Logical Fallacy

[Madelaine McMasters]

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PeterCanessa Oh wrote:

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Madelaine McMasters wrote:

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Alak Dyrssen wrote:

The theory that the Large Hardon Collider would pound us in to a black hole was an illogical phallacy

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During the Manhattan Project, Edward Teller raised the possibility that detonation of a nuclear bomb might ignite the Earth's atmosphere.

Two scientists

aided Teller in calculating that it couldn't actually happen, which I suspect reduce some of the angst over development of the bomb.

When I first heard of the LHC black hole scare, I immediately thought of this.

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I believe you have missed the joke Alak intended.  Please see the last word of his sentence and any other unorthodox spelling.

"Mobile phones causing cancer" was an interesting scare I think.  If I remember correctly it was 'crazy thinking' that was considered quite seriously as a possibility, investigated, tested, found to have no specific or statistical link and wrapped up quietly.  I haven't heard any irrational continuations so it

seems

 to be exactly the way things should be done (although we'd like to think there was no 'crazy thinking' required in the first place).

Oh yeah - and to all these things, if I can't blame fairies at the bottom of the garden or orbiting teapots I think:

• Lazy journalists cause scares to sell advertising.
• But only when they have to because it's even easier to just re-publish press releases and call it news.

 

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No, I got it Peter. Teller's concern over igniting the N2 in the atmosphere also produce joking (one can wonder if they found a sexual angle as well), with Hans Bethe taking wagers on whether it would happen. The full analysis of Teller's worry wasn't completed until after Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In Teller's case, he was worth listening to (even though he was a whiner), but in both cases, the virtually instantaneous end of the world was at stake. For me, the humor is deeper than the jokes. How many times will we think we're but a button push away from ending it all. Let's hope we're always wrong!

The worries over EMF/RF causing cancer stem from research into non-heating effects. The thought is that, at the right frequency, DNA can be made to resonate and eventually break. Tests were done on unwound linear sections, showing that microwave radiation, as one might get from a cell phone or wi-fi/microwave oven, can indeed break DNA. Fortunately, our DNA (all six feet if it) is wound up in a ball that fits inside a human cell. This shifts the resonant frequency up so high that there's nothing we make that can reach it, except ultraviolet light, which can only break DNA in our skin because it doesn't penetrate, and ionizing radiation from X-Rays to proton beams.

My Father knew quite a few scientists and engineers, and his office was in our home (I am sitting in it as I type this), so I was exposed to quite a few of those fellas growing up. One of them had done experiments with military radar, sitting in the beam until he felt uncomfortably warm. They had calculated the rate at which his body core temperature would rise, so he was in no danger of cooking. I think back to that and wonder if Otto would have lounged in the beam if he'd been a molecular biologist rather than an electrical engineer.

MRI machines torque our hydrogen atoms around to align the spins of their protons. The electromagnetic fields we experience inside an MRI tunnel are many orders of magnitude larger than those we encounter anywhere else. We've yet to discover any problems from the use of MRI.

Dad told me of another of his colleagues who worked at the University of Chicago (now Fermilab), building their first cyclotron. To test the thing, they placed an aquarium near the exit port and dumped the beam into it, creating a bat shaped blue glow in the water. One of the guys wondered what looking directly into the beam would be like. The bat shaped glow died out before the beam exited the tank, so it was thought that there were few particle leaving the aquarium. He looked into the beam from the far end of the aquarium and proclaimed the view to be "all sparkly!". This later developed cataracts in the one eye he used to view. He was cautious enough not to use both eyes, which seems to me to mean he was crazy enough to use one.

That same cyclotron was left to run overnight as a sort of burn-in for all the systems. A crescent wrench was inadvertently left in or on the thing, and was discovered the next day by one of the technicians, who picked it up. That technician developed radiation poisoning.

These stories stick with me,  as cautionary tales. It's easy to think that because we know a lot, there's little we don't know.That's dangerous thinking.

[Celestiall Nightfire]

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Deltango Vale wrote:

"I do not believe in giving kids a chicken pox vaccine that is far inferior than them contracting the disease and using their innate system, which will give them immunity for LIFE, not just a few years. Contracting the disease later in life has far more risks than when they are younger. This is just 1 example, and there are many."

