I recently finished
reading a curious book called "Surely
You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!": Adventures of a Curious Character. It’s
a collection of memories and funny stories by the Nobel Prize-winning physicist
Richard Feynman, who tells about all kinds of things: from fixing radios
as a child, over his involvement in developing the atomic bomb, to his many adventures
with beautiful blondes – the typical life of the average academic, quoi. (Not.)
Now if there was one thing Feynman couldn’t
stand, it’s pseudoscience. In his
last chapter of the book, he explains why:
During
the Middle Ages there were all kinds of crazy ideas, such as that a piece of
rhinoceros horn would increase potency. Then a method was discovered for
separating the ideas--which was to try one to see if it worked, and if it
didn't work, to eliminate it. This method became organized, of course, into
science. And it developed very well, so that we are now in the scientific age.
It is such a scientific age, in fact that we have difficulty in understanding
how witch doctors could ever have existed, when nothing that they proposed ever
really worked--or very little of it did. But even today I meet lots of people
who sooner or later get me into a conversation about UFOS, or astrology, or
some form of mysticism, expanded consciousness, new types of awareness, ESP,
and so forth. And I've concluded that it's not a scientific world.
On the one hand, it’s really quite
fascinating to see that Feynman reacted so heavily against pseudoscience because of his unshakable
belief in science itself. On the
other hand, it’s quite tragic that what Feynman complained about decades
ago (the above was written in 1974), still applies today.
Indeed, it’s tragic
how much pseudoscience is still around these days. One very clear example of
this is what is known as post
hoc ergo propter hoc. Confusing an event that preceded another event with one the cause of the latter event. Indeed, only today there was a very clear example of
this kind of mistaken logic in the papers.
Four hours of
sport a week reduces your chances of having a burn-out by half the article in
question said. An Israeli study had studied workers for nine years and observed
that the more people did sports, the less their chances were of getting a
burn-out. Ergo: doing sports prevents
a burn-out.
But this is faulty
logic. It’s not because event A is followed
by (post hoc) event B, that event B is caused by event A (propter hoc). It’s not because you do
sports, that you don’t get a burn-out; just like it’s not because you don’t do sports
that you do get a burn-out. Think about it. Isn’t it much more logical that
people who exercise for four hours a week have energetic personalities and are
therefore (either genetically or psychologically) less prone to get a burn-out anyway?
At the very least the Israeli experiment does not prove that exercise is the cause of the lack of the burn-out.
The same is true
for all the alcohol versus life expectancy research. Every so often there is a
study that proves that one or two glasses of beer or wine a day supposedly
makes you live longer. Indeed, when you observe a bunch of people, those who
drink moderately tend to live longer than those who don’t drink at all. But
that doesn’t prove that moderate drinking is the cause of living longer. Isn’t it more likely that most people who drink
moderately probably live an easier, a funner, in short a happier life than those who never touch a drop of alcohol? And
happy equals less stress equals less cardiovascular disease. But if you’re
happy because of another reason, like through having a rewarding job, a good family
life, etcetera, I’m sure it’s just as beneficial for your life expectancy. So
it’s happiness that makes you live longer, not alcohol.
After all, Feynman stopped
drinking very early on in his life and he lived to be 70, which was exactly the life expectancy of a male at
the time.
Aha!
