeting at the BLTS event (#blts) I recognised many of the names and Twitter handles. I could even put a few to actual faces. Going across town to Westminster Skeptics, I met up with many of the regulars for the Q&A session and a chat afterwards, some of whom have become friends over the last 7 months of my attending and interacting on Twitter, others I could just place either faces or Twitter handles again. And as Jack of Kent pointed out, the Simon Perry, our speaker last night, is not someone who has made his name elsewhere and become a skeptic, but rather made a name as a skeptic.

The long-winded point I am attempting to make is; has skepticism become an echo chamber, where we all know each other and agree with one another? Rather than wandering around the country, talking to each other in pubs, should we be focusing more effort in starting dialogue with others outside of the skeptic fold. In no way am I insinuating that the Skeptics in the Pub movement is a bad thing; it is fun, social and motivates skeptics, but I’m not sure of its value in publicising the skeptic values and position.

We’ve had a warning about this before, as Evan Harris found out to his (and our) dismay. If you had looked on Twitter around the first week of May, I think you would have thought Evan was a dead cert to hold his Oxford West and Abingdon seat. As a community, we were making so much noise at each other that to us, Evan appeared more popular than he turned out to be. This was something he remarked upon last night as “observer bias”; when you are both observing and involved in something, your perception is distorted.

I also think this fits in with JoK’s recent post “The Image of Skepticism“. Coming across as one insular group can also hurt our credentials. The development of skepticism into a close-knit group with its own in-jokes (homeopathy-dilution jokes, skeptic Top Trumps) can make us look like “the nasty party”. We also run the danger of having the possibility to develop a “herd mentality”, where individuals don’t appraise the evidence, but take it as a given because other skeptics (or those in authority) have already adopted a viewpoint.

I’m not sure what the answers to these points or questions are, but I do think that recognition of some of these problems in the growing skeptic community is important. Do other people feel the same way? Or am I off by a country mile here?

Science and Politics at a local level

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After blogging about the manifestos of the three main parties, I thought I’d email the three main party candidates standing in my constituency (Frank Dobson (Labour), George Lee (Conservative) and Jo Shaw (Lib Dem)) to find out what their personal views on these kind of issues are, so I sent them the following email:

Dear …,

I am writing to you and the candidates from the other major parties to find out your views on science and education issues in the General Election and I will be posting all responses to my blog at http://www.blog.jstreetley.co.uk and updating the Skeptical Voter wikipage (http://skeptical-voter.org/wiki/) so that all can see where you stand. I think these issues are particularly pertinent to this constituency given the large number of HE institutions within it, so I hope you will find time to answer these questions.

Do you support the use of public funds to provide unproven health products such as homeopathy? Including funding of the Royal London Homeopathic Hospital within the constituency?
Do you agree that testing on animals (within strict criteria) is a necessary part of the development of medicines?
Do you believe the science budget represents a sound investment? Will you act to protect science funding?
Do you support the concept of tuition fees/top-up fees, along with any cap?
Is a good Science education as important as one in English or Maths? Why?

I realise your party’s stance on some of these issues is clear in their manifesto, but I would really value your personal opinions on these and I know others in the skeptic and science community will too.

Regards,
James Streetley

Some questions are taken from the Skeptical Voter Survey and others I have invented. Feel free to use them to quiz your own PPCs if you wish. I will post back as soon as each replies to me.

Simon Singh Celebration and Westminster Skeptics gets political

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Last night was a special edition of Westminster Skeptics, celebrating Simon Singh’s recent victory at the Court of Appeal over the meaning of the words he is being sued over (or as Dave Gorman put it “the 2nd Annual Simon Singh free-speech event”) and it was also a chance for us to hear what each of the three main parties had to say on the matter, which is of particular interest given the general election coming up and the manifestos being released this week. The Lib Dems were being represented by the veteran of Westminster Skeptics, Dr Evan Harris; the Conservatives by Joanne Cash, their PPC for Westminster North and Labour were Lord Bach, one of their Justice Ministers. This was followed by a panel discussion between Nick Cohen, Padraig Reidy, Sile Lane and Allen Green. As with every Skeptics in the Pub event, I was again pleasantly surprised at how engaging and educational standing in a pub and listening to what these renowned speakers had to say.

