Search Results for: Grandjean

Special pleading by Philippe Grandjean on fluoride

Scientists are as human as anyone else. They aren’t immune to jumping on bandwagons, getting bees in their bonnets, special pleading or selectively interpreting their data to support a pet hypothesis or an obsession. The scientific peer review process restrains … Continue reading

Fluoridation and child IQ – the problem of counting chickens before they hatch

It’s easy to find studies that confirm ones own bias on health issues. But cherry-picking such studies is unscientific because one could equally cite studies showing the exact opposite. The problem is these studies often rely on poor data, do … Continue reading

Data dredging, p-hacking and motivated discussion in anti-fluoride paper

Image credit: Quick Data Lessons: Data Dredging Oh dear – another scientific paper claiming evidence of toxic effects from fluoridation. But a critical look at the paper shows evidence of p-hacking, data dredging and motivated reasoning to derive their conclusions. And … Continue reading

Can we trust science?

Image credit: Museum collections as research data Studies based simply on statistically significant relationships found by mining data from large databases are a big problem in the scientific literature. Problematic because data mining, or worse data dredging, easily produces relationships … Continue reading

Science is often wrong – be critical

Uncritical use of science to support a preconceived position is widespread – and it really gets up my nose. I have no respect for the person, often an activist, who uncritically cites a scientific report. Often they will cite a … Continue reading

Canadian studies confirm findings of Broadbent et al (2015) – fluoridation has no effect on child IQ

Readers may remember the scathing reaction of anti-fluoride campaigners to the paper of Broadbent et al (2015). This was the first paper to compare child and adult IQ levels for people living in fluoridated and unfluoridated areas. The anti-fluoride campaigners … Continue reading

New review finds fluoride is not a developmental neurotoxicant at exposure levels relevant to fluoridation

A new extensive review of the scientific literature has concluded that fluoride is not a human developmental neurotoxicant at the current exposure levels in Europe. This is of course just as valid for New Zealand, the USA and other countries … Continue reading

Anti-fluoridation propaganda now relies on only four studies. 6: Incestuous relationship of these studies

A Fluoride Action Network (FAN) propaganda video where Paul Connett urges listeners to consider only four studies when considering the possible harmful effects of fluoridation. Paul Connett, director of the Fluoride Action Network (FAN), now claims “You only have to … Continue reading

Industry-funded translation can introduce bias in selection of studies for scientific review

Image credit: Assessing and addressing bias in systematic reviews The Fluoride Action Network (FAN), in the last decade, paid for translation of a lot of Chinese-language scientific papers linking high fluoride dietary intake to IQ deficits in children. They, of course, … Continue reading

Another embarrassment for anti-fluoride campaigners as neurotoxic claim found not to be justified

Anti-fluoride campaigners have just lost another of their propaganda claims with the release of a US National Academies of Science (NAS) peer review of the recent National Toxicity Program’s (NTP) draft monograph discussing fluoride exposure and neurotoxicity. Ever since the … Continue reading