By Jonathan Berman
| Jonathan's Debunking Tour By Jonathan Berman |
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Contents:
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DEBUNKING: ASPARTAME
A lot of hype has been made about aspartame and formaldehyde, lots of scary stories about hair falling out, brain tumors, cancer, and a whole list of other maladies that have no basis in scientific fact.
The reality is, many things consumed by people create formaldehyde in the body, namely citrus fruits like oranges and grapefruits, tomatoes, and alcohol to name a few, some in much greater quantities than what's found in artificial sweeteners.
We take on a lot more toxins than we know, and the body is very adept at removing most of them. We stand a much greater risk from much more socially acceptable poisons like sugar, high fructose corn syrup, processed chemically laden foods designed for maximum shelf life, alcohol, and prescription drugs.
The only thing I know about aspartame is that it should be avoided by those with phenylketonuria, as it contains the amino acid phenylalanine. Many aspartame-containing drinks and foods have a warning on them, 'contains phenylalanine', and as this is associated with aspartame, I think many people believe that both are dangerous to everyone.
After all, how many people have heard of phenylketonuria? It's believed that it was originally the cause for every village having an idiot in residence.
The amount of methanol found in aspartame is hundreds of times lower than the lower bound on toxic dosage. Yes alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH) converts methanol to formaldehyde but this reaction occurs every time we eat an apple as well. Formaldehyde is toxic but not at the dosage that occurs when we eat fruit or use aspartame.
22mg of methanol at 0.7918 g cm−3 is about 28 uL which is 1000th of a minimum fatal dose. So you would have to drink 12000 fluid oz or 375 litres of aspartame drink.
Have you heard of a disease called drowning ?
Formaldehyde is naturally produced by all the cells in our body, right? And that it is necessary for cell metabolism? It often reaches concentrations of 6-12mg/kg, but doesn't cause any problems in the body because formaldehyde is so quickly broken down by our bodies.
Why would such a natural and necessary chemical produced by cells, be so damaging and destructive to cells? The key here, presumably, is dosage and the levels produced by the aspartame in drinks is clearly negligible. Byofrcs is correct in saying that we should be more concerned about water intoxication from drinking these beverages, before we should be concerned about negative effects from aspartame or formaldehyde.
There are tens of thousands of papers looking at the effects and safety of aspartame and the worst that can be said is it is a mild exsitotoxin. Even then high quantities have to be ingested, much higher then recommended safe levels, much higher then people can normally eat in a day, to cause nerve damage.
I, for example see no valid scientific reason for the majority of the population to avoid aspartame or any artificial sweetener. It mostly just comes down to personal preference and a small percentage of rather specific cases of medical conditions and such. If anything disagrees with your body, common sense would be to avoid it.
I've been looking into aspartame for a while now and I've honestly done my best to find evidence of its harmful effects. I have come away mostly empty handed. I still have some research I need to go through, but a lot of it is old and hard to obtain in full texts without paying ridiculous sums of money. Most are poorly done rat studies which are just about useless.
I just "love", how most conspiracy style websites go on and on about how you get methanol and formaldehyde and formic acid from aspartame and how they are all toxic and bla bla bla.
After having looked into the facts, that we are constantly exposed to all these substances just about all the time, I'm not really worried. Our body actually has methanol in the blood, obtains some every day and handles it just fine in small quantities. The fact that our blood always has a certain level of formaldehyde and we process about 50 000mg of the stuff on a daily basis (it's practically impossible to get even 1000mg of it from aspartame) is also quite interesting. Similarly, concerning formic acid, we are exposed to it fairly frequently as a separate substance - for example through ant and bee venom, but also as food additives and other things. And let's not forget - we aren't actually consuming concentrated doses of any of these things. We metabolize them over the course of days and it is basically impossible to spike their concentration in the body in any significant manner using something like aspartame.
