(Near) Death From Stupidity: Gary Null's Personal Product Endorsement

Putting the 'die' in diet

Health guru nearly killed eating own product

By DAREH GREGORIAN New York Post

Last Updated: 10:20 AM, April 28, 2010

UPDATE: AOL NEWS picks up the story.




That's not exactly a ringing endorsement.

Nutrition guru Gary Null says he was almost killed by eating a dietary supplement -- his own.

In papers filed in Manhattan Supreme Court, the controversial alternative-medicine advocate says he suffered "mentally and physically" after eating his Gary Null's Ultimate Power Meal.

Over the month Null, 65, ate the powdered product, he suffered "excruciating fatigue along with bodily pain," and "began to suffer from extreme cracks and bleeding from within his feet," the suit says.

AIDS Denialist - Libertarian Connection: Celia Farber's Dad Reports on Her Tea Bagging Activities

A warning to the tea partiers
by Barry Farber (aka Dad)
WorldNetDaiily.com April 21, 2010

The following has never been verified by me. Too many good stories are ruined by over-verification. Just call it "Southern folk-biology."

We were taught that the magnolia blossom, probably the most beautiful in the plant kingdom, stays beautiful only as long as you do nothing but look at it. If you touch it, it blackens and dies! I think tea parties do, too.

Is Peter Duesberg Finally Paying His Dues?

Exclusive:
AIDS Scientist 
Investigated for 
Misconduct
After Complaint

by Greg Miller on April 16, 2010, Science Insider 
UPDATE: Huffington Post / Daily Californian pick up the story:UC Berkeley Professor Under Investigation For Controversial AIDS Article; 
Statement by Nathan Geffen on Complaint Against Peter Duesberg 

University of California, Berkeley, professor of molecular and cell biology Peter Duesberg tells ScienceInsider that he is the subject of a misconduct investigation launched by the university. Duesberg has been a controversial figure for decades because of his vocal skepticism that HIV is the cause of AIDS. But he says this is the first time he has ever been investigated for misconduct, and ScienceInsider has learned that an AIDS activist may have helped initiate the investigation.

HIV/AIDS denialists prefer the term "re-thinkers." What's the difference?

When Is The Truth Pejorative?

by J. Todd DeShong

Published by splicetoday.com
 

The truth is often cold, hard and downright ugly. But is the truth ever pejorative? Can the truth be used in such a way that it can have a disparaging, derogatory, or belittling effect or force? I’d say no; truth can only be what it is. When the truth is portrayed in any other form, it is, quite simply, a lie. The truth is really the only thing in the world that is black and white.

In The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, the father, Baba explains sin to his son Amir this way:

"Now, no matter what the mullah teaches, there is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. Every other sin is a variation of theft. When you kill a man, you steal a life. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness. When you tell a lie, you steal someone’s right to the truth."

David Crowe's Incisive Interview with David Crowe on Global Warming

I was recently asked whether AIDS Denialists are involved in other denialisms, such as Holocaust denial, the anti-vaccine movement, 9/11 Truth Seeking, etc. 

The answer is, of course, yes. Gary Null is an AIDS Denier and Cancer Denialist. Liam Scheff and Tom Bethell are AIDS Denialists and creationists. There is overlap between AIDS Deniers and the anti-vaccine crowd. Henry Bauer is an AIDS Denier and a well known Anti-Reality Activist. 

I suppose I should not have been surprised when I saw that David Crowe, President of the Rethinking AIDS Society, is also a Global Warming Denialist. David Crowe is well known for his AIDS and cancer denialism. But Global Warming too? 

I suppose when it comes to the wacky world of AIDS Denialism, nothing should surprise us. 

My Position on Global Warming and Climate Change

by David Crowe

March 19, 2010

If I can be classified it would be as a left-leaning environmentalist, with a history of environmental concerns dating back to my pre-teen years in the 1960s. I was one of the founders of the Alberta Greens political party in 1990 based on support for a federal Green candidate in 1988, and was the party's president until 2004 and then CFO until a right-wing takeover in late 2008.

I have organized my position on global warming/climate change as a self-interview because my concerns have arisen as I have been asked more questions about this and some of my green friends exhibit shock at my position.

New Book by Nathan Geffen

Quackery taken to task
by Lesley Odendal
health-e


Nathan Geffen’s book Debunking Delusions reminds us what can go wrong when AIDS denialists are given the time of day. The book also documents clearly how we can fight denialism in a manner that saves lives and respects science. What is clear given the resurgence of AIDS denialist propaganda is that now is not the time to sit back.

As Geffen argues in his book, underlying the Treatment Action Campaign’s success in fighting denialism and quackery was the almost unsung treatment education programme. Knowledge truly is power in this case.

Deconstructing David Crowe

Next to Henry Bauer, David Crowe is my favorite AIDS Denialist.

It was, after all, David Crowe who took me under his wing to give me a bird's eye view of AIDS denialism. Crowe and Henry Bauer taught me that AIDS Deniers are sincere when they say that HIV does not cause AIDS. In fact , they don't just say it -  they live it! Crowe and Bauer really believe that HIV is harmless and that HIV tests are invalid.  It is their reality.  Using my nickname, Joe Newton (for obvious reasons), the psychopathology that runs through Denialism was vividly displayed by my AIDS Denialist mentors. AIDS Denialism is no joke...still it is easy to mistake David Crowe the AIDS Denialist for David Crowe the comedian. 

I recently saw David Crowe's (the AIDS Denialist) latest essay. Trying to keep the legacy of former South African Denialist President Thabo Mbeki in our hearts and minds, David Crowe rants that AIDS In Africa is caused by poverty, HIV tests are invalid, the numbers are cooked, blah ......  

