PartSkeptic’s Thread for Predictions and Other Matters of Interest

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PartSkeptic said:
Yesterday I thought I would try the first WiFi test at about 6pm. The two pain tablets would have worn off by then. At 12 pm, I did my errands which took time due to lines in stores. I did not wear a head shield.

At 4pm I started getting a headache.

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It could alse be withdrawal, with the amount of painkillers you seem to use, addiction is sure a possibility.
 
PartSkeptic said:
True or false:

NIR that is within the ICNIRP safety guidelines cannot cause cancer.

JayUtah is still avoiding this question. And so is everyone else.

Focus on the person and not the issues is what people do when they are wrong.

The answer is that the statement is false. And has been conclusively and scientifically proven to be so.

See the NTP rat study and the Ramazzini study. After these studies the WHO declared cell phone emfs as "a possible human carcinogen".
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Would that be the rather flawed study with rats and mice with very unrealistic doses or radiation as discussed by the Skeptical Inquirer?
 
PartSkeptic said:
True or false:

NIR that is within the ICNIRP safety guidelines cannot cause cancer.

JayUtah is still avoiding this question. And so is everyone else.
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The question that has absolutely nothing to do with what I posted? Yes, I continue to resist your increasingly desperate attempts to change the subject and drag me back onto your script. Did all this distraction work for you in court? I daresay it didn't.

I gave you my input, which you ignored. When you're ready to address my actual argument, be so kind as to say so. Otherwise you seem to be far too occupied debating yourself.

Focus on the person and not the issues is what people do when they are wrong.
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Is that why you're focusing on me instead of the hysterically inappropriate comparison you're failing to defend.

You claim to be extensively self-educated on the relevant topics. Yet all you seem able to do is to regurgitate the arguments and pseudoscience of politically-motivated activists, with no more actual understanding of the subject than any other layman. You've been engaged by people with decades of experience in the subjects you've pretended to know. Do you really think you're fooling them, or anyone?
 
I have been in bed for most of the day. Not well. But I have figured out a possible test under the conditions.

I will lie in bed. My wife will put the modem in the lounge on top of the sofa which is on the other side of the wall. She will flip a coin to decide the first trial of 15 minutes. Heads is on. Then wait 15 minutes with the unit off. The third 15 minutes will be the second test run and the state will be the opposite of the first state. I will wait a fourth 15 minute period in be. I will decide whether the test was on-off or off-on.

I can do this in the morning before I take the pain tablets. And I can try again in the evening at about 7 pm.

When the modem is on, my wife will put on a video on her cell phone in the study, communicating with the modem. We will test the emf in the lounge and in the bedroom where my head will be.

I figure that although I might be in pain, the pain will get much worse when the modem is on. The 15 minutes between is because the effect is often delayed.
 
PartSkeptic said:
See the NTP rat study and the Ramazzini study. After these studies the WHO declared cell phone emfs as "a possible human carcinogen".
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Good to see that you trust the WHO on the subject of cell phone EMFs.
Let's see what they have to say:

A large number of studies have been performed over the last two decades to assess whether mobile phones pose a potential health risk. To date, no adverse health effects have been established as being caused by mobile phone use.

A number of studies have investigated the effects of radiofrequency fields on brain electrical activity, cognitive function, sleep, heart rate and blood pressure in volunteers. To date, research does not suggest any consistent evidence of adverse health effects from exposure to radiofrequency fields at levels below those that cause tissue heating. Further, research has not been able to provide support for a causal relationship between exposure to electromagnetic fields and self-reported symptoms, or “electromagnetic hypersensitivity”.

The international pooled analysis of data gathered from 13 participating countries found no increased risk of glioma or meningioma with mobile phone use of more than 10 years. There are some indications of an increased risk of glioma for those who reported the highest 10% of cumulative hours of cell phone use, although there was no consistent trend of increasing risk with greater duration of use. The researchers concluded that biases and errors limit the strength of these conclusions and prevent a causal interpretation.

Based largely on these data, IARC has classified radiofrequency electromagnetic fields as possibly carcinogenic to humans (Group 2B), a category used when a causal association is considered credible, but when chance, bias or confounding cannot be ruled out with reasonable confidence.
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https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-...gnetic-fields-and-public-health-mobile-phones

Group 2B carcinogens also include coffee, aloe vera, coconut oil and gingko biloba. In other words, not terribly likely to cause cancer. Possible, but not likely.
The reason EMFs were put into that category was because of those flawed animal tests:
This category is used for agents, mixtures and exposure circumstances for which there is limited evidence of carcinogenicity in humans and less than sufficient evidence of carcinogenicity in experimental animals. It may also be used when there is inadequate evidence of carcinogenicity in humans but there is sufficient evidence of carcinogenicity in experimental animals.
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The WHO also supports what has already been posted before on EMF sensitivity:

A number of studies have been conducted where EHS individuals were exposed to EMF similar to those that they attributed to the cause of their symptoms. The aim was to elicit symptoms under controlled laboratory conditions.