Coke-Zero has like 225mg aspartame per litre and Coke-Light more than double that, close to 500mg. So that's like 22,5-50mg of methanol, which becomes formaldehyde and formic acid down the line in somewhat lower amounts. The best I could find on methanol toxicity, put it around 0.3-1g/kg as a lethal dose and around 8g to start showing symptoms of vision damage.
Even if we divide that dose with /10 to be safe - It would still be a whooping 800mg of methanol required, which would still take a dozen litres of soft drinks.
Basically you are more likely to die from excessive liquid consumption, than actually see negative effects of methanol (or formaldehyde, formic acid more specifically) from aspartame intake.
And it's not much different with anything else either. To get 800mg of methanol takes 8g of aspartame, that is enough sweetness to equal about 2lb of pure sugar. It's pretty much impossible to consume that much sweetness in a day... although I'll leave that as a "possibility" - some crazy people out there.
And all this is just the basic chemical/biological stuff about aspartame and its metabolism. If one starts to read the actual research about clinical trials with aspartame and such, the first thing that jumps up is the utter lack of relevant human trials that find anything. At best, I believe there are a few, that have found some correlation with possible increased risk of seizures in epileptic children or something. Or a few possible reactions of increased migraine likelyhood - some of which seem to have been nothing but psychological reactions to "news about aspartame", not actual physical symptoms.
Ugh - either Aspartame has been the greatest, most thorough cover-up of all time, or it really is quite safe in doses anyone is ever likely to consume. And if you are going to consume extreme doses - well, safe to say - it's the dose that makes the poison. Practice moderation.
Read more... http://www.rationalskepticism.org/general-debunking/aspartame-t31565.html
DEBUNKING: CHEMTRAILS
Next up on the Jonathan's Debunking Tour: Chemtrails - I will research the hard science to find out, Do chemtrails exist, or are conpiracy theorists freaking out over the behavior we would expect for a biproduct of combustion coming off of a fast moving vehicle at high altitudes? Stay tuned!
Theorist claim: grids and X patterns prove they can’t be contrails
Reality: grids and X’s are inevitable results of air traffic, and winds and weather conditions.
Debunking Chemtrails Once And For All
http://www.csicop.org/specialarticles/show/a_million_poisoning_planes
DEBUNKING: GMO'S
A well reasoned article, right up to the last three sentences. I would argue that the regulatory process for assessing safety and identifying risks/benefits for GM foods is not only rigorous, but, in fact, arduous. Much more so than anything required for conventional and/or organic before being allowed on the market. The safety of non-GM food has been shown to be extremely sketchy, at best, in the past couple of years (lettuce, spinach, cantaloupe, etc), yet no one cares about being coerced into eating it without knowing the risks/benefits up front.
http://www.psmag.com/health/scientific-debate-gm-foods-theyre-safe-66711/#comment-1064420875
We've been over several of these questions before in GMO Skepti-Forum, and we encourage them again: https://www.facebook.com/groups/280492318756692/
Also, scientists were saying smoking was harmful: http://www.skepticalraptor.com/skepticalraptorblog.php/mistakes-science/
http://informahealthcare.com/doi/abs/10.3109/07388551.2013.823595
http://ec.europa.eu/research/biosociety/pdf/a_decade_of_eu-funded_gmo_research.pdf
And if those aren't enough...
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3584506/#__ffn_sectitle
http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10977&page=1
http://www.ama-assn.org/resources/doc/csaph/a12-csaph2-bioengineeredfoods.pdf
http://www.who.int/foodsafety/publications/biotech/20questions/en/
http://www.akademienunion.de/_files/memorandum_gentechnik/GMGeneFood.pdf
DEBUNKING: 9/11
I try to avoid this topic nowadays... truthers want to believe the conspiracy at all costs.