I have not read Crowe's essay myself. I tried. I cannot. I am finding it increasingly difficult to read the same old crap spewed by AIDS Denialists, over and over and over again.

Stunning Admission by the NIH: Advances in HIV Treatment have saved countless lives

At a meeting with the (Washington Post) editorial board yesterday, Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, dropped this stunning piece of data on the AIDS epidemic in the United States. In the 1980s, he said, a 21-year-old diagnosed with HIV could expect to live just one year. Today, a 21-year-old who becomes HIV-positive has a life expectancy of 70.

"Pretty remarkable," Dr. Collins said, after noting the impact of anti-retroviral treatments that lower the level of HIV in the blood and boost immune systems. For those whose lives have been saved, it's a miracle.

You can hear more about what he said on AIDS and other topics here: 

David Rasnick: Recognized by the Scientific Community as a Certified Whack Job

State of denial

By Megan Scudellari

Nature Medicine

16, 248 (2010) 
doi:10.1038/nm0310-248a

Scientists regularly debate hypotheses and interpretations, sometimes feverishly. But in the public sphere, a different type of dissension is spreading through media outlets and online in an unprecedented way-one that challenges basic concepts held as undeniable truths by most researchers. 'Science denialism' is the rejection of the scientific consensus, often in favor of a radical and controversial point of view. Here, we list what we see as a few of today's most vocal denialists spreading ideas that counter the consensus in health fields.

-David Rasnick: A biochemist who studied protease inhibitors in the pharmaceutical industry, Rasnick is the former president of Rethinking AIDS, an activist group that calls for the reappraisal of the 'belief' that HIV causes AIDS. Rasnick was also a member of South African president Thabo Mbeki's AIDS Advisory Panel; as part of the panel, Rasnick argued that AIDS does not exist and suggested that HIV testing be outlawed and antiretroviral drugs no longer used in the country. Although not linking their findings to Rasnick, two studies have independently estimated that more than 330,000 lives were lost in South Africa between 2000 and 2005 because of the delayed use of antiretrovirals (J. Acquir. Immune Defic. Syndr. 49, 410-415, 2008; Afr. Aff. 107, 157-176, 2008).

CORRECTION posted by Nature Medicine (this may be a first. Correcting something crazy with something just as crazy)

In ‘State of Denial’ (Nat. Med. 16, 248 (2010)), we originally stated that David Rasnick denied the existence of AIDS while serving on an advisory panel. Contrary to a report produced by the panel, Rasnick says he did not question the existence of AIDS. Rather, he says that AIDS is not contagious and is not caused by HIV. The text should have read “Rasnick was also a member of South African president Thabo Mbeki’s AIDS Advisory Panel; as part of the panel, Rasnick suggested that HIV testing be outlawed and antiretroviral drugs no longer used in the country.” The error was corrected in the HTML and PDF versions of the article on 17 March 2010.

Duped by Denialists: Final Verdict on Editor of Medical Hypotheses Part III

 Implement peer review or resign, controversial journal’s editor told

Times Higher Education

10 March 2010

By Zoë Corbyn

Ultimatum spells end for Medical Hypotheses in its current form. Zoë Corbyn reports

The editor of the journal Medical Hypotheses has been given until 15 March either to implement changes to adopt a traditional peer-review system, or to resign.

He has also been told that even if he stays with the journal, his contract will not be renewed at the end of the year.

As Times Higher Education reported in January, publisher Elsevier is attempting to rein in its unorthodox journal, which publishes papers on the basis of how interesting or radical they are rather than using peer review, after it published a paper last July that denied the link between HIV and Aids.

The article prompted an outcry from Aids researchers, leading Elsevier to propose changes to both introduce peer review and exclude papers on certain controversial topics.

Duped by Denialists: Final Verdict on Editor of Medical Hypotheses Part II

Elsevier to Editor: Change Controversial Journal or Resign

Science

by Martin Enserink on March 8, 2010 7:37 PM 

The editor of the journal Medical Hypotheses—an oddity in the world of scientific publishing because it does not practice peer review—is about to lose his job over the publication last summer of a paper that says HIV does not cause AIDS. Publishing powerhouse Elsevier today told editor Bruce Charlton that it won't renew his contract, which expires at the end of 2010, and it asked that Charlton resign immediately or implement a series of changes in his editorial policy, including putting a system of peer review in place. Charlton, who teaches evolutionary psychology at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in the United Kingdom, says he will do neither, and some on the editorial advisory board say they may resign in protest if he is fired.

Duped by Denialists: Final Verdict on Editor of Medical Hypotheses

Journal Editor Faces Axe
by Jef  Akst
The Scientist
March 8 2010
Elsevier has asked the editor-in-chief of its only non-peer-reviewed journal, Medical Hypotheses, to either resign immediately or implement a series of changes, including a traditional peer-review system.

The journal's editor-in-chief Bruce Charlton told The Scientist that such changes are "vehemently opposed" by the editorial advisory board, as well as at least 150 scientists who have published in the journal. Elsevier has given him until next Monday (March 15) to respond, and he said he is still contemplating his decision.


In addition to instituting a peer-review system, an external advisory board assembled by Elsevier also recommends that articles on controversial subjects, such as any that support racism, not be considered for publication.
Elsevier has also given Charlton notice that his contract will be "terminated" at the end of this year, Charlton said. "My understanding is that Elsevier will indeed appoint a new editor and make the changes while keeping the same title," he explained, a move that he considers "dishonest" and "unethical."