Dave Gorman

Dave Gorman opened proceedings with his fantastic line from above about this being the “2nd annual” event, to much applause from the crowd, before giving a both comedic and serious version of the story so far. To someone that doesn’t hang off of every word from Simon’s case (or in my case, have it distilled for me by Jack of Kent),  we must be a strange bunch with a lot of skeptic/libel reform in-jokes, and it was nice to see that Dave Gorman is someone who is fully in that crowd as it could be so easy for someone famous to put their name to a campaign without having the intimate knowledge at his fingertips that Dave Gorman appears to have.

He observes that the BCA have more-or-less failed in their mission to promote chiropractic by inviting more criticism than they previously had, and by trying to measure up to science. (I might be slightly paraphrasing here, as my notes aren’t as good as I thought)

both practitioners and customers know that the evidence isn’t up the standards set by science…that is the reason for their custom…they like to be “outside of science”

Indeed, why try and square up to science if you are purporting to be alternative?

He continues this train of thought throughout the whole case, talking about the right of reply and apology in the Guardian:

to not take the right of reply was to spectacularly miss an open goal

They were basically given the opportunity to put their side across that they don’t need evidence and operate beyond science, and they missed it. He then discusses the oddity asking for an apology and trying to understand just what sort of apology would have sufficed. After all, the BCA are apparently most upset about the idea that they were dishonestly promoting treatments (something the article is now deemed not to imply by the Courts). He puts forward a short potential apology:

They honestly believe this stuff works, but it doesn’t and they are stupid.

Well, it seems to cover their bases…

The final quote of the evening from Dave Gorman was a serious one about libel chill, and really the one that we are all worried about:

[some articles] are retracted before they’ve even been published, and that is what really scares me.

Quite.

(He sums this all up very neatly on his own blog too)

Simon Singh

Simon only took to the stage briefly as some of the politicians were on a tight schedule, but he (as many of the speakers did), thanked the blogosphere, the twitterers and all the supporters for helping this campaign to reach critical mass in the time it has, and putting libel reform into the limelight:

every major political party is backing libel reform

and updating us on his outlook following the judgement earlier in the month:

the case has changed position…looking a lot rosier

The Politicians

Lord Bach – Labour

Lord Bach (and Labour party) was much more committed to libel reform than I had initially expected and had some very powerful quotes to give to the room on where labour stood on the matter.

[we have] the full backing of the Government party

“new legislation on libel” in the manifesto

Labour are fully behind the movement, no matter what the election outcome

this is a firm commitment

Very strong words indeed, although as Evan Harris later pointed out, their manifesto still refers to “defendants” in libel cases; somewhat presumptuous.

Joanne Cash – Conservative

I was eager to see Joanne Cash for myself for two reason: as a Tory voter myself I really wanted to hear the party’s commitment to reform and she has been talked about at length in the media/blogosphere so I wanted to see for myself. I have to say that after the hype I was somewhat disappointed, but I suppose if someone has been built up in your mind, that is almost inevitable. As a libel barrister, I thought she would have more to say on the issue, but instead she kept it quite short and sweet and outlined their position as follows:

  • a commitment to change the cost regime
  • Dominic Greive plans to widen the comment defence
  • Commitment to new legislation if required

Dr Evan Harris – Liberal Democrats

As Allen Green said:

no meeting of Westminster Skeptics would be complete without a talk from Dr Evan Harris

and so it happened. Evan is really on home turf here and as a result he came across the best, especially when talking about the wider issues of libel chill and its existence throughout writing. He knows that the devil is in the details too, saying all the parties (even his own) might shy away from legislation if they haven’t promised us details. Consequently, here are his details:

The Lib Dems are committed to a statutory public interest defence

automatically qualified privilege for peer-reviewed journals

no reason that companies should be able to sue for libel…and a number of other things

I’m particularly interested in qualified privilege for peer-reviewed journals: seems to me like a brilliant idea, as long as there is adequate peer-review to stop nonsense becoming “qualified nonsense”!