Pentagon: http://www.snopes.com/rumors/pentagon.asp
Thermite debunked: http://www.debunking911.com/thermite.htm
So how many people were involved in rigging this again? And they went completely unnoticed before the attack and no one remembered them after it either? Not one of them had second thoughts, or blew the whistle afterward? None of them blurted out what they had done drunk at a bar, or confessed it in a church? None of their family members noticed they got a job they didn’t talk about at the WTC a short while before the attack and they suddenly came into a veritable fuck ton of mysteriously gained money? Not one jealous family member or friend said anything? These guys that rigged it just vanished from the face of the earth afterward? And somehow they had never met anyone else in their entire life that would notice them disappear? None of this sounds far fetched at all…
The argument for an inside job is as insane as how many people and invisible planes would have to be involved with chemtrails, fake moon landings, and all the rest... if the govt was so good at being evil they'd have planted weapons in Iraq, not get caught and look incompetent.
Conspiracies like this are distractions, not science.
What I’m saying is, not one person before or after the attack came forward about it? None had second thoughts? No one noticed them? What was their personal motivation that would make them so loyal to this cause? Was it money? None of their family members noticed they suddenly got a shit ton of it?
This is a lot of individuals (you do know that groups of people are made up of individuals, all with different motivations and personal beliefs and not just a hive mind, right?) to be so motivated to killing fellow citizens of the same country they live in. You can’t have a Governor hire a prostitute or a Senator trying to elicit gay sex in an airport bathroom without it leaking out , and yet all these people involved, not a single bit of information? Really? How is that even possible?
Rocks, and composites (such as concrete) are made up of several substances, all of which have different melting points. All it would take is for a portion of the overall structure to reach a phase transition and cause a partial melt, which would cause the overall structure of the concrete to begin flowing. Most concrete will reach this point between 900 and 1100 deg F… that’s still below 1500 deg F, right?
None of this is even taking into account the fact that if the heat is sealed and creating a “mircoclimate”, causing pressure to continue to rise, this will in turn cause the temperature to continue to rise and exceed normal expectations.
Here's (more than pictures) debunking this whole free fall, defying physics theory.
http://www.debunking911.com/freefall.htm
Collecting video evidence is standard procedure, not as a cover up but as a means of looking for evidence to help an investigation. This is done in ANY crime.
Norad was not shut down or made to stand down, that is a myth.
None of the towers in fact fell at free fall speed, I've shown you exact science debunking that, which I guess you refuse to look at.
This is a myth, as demonstrated in a definitive 2008 article published by Zdenek Bazant, Jia-Liang Le, Frank Greening and David Benson in the Journal of Engineering Mechanics ASCE. “Calculations show that the duration of the entire crush-down phase exceeds the free-fall duration by 65.5% for the North Tower,” they conclude, “and by 47.3% for the South Tower.”
Wait, so a basket isn't real because I can't sew one myself? If someone shows me hard science on something, and it's peer reviewed to be correct, I have to accept that, because I myself am not a scientist. That's called living in the real world.
WTC 7 Free Fall Debunking:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K82wcKwxPZc
Debunking 9/11 conspiracy theorists part 1 of 7 - Free fall and how the towers collapsed
Link
Building 7 didn't fall into it's own footprint. It crashed into the buildings around it (destroying 1 beyond repair), nor did it crumble symmetrically. It didn't look like a demo in any sense of the word. In any case, if you wanted it to look like a real tower collapse, why make it look like a demo? heheh,
Don't forget to watch out for black helicopters
http://zapatopi.net/blackhelicopters/
I tell you what, even I question myself sometimes whether I'm using proper skepticism or confirmation bias when I'm dismissing dozens of google links and only holding on to the ones I determine to be reputable. Of course 90% of those dismissed links are usually just parrots of a naturalnews article.
Yeah the controlled demolition one really makes me laugh. I work in construction, if you've ever seen one of those shows where they demolish a building, it's a ton of work. You have to completely cut out most of the columns leaving just enough left to keep the building from falling on your head. Then those ones left you still have to cut deep notches in them and brace the explosives against that notch. Then you have to run the 50 odd detcord lines back to a point where you can tie them all together then run one all the way down to a receiver that is close enough to the ground to communicate with the sender.
