What scientists really mean ...

I'm sure I saw something similar before, but this spoof on scientific reporting from Genomicron is good for a laugh (and hopefully not too often true!). I list some of the better ones:

The statement	What it really means
It has long been known...	I haven't bothered to look up the reference
It is thought that ...	I think so
It is generally thought that ...	A couple of other people think so,too
It is not unreasonable to assume...	If you believe this, you'll believe anything
Typical results are shown	The best results are shown
Three samples were chosen for further study	The others didn't make sense, so we ignored them
Results obtained with the second sample must be interpreted with caution	I dropped it on the floor but managed to scoop most of it up
Correct within an order of magnitude	Incorrect
Stringent controls were implemented	My advisor was watching
I thank X for assistance with the experiments and Y for useful discussions on the interpretation of the data	X did the experiment and Y explained it to me

Teaching thinking & De Bono

David Perks, writing for Spiked, is skeptical about the explicit teaching of thinking skills to high school learners in Britain. He criticizes the influence of management training ideas on school education and the resulting de-emphasis of the importance of knowledge. Perks specifically questions the introduction of Edward de Bono's Six Thinking Hats methodology into schools.

I do not know just how central De Bono's methods would be in the teaching of thinking skills in British schools. What I do know is that whatever happens in American and British schools have a high probability of migrating to South African schools.

That considered, I had another look at De Bono's concepts and techniques. From what I saw, De Bono's techniques would be useful as a limited part of a general programme to enhance critical thinking within schools. Critical thinking, however, forms just a small part of De Bono's Six Thinking Hats methodology, the black hat. Perks characterises his view of critical thinking thus:

"In fact, argument and criticism – the tools of philosophers and thinkers in any serious field of knowledge – are to be dispensed with in the de Bono outlook, since they apparently lead to a ‘dangerous arrogance’."

Francis Wheen, in his book "How mumbo-jumbo conquered the world", quotes De Bono as follows:

"Without wishing to boast, this is the first new way of thinking to be developed for 2 400 years since the days of Plato, Socrates and Aritotle."

On his own website De Bono is quite derogatory about Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, referring to them as the "Greek Gang of Three". A good review on De Bono's views and methods can be found at Think Differently!!, the blog of Dr. Lauchlan MacKinnon. Evidence to support De Bono's methods is somewhat lacking, considering the period it's been used. Some mainly anecdotal evidence can be found on his website.

De Bono has not always been well received in the press, as the following quote by William Harston shows:

"Well, the English language has a word that means: 'I have listened to what you have to say and I understand the points you are trying to make, but I find your argument utterly unconvincing.'That word is 'bullshit', and this book is full of it."

In conclusion, some of De Bono's methods seem useful, but hardly justify all the hype. An excellent book on teaching learners to think was available in 1936, why does the wheel need to be re-invented? I'm referring to the book "Clear Thinking" by R.W. Jepson, at that time the headmaster of Mercer's School, Holborn. Jepson's book can form the basis of a good programme to teach thinking - and it's free online!

The Son-Of-A-Bitch Mouse

Follow this link, it's brilliant!

Son-Of-A-Bitch Mouse Solves Maze Researchers Spent Months Building

IOWA CITY, IA—The mouse briskly traversed the complicated wooden maze in under 30 seconds, roughly 1/8,789,258 the time it took to secure funding for the experiment.

Well what can you say, mice and men (sorry, people) ruin the best laid plans. Where, however, could this mouse have come from? A conspiracy maybe? A recently exposed quack trying to get back at science? How about the mice from the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy? Perhaps the Vogons are ready to demolish Earth again?

Or maybe it was just an exceptional mouse, the result of decades of selective scientific breeding? Or worse yet, the result of genetic manipulation? These darned scientists must be careful they don't breed a mouse that is more intelligent than they are.

Another word of warning to these scientists. The last paragraph in The Onion's report reads as follows:

"Taking into account my past successful experiments with chimpanzees, it is my final analysis that we are dealing with one smart little f...r," said team member Dr. Russell Sutton, who has already applied for an additional grant to study cognitive learning in the same mouse. "I wonder if he'll be so smart without a functioning hippocampus."

If the world has'nt been demolished yet, Dr. Sutton had better breed some more of these mice and run a decent scientific study. He must remember anecdotes and case studies count for squat.

Not only teachers are gullible

Teachers in Britain have come in for a lot of flak lately about gullibility and practicing pseudoscience nonsense in their classrooms. This came about mainly through their involvement with Brain Gym. Brain Gym (also called Educational Kinesiology) is practiced in schools in many Western countries, including South Africa, so the accusations of gullibility really applies much wider than Britain.

One must be careful about singling out teachers. Brain Gym is also practiced by occupational therapists, physiotherapists and psychologists, all of whom should really know better. Brain Gym has also targeted the corporate world and have found no shortage of gullible victims. A businessman or engineer doing Lazy 8's or pressing their brain buttons, the mind boggles, but it happens!

This is the telling response from a teacher calling herself "scarycurlgirl" and commenting in Charlie Brooker's column "Comment is Free" in The Guardian:

Everyone's a bloody expert on education aren't they? Being a teacher these days is about constantly dealing with the vomit that government calls policy, whilst defending yourself against wildly ambitious parental expectations akin to making numerous high quality silk purses out of frankly unsuitable sow's ears. Teachers do Brain Gym for a number of reasons, one of which might possibly be because they've been told to do it. And if you're a teacher and you don't do what you're told to do, you get shat on.

