Journal: study linking vaccine to autism was fraud

Next time you see her ask her if she believes in homeopathy. If she says "yes," show her a James Randi lecture about homeopathy. There are probably dozens of those in You Tube. I love how during each lecture Randi eats a lethal overdose of homeopathic sleeping pills to prove that there is no such thing as a lethal overdose of a pill that doesn't contain any active ingredient.

Nuh uh.

It'd totally be fatal if you were force-fed enough of them to make your stomach explode.

Damn. Should've been more careful with my wording.

Well, I guess you can conclude from that that homeopathy works and you should never buy any medicine that a doctor recommends if a homeopathic alternative is available.

Totes.

I wonder if you could get addicted to homeopathic sleeping pills via the placebo effect...

psychological addiction, maybe, maybe physical. But I doubt it.

The box apparently says that there are no side effects (surprisingly enough,) and I think it also says "not habit-forming" (again, surprisingly enough.) (I just watched one of those James Randi vids about this but already forgot if the bit about addiction was Randi reading from the box or commenting on it.)

That said, I think it's very plausible that someone could get placebo addiction to them.

That amuses me.

To be fair, a lot people seem to be under the impression that homeopathics is some sort of herbal remedy when really it's just water.

^

In military logic, water is the cure for everything, and a lack of water is the reason for every ailment.

Broken leg and a gunshot wound? YOU WERE DEHYDRATED SON!

Anyhow, that's weird, Autism isn't well enough understood for there to be a "vaccine" for it at this point anyway, and being a mental condition with no direct causes that we know of, I would think a vaccine for it is absolutely impossible until we know those things.

Also, isn't vaccine defined as using a small amount of a sickness to get the body prepared to ward it off in larger quantities? How do you go "Ok, I'm gonna shoot you up with this syringe filled with trace amounts of autism. This will keep your baby from developing it."

The whole idea sounds idiotic from the start, and the only thing anybody could say to try and scientifically back that is quack pseudo science. It's like if I said I could make a vaccine for paranoid schizophrenia.. It's a mental condition that has no known origin. If you don't know the origin, you can't develop a vaccine, only do your best to design preventive medicine that wards off factors known to be related to the development of that condition.

edited 7th Apr '12 8:32:26 PM by Barkey

It wasn't a vaccine for Autism, quacks were saying vaccines cause autism, so Granola Girl moms stopped vaccinating their kids.

Actually, far more complicated than that. It's not a sickness that gets injected. Though I agree with other points.

edited 7th Apr '12 8:40:40 PM by IraTheSquire

Sometimes it is... live attenuated vaccines are used for some diseases, and even live virulent ones delivered to an unusual site in some cases.

But yeah, the article claimed that since autism is usually diagnosed after children get the 3-in-1 measles and whatnot vaccine, that meant the vaccines were causing autism.

Who was that comedian who said "You know what they call natural medicine and alternative medicine after they've tested it and found it works? 'Medicine'!" in one of his acts?

Ok, rephrase: it is not always a sickness that gets injected. Forgot about polio.

edited 7th Apr '12 8:56:47 PM by IraTheSquire

A lot of people say that, but maybe you'll find the one you're looking for by Google-fu?

edited 7th Apr '12 8:58:23 PM by BestOf

I'm sure I got the wording wrong.

@Taoist: it's an really old doctor's joke, but you're probably thinking of Tim Minchin.

Homeopathic medicine isn't the same as herbal remedies. The former is water. The latter is the untested and unreliable version of medicine.

That's true. I brought up homeopathy because the people who talk about stuff like "natural remedies" are very often the same people who will ask their numerologist when they should see their astrologist about an experienced homeopath.

When someone says that they'll avoid vaccines because it's too risky, present them with this:

Penn And Teller are awesome.

^They are a pair of arrogant opinionated insufferable assholes... but they are right dam it!

The rational wiki does a good job of explaining Homeopathics, If you can get past the snark it's well worth a look.

edited 7th Apr '12 10:34:57 PM by joeyjojo

Penn and Teller aren't always right, though.

Still, I think the Richard Dawkins award that they got was well deserved. In their own way, they really are promoting science and scepticism (and even reason,) even if the way they present their stuff is about as stupid as Fox News. The difference being that Penn and Teller are biased and dishonest on purpose and they let you know it.

I like 'em 'cause they're funny.

And I tend agree with them.

If you want a less douchey presentation, just ask them if the risk of getting the disease outweighs the negligible risk of getting a vaccine.