It's a huge undertaking when you're working ten hour shifts in plain view. To do it undetected without anyone hearing or seeing the literally tons of debris being removed is ludicrous.
It would also require a crew of trained demolition professionals that had no problems killing hundreds of innocent people yet they also would have to never sell out their secret to anyone or worry about being silenced once the job is done. I don't think you're going to find too many people in the world with that combination of sociopath, loyalty and naivety.
Concerning the video, where the guy uses the word "pull" and the misleading title saying it was admission, which it was not, that was interpreted as an admission, and because it sounds like one doesn't mean it is one.
He used slang meaning "pull out of the building, remove your firemen from the building" because the fire marshal told him the fire was beyond help and the building was becoming structurally unsound. It's less of an order and more of an acknowledgement "Yes I understand my building is beyond saving, thanks for the effort in trying to save it guys"
I read a really good page detailing it all but I can't seem to google past all the conspiracy sites. Here's at least something.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wtc7#9.2F11_and_collapse
Again I take you back to this site, there's a section on the side for WTC7 too.
http://www.debunking911.com/
I have no problem with people enjoying mind altering substances in recreational quantities. But I don't care how often they tell me it's harmless, every major pot head I've known becomes crazy paranoid after a while.
You have to be able to objectively see how you are interpreting the words, or word rather in this case... when he says pull it he could mean pull the operation, we don't know, we only have what the word means to yourself, and that may simply be incorrect, either way it's not enough to prove anything, because there's definitely reasonable doubt.
Yes, here's the facts: interestingly enough the debunk site i linked to says my guess was wrong, it shows a longer video where the project manager for demolishing building 6 is saying pull it to cable pull a leaning wall over . it's in the middle of the wtc7 page
http://www.debunking911.com/pull.htm
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Final Thoughts...
The fallacy of argument from authority is not that authorities should not be cited, but that one is using questionable authorities. It is indeed questionable that 1700 A&Es are authorities when they stand in opposition to 2.3 million others. Authorities on a subject ought to be able to discuss the merits of their case and reach a reasonable conclusion. Though that sometimes does not happen, we cannot base an argument on the exception. It is a fallacy to claim that 9/11 is an inside job on the basis of a small minority opinion, especially when those opinions have been contradicted by other authorities.
"outlandish claims REQUIRES extraordinary evidence" - The amazing thing is that "Truthers" don't seem to recognize that claiming the 9/11 attacks were an inside job IS an outlandish claim. Occam's Razor says that the simplest interpretation of events is the most likely, but "Truthers" cannot tell that a theory of overt hijackings and crashes is much less complex than a secret military conspiracy theory disguised to look like overt hijackings and crashes. Trust me; it is! The official account of the 9/11 attacks is complicated, but making a false flag operation look like what we saw on television is far, far more complicated. It would be the most sophisticated operation the world had ever seen, achieving something that I believe is impossible; a perfect clandestine military operation.
So, where is your extraordinary evidence for this mythical beast of an inside job? Oh, some fringe academics tested some 6 year-old dust and found "thermite"? You mean, iron oxide and aluminum were at WTC? Say it isn't so! Oh, right; it was "nanothermite," which hardly existed in 2001. How did they make it? How did they ship it? How did they rig it? How much did they need? How did they trigger it? Who triggered it? From where? How did they happen to plant it exactly where it needed to be to make it look like an accident? If they were trying to make it look like an accident, why did they make it look like a controlled demolition? Where is your extraordinary evidence?
Marijuana to Treat Cancer: (Mixed Result)
Cancer isn't treated through smoking THC per se, but rather it's through the use of chemicals found in marijuana to make injected formulas and pills where Cannabidiol could essentially 'turn off' the ID-1 gene that causes cancer, though you could never get enough Cannabidiol for it to be effective just from smoking. Smoking marijuana is primarily for discomfort, migraines, etc, not the causes but the effects of other issues.