The majority of studies indicate that EHS individuals cannot detect EMF exposure any more accurately than non-EHS individuals. Well controlled and conducted double-blind studies have shown that symptoms were not correlated with EMF exposure.
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They go on to say that
There are also some indications that these symptoms may be due to pre-existing psychiatric conditions as well as stress reactions as a result of worrying about EMF health effects, rather than the EMF exposure itself.
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https://www.who.int/peh-emf/publications/facts/fs296/en/

Presumably, PartSkeptic, as you trust the WHO, you can now accept that electromagnetic sensitivity is not an actual medical diagnosis, and that your symptoms are more likely caused by stress or other environmental factors.
You are here to learn, after all.
 
The receptionist at the factory will not be in tomorrow. The auditor she spent time with has Covid-19 and the receptionist now has to be tested.

I have a virus of some sort and am struggling to get rid of it.

The US population does not really take the virus seriously. I said right from the beginning that a mask is a common sense precaution. But are Americans wearing masks? Where is the science? Are people social distancing - as in avoiding crowds? Riots and marches!!

I predicted that the way the pandemic would work was that it would be sneaky and the spread would not be stopped. My opinion. And the experts are baffled at why the spread seems abnormal - not racing through the poor squatter camps despite racing through the developed world. I do think we will see a massive spread in the poor and crowded areas. There is no social distancing. But the pattern of the fear and uncertainty factor is causing much social upheaval.

So my personal opinion is that, if God wants the world to change, to reduce population and to have a fairer more just and more spiritual society, his plan might just be on track. In my opinion, the racism issue is part of an underlying class issue. The poor and the rich elite.

I predicted (my opinion) social upheaval as part of the change. I think we are seeing the start.
 
Mojo said:
Perhaps you should try to essentially prove your hypothesis using Bayesian statistics.
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I realize this is a veiled reference to Jabba, but the data-dredging techniques that PartSkeptic's pseudoscience has relied upon are, in some cases, alleviated by a Bayesian approach to the analysis.

Make no mistake, there are many things we can learn from mining existing datasets if we go back and look for patterns we previously didn't seek. However, we must be very careful to ensure that such patterns are not accidents or artifacts. Time and again we see patterns emerge from large datasets with head-turning p-values. Rather than say, "Oh, wow, this must be a highly conclusive result," the prudent approach is to reason instead from a properly formed null hypothesis and a reasonable estimate of prior probability. Even more prudence requires repetition with an ostensibly similar dataset.

Here's how science normally works. Anecdotes from the field suggest a previously unseen causation. You arrange to collect data to test first whether there's a correlation between indications of the cause and indications of the effect. If there is none, you dismiss the anecdotes. Let's say there is, but correlation is not causation. To test causation, you hypothesize various ways in which that causation might occur. Each of those hypothetical mechanisms produces side-effects whose results might not have anything to do with the effect you care about, but are nevertheless observable. This is the deduction step of science. You deduce that if some particular mechanism is the operative one, you'll be able to tell that by observing the presence or absence of the side-effect. That's the differentiation step of experiment design. Now you don't want to waste empirical effort, so you gather the whole set of possible observables from several different hypothesis and you arrange to measure them all in the same experiment.

But wait, there's more. You're a good scientist, so you reason that some of these side-effects will have multiple possible causes. You want to control for those. So you gather together all the possible other causes of those side-effects and agree to make sure they are evenly distributed between your control and experiment groups. And you realize that there may be untold causations, so you collect a whole bunch of other common data in hopes of ruling out confounds you haven't initially thought of. For human subjects, there is a whole standard set of demographic, health, and other kinds of data that are common correlates to things we want to investigate about them. That's why human subjects in an experiment fill out an intake form that has a whole bunch of seemingly irrelevant information. The goal is to divide the subject pool -- whether humans, rodents, or rutabagas -- into groups that differ only by the purported causation(s).