Panel Discussion and Questions

The panel discussion was a somewhat rushed affair, and I think everyone (including me) was dying for a break at this point, but still a few good points were made by each speaker. Nick Cohen spoke at length about Conditional Fee Agreements and the recent defeat of a move to abolish them, lead by Tom Watson, but probably his most rousing quote was that we need libel refrom to

protect the freedom the internet has given

Allen Green then re-iterated that while Simon’s case and the recent judgement is important, it is not the end of the campaign and is relatively insignificant for most.

some writers will be more protected now, in some disciplines, but still no public interest defence and no end to libel tourism

And finally Padraig Reidy told the story of how Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz, who sued Cambridge University Press regarding a book he claimed accused him of funding terrorism. CUP promptly apologised, pulped the books and donated a sum of money to Unicef on his behalf, despite the authors maintaining they had done nothing wrong.

Cambridge University Press folded at the first hurdle

I think this very neatly sums up the libel chill in this country.

So now, more than ever, we need to be watching our PPCs and their pledges as we go into this general election and make sure we have all signed the petition: lets get to 100,000 before Parliament starts again. The election gives us a chance to make a difference and change the law.

Sign the Petition

Prof. Brian Cox, Science Policy and the General Election

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This is just a few highlights of tonight’s Westminster Skeptics as: 1) I’m not a journalist (infact barely a blogger) and 2) it being in a pub, I’ve had a few pints!

Prof. Brian Cox kicked off the night with an excellent presentation on science funding and how it is so small that to cut it would be insignificant; except for the huge advances and increase in GDP that it brings. To see for yourself how small government science funding is, check out this graphic from the Guardian and see if you can spot it! A good illustration of the point is that the Apollo program paid for itself 14 times over its cost in terms of GDP generated for the American economy.

After this we heard from Nick Dusic of CASE (Campaign for Science & Engineering in the UK). His basic message was that there is a science vote out there to be won, and we as voters need to be stronger, more vocal and show our presence. This is a point I totally agree with.

Dr Evan Harris MP (Lib Dem Science Spokesman) was also there, but he basically re-iterated Brian Cox, so I shan’t bother re-writing. He did come out with one beautiful quote during the Q&A session, but I promptly forgot it so will have to paraphrase. He was discussing the Government funding of humane animal research and said he advocated writing on the pill bottle “Only made possible by the public spending on humane animal research and testing”, and went even further to suggest we should disclose how many animals went into a treatment in the original (he suggested MRC) press release for the treatment, making very sure the public spending is acknowledged. I like this point very much: scientific triumphs need more proper celebration rather than derision or ridiculous hyperbole.

The rest of the session was unremarkable (as far as I have noted anyhow), but enjoyable as ever. And we only managed to slip into homeopathy once, which I presume is some kind of record for the skeptics!

More on homeopathy at Birkbeck

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A little while ago I wrote about the set-up of a homeopathic society at Birkbeck and my concerns about it. This prompted me to write to our Student Union to try and understand exactly what was going on, what the size of the operation was and if we were financing this (in my opinion) ethically dubious behaviour by students of another university on our campus. I never heard back, despite chasing.

However my point did appear to have struck home, at least for a brief while: posters were removed from the lifts and corridors and their original website was torn down and replaced with this one. I’d like to class this as a small victory as it appears I have at least cleared the name of my College from their website and so we are no longer associated with such drivel.