Education these days is like playing soccer with a rugby ball. Just when you think you've got it, it bounces off in a completely random direction. And just as you get near the goal, someone tells you you're actually plying netball. And the crowd REALLY hate you, because they could do it so much better.

And yes, Brain Gym has got to be bollocks, otherwise I am really going to have to look carefully at what I teach in Biology in the future.

Scarycurlgirl certainly does'nt pull her punches, but many teachers will find much to agree with in her views.

Poor misled consultants

Educational quackery has had a hard time lately. Questionable approaches such as learning styles, multiple intelligences, facilitated communication and Brain Gym have come in for a lot of negative comment and bad publicity. It has been said that there's no such thing as bad publicity, but let's trust that parents and schools take note this time and seriously start demanding evidence before they commit to questionable educational solutions.

Spare a thought, however, for some misled consultants selling snake oil educational products. Many of them were duped by the unscrupulous originators of these products. I have come across teachers who were retrenched and then used their retrenchment packages to acquire training up to the required level in the quacking granfalloons (franchises) that they bought into. Having spent their measly severance pay on nonsense, they now had no option but to continue. Yes, they should have known better, but critical thinking and evidence supported practice have never featured strongly in teacher training.

Even sadder are young people whose parents paid for them to do courses that sounded scientific and that they hoped would set them up as entrepreneurs in the burgeoning market for educational solutions. Neither they nor their parents had the background or training to distinguish science from pseudoscience.

I've seen this happening especially in the brain based pseudosciences. The charlatans who sell neuro-nonsense know only too well the allure of neuroscience.

A quacking granfalloon

I have referred in a number of posts to a quacking granfalloon and each time have had to explain myself. This is what I previously wrote on the topic of granfalloons in a post entitled "Whole-brain half-wittedness":

They are often what I would like to call inbred granfalloons. A granfalloon is a group of people, often hierarchically organised, that associate around a meaningless, fabricated premise. The granfalloon would be established by the leader (or guru) and members would be limited to approved training and literature. The guru may be well aware that his or her product is nonsense, but the faithful followers or practitioners are kept in the dark. The quaint American expression "mushroomed - kept in the dark and fed manure", seems appropriate.

A more comprehensive description of a granfalloon is to be found in Anthony Pratkanis' excellent"How to sell a pseudoscience":

Establish a Granfalloon

Where would a leader be without something to lead? Our next tactic supplies the answer: Establish what Kurt Vonnegut terms a "granfalloon," a proud and meaningless association of human beings. One of social psychology's most remarkable findings is the ease with which granfalloons can be created. For example, the social psychologist Henri Tajfel merely brought subjects into his lab, flipped a coin, and randomly assigned them to be labeled either Xs or Ws. At the end of the study, total strangers were acting as if those in their granfalloon were their close kin and those in the other group were their worst enemies.

Granfalloons are powerful propaganda devices because they are easy to create and, once established, the granfalloon defines social reality and maintains social identities. Information is dependent on the granfalloon. Since most granfalloons quickly develop out-groups, criticisms can be attributed to those "evil ones" outside the group, who are thus stifled. To maintain a desired social identity, such as that of a seeker or a New Age rebel, one must obey the dictates of the granfalloon and its leaders.

The classic séance can be viewed as an ad-hoc granfalloon. Note what happens as you sit in the dark and hear a thud. You are dependent on the group led by a medium for the interpretation of this sound. "What is it? A knee against the table or my long lost Uncle Ned? The group believes it is Uncle Ned. Rocking the boat would be impolite. Besides, I came here to be a seeker."

Essential to the success of the granfalloon tactic is the creation of a shared social identity. In creating this identity, here are some things you might want to include:

(a) rituals and symbols (e.g., a dowser's rod, secret symbols, and special ways of preparing food): these not only create an identity, but provide items for sale at a profit.

(b) jargon and beliefs that only the in-group understands and accepts (e.g., thetans are impeded by engrams, you are on a cusp with Jupiter rising): jargon is an effective means of social control since it can be used to frame the interpretation of events.

(c) shared goals (e.g., to end all war, to sell the faith and related products, or to realize one's human potential): such goals not only define the group, but motivate action as believers attempt to reach them.

(d) shared feelings (e.g., the excitement of a prophecy that might appear to be true or the collective rationalization of strange beliefs to others): shared feelings aid in the we feeling.

(e) specialized information (e.g., the U.S. government is in a conspiracy to cover up UFOs): this helps the target feel special because he or she is "in the know."

(f) enemies (e.g., alternative medicine opposing the AMA and the FDA, subliminal-tape companies spurning academic psychologists, and spiritualists condemning Randi and other investigators): enemies are very important because you as a pseudoscientist will need scapegoats to blame for your problems and failures.

Tyranny with manners

As I write this, the news that Charlton Heston is dead has just become known. I respected him and I enjoyed his movies. He seemed a real and substantial person, unlike most of Hollywood's actors. Everyone may not have agreed with his politics, but few could have doubted his integrity. My thoughts go out to his family.

The fact that he supported causes that were not always popular is reflected in this quote from his address to the Arizona State Legislature: "Political correctness is just tyranny with manners."

I also found much that I could agree with in another well-known Charlton Heston speech, this time to students at Harvard Law School.

Farewell Chuck.

Read a similar, but more comprehensive, view of Charlton Heston in Spiked.