As of this morning, my best efforts to cleanse this post of any reference that could lead back to the author of the original post which had more misrepresentations clearly intended to persuade by inciting fear , clearly selected because they are virtually certain to be undetected by the average lay person who cannot recall any chemistry more advanced than introductory university-level chemistry and/or does not have exceptional critical thinking skills to compensate for lack of subject matter expertise.

But even that wasfortuitous; the new title is much pithier and if you accept a premise that a very charismatic Brit who  makes you chuckle when he talks (the one that doesn’t use a bliss symbol board–that I know of) as an acceptable theorum upon which to build a less intuitive proof, then you will understand at least two dimensions to the reference. (Although I wrote this article almost 24 hours ago as a response to a specific article, the author has contacted me and requested that I withdraw any references to the article.  Since my objection is not personally about the author, I have done so.  I feel the need to point out, though, that even if the author did not intend for anyone to see those thoughts–someone did.  And that it would have been a great example for others to see that it we don’t have to let our pride deprive us of any improvements that suggestion might have had or how testing our opinion against the suggestion before rejecting it could reinforce our beliefs in new ways.)

That said, the original post was an egregious violation of the principle that scientists should be scholarly and transcend their biases when they present information.  And since theory is not accepted (or, “become theORum”  if you went to the University of Pop Science Superstar on Audiobook) merely because you were shown enough cases that you accept it intuitively, but only when confirmatory studies demonstrate that the empirical data support accepting a theory as fact with less than 5% chance that cosmic alignment caused enough abnormal data that supports  a theory that is actually false based on application of the proposed theory in a manner that at least one other subject matter expert deems has minimized threats to internal validity and omits no other possible moderating, modulating, or confounding factor but also that at least one methodologist deems was accurately and completely translated into actionable research tasks using a research design, the results of which were  analyzed using the most appropriate statistical test and the emergent trivial conclusion derived via rigorous logical deductive (or inductive, in the case of Grounded Theory and other qualitative designs).

The author’s Masters degree attests that, at some point, she knew this.  For the public disservice that she could have caused with her misrepresentation, the same “false advertising” charges that few people hesitate to accuse corporations of should apply to her. During my three-month Foundations for Doctoral Studies (AMDS 8008) course required of all incoming PhD students at Walden University, we were all required to read On Being a Scientist: Responsible Conduct in Research, discuss what it meant to us, and respond to each others’ interpretations.  During my first three-month course on Research Theory and Design (RSCH 8100), we present our understanding of the very issue of Researcher Bias and Objectivity and respond to our peers’.  (Interested readers can follow the RSCH 8100, Winter 2010 course discussion on Researcher Bias and Objectivity). Some readers have indicated that they were reticent to voice their opinion because they got bogged down trying to follow the science in the examples I used.  I want to emphasize that I object to the principle knowingly misleading people to support your position.  Here’s a simple example that doesn’t involve science; pretend, for a moment, that the blog article I am objecting to is “Kids–Santa does exist! Your parents lied to you!”

The author of this hypothetical article claims that she has definitive proof that Santa Claus does exist, and that parents who tell their children otherwise are lying, perhaps to deprive their children of gifts.  The author claims that, on numerous occasions, during mid- to late-December, she has personally seen Santa at malls across the continent; further, she actually sat on his knee and has photographic proof–seeing is believing (unless you call people who believe in God delusional even though your deluge of grander beliefs  constantly reminds you that things cannot exist unless they prove it to you when you demand it–if only someone else could hear that same voice of reason).  To appear scholarly and unbiased, she even proactively admits the possibility that she Pictureshopped® the Santa into a photo of her sitting on a piano bench and so offers to take you to Square One Mall next December and show you (possibly knowing that most people will not take her up on the offer anyway).

Everything that the author mentioned is true and can be independently verified.  Likewise, the original post did list true hazards and effects of the compounds, all of which can be independently confirmed from authoritative sources, such as the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics.  The problem is not that her facts are not true; the problem is that they are applied to situations that are not representative of eating a Big Mac. It would be analogous to claiming that “If you’re not careful and drink too much bottled water, you could cause a severe electrolyte imbalance resulting in death by cardiac arrest.”