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Agree. Kids need to be allowed to get sick in order to boost their immune systems. Antibiotics should be avoided unless absolutely necessary. Kids need to play. They need dirt. They need to get scratched up a bit. Keeping kids in a plastic bubble, isolated from the world, protecting them from every dust particle or breath of stale air, is a form of slow murder.

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The chicken pox vaccine does boost one's immune system, and it does it the exact same way that contracting the disease does it.  Completely natural, with the actual chicken pox virus.  (chicken pox is = varicella zoster virus, a herpes virus) 

It has nothing to do with antibiotics.  Nor, does it have anything to do with playing outside, getting dirty, or breathing various forms of air.  Nothing of have has any relevance to the issue of vaccines.

Chicken pox can kill people, and even those it does not kill can have severe complications. But, since the chicken pox vaccine has been introduced, chicken pox deaths and complications have plummeted.

http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2011/07/25/deaths-from-chickenpox-down/

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/25/us-deaths-with-vaccine-idUSTRE76O0YJ20110725

It's not just the benefit of reducing needless deaths, and serious illness, but there is also the overall benefit to society by reducing healthcare expenses.  Reducing missed work time, reducing missed school time and all other aspects that are the negative outcomes of illness. 

Chicken pox is highly contagious, and can unknowingly be spread to those who have weak or compromised immune systems. (babies, elderly and the sick)  By becoming vaccinated, you are not only protecting the person who received the vaccine, but you are also help to prevent the spread of the disease.

http://www.health.ny.gov/diseases/communicable/chickenpox/fact_sheet.htm

Also, when you contract the actual chicken pox in it's virulent form, you always have that live herpes varicella zoster virus in your body.  It does not leave.  Even though your immune system fights it, and your symptoms subside, the virus is not gone.  It simply retreats down into your spinal column where it lies...dormant, waiting to be triggered into activity. 

In adults this is known as shingles..but it's merely another outbreak of the herpes varicella zoster virus. The can cause pain, missed work, more healthcare costs, and complications later in life.  While someone is having an outbreak of the herpes zoster virus (shingles) they can then spread it to others, just like when someone has the first outbreak (chicken pox)  So, not only can the disease be spread at early onset, but can also be spread later with subsequent outbreaks.  

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001861/

All of this can be prevented by getting the vaccine. There is also a vaccine that can be given to prevent the later herpes zoster outbreaks (shingles)

Vaccines are the victim of their own success.  Because people are not seeing the deaths, and severe complications that so many of the diseases cause, the average person is forgetting (or never saw) the devastation that they wreak on humans.   So, it's easy to dismiss their vital importance. 

 

[Madelaine McMasters]

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Celestiall Nightfire wrote:

Vaccines are the victim of their own success.  Because people are not seeing the deaths, and severe complications that so many of the diseases cause, the average person is forgetting (or never saw) the devastation that they wreak on humans.   So, it's easy to dismiss their vital importance. 

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This demonstrates the value of teaching history and, in particular, the histories of science and disease. While teaching history to help us avoid wars is laudable, li'l bugs have killed more of us than all wars combined.

I don't know that Deltango was responding to the anti-vaccine idea so much as the "pro dirty childhood" idea, which is one I think we both agree with. I consider vaccines to be one of the more important kinds of "dirt" we should encounter when young.

I am concerned about our current anti-biotic predicament. MSRA is a growing problem and there doesn't seem to be sufficient financial reward for the development of new anti-biotics. Unfortunately, we have a health care system that is more reactive than proactive. You can't make a profit treating diseases people never acquire, nor from drugs that cure a problem in one week rather than control it for 75 years.

[Medhue Simoni]

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Madelaine McMasters wrote:

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This demonstrates the value of teaching history and, in particular, the histories of science and disease. While teaching history to help us avoid wars is laudable, li'l bugs have killed more of us than all wars combined.