I suppose the next stop is to drive them out of using College rooms by showing the College what nonsense is being harboured within our building. I think that shall be my next port of call.

The Big Libel Reform Gig (or what I learned today)

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Libel Reform LogoJust got in from The Big Libel Reform Gig at London’s Palace Theatre and thought I’d jot down a few things I didn’t know this time yesterday.

1. People on the internet can be nice

When I woke up this morning I didn’t know I’d be going to the gig. I’d thought about it, but apathy mixed with having no-one to go with meant I decided to give it a miss. Until this tweet came along morning and I decided to go with it, thanks to Marianne (@noodlemaz). Turned out that for £20 we had pretty much the best seats, very front of the second circle, so could see everything beautifully. I was slightly hesitant about meeting people from the internet, but what can be more public than a 1,000+ auditorium. In fact, Marianne was lovely and it turns out we are both off to tomorrow’s Westminster Skeptics in the Pub to see Prof. Brian Cox, so I think that is a success.

2. Dara O’Briain’s wife is a surgeon

Who knew?

3. The techies at the Palace Theatre are shocking

The Palace Theatre, owned by Lord Andrew Lloyd-Webber is a pretty large West End theatre that currently houses “Priscilla”, and was the venue for tonight’s event. Clearly, the (in-house?) techies either couldn’t be arsed, are incapable or have some other reason for the shoddy production values of the event.

I can’t think to imagine how much it costs to hire the theatre for a Sunday, but it can’t be small given my experience of other venues, and yet the stage-cloth was terribly laid such that it had ripples all over it, the lighting mostly awful with live changes in the most awkward of times (and not when Brian Cox repeatedly asked for dimmed lights), inappropriate use of pink everywhere (fine for “Priscilla” maybe) and repeatedly poor followspotting; moving when the performer was still and vice versa. The host even commented on it! The use of colour was particularly lazy given the lanterns had scrollers mounted!

In fairness to the Libel Reform Campaign, as a charity I would rather they kept the money to spend on their aims rather than paying for nicer tech/more time, but some of these things would have cost nothing to change and, to my mind, are deplorable on the part of the venue.

4. Drinks prices in theatres border on some kind of robbery

Ok, so this one I did know, but still; 275ml of Magners and a bottle of Pepsi shouldn’t be >£5.

There are plenty more things I also learned, given that the show was SO GOOD and had a brilliant mix of science/seriousness and stand-up comedy. I really wanted more!

If you’ve not done so already, please, please make sure you have signed the petition. Many good reasons for doing so are on the same website or in my previous post.

Libel Reform Banner

The libel aspect of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee Report

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Continuing the epic week for skepticism, libel reform and science (see previous posts), today the Culture,Media and Sport Committee published a report entitled “Press standards, privacy and libel”.  Reporting of this has mainly (but not solely) focused on the privacy and press standards parts which have several high profile facets to them, not the least the “phone-hacking” scandal from News International.

In terms of there recommendations for libel reform, coverage has been thin on the ground, so here are their salient points:

Paragraph 129 calls for investigation into into preliminary hearings on meaning (familiar to those following Simon Singh’s case) and how they could cut costs by deciding cases earlier, although with the caveat that this doesn’t always work.

We urge the Government, therefore, to look closely at this aspect[hearings on meaning] of procedure in its present review of the costs and operation of UK libel laws.

They also talk about the burden of proof and how it should lie. They basically conclude that it is more or less right for defendants to prove their allegations, but also noting that

We are concerned, however, to see cases where that burden becomes overly onerous

and that there should be an exception for big corporations as claimants, when the burden of proof should be reversed.

address the mismatch in resources between wealthy corporations and impecunious defendants … We also consider that it would be fairer to reverse the general burden of proof in such cases

The report goes on to talk about strengthening a ‘responsible journalism’ defence, where by if the story has been properly researched and in the public interest then the statements made in it are protected. It also comes up with a lot of welcome and needed thoughts on “libel tourism” and the place of libel on the internet and the much needed and relatively obvious updating of libel law that is required regarding the internet, the blogosphere and the availability of information internationally and how different jurisdictions should deal with it.