The null hypothesis is that your hypothesized causation doesn't occur. That is, if the results appear to coincide with what you expect were the hypothesis true, what's the probability that's just random happenstance? Science says you need a 95% probability that the significant result is not a fluke.

Right, we all learned that somewhere in our education. But here's how pseudoscience works. You've collected all this data, all these rows in the database with all those columns corresponding to variables you measured for the subject, whether they belonged to any particular hypothesis or not. And there's the summer intern sitting there with nothing to do. You have her run variance analysis not just on the variables that you deduced, but all the variables you collected. Indeed, all the combinations of variables. Lo and behold, she finds a statistically significant correlation for brain tumors in the subgroup of gay, left-handed, model train enthusiasts.

Yikes! What about any of that could possibly cancer? That's the rub. That "conclusive" result didn't arise out of any sort of causal reasoning. Sexual orientation, handedness, and a particular choice of hobby have nothing reasonably to do with each other. None separately and nothing about them together has any health consequence that oncologists would deduce according to our extensive knowledge of carcinogens. The error in judgment here is to presume that the statistical analysis cannot lie and must be taken at face value. The fallacy is, "Numbers don't lie, therefore there must be some causation at play even if we can't imagine what it is."

Subgroup analysis is one of the new darlings of pseudoscience. We expect that everyone knows the basics of statics. We express quantities in fundamental terms such as percentages and margins of error, and expect everyone to be able to reason from there. We expect that something like a "batting average" doesn't require a lot of explanation. Lots of concepts in statistics are necessarily intuitive. Comparatively few -- but enough -- know about such things as p-values and statistical significance in scientific research. They know that if something doesn't rise to a certain level of prominence, it should be discounted as chance, even if they aren't professional scientists. Conversely, if a study produces a result with very small p-value, and the study has been properly conducted, it reflects a reliable conclusion. Again, details that aren't common knowledge but can be easily learned. This is the new sophisticated layman that subgroup hacking is intended to fool

It's now possible to mine data to absurd lengths. So let's say I have a hypothesis A and a measurable outcome X. I also collect control information, B, C, and D, all of which are potential confounds to X. I want to see whether X varies only with A, and not with B, C, or D. Software to do that is essentially free. But since it's quarantine and we're all stuck indoors, I can play with the software. Does X correlate to the Boolean expression (B and C)? (A or B, but not C)? (not B, but C and D)? If you have a lot of control variables, you have a practically infinite set of algebraic possibilities you can test for "significance."

But are any of these actually significant? Does (not B, but C and D) correlate to anything that makes sense in terms of what those variables actually measure? I originally set out to test A versus X, not "some pile of gibberish" versus X. More importantly, what are the chances -- statistically speaking -- that no contrived combination of variables will predict X? Subgroup hacking is predicated on the layman's assumption that this will be a very rare event. And in fact it may be, but that doesn't matter. We have the computational ability to test astounding numbers of algebraically definable subgroups with little effort. That slicing and dicing is quite likely to produce accidental correlations, whether it's what the experimenter set out to discover or not. And whether the correlation makes any logical sense or not.

Fringe claimants love this, because the vast amount of computation required to stumble onto an accidental correlate can be spun to seem like the researchers were dedicated and exhaustive in their research, rather than the undirected groping in the dark it really is. If you're committed to keep going, slicing and dicing more absurdly until you get a positive result, you will get a positive result. That doesn't make it valid science. It's just the scientific version of ad hoc refinement, wrapped in a misleading statistical disguise.
 
JayUtah said:
The question that has absolutely nothing to do with what I posted? Yes, I continue to resist your increasingly desperate attempts to change the subject and drag me back onto your script. Did all this distraction work for you in court? I daresay it didn't.

I gave you my input, which you ignored. When you're ready to address my actual argument, be so kind as to say so. Otherwise you seem to be far too occupied debating yourself.



Is that why you're focusing on me instead of the hysterically inappropriate comparison you're failing to defend.

You claim to be extensively self-educated on the relevant topics. Yet all you seem able to do is to regurgitate the arguments and pseudoscience of politically-motivated activists, with no more actual understanding of the subject than any other layman. You've been engaged by people with decades of experience in the subjects you've pretended to know. Do you really think you're fooling them, or anyone?
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Your post is a unwarranted personal attack using your unsupported personal opinions. Shame.

So far the discussion with you means I have to try to show that your assessment of me is wrong. You make unsupported statements about me.

You try to avoid the key issues with side-issues and then tell me I am not responding. You are obtuse.

I struggle with all the words you put out. Please state your argument briefly and concisely so we can refocus. Even if it is one point at a time.