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I very much hope you are including teaching the very dark age of medicine, which includes the, all encompassing, eugenics programs. As recent as 1978, native american women were sterilized. In numerous counties around the US nation there are confirmations of eugenics programs with thousands of victims. It pretty much dominated medicine from 1930s into the 1970s. Take note, classified information generally takes 30 years to become declassified.

So, if your proof for every is the government said so, you should really rethink that attitude, and reasoning.

Oh, I just have to post random Stefbot videos. The man has a beautiful mind.

 

[Deltango Vale]

"I don't know that Deltango was responding to the anti-vaccine idea so much as the "pro dirty childhood" idea, which is one I think we both agree with."

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I have no opinion on the vaccine debate.

I had every childhood disease in the book (Mumps, Measles, Rubella, Whooping Cough, Scarlet Fever, Chicken Pox). Our house was full of cigarette smoke. I swam in polluted rivers. Thank all the gods I had such a healthy childhood (seriously).

I strongly recommend the following film. No doubt about it, the African baby got the best deal.

[Paladin Pinion]

I was discussing this thread with a doctor I know and he mentioned Andrew Wakefield whom I'd forgotten about. For the whole story, see Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Wakefield

Wakefield was the original source of the claim to the mercury/autism connection. All subsequent research was a result of his claims. In a nutshell (and it's a big nutshell so I can't possibly cover it all, the article is fascinating):

Wakefield was paid a very large sum to do research by a group intending to sue the vaccine companies. He used an extremely small study group of 12 children, only one of which was later found to have any form of autism. He intentionally invented or misrepresented his research findings in order to help the lawyers with the lawsuit. His findings were later found intentionally fraudulent. He lost his license to practice and was struck from the medical registry in the UK, the most severe consequence they have. When his original blood samples were re-examined by independent researchers, none of results matched those he published.

All publishers of his original articles have retracted them and issued statements. After losing his profession in the UK, Wakefield moved to the U.S. where he continued his claims, though he has said publicly that they are "not proved." He does not have a license to practice medicine in the US. Wakefield has been sued, and has counter-sued, numerous times and has lost his case or dropped it each time. He settled out of court in a civil suit for dangerous complications as a result of his research studies. The UK court found some of his methods akin to abuse.

Wakefield had invented a "disease" that he claimed was caused by the mercury in vaccines. From Wikipedia:

 

"The Lancet paper was a case series of 12 child patients; it reported a proposed “new syndrome” of enterocolitis and regressive autism and associated this with MMR as an “apparent precipitating event.” But in fact:

"Three of nine children reported with regressive autism did not have autism diagnosed at all. Only one child clearly had regressive autism;

"Despite the paper claiming that all 12 children were “previously normal,” five had documented pre-existing developmental concerns;

"Some children were reported to have experienced first behavioural symptoms within days of MMR, but the records documented these as starting some months after vaccination;

"In nine cases, unremarkable colonic histopathology results—noting no or minimal fluctuations in inflammatory cell populations—were changed after a medical school “research review” to “non-specific colitis”;

"The parents of eight children were reported as blaming MMR, but 11 families made this allegation at the hospital. The exclusion of three allegations — all giving times to onset of problems in months — helped to create the appearance of a 14 day temporal link;

"Patients were recruited through anti-MMR campaigners, and the study was commissioned and funded for planned litigation."

Finally, after inventing his new syndrome, Wakefield predicted he "could make more than $43 million a year from diagnostic kits" for the new condition. He had already collected almost a million dollars from undisclosed payments from the lawyers and the government to do the "research".

Because of this hoax, the vaccination rates in some parts of London fell from somewhere in the 90th percentile to the 50th. Measles, which had been almost erradicated, resurged. A 2011 journal article described the vaccine-autism connection as "the most damaging medical hoax of the last 100 years".

 

[PeterCanessa Oh]

Mr. Original is the one I think of in connection with this hoax, coverage of it having all but disappeared in the UK since he was discredited.  I wasn't aware how prevalent it still is in the USA until this thread.  I am sorry that you and other families have to suffer even more because of such charlatans.

