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N E W S A N D C O M M E N T

Study Links Carbon Dioxide to Near-Death Experiences

According to a new study published in Heart attacks occur when the supply of as euphoria and the feeling of moving the April 8, 2010, issue of the medical blood (and therefore oxygen) is blocked toward a white light) are also symptoms journal Critical Care (“The Effect of Car - from the heart. The heart stops circulat- of oxygen deprivation. In fact, several bon Dioxide on Near-Death Experi ences ing blood, and as a result, the brain is sub stances have been found to cause in Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest Sur - deprived of oxygen. This in turn can near-death or out-of-body experiences, vivors: A Prospective Observa tional increase carbon dioxide in the blood. including ketamine (a hallucinogen sim- Study”), people who have elevated levels Carbon dioxide is toxic in high concen- ilar to PCP that is used mainly as an of carbon dioxide in their blood report trations, starting at about 1 percent of the anesthetic). having experiences identical to near-death inhaled air (10,000 parts per million). Though many believe that near-death experiences. Pain-killing endorphins are released in experiences provide evidence of life after The study examined fifty-two heart response to the stress of the heart attack, death, the fact that such experiences can attack patients in three large hospitals. Of and they dull the pain and can cause ela- be chemically induced points to a nat- those, eleven reported experiences such as tion or hallucinations. ural—instead of supernatural—cause. moving toward a bright light, feelings of The link between oxygen deprivation —Benjamin Radford peace and joy, and profoundly spiritual in the brain and near-death experience moments. Studies suggest that between has been suggested for many years. Benjamin Radford is managing editor of the one in four and one in ten heart attack British researcher Susan Blackmore, and author of the new survivors report having such experiences. author of Dying to Live: Near-Death Ex- book Scientific Paranormal Investi ga tion: The exact cause has remained a mys- peri ences, notes that many characteristics How to Solve Unexplained Mysteries. His tery, but the new study provides a clue. of typical near-death experiences (such Web site is at www.radfordbooks.com.

Alternative Medicine 1994, “The manu- Guru Nearly Killed by facturer is responsible for ensuring that a dietary supplement is safe before it is Own Supplements marketed. ... Manufac turers must make sure that product label information is Health guru Gary Null, nutrition au thor truthful and not misleading.” and marketer of dietary supplements, Indeed, there is no requirement that including Gary Null’s Ultimate Power these substances be scientifically tested Meal, filed a lawsuit against a manufac- for safety or efficacy, and many have turer because he claims that he nearly been proven ineffective for the condi- died after taking his own supplements. tions for which they are used. Supple- Null claims that after consuming two doses of his Ultimate Power Meal each ments often contain doses and ingredi- day for a month as directed, he experi- ents wildly different than what is indi- enced severe kidney damage, “excruciat- cated on their labels, as this case demon- ing fatigue along with bodily pain,” and strates. The vitamin and herbal supple- bleeding “within his feet.” Null claims ment industry, a multi-billion-dollar that the manufacturer, Triarco Indus tries, business, has lobbied hard to keep its put 1,000 times the correct dose of Vita - products from being regulated by the ment was linked to over one hundred min D in his product. According to FDA. As a result, the FDA can step in deaths. Null’s attorney, at least a half-dozen other only when something goes wrong, such Ironically, Null and his customers consumers also became sick from the as after people have been injured or would likely not have been poisoned if tain ted supplement. killed by natural herbs. That happened his products were held to the same stan- Alternative medicines, herbal reme- in 2004, when the FDA banned dards and regulations that pharmaceuti- dies, and dietary supplements are not ephedra, an her bal remedy used in tradi- cals are subjected to—and which Null regulated by the Food and Drug Admin - tional Chi nese medicine for thousands and others in the “alt med” industry istration because they are not marketed of years. Mill ions of consumers took the have long rejected. as drugs. According to the Dietary Sup - herb on the belief that it was natural, ple ment Health and Educa tion Act of safe, and effective—until the supple- —Benjamin Radford

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What’s New? Observations on Science and Fringe Science from Bob Park

