Tag: reason

Obama administration provided a grant to the Wuhan Institute of Virology

The claim that "The Obama administration provided a $3.7 million grant to the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China" started in April 2020.

The report started to circulate that the National Institutes of Health had provided the Wuhan Institute of Virology a $3.7 million grant in 2015, while former US President Barack Obama was in office.

These reports suggested COVID-19 had escaped or been deliberately released from this laboratory.
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16 October 2020
Impact of Gluten-free Diets

There is a substantial difference between a standard western diet and a gluten-free diet. If a gluten-free diet is no warranted, a gluten-free diet may have unintended health consequences that are not beneficial as well as creating an additional inconvenience.

Consumption of complex carbohydrates (polysaccharides) and dietary fibre can be significantly less.
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1 January 2020
The Enlightenment and the Age of Reason

Popular commentators often contend the The Enlightenment and The Age of Reason was accompanied by a loss of connection with our emotional and intuitive instincts resulting in a purely mechanical view of nature and the universe.

Galileo Galilei (1564-1642) is one of the modern instigators of the “Age of Reason” although similar sentiments can be found in other cultures such as ancient Greece and Islamic civilisations. He believed that knowledge must be found in sensory experience - in observation. However, he was aware that our senses can be deceived. He was a supporter of Nicolaus Copernicus' (1473-1543) view that the sun was at the centre of the solar system even though each day we see the sun rise in the east and set in the west.
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2 April 2019
Letter to Diggers – October 2018

In the Spring 2018 edition of Diggers, Bel P claims that What The Health has been “expertly torn to pieces”. No effort has been made to justify this claim. What The Health web site has listed approximately 300 references for the movie with the elapsed time that the information was presented.

In the absence of a valid critique of What The Health, I will present some evidence presented by the movie for the health benefits of a whole-food, plant-based diet. All references provided are from primary sources for which I have the paper or electronic copy.
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29 October 2018
Big Fat Myths by Ruben Meerman

Ruben Meerman and Professor Andrew Brown from the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences, University of New South Wales published a paper in 2014 When somebody loses weight, where does the fat go?

Meerman has a physics degree and is known as the surfing scientist and has appeared in a number of television shows including ABC's Catalyst program. and he is the author of Big Fat Myths, a book that expands on the previous paper. The original paper and later book explains how every molecule of fat escapes the human body during weight loss.

He believes that his research shows that weight loss is best achieved by "eating less and moving more".
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9 September 2018
Michael Mosley and Coconut Oil

Dr Michael Mosely (Trust Me, I’m a Doctor) instigated a trial to determine the impact of coconut oil on cardio-vascular health.

In a University of Cambridge study, 94 participants were randomly assigned to one of three groups. They were asked to consume an additional 50g of fat – either coconut oil, butter or olive oil, daily for a period of four weeks.

The main measure was the change in total cholesterol.

Based on this study, Michael Mosley now thinks that coconut oil may be good for you. The study showed nothing to suggest that this could be true.
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1 April 2018
Tornadoes, Seagulls and the Butterfly Effect

Edward Lorenz was a mathematician and meteorologist. Whilst his name may not be familiar, you would have heard about the results of his work.

Whilst he is best known for his work on Chaos Theory, he made very valuable contributions to other areas of mathematics including climate theory.

Lorenz presented a paper at a meeting in December, 1972 in Washington, DC, the title of the talk being, Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?

The title was a question. The answer is - of course it does not. If it did we would be creating tornadoes every time we clapped our hands. Lorenz conclusion was that long-term weather forecasting was doomed.

The problem of accurate, long-term weather forecasting has been recognised for some time - and seagulls, grasshoppers or butterflies are not part of the problem or solution.
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9 March 2018
Why Eggs are Not OK – Obtain your copy

The nutritional benefits of eggs is highlighted in the Australian Eggs’ OK Everyday campaign. Just how accurate is the assertion that “eggs aren’t just delicious, they’re incredibly nutritious. There’s a…

4 December 2017
How do we know what we know?

Many “facts” have a long history of discovery, with a sometimes bitter and acrimonious debate before a final acceptance.

In Life, the Universe and Everything (part of the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series), Douglas Adams explains our inability to take in new information as a result of the Someone Else's Problem field. Effrafax of Wug utilised the SEP field to create an invisibility device that would run for a hundred years on a single torch battery.

It relied on people's inability to see anything that they do not want to, were not expecting or cannot explain.

We obtain our information initially from parents and from interacting with the world around us. We learn that fire is something that should be avoided if we put our hand in it.

As we grow older, we learn from other people, reading, school, television. Observation is not always a reliable guide. It is obvious that the sun and the moon revolve around the earth - we see the sun rise each morning in the east and set at night in the west.
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14 April 2016
Interview with Karo

Karo Tak is a wonderful, passionate yoga teacher, vegan cook, animal activist working with the "Sea Shepherd Organisation".

She visited Maitland recently to teach a vegan cooking class at "Organic Feast - East Maitland".

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21 May 2014