Longer, Healthier, Happier

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Longer, Healthier, Happier?

• Human Needs, Human Values and Science
• Annual Sense About Science Lecture

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The physicist of the future ?
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TWO MYTHS

• Science is running into insuperable difficulties
  and failing to deliver on human needs
• Science undermines human values

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Appreciation of Science

• Understanding
• Celebration

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Themes of this Talk

• Science and human needs
• Science and human values
• The allure of junk science
• Science and human consciousness

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Themes of this Talk

• Science and human needs
• Science and human values
• Junk science
• Science and human consciousness

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The Unconverted (1)

• Fewer than 50 of the British public believed
  that science played a positive role in society
• Survey cited in Gerry Lawless, What is Science
  Education For? Institute of Ideas, 2006

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The Unconverted (2)

• 85 thought science made a good contribution to
  society
• 71 thought that the benefits of science
  outweighed the risks
• 44 disagreed with the statement that the
  risks of science outweighed the benefits
• Science in Society MORI for OST, 2005

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AIMS OF MEDICINE

• Postponement of death from illness, injury etc
• Reduction of suffering arising out of to illness,
  injury etc

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WORLDWIDE LIFE EXPECTANCY THE BIG PICTURE

• 1800 Less than 30 years
• 2000 Just under 67
• Source Rising Life Expectancy. A Global
  History,James Riley, CUP, 2001

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Good news demographic trends in the first 50
years of the NHS

• Life expectancy at birth
• 1948 1996
• Males 66.1 74.4
• Females 70.5 79.6

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Life expectancy at birth UK
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The Story Continues (2)

• At current rates, life expectancy in the UK is
  increasing at the rate of about two years for
  each decade that passes
• Ageing Scientific Aspects
• House of Lords S and T Committee, 2005

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The Story Continues Hot News from the
Actuarial Front

• In 1997 65 year old men who have life
  insurance and pensions plans could expect to
  live to 83 years and two months.
• In 2005, they could expect to live to 86 years
  and 7 months.
• By 2015, they could expect to live to 89 years
  10 months
• Continuous Mortality Investigation,
  September 2005

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THE PACE QUICKENS
Reduction in the mortality rate for males aged
65-74 in the England Wales population since 1901

• 20 fall between 1901 1969 (68 yrs)
• 20 fall between 1969 1986 (17 yrs)
• 20 fall between 1986 1996 (10 yrs)
• 20 fall between 1996 2002 (6 years)

Source Paternoster calculations using ONS data
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The future of old age gloomy in practice ?
Four scenarios

• 1 year of additional woe for every year of life
  gained
• Less than 1 year of additional woe for one year
  of life gained
• No additional woe for each year of life gained
• Less woe despite life gained Fries Compression
  of morbidity

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USA National Long Term Care Survey (1982-1999)

• Disability in over 65s decreased from 26.2 to
  19.7
• This is double the rate of decrease in the
  mortality rate
• Rate of decline accelerating
• Manton, cited in Tallis and Fillit, 2003

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Incidence of stroke in 2002-04 (OXVASC) vs
1981-84 (OCSP)
Ratio 0.60 (0.50-0.73) Plt0.0001
Lancet 2004 363 1925-33
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Stroke in Oxford OCSP (1981-84) to OXVASC
(2002-04)

• Incidence expected to rise by 28
• Incidence actually fell by 29
• Rothwell et al, The Lancet 2004

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CAUSES OF IMPROVED LIFE AND HEALTH EXPECTANCY

• Wealth, income and economic development
• Nutrition and diet
• Household and individual behaviour
• Literacy and education
• Public health
• Clinical Medicine

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Increased life expectancy at birth increasingly
due to science based medicine

• In the earlier half of the 20th century decline
  in infant mortality was most important public
  health and broader social measures central
• At the end of the 20th century decrease in
  mortality at relatively later ages most important
  - science based medicine central

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CARDIOVASCULAR MORTALITY UNDER 75 UK 1970-2003

• 1970 275/100,000
• 2003 100/100,000
• Source British Heart Foundation (Heartstat)

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DEATHS FROM CORONARY HEART DISEASE

• Fell by 44 in last 10 years
• Causes of mortality decline in 1980s and 1990s
• Treatment of individual patients 42
• Prevention
• Smoking cessation 48
• Blood pressure reduction 9.5
• Cholesterol reduction 9.5
• Source Unal et al, 2003

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• Longer ?
• Healthier?
• Happier?

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• Longer? Yes
• Healthier Yes
• Happier Most probably

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MAKING THE CASE AGAINST SCIENCE

• Emphasise disasters
• Underplay successes

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CHERNOBYL A WARNING AGAINST HUMAN HUBRIS?

• Eventual total of deaths according to UN-Backed
  Chernobyl Forum 4,000
• Greenpeace estimate of deaths between 1990 and
  2004 200,000
• Source Kaplinsky in Science and Superstition,
  2006

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Themes of this Talk

• Science and human needs
• Science and human values
• Junk science
• Science and human consciousness

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Science v Human Values

• Anticipate future disasters destroying the
  planet
• Industrialisation of death
• Ethical neutrality equals amorality
• The sweet disposition of Mother Nature

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SCIENCE AS A PARADIGM HUMAN ENTERPRISE (1)

• Mighty intellectual achievement
• Penetrating the opacity of the material world
• Breaking the mind-forgd manacles
• Superstition
• Common sense
• Cultural assumptions
• Deception
• Self-deception

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SCIENCE AS A PARADIGM HUMAN ENTERPRISE (2)

• Effortlessly global
• Model for acquisition of reliable knowledge
• Permanently self-critical