Cell Phones: Lawyers May Be mark. JNCI 93 [2001]: 2037). The study was based entirely on existing public records: the Danish Can cer Registry, Planning a Mass Tort Blitz mobile phone charges, death records, subscriptions, etc. The conclusion was unequivocal: there is no correlation between On June 15 the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted cell phone use and the incidence of brain . 10–1 to require retailers to post the “specific absorption rate” It was nice to have that fact confirmed, but it was not a sur- (SAR) of cell phones. Others will follow. The story began in prise. I was invited to write an editorial on how scientists 1988 when David Reynard gave his wife, Susan, a cell phone. should respond to the cell phone/brain cancer question for the She died of brain cancer four years later; as David explained same issue of JNCI. Cancer agents act by creating mutant on Larry King Live, “she held it against her head and talked strands of DNA. In the case of electromagnetic radiation, there on it all the time” (What’s New, January 29, 1993). With is a sharp threshold for this process at the extreme blue end of such compelling evidence, David Reynard sued the cell the visible spectrum. Albert Einstein explained this with the phone industry. Con fronted with , the first photoelectric effect in 1905, for which he received the Nobel question is: who profits by this? With an estimated five bil- Prize in 1921. Cell phones operate at a frequency about one lion cell phones in use, it’s fertile soil for a “mass tort blitz,” million times lower than the ultraviolet threshold and hence the dream of every tort lawyer. As in the asbestos and tobacco cannot be a cause of cancer. It’s important to recognize that the industries, some companies face so many lawsuits that it frequency, not the intensity, of radiation makes it a cancer becomes cheaper to settle than to defend. (June 18) agent. (June 25) (For more on the cell phone scare, see the September/October 2009 issue of the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER.) Cell Phones: The High Cost of Scientific Ignorance COSMOS: An Acronym I Am at Present Unable to Decipher An opportunity to explain one of the simplest and most pow- erful concepts of science to the public is slipping away. A The WHO study that prompted the board’s decision seemed month ago the World Health Organization (WHO) released to settle nothing. Indeed, even as the non-results were its long-awaited Interphone study of cell phones and brain announced, still another mobile phone study, the COSMOS cancer in thirteen countries. The ten-year, $14 million, case- cohort study of health effects in five European countries, to control study reports that “no increase in risk of glioma or be carried out at Imperial College London over a period of meningioma was observed with the use of mobile phones.” thirty years, was announced. It must be a joke; in thirty years That’s the right answer, so what’s the problem? We already the technology will be completely different. (June 18) knew that cell phones don’t cause cancer. We’ve known it for years. From the media coverage, you would think these guys just discovered it. Let’s go to the next sentence: “There were Fake Bomb Detector: The High suggestions of an increased risk of glioma at higher exposure Cost of Ignorance levels, but biases and error prevented a causal interpretation.” So is there a supernatural interpretation? That one sentence According to a story in The Independent (U.K.) on June 8, undoes everything in the study. Case control requires human the investigation into the sale of fake bomb detectors has recollection; at their best, case-control studies are to science been expanded to a number of firms in the U.K. That golfers as polls are to elections. They may come out the same, but were buying fraudulent golf-ball finders seemed comical you can’t count on it. (June 25) fourteen years ago. The Quadro Tracker was nothing but an “antenna” mounted on a pistol grip with a swivel that was free to rotate 360 degrees. An almost imperceptible deviation Conservation of Energy: Yes, of the swivel from horizontal would cause the antenna to Biology Must Also Obey the Law rotate under the force of gravity to its lowest point. To a cred- ulous observer it might seem to be controlled by some mys- Ten years ago a group in Denmark published a beautiful epi- terious external force. Quadro soon began marketing the demiological study of cell phones and brain cancer in the tracker to law enforcement agencies and the Department of Journal of the National Cancer Institute (JNCI) (Johan sen, C., Defense for $995 each to search for drugs and weapons. Boice, J.D., Jr., McLaugh lin, J.K., Olsen, J.H. Cellu lar Tele - But it failed a simple scientific test. Sandia National Labs phones and Cancer—A Nationwide Cohort Study in Den - took one apart and found it contained no internal parts. The