[PeterCanessa Oh]

It's interesting Deltango, that in so many ways I agree with you.  Babies that survive a rough upbringing WILL be stronger and that's good for the species in the long term.  On the other hand sub-saharan Africa still has the highest infant mortality rate in the world so you're asking parents to put their children at a higher risk of death in order to toughen them up.  This is eugenics, exactly as Medhue says.

Risk assessment - we probably could do with leaning more that way so our kids don't all grow up as neurotic, allergy-ridden wimps.  Then again I'm ex-Army and have a more 'robust' view of risk than most.  At the same time I certainly never have and never would deny my daughter medical treatment.

[Paladin Pinion]

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PeterCanessa Oh wrote:

Mr. Original is the one I think of in connection with this hoax, coverage of it having all but disappeared in the UK since he was discredited.  I wasn't aware how prevalent it still is in the USA until this thread.  I am sorry that you and other families have to suffer even more because of such charlatans.

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Fortunately we didn't suffer. I never believed the research, and at any rate, my son was already vaccinated when the first reports were issued. I do feel terrible for families who bought into it though. They were victims.

[Madelaine McMasters]

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PeterCanessa Oh wrote:

It's interesting Deltango, that in so many ways I agree with you.  Babies that survive a rough upbringing WILL be stronger and that's good for the species in the long term.  On the other hand sub-saharan Africa still has the highest infant mortality rate in the world so you're asking parents to put their children at a higher risk of death in order to toughen them up.  This is eugenics, exactly as Medhue says.

Risk assessment - we probably could do with leaning more that way so our kids don't all grow up as neurotic, allergy-ridden wimps.  Then again I'm ex-Army and have a more 'robust' view of risk than most.  At the same time I certainly never have and never would deny my daughter medical treatment.

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In my graduate statistics class, the professor introduced himself to us on day one with this simple wish... "I hope to teach you to look at a thing and, in your heart, know if it's right." I thought that a very odd thing to say this was a class for thinkers, but he was a wonderful teacher. At the end of the year, he repeated his wish for us, and I no longer thought it odd at all.

What he wanted was to instill in us an understanding of the ways in which we fool ourselves and how to be aware of it, not just when crunching the numbers (mind), but every waking moment (heart). His class was as much about wrong thinking as right. I'm certain I can still be easily fooled, but hopefully not as easily as before meeting him.

So it is about risk assessment. The "dirty" world I advocate for children is, I hope, the healthiest and happiest one they could have. It is full of minor trifles, a cold or two, a cut, a bruised finger, a bruised ego and kisses to make them better... the little life lessons that build our character and our resolve, but are ultimately beneficial.

This is a hard path to find, much less take, and it's why I keep my eyes and ears open.

[PeterCanessa Oh]

Coincidentally I had a brilliantly amusing and inspiring stats teacher too :-)  His particular message was "lies, damned lies and statistics" and how to use one to distinguish the others.  Having introduced some new statistical analysis method he would often assign us to 'both prove and disprove this assertion ... using this set of data'.  He wanted to make sure we knew all the 'dirty tricks' fakers, frauds, advertisers and other criminals used - non-zero origin graphs, improperly discounted data outliers, selective sampling, etc.  It was a lot of fun.

Hehe, I just remembered, one of his statements was "if you remember that 'average' has 3 common definitions you probably beat 90% of people.  If you can remember what they are you probably need to get out more" (sadly enough; mean, median and mode)

[Deltango Vale]

"It's interesting Deltango, that in so many ways I agree with you.  Babies that survive a rough upbringing WILL be stronger and that's good for the species in the long term.  On the other hand sub-saharan Africa still has the highest infant mortality rate in the world so you're asking parents to put their children at a higher risk of death in order to toughen them up.  This is eugenics, exactly as Medhue says."

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No. Eugenics is manipulation of the genome, usually through controlled breeding.

Nor was I suggesting that if my daughter had Chicken Pox I would feed her arsenic wrapped in poison ivy then toss her naked into a malarial swamp in the middle of a cold, rainy night.

I was talking about strengthening the immune system through exposure to historical, childhood diseases and environmental 'noise', which is a natural and necessary function for good health.