ETA: Oh goodness. I just posted and saw your long post. My eyes glazed over.
 
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With regard to the criticism of the NPT and Ramazzini studies I simply respond as follows:

The industry is very powerful and knows how to discredit any credible science. They are Masters when it comes to Merchandising Doubt. Many posters here use similar tactics.

The various articles can themselves be dealt with point by point to show how false they are and were they distort the truth.

You ask for proof and then reject the proof instead of providing experiments which are properly done to show that the ones under fire are faulty.

I told you that the industry no longer does that. They know it will only strengthen the case for harm.

ETA: Back later tomorrow when I am in better shape.
 
PartSkeptic said:
The industry is very powerful and knows how to discredit any credible science.
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Gee, how do they make mathematics obey them?

You ask for proof and then reject the proof...
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Yeah, that's what happens to proof that doesn't stand up to inquiry.

...instead of providing experiments which are properly done to show that the ones under fire are faulty.
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If you do bad science, it remains bad science regardless of whether someone else undertakes better science.
 
PartSkeptic said:
I have been in bed for most of the day. Not well. But I have figured out a possible test under the conditions.

I will lie in bed. My wife will put the modem in the lounge on top of the sofa which is on the other side of the wall. She will flip a coin to decide the first trial of 15 minutes. Heads is on. Then wait 15 minutes with the unit off. The third 15 minutes will be the second test run and the state will be the opposite of the first state. I will wait a fourth 15 minute period in be. I will decide whether the test was on-off or off-on.
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OK, that sounds like the beginnings of a reasonable test protocol. I assume you will synchronise watches and agree fixed times for each switch on/off.

The main thing missing is how each of you is going to record the results. I suggest you write down the sequence you think has taken place during each trial and put it in a sealed envelope labelled with the trial number, and your wife does likewise. When you have completed a set number of trials, open and compare the envelopes.

The other thing missing is the success criteria. You need someone whose maths is less rusty than mine to calculate how many trials you need to do for the result to be statistically significant, and how many hits are required to reach that result. Maybe JayUtah will oblige.

I can do this in the morning before I take the pain tablets. And I can try again in the evening at about 7 pm.
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So that's two trials a day? It shouldn't take too many days to get enough data if you can manage that.

When the modem is on, my wife will put on a video on her cell phone in the study, communicating with the modem.
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So just having the wifi on isn't sufficient, it also has to be in use? OK.

We will test the emf in the lounge and in the bedroom where my head will be.
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Test it how? With what? Why? When? I don't understand this bit.

I figure that although I might be in pain, the pain will get much worse when the modem is on. The 15 minutes between is because the effect is often delayed.
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OK.
 
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PartSkeptic said:
Your post is a unwarranted personal attack using your unsupported personal opinions. Shame.
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Report it then. Don't keep playing the victim for rhetorical effect.

So far the discussion with you means I have to try to show that your assessment of me is wrong. You make unsupported statements about me.
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Nonsense. I'm trying to have a discussion about the characteristics of different kinds of radiation, and lately about the statistical games played by unscrupulous researchers. You respond to any display of actual knowledge with bluff and bluster, claiming to be, among other things, the smartest guy in the room on all subjects. When all you can respond with is narcissistic twaddle, the narcissism necessarily has to take center stage until it no longer becomes the premise of all your responses. You are the one making you the topic of this thread. What's left that needs support?

You try to avoid the key issues with side-issues and then tell me I am not responding. You are obtuse.
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Asked and answered. You can't address anyone who shows actual knowledge, so you try to bait them back onto your comically naive talking points. Your inability to discuss the differences between radiological causes and effects is not a "side-issue." It's central both to your thesis that you know what's causing your health problems and that you are competent to discern this without expert help.

I struggle with all the words you put out. Please state your argument briefly and concisely so we can refocus. Even if it is one point at a time.
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No, I don't think I will. You can either cover your subjects in as much depth as I do, or you can continue to flounder. You whine when I write too little and you whine when I write too much. The reader is likely to conclude you have nothing to offer but whining. You certainly are no scientist.

ETA: Oh goodness. I just posted and saw your long post. My eyes glazed over.
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Probably because you don't understand experimental statistics. You may prove that proposition wrong at your leisure.
 
PartSkeptic said:
With regard to the criticism of the NPT and Ramazzini studies I simply respond as follows:

The industry is very powerful and knows how to discredit any credible science. They are Masters when it comes to Merchandising Doubt. Many posters here use similar tactics.
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Why am I not surprised you take this line?