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FBI shut Quadro down and arrested its officers (What’s New, very-low-frequency electromagnetic radiation, which of January 26, 1996). However, the device soon reappeared in course does nothing at all to the water. However, Nativis is the U.K. as the ADE 651, sold by ATSC for prices as high as convinced that the ordinary water will now behave like med- $48,000. At least 1,500 were sold to the government of Iraq icine. This is lunacy, and not even original lunacy. as bomb detectors at a cost of millions of dollars, as What’s In 1988 Jacques Benveniste, a French biochemist, con- New reported in January (What’s New, January 29, 2010). The vinced himself that water can be made homeopathic by expos- fake bomb detectors have reportedly contributed to hundreds ing it to low-frequency electromagnetic waves. I challenged of bomb deaths in Iraq and Afghanistan, including British him publicly in the May 17, 1999, issue of Time magazine to and American troops. (June 11) (For more on fake bomb an intercontinental test involving an exchange of samples. detectors, see SI News and Comment, May/June 2010.) Ben veniste agreed but said he needed a little time. Weeks grew into months. Months into years. He died five years later with- Magical Thinking: Dowsing Is Not out completing the test. I think I know why. Homeopaths see ordinary water and convince themselves it’s magic water. Illegal in the U.S. or the U.K. Nativis must do the same. (June 4) In spite of the heinous nature of the ATSC crime, it may be difficult to ob tain a conviction. The defense of those charged Acupuncture: Gimpy Mice with selling fake bomb detectors will be that they believe the Bamboozle Nature Magazine devices work. Their defense will point to the hundreds or thousands of people who openly market their services to A team at Rochester University led by neuroscientist Maiken dowse for water or other substances. Some times called water- Nedergaard studied the production of adenosine when pain is witching, dowsing is said to rely on supernatural influence inflicted on the hind paw of a mouse. Adenosine is a neuro- over the muscles of the person holding a willow fork or an modulator that reduces pain. If the mouse is then stuck with ADE 651. Dowsing doesn’t always work, but what does? The an acupuncture needle, the production of adenosine persists prosecution will find itself hip deep in arguments over how for a longer time. I suppose it might last longer still if the an ADE 651 differs from prayer. Magical thinking will be mouse’s tail is pulled. Nedergaard says her study may open the with us until children are taught that observable effects result way to making acupuncture more effective. Even Daniel only from physical causes, and they must be taught at the Cressy, writing in Nature, said the study “makes acupuncture time they are learning their first language. (June 11) seem less alternative,” but I can’t see how. The acupuncture needle was inserted just below the knee in the Zusanli point, Lies: The Animal That Talks which is supposedly for the stomach, not paws. This study Often Tells Lies does nothing to answer the basic scientific questions: what is the evidence for the meridians or the mysterious qi, and how The polygraph can’t tell a lie from the sex act. But four years are acupuncture points determined? Pressed on these points, ago we predicted that functional magnetic resonance imag- acupuncturists fall back on the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of ing (fMRI) might (What’s New, June 23, 2006). The defen- Internal Medicine, but that book is at least 2,000 years old. No dant in a Ten nessee court case sought to use fMRI to demon- matter—they freelance a lot. (June 4) strate his veracity. The judge did not allow it. Good! The only thing worse than a lie detector that doesn’t work is one that Jesus Statue: Gaze on My Works does. It would be the ultimate invasion of privacy. (June 11) Ye Mighty and Despair

Nativis Inc.: Haunted by the Ghost A familiar landmark in southwestern Ohio, the six-story of Jacques Benveniste statue of Jesus from the torso up, was nicknamed Touch down Jesus because the arms were raised like a referee signaling a A start-up in La Jolla, California, expects to transform the touchdown. Con structed of plastic foam over a steel frame, way medicine is delivered. The company says it’s based on it was consumed by fire after being struck by lightning, as if the work of several Nobel physicists including Paul Dirac and to invite comparison. (June 18) Richard Feynman. A video of Feynman giving a talk on —Robert L. Park quantum electrodynamics (QED) is posted on its Web site. Based on QED, Nativis claims pharmaceuticals have electro- Robert L. Park is professor of physics at the University of Mary - magnetic signatures that convey the same effect as the drug land and author of Voo doo Science and Superstition. He is a itself. It’s done backwards. Homeopathy starts Committee for Skeptical Inquiry fellow. These items are from his with medicine and dilutes it sequentially until it’s just water. weekly What’s New electronic newsletter (archives at www.bob- Nativis, by contrast, starts with pure water and exposes it to park.org). E-mail: [email protected].

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