Finally, and of most weight for those campaigning for libel reform from the scientific perspective is Paragraph 142.

We look forward, clearly, to the outcome of the important Simon Singh case. Even from the limited evidence we have received, we believe that the fears of the medical and science community are well-founded, particularly in the internet age and with the growth of ‘libel tourism’. We urge the Government, therefore, to take account of these concerns in a review of the country’s libel laws, in particular the issue of fair comment in academic peer-reviewed publications.

I think that is probably the best two sentences that people campaigning for libel reform could have hoped for. Let’s hope the report’s recommendations are taken on board.

edit @ 15:12. Realised I’d blockquoted one of my own paragraphs and not a quote from the report. Now fixed.

Supporting Simon Singh

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Simon Singh making speech outside Royal Courts of Justice this morning

Last night I attended my second ever Skeptics in the Pub, this time at the Westminster branch which was entitled “Science Libel Survivors – Rally of the Skeptics”, and held the night before Simon Singh’s hearing at the Court of Appeal regarding his case with the British Chiropractic Association. (For those not familiar with Simon’s case, as Simon put it: the Jack of Kent blog is a good place to start… and end!).

As per my previous visit to a Skeptics in the Pub event, this was an entertaining, chilling and educational event and I’d recommend anyone to give it a go. I’ve heard a lot about Simon’s case thanks to the slightly geeky science, news, politics circle that I seem to move in (students), but hearing the tales of those being sued, particularly Peter Wilmshurst, really brought home to me the need for libel reform in this country. I know it is cliche, but it really is throttling the criticism of scientific ideas and their practice, which is no way to do science: a method which thrives on peer-review and having your ideas scrutinised.

Libel Reform supporters with placards outside the court

With that in mind, I decided to get up extra early this morning and trudge down to the Royal Courts of Justice to show my support for Simon Singh and libel reform in general before his hearing today. I also took the opportunity to sign the petition for libel reform, and encourage everyone to do the same, if not for Simon then the next journalist, blogger, scientist or medic who falls foul of someone with a lot more financial backing and has to retract their statement.

In terms of today, it sounds like a success from what I can see from those avidly tweeting the event with the hashtag #SinghBCA, with the judge’s posing some awkward questions for the BCA. The first news article from the hearing is at the Index on Censorship and Jack of Kent is due to blog about today’s hearing any minute, so I will leave it to those who were actually there and are of a legal persuasion to comment on what actually happened.

However, regardless of today’s hearing and the ruling further down the line, that doesn’t stop the ongoing reform campaign being massively significant, so I urge anyone that reads this to make sure they have signed up.

**UPDATE**
Jack of Kent has just completed his blog post on the day in court.

Skeptics in the Pub – London

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Ok, so this was nearly a week ago now, but I’ve been busy!

On Monday I had the pleasure of attending my first meeting of the London branch of Skeptics in the Pub. Both me and my friend (female) were pleasantly surprised to discover that it wasn’t just a room full of boring looking middle-aged men as the name (and some of their photos…) might proclaim. Although it is mostly male.

Any how, Monday’s speaker was Martin Robbins (@mjrobbins) of The Lay Scientist. He gave a humorous (if not foul-mouthed) account of his work as press officer for the excellent 10:23 campaign (Homeopathy: There’s nothing in it). Homeopathy, its evidence and how widely understood it is are becoming great interests of mine, on the back of reading Ben Goldacre’s book: Bad Science and my previous disdain for how poorly science is generally understood by and communicated to the public.

This meeting was the opposite to all that dumbing down and proved that you can present graphs and real data to the (self-selecting) masses who might not be experts and people are receptive to that. I will certainly be attending the next one.