@ everyone

ETA. Here is a link to a superb book on the history of disease by one of the world's top economic historians:

http://www.amazon.com/Plagues-Peoples-William-H-McNeill/dp/0385121229

[Madelaine McMasters]

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Deltango Vale wrote:

ETA. Here is a link to a superb book on the history of disease by one of the world's top economic historians:

http://www.amazon.com/Plagues-Peoples-William-H-McNeill/dp/0385121229

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I've added it to my reading list, Del. Thanks!

[PeterCanessa Oh]

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Deltango Vale wrote:

No. Eugenics is manipulation of the genome, usually through controlled breeding.

 

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Same difference - controlled breeding, whether you weed-out the weak in infancy, provide "special breeding programs" for your super-warriors or force sterlisation on the 'criminal and mental infirm' in (pre) adutlhood.  We could argue the definition but we know what we mean, I think.

And lol at "feed her arsenic wrapped in poison ivy then toss her naked into a malarial swamp in the middle of a cold, rainy night" - at least it's all natural :-)

The book sounds interesting, I shall browse ...

[Madelaine McMasters]

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PeterCanessa Oh wrote:

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Deltango Vale wrote:

Nor was I suggesting that if my daughter had Chicken Pox I would feed her arsenic wrapped in poison ivy then toss her naked into a malarial swamp in the middle of a cold, rainy night.

 

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And lol at "

feed her arsenic wrapped in poison ivy then toss her naked into a malarial swamp in the middle of a cold, rainy night" - at least it's all natural :-)

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Swamp living has its perks...

[Celestiall Nightfire]

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Paladin Pinion wrote:

I was discussing this thread with a doctor I know and he mentioned Andrew Wakefield whom I'd forgotten about. For the whole story, see Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Wakefield

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Yup.  My previous links covered this, but I'm glad you have posted it in detail.   :  )

[Celestiall Nightfire]

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PeterCanessa Oh wrote:

Hehe, I just remembered, one of his statements was "if you remember that 'average' has 3 common definitions you probably beat 90% of people.  If you can remember what they are you probably need to get out more" (sadly enough; mean, median and mode)

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Well, heck...I remember that from my high school courses.  (mean, median and mode)   Also, the definitions. 

*Oh, and I'm a social butterfly...and party gal! 

 

*...hahaha..as if... ; )

[Innula Zenovka]

For the GMC's decision in the case of Andrew Wakefield, see here http://www.gmc-uk.org/Wakefield_SPM_and_SANCTION.pdf_32595267.pdf

Incidentally, there's been some publicity recently about the fact that earlier this month Mr Justice Mitting overturned the GMC's findings against Professor John Walker Smith, who had also been struck off the Medical Register by the GMC over his role in the affair.  Andrew Wakefield did not appeal.

The publicity is largely based on a misapprehension; the issue in the appeal was, as the judge put it (paragraph 9)

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At the heart of the GMC's case against Professor Walker-Smith were two simple propositions: the investigations undertaken under his authority

on

eleven of the twelve Lancet children were done as part of a research project – Project 172-96 – which required, but did not have, Ethics Committee approval; and they were clinically inappropriate. Professor Walker-Smith's case was that the investigations were clinically appropriate attempts at diagnosis of bowel and

behavioural

disorders in children with broadly similar symptoms and, where possible, treatment of the bowel disorders or alleviation of their symptoms.

The GMC's case was that he was conducting research which required Ethics Committee approval. His case was that he was conducting

medical practice

which did not.

Accordingly, an unavoidable and fundamental question which the panel had to answer was: what is the distinction between medical practice and research?

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The judge decided that Professor Walker-Smith was conducting medical practice, and did not, therefore, require Ethics Committee approval.   That's why his case was successful.

And there can be little doubt that, in the judge's summary of the evidence, under the heading "Undisputed Facts" (that is, propositions with which Professor Walker-Smith did not take issue) is the "Undisputed Fact" in para 7 that

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The joint view of Professor Walker-Smith and Dr. Murch, stated in a letter to Dr. Wakefield on 21st January 1998, was that it was inappropriate to emphasize the role of MMR vaccine in publicity about the paper and that they supported government policy concerning MMR until more firm evidence was available for them to see for themselves. They published a press release to coincide with publication stating their support for "

present

public health policy concerning MMR". Dr. Wakefield's statement and subsequent publicity had a predictable adverse effect upon the take up of MMR vaccine of great concern to those responsible for public health.