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Relentless Self-Criticism of Science

• a kind of leaning over backwards..Details
  that could throw doubt on your interpretation
  must be given, if you know them..If you make a
  theory..you must put down all the facts that
  disagree with it, as well as those that agree
  with it. And you must make sure, when you are
  explaining what it fits, that those things it
  fits are not just the things that gave you the
  idea for the theory but that the finished theory
  makes something else come out right in addition.
• Richard Feynman Cargo Cult Science 1985

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THE COLLECTIVE AUTHORITY OF THE SCIENTIFIC
COMMUNITY

• Stifles debates, closes minds, obstructs
  paradigm-busting ideas
• Characteristics of Science establishment
• Set out in ranks that close
• Conventional wisdom brings tenure
• Backhanded by e.g. Big Pharma

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A Mighty Paradigm Buster

• That peptic ulcers are due to infection
• Hypothesis in early 80s, initially resisted
• Supported in late 80s
• Antibiotics used in treatment of peptic ulcers
  90s onwards

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What is wrong with science?

• Difficult
• Honest about its many failures en route to
  success
• Victim of its success

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Raymond Tallis An Everyday Story of Failure
1977-2007

• Unsuccessful treatments
• Epidural spinal cord stimulation for MS
• Patterned Neuromuscular Stimulation for
  quadriceps wasting
• Patterned neuromuscular stimulation in
  age-related wasting of hand muscles
• Contingency stimulation in patients with tactile
  neglect in stroke
• Transcranial magnetic stimulation in stroke
• Lubelizole in acute stroke
• RT ant in ant-heap

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Raymond Tallis An Everyday Story of Failure
1977-2007

• Successful treatments
• Epidural spinal cord stimulation in end-stage
  peripheral vascular disease
• Aspirin in acute stroke
• RT ant in ant-heap

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ASPIRIN IN ACUTE STROKE

• 1 IN 100 PEOPLE SAVED FROM DEATH OR DISABILITY
• 10-15 YEARS FROM TWINKLE IN EYE TO PUBLISHED
  RESULTS
• 20,000 PATIENTS
• 467 CENTRES IN 36 COUNTRIES

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Consoling the Troops

• True science is full of disappointments only
  charlatans win a prize every time Raymond Tallis
  

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What is wrong with science?

• Difficult
• Honest about its many failures en route to
  success
• Victim of its success recalibration of
  expectation

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Themes of this Talk

• Science and human needs
• Science and human values
• The allure of junk science
• Science and human consciousness

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Junk science Cognitively Primitive

• Plural of anecdote is data
• Induction based on emotion not numbers
• Confirmation-bias

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Two Complementary Trends

• Free-floating suspicion towards real science and
  the authority of those who support it
• Credulousness towards junk science and the
  authority of its advocates

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Enter Junk Science

• Exaggerates and exploits material failures of
  orthodox science
• Underplays spectacular success of orthodox
  science
• Charges orthodox science with being inhuman

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JUNK SCIENCE PROTECTION AGAINST LAUGHTER

• Utilising argument from authority
• Parasitizing the language of orthodox science
• Intuitively attractive

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JUNK SCIENCE PROTECTION AGAINST LAUGHTER

• Utilising argument from authority
• Parasitizing the language of orthodox science
• Intuitively attractive

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The physicist of the future ?
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The immunologist of the future ?
It seems to me a child of 14 months is
incredibly vulnerable. Why whack all three
vaccines into a child at the same time ?
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Lethal celebrity endorsement

• Stalin Lamarckian genetics
• Thabo Mbeki AIDS not caused by HIV

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JUNK SCIENCE PROTECTION AGAINST LAUGHTER

• Utilising argument from authority
• Parasitizing the language of orthodox science
• Intuitively attractive

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WOODEN HEADPHONES

• Reflexology
• Homoeopathy
• Scientology (Ologyology)

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WOODEN HEADPHONES

• Dislocated
• Disconnected

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Orthodox Medicine Proton Pump Inhibitors Located
in a Syncytium of Knowledge

• Proton fundamental physics
• Semi-permeable membrane physical chemistry
• Active transport biochemistry
• Acid secretion physiology
• Proton pump inhibition intracellular
  biochemistry

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JUNK SCIENCE PROTECTION AGAINST LAUGHTER

• Utilising argument from authority
• Parasitizing the language of orthodox science
• Intuitively attractive

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Junk Science

• Science assimilated to everyday sense
• True biology (lymphatic system) meets Hello
  magazine (massage)

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The Unnatural Nature of Science

• the way in which nature has been put together
  and the laws that govern its behaviour bear no
  apparent relationship to everyday life. Lewis
  Wolpert The Unnatural Nature of Science, 1992

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Themes of this Talk

• Science and human needs
• Science and human values
• Junk science
• Science and human consciousness

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The Allure of Junk Science A Tentative Diagnosis

• Human consciousness divided. Gaps between
• sentience and knowledge
• sensory experience and facts
• These gaps widest in science
• Junk science seems to narrow the gap between
  science and everyday awareness (intuitive
  attraction, common sense)

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Combating Science Phobia and Junk Science (1)

• Increase awareness of the mighty achievement
  of science encouraging people to untake the for
  granted.
• Increase awareness of the ubiquity of science
• Increase awareness of the rigour of science
• Methodological sophistication
• The long hard road to truth

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Combating Science Phobia and Junk Science (2)

• Underline link between science, human values and
  human beings at their best
• Expose the parasitic nature of junk science and
  the groundlessness of its apparent attractions

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Disseminating Sense About Science

• Tough on unreason
• Tough on the causes of unreason