The facts are true.  But there are two wrongs in that statement that don’t make a right: (1) The amount of water most people would have to drink in order to cause a severe enough electrolyte imbalance to cause cardiac arrest.  Britten (2008) describes the case of one man’s death attributed to drinking 10 L of water in one third of a day.  (2) The statement implies that the danger applies at levels close enough to average water consumption that readers might accidentally drink nearly 10 litres of water if they don’t pay special attention to their drinking. (Please see my own blog post this very problem, at http://robincheung.info/mbalog/2010/03/16/whos-afraid-of-vitamin-e/ )

I support the use of persuasive writing to make recommendations to the public informed by expertise that the public generally does not have; however, in presenting the opinion, the author should still take care to represent supporting evidence in the most relevant contexts, evaluate (but not omit) relevant evidence that opposes the recommendation, and ensure that the assumptions made and circumstances that the recommendation applies to are clear. Maybe the author completely forgot about internal and external validity from Masters studies.   Regardless, this post is does a disservice to science and reflects poorly on respectable nutritionists.  The lay public already views academics and theory as irrelevant in “the real world.”  When scientists deliberately use theory inappropriately, this problem only worsens.  When you’re caught in a lie–it hurts credibility in everything you say in the future and have said in the past. Although there I object to the majority of the assertions in the article, I will consider only two examples.  Although author has since removed these references, I feel they are still excellent examples for two reasons: they were actually used as I describe–these are not contrived hypothetical didactic tools only relevant to convey a point, and since the author only sidestepped the issue and removed the references entirely, if I do not discuss them, then nobody will have gained from the experience:

“Sodium citrate” Years before even being eligible for a Masters programme, students competent in cell physiology, organic chemistry, or even Grade 12 chemistry would know that “citrate” is simply the conjugate base of the carboxylic acid, “citric acid,” which we all know for the fruit after which it is named.   With a pKa of 3.13 Citric acid is a “weak acid” (a formal chemistry term that implies that, in solution, it predominantly does not dissociate into citrate ion and give up a proton; it is not a subjective evaluation of whether it is dangerous or not–a concentrated solution of weak acid can therefore be described as very strong). Of course the MSDS sheets on pure citric acid would list personal protective gear and possible skin, eye, and mucosal irritations; if you took the citric acid out of any citrus fruit, concentrated it, and then splashed it into your face and eyes, it would do exactly the same thing. Wikipedia isn’t acceptable as an academic reference, but it is a good starting point for background on a topic that’s new to us: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trisodium_citrate

“Calcium Carbonate” We usally call calcium carbonate “chalk,” or occasionally, “Tums.” But those monikers probably conveyed too much sense of being neutral or helpful and would , so either she forgot to mention it or intentionally omitted it. Perhaps  the most egregious affront to science in her blog post is the claim that “calcium carbonate” is “aka. carbonic acid, carbonate salt.” The reason why this alternate name (which isn’t an accepted one to anyone but herself) sounds awkward is because it is a stretch.  It distracts us from the fact that calcium carbonate that makes up about 10% of our bones and associate it with “carbonic acid.”  We hear about carbonic acid because it is a major component of soft drinks (it is formed when carbon dioxide is dissolved in water) and acid rain.  It is absolutely true that calcium carbonate is a salt of carbonic acid.  But the salt of an acid does not inherit physical or chemical properties of the acid itself. The reasoning for this is immediately-obvious if you understand the theory behind what an acid is and what is responsible for the corrosive properties of many acids; perhaps the most prevalent definition of an acid (which definition is most appropriate really depends on the specific compounds that are being discussed, in what reactions, and for what purpose), the Br0nsted-Lowry definition, describes the propensity of an acid to lose protons (a proton can also be thought of as a hydrogen nucleus), whilst bases accept them. The salt of an acid, however, is the result of an acid-base reaction whereby the acidic proton has been replaced by another moiety; in the case of calcium carbonate, the acidic proton was replaced by a calcium ion.  To imply that calcium carbonate still behaves as an acid no longer makes sense. (I avoid generalizing that all salts are no longer acidic because there are common acids, such as sulphuric acid or phosphoric acid, that are “polyprotic acids.”  In the case of phosphoric acid, there are three acidic protons, and forming a salt by replacing only one of these still leaves two remaining protons to contribute acidic character.) It is also absolutely true that table salt (sodium chloride) is a salt of hydrochloric acid, such as the predominant acid our stomachs secrete.  Hydrochloric acid is used to make PVC plastic, for sewage treatment, and as an industrial-strength rust-remover.  It is the same kind of stretch to claim that to consume table salt is to consume the sodium salt of a chemical used to make plastic, a sewage treatment agent, or industrial rust-remover. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrochloric_acid

The public needs protection against this kind of abuse more than from any junk food.