There is now no respectable body of opinion which supports his hypothesis, that MMR vaccine and autism/

enterocolitis

are causally linked

.

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 In brief, the learned judge's decision gives no comfort whatsoever to Andrew Wakefield's supporters, among whom Professor Walker-Smith should not be numbered.

 

[Celestiall Nightfire]

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Deltango Vale wrote:

@ everyone

ETA. Here is a link to a superb book on the history of disease by one of the world's top economic historians:

http://www.amazon.com/Plagues-Peoples-William-H-McNeill/dp/0385121229

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Awesome link Del!   I'm going to order that book...it will make a perfect gift for anyone in my family.

Here are a couple of others that are good reading...ones that I read years ago, as they were on our family bookshelves:

 

"Paul de Kruif's Microbe Hunters is a timeless dramatization of the scientists, bacteriologists, doctors, and medical technicians who discovered microbes and invented the vaccines to counter them. De Kruif reveals the now seemingly simple but really fundamental discoveries of science—for instance, how a microbe was first viewed in a clear drop of rain water, and when, for the first time ever, Louis Pasteur discovered that a simple vaccine could save a man from the ravages of rabies by attacking the microbes that cause it."  (Amazon's description) 

http://www.amazon.com/Microbe-Hunters-Paul-Kruif/dp/0156002620

 

Daniel Defoe was only 5 years old in 1665, the year the story takes place, but later in life, he reconstructed a detailed narrative, that puts you right there.   Although the person in the story is fictional, as is the story, Defoe used actual recounts from his own family members to tell his tale of the plague years.   Very gripping...and grim (my description)

http://www.amazon.com/Journal-Plague-Year-Daniel-Defoe/dp/1604241152

 

Based on the life of Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis...the true and heartbreaking story of the man who discovered that washing hands...would save the lives of women during childbirth.  (this is an historical fictional retelling...but it's based on the actual life accounts)   But, if I'm not mistaken..the death of the good doctor in the book, is not as horrific as his actual death. (my description)

http://www.amazon.com/The-Cry-Covenant-Morton-Thompson/dp/0899667589

There was also a movie made about Dr. Semmelweiss, made back in 1938, titled "That Mothers Might Live."  It won an early Academy Award. 

 

 

[Madelaine McMasters]

I added your books to my list Celestiall.

Del's passion is economics. Most people believe that's a dry subject, as they think of the standard definition of econ as "the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services." It's a lot more exciting if you think of economics as "figuring out what motivates people". I believe Del thinks of economics that way, as do the "Freaknomics" fellas.

And you gotta watch out for folks like Del. They know enough to pull the wool way over your eyes ;-)

[Paladin Pinion]

I've read both Microbe Hunters and Cry of the Covenant and they are excellent. Semmelweis in particular was a captivating character, and it is hard to believe that something as fundamental to us as basic hygiene would have been ridiculed. Even after he forced his staff to wash their hands and childbed fever virtually disappeared, they didn't believe the evidence.

But anyone who's read this far into this thread is probably used to that.

[Medhue Simoni]

The MMR Wakefield study was 1 study. That's it. That is the whole extent of it. The medical community has kept pointing to it and pointing to it as some kind of reason not to question vaccines. This is a dangerous attitude. We should always question everything. Any1 reading this thread must be seeing the pattern now of the constant Wakefield study being brought up. It's the deniers only defense, and it has absolutely nothing at all to do with Thimerosal. When you study an issue, you are looking for the path that is most likely. The MMR study, even if don't correctly, still would of been a hard sell for many. The problem was the excitement around his claimed findings, which cause a big stir and went national.   It was the very study that was quoted on ER. The only real relationship between MMR and autism was timing. Thimerosal is a whole other story, and has to make you wonder why the standard response keep trying to point you away from Thimerosal. It's the classic StrawMan arguement.

