Belief in Conspiracy theories may put children's health at risk

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This press release turned up in my skeptics alerts today:

Conspiracy theories may put children's health at risk
23 August 2013 British Psychological Society (BPS)
Under embargo until 28 August 2013 00:01 GMT

 

Sad but true Craig. In much the same manner as I fight the Creationist nutters, my daughter (Dr Sarah Kidd) is fighting the non-vaccinators. What really gets up her chest is their name: the AVN - Australian Vaccination Network). Of course this is a misnomer since they are a NON-Vaccination network. Their advice seems to be to research for yourself, and make up your own mind. Where to people seem to research? Google, which almost invariably leads to Wikipedia!

 

I very familiar with AVN - they loose every fight they get into! Their facebook page was a hoot to read when Rudd announced the Labor policy on taking away the child benefit if they are not vaccinated...

In the last few days there has been even more research published discounting the dangers of vaccination ...

 

"In much the same manner" confused:???)... what? - provide no evidence... provide no adequate reasoning (yes, "sad but true" indeed). Questions inappropriately answered Rob will not go away - despite how much whinging & wishful thinking you employ! :hammer: I'll leave at that! :butcher:


Just stick to the topic...

 

I would not let the kids into school until vaccination - but I am told this is already the case with some pre-school; good. I note the message from Ben-Hur, but he is on my ignore list; thus I have no idea what his academic contribution was to this debate.

 

Yes, as some would say... "ignorance is bliss" Rob. Thus, this ignore function is like a double edge sword - hence why I won't add you to my "ignore list" as the result of the nature of statements you sometimes post i.e. above contribution (regarding my presence), which was the main point of your post, which didn't need to be elaborated if intentions were clear/sincere.

As far as "academic" contribution (which can also be a double edge sword) - let's just allow the objective/empirical science do its job with regard to disease control (& that's a loaded statement)... "conspiracy theories" aside.

 

There are many groups out there that promote others as doing harm...Anti vaccination Vrs. pro vaccination, barefooters (anti shoe) versus shod and on and on. In fact if you look hard enough you will likely find information showing someone against almost anything you can think of.

They all share something in common and of course it is confirmation bias.

Removing that is easier said than done. Some people will always want to find information that agrees with what they think and ignore the rest. They typically do not like the feeling cognitive dissonance gives them. They do not realize that only by examining all sides of any issue can they find the truths in the answers they seek.

 

I have a problem with the use of the phrase 'conspiracy theory'.

It should be neutral, ie it requires evidence for or against but when, as in this case, the phrase 'conspiracy theory' is used it commonly seems to imply that those accused of formulating a theory of conspiracy are inherently wrong, if not paranoid. It's as if the idea of conspiracy is foreign to human nature. Its use certainly would seem to make it an uphill struggle for those who think there could be a conspiracy to be heard or to have their evidence judged fairly.

Possibly part of the problem is the phrase itself which implies deliberate collusion. In other words the subject of the conspiracy has to be considered by a group and conscious decisions made as a result of the group discussion.

It is possible to imagine many situations where groups discuss a subject or subjects (commonly profit and promotion) which might result in conspiracy theories, even though the focus of the apparent 'conspiracy' was never consciously considered by the group. I would imagine that for a long time that was the case with cigarettes, ie the possibility of group profit or personal promotion made it difficult to interpret data re -the relationship between cigarettes and cancer in a neutral way.

If subconsicous collusion could be included in the definition the 'conspiract theorists' would be proved right more often.

Bill