> This is beginning to sound like the arguments made against the >authenticity of the moon landing. "Why was the flag waving?" Jeeze. >Death by nitpicking. The problem with nitpickers is that they aren't >deterred by refutations of their assertions; they just find other nits >to pick. And when you're all exhausted they reintroduced the nits you >thought you had originally scourged. Believers in Creationism are >masters of this. > Interesting article in the present Skeptical Inquirer about the >relationship (nonexistent) between autism and mercury based >preservatives in vaccines. A prominent believer in the autism inducing >properties of these preservatives told the author that if autism >continued to rise after the elimination of those preservatives in >vaccines, that would serve as a refutation of his thesis. That's >exactly what happened. When informed of this, the naysayer insisted >that doctors' shelves were still stocked with old vaccines containing >the mercury. When this was refuted (careful records are kept of the >vaccines actually administered), he..... But you get the point. >Nitpicking and ad hoc arguments. The rhetorical tools of the deranged. > I just have no patience with rippling muscles and waving hands. If we >get involved in those sort of arguments, we have truly gone over to the >dark side. I attended a scientific meeting where they had a symposium on the title topic. The good news was that none of the speakers continued to advocate that the connection on the whole. They were focusing on certain susceptible populations which they felt might be genetic. It was unconvincing. Dale Sharp <desharp5@verizon.net>