STRAWMAN

You misrepresented someone's argument to make it easier to attack.

By exaggerating, misrepresenting, or just completely fabricating someone's argument, it's much easier to present your own position as being reasonable or valid. This kind of dishonesty not only undermines rational discourse, it also harms one's own position because it brings your credibility into question - if you're willing to misrepresent your opponent's argument in the negative, might you also be willing to exaggerate your own in the positive?

My clarification, as I understand it - The phrase strawman refers to the creation of a another version of the debater's arguement, cloning it with 1 important different factor to make an arguement easier. The term is used as a different representation of the debater's arguement.

Erratication is a word thrown around alot when talking about vaccines, dispite the fact that no disease has yet to actually be erraticated. I mean think about it. Many of these disseases come from animals. Basically, it is impossible to actually erraticate a dissease. What we do know tho, and I'm talking general populace here, that hygiene plays a major role, and is the major factor in the improvement of health overall, much more than vaccines. Of course, some people do go overboard.

At the same time, we have alot more industrial polution. Dirt is 1 thing, metals like mercury floating in the air is a whole other thing. It is said, which I have not confirmed, that the fish get the mercury from our coal plants.

[Paladin Pinion]

Except for some samples in a lab, smallpox has been erradicated. That's due to the vaccine and is one of medicine's finest accomplishments. Measles in the US was erradicated as well due to the vaccine, and the only cases seen in the US are brought in from visitors from other countries. However, measles cases in the United States hit a 15-year high in 2011, with 90 percent of the cases traced to other countries with lower immunization rates.

The Wakefield study started the scare, and it was his TV interview that set off the public panic. The lowered vaccination rate in at least the English-speaking countries directly correlates to his hoax.

So far you have not provided any credible evidence for your position. Anyone can make a video. I searched for the physician (if that's what he was) in the utube video and got no solid results, so if he is a valid spokesman for this position it isn't commonly recognized. I would like to see some medical journals or papers with statistics, research results, and lab tests that support your position. So far you have provided only assertions and utube. Do you have links to any actual research papers that I can read?

ETA: I should do as I say. Here is a link to a research paper that examined 12 different studies on the mercury/autism link: http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/114/3/793.short

The summary:

"Studies do not demonstrate a link between thimerosal-containing vaccines and ASD, and the pharmacokinetics of ethylmercury make such an association less likely. Epidemiologic studies that support a link demonstrated significant design flaws that invalidate their conclusions. Evidence does not support a change in the standard of practice with regard to administration of thimerosal-containing vaccines in areas of the world where they are used."

Here is a link to a good number of research articles on the topic:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=thimerosal+autism&hl=en&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1&oi=scholart&sa=X&ei=U0aaT-KgGYeI8QSl-6nhDg&ved=0CBsQgQMwAA

These articles are from medical journals and peer-reviewed papers, and almost all could find no connection. The blurb for one paper does suggest support for your position but the research and conclusion are unavailable; it costs money to read so I couldn't see it.

[Conifer Dada]

I like it when people come round to your viewpoint by saying:  "but that's exactly what I've been saying all along" after arguing against you for 15 minutes.  Not that I argue with people very much, it's not in my nature.

[Medhue Simoni]

From the later videos I posted - Dr Boyd Haley - professor of chemistry at the University of Kentucky.

Lots of good references here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boyd_Haley

 

Here is paper "Sorting out the spinning of autism - http://www.ane.pl/pdf/7021.pdf

 

Dr Mark Geier & David Geier, both are references from the above paper.

Here's a video by 1 of them.

Here is a longer video with both.

 

This is the doctor I orginally wanted to reference.

Russell L. Blaylock  is a retired neurosurgeon and author. He is a former clinical assistant professor of neurosurgery at the University of Mississippi Medical Center and is currently a visiting professor in the biology department at Belhaven College.

References here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Blaylock

this is the video I originally watched of him at a conference. It is lengthy.

 

Here is a video where he talks directly about autism. This 1 is shorter but you can see more cause it is only part 1.

If you need more, let me know.