The various articles can themselves be dealt with point by point to show how false they are and were they distort the truth.
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I await your debunk of the debunk with bated breath. Actually, who am I kidding? You will never attempt to show these supposed falsehoods. Your track record is one of misdirection and denial.

You ask for proof and then reject the proof instead of providing experiments which are properly done to show that the ones under fire are faulty.
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The "proof" you put forward is questionable, the experiments are flawed, we point this out because we know how to do proper experiments. The onus is on YOU to provide the proof to back up your claims, sunshine.

I told you that the industry no longer does that. They know it will only strengthen the case for harm.
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Industry is very aware of repercussions if something goes wrong. Your claim is BS.

ETA: Back later tomorrow when I am in better shape.
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Great, hope you feel better. I really don't want a blow-by-blow account of your travails, however, if you don't mind.
 
So my wife chimed in after I pointed her to this thread, extolling Jay's eloquence and bemoaning the general feeling of frustration with the conversation deflections. Seeing as anecdotes seem to be a thing, I thought I'd share:

Darling. I'm considerably exhausted and, had someone in this house raided the aisles wisely (no offense), I could’ve knocked down a bag of popcorn with every single of the many (so far) pages on this discussion. Sadly, as a non-native, I have no words to express my confusion adequately but I guess even in my mother tongue I’d fail.

So please, you gotta help me out here and explain: Why the heck would a bunch of obviously highly-educated and knowledgeable people with lots of expertise in their respective fields waste 68 days to argue with a guy who is clearly in no shape to process what you are talking about?

Reading this thread is like watching a train crash in slow-mo, everybody suspended in mid-air, limbs flailing, the inevitable mercilessly approaching and sadly, no popcorn (no offense). I don’t dare to ask them, I’ll get slapped so I wish to shift the blame and rather have you slapped instead. Would you mind asking? And I’ll get dinner ready in exchange and in the meantime?
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Feel free to slap me :D Maybe next time she'll actually post herself :p
 
Speaking for myself: I engage with posters like PartSkeptic for the mental exercise. I'm retired, with very few calls on my time, but I like to keep my brain working. Marshalling arguments and information, analysing and dismantling poor logic and correcting errors stops my mental muscles from atrophying. I have no hope that PartSkeptic will ever learn anything, but the rest of us do occasionally learn something from each other, I think.
 
People read and post here out of a love of critical thinking. But in order to practice critical thinking, there has to be something to think about. Spotting bad arguments requires there to be bad arguments, ideally with someone willing to earnestly defend them in a limited interactive forum such as this. The interaction is what hones the skill. If you just want to passively observe bad arguments, there is no end of failed court cases to study, or just spend ninety seconds on Twitter. But we learn by doing. We learn to think and reason effectively by challenging and being genuinely challenged in return. This is why law school is taught in an adversarial manner.

Others have an affinity for the topics that arise in various arguments. A physician might have an interesting and informative take on, say, the Kennedy autopsy. A pilot might have insight on UFOs. Electrical engineers might have something to say about radio communications. It doesn't even have to be professional expertise. Fringe theories have the side effect of raising topics among interested parties that might not come up otherwise. It pushes people to read, do research, ask questions -- all to try to resolve controversy. In the end, skeptics try their best to get the facts right and evaluate them fairly. For those who bring knowledge to the table, there is some satisfaction in setting the record straight. And for others, it may be getting information they always wondered about.

When the claimant is deeply entrenched, it's rarely an achievable goal that you will convince him of his error. Critical thinking requires a valiant attempt, but it's usually more about making a good attempt than succeeding at any cost and by any means. What's important is that people have a place they can go to see good and bad arguments side by side. When the topic is current and lively, like for telecommunications infrastructure, those preserved debates may have real value over the one-sided presentations they may get elsewhere. We savor the journey, not expecting necessarily to arrive at a destination.

Usually one or both parties eventually tire of the and move on. And then other claimants and other critics take it up. The Kennedy assassination thread here extends back several years and has had several groups on both sides over those years. Yes, the discussion itself is repetitive and exhausting. But that momentum is what maintains interest. It's more engaging than reading any of the many books published on the subject.

And then there is the entertainment value. Some people see debate as a spectator sport. Others participate just for the fun of it, having no particular purpose other than to see what happens. It's not always wholesome. You see references to "chew toys": contributors who have easily-pressed buttons and respond in ways that amuse others. Not really part of the skeptic's mission, but a part of many social gatherings, for better or worse.
 
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