It is actually a cannabinoid called CBD, not THC, that is responsible for most of the medical anecdotes regarding medical remedies. Unfortunately, most cannabis is grown for the high THC content--the cannabinoid that gets you high--because there is more demand for it. CBD high cannabis is usually low in THC, so you don't get stoned. But there are many other cannabinoids in cannabis that have yet to be explored and tested. Unfortunately, because of the federal laws, there is no clinical work being done in this country.
~*~
CRYSTALS AND HERB BAGS FOR SPIRITUAL PROTECTION
The next stop on Jonathan's Debunking Tour 2013... Crystals and Herb Bags for Protection and Spiritual Well Being
Now personally, I believe ANYTHING can be used to give oneself a space of calm and comnfort, it's about our intentions and no power inherent in any item but what we feel in relationship to those items... and it is my belief that companies who make MILLIONS off of the gullible who live in fear and superstition have no desire for truth to be known about what they're selling to the public at very high prices. Fantasy enriches the imagination, but we should not confuse fantasy with science. Now, I love the feeling of empowering my space with items like crystals and plants, and so forth, but I think once you start putting herbs in bags with crystals for protection from spirits, you've gotten off at the last stop in looney toons town.
My first bit of evidence is a conversation with one such retailer...
When you start saying hey just do what feels right, you've left the world of science and entered the realm of fantasy... notice the difference between the world and the realm...
1+1 does not equal 2 when we feel like it... Gravity doesn't pertain when we feel like it.
If you want to know how deluded people are, just recognize that a large majority of society still believe in saying bless you when you sneeze instead of handing you a tissue, fear of jinxing you, angels, ghosts, and protections with herbs... and when you ask for the science they say "Magnetism". And don't forget making a wish when all the numbers of a clock are the same.
So how can we expect people to behave rationally, and with a view towards scientific progress on anything from GMOs, when they're too busy living in fear-based conspiracy minds of anti-establishment, 9/11 and Chemtrail fantasies?
~*~
CRYSTALS AND HERB BAGS FOR SPIRITUAL PROTECTION
Anyone who tells you that physical sensation is evidence of the paranormal is likely a fool. No offense, just not pulling any punches here, because there is a vast community of the deluded who lack objectivity or scientific method or analytical process when delving into emotionally polarizing issues, they often are seduced by the distraction, personal superiority and knowledge that sets them apart from the mainstream...
The physical sensations are easily recreated and easy to debunk... here's how.
1. Go into any dark room, it doesn't even have to be a room you have never been in before, like on the show which makes this even easier to debunk.
2. In the dark you lose sense of depth, so what happens is you hear something and grab hold of it with your attention, this slightly disassociates you from your body.
3. Another sound from somewhere else, now you are trying to focus on that, but since you were already slightly removed from yourself the sound hits you closer than it would have and creates a slight physical sensation because you feel it as yourself, the aspect that has disassociated.
4. The more sounds at this point and the physical sensations compound and make you feel cold, or get goosebumps, but all that has happened is you are freaking yourself out and if you believe the identity is something outside yourself, it's actually you just misinterpreting your own focus.
That is all it is, I've experimented with this for years.
The good news is, but sitting with that energy, because if you fear it, it's just an externalization of your own subconscious fear and not a ghost, but inviting it back into yourself, you do become a more whole person and open up doors to some amazing things, like for instance, out of body experience, it can be a way to deepen meditation and find personal power and wholeness.
So when I see a person who thinks physical sensations are ghosts, I realize I'm looking at someone who has become self indulgent, and is too afraid to face the truth, that they are afraid of themselves, and have externalized that fear onto the outside world and identified it as ghosts, to confirm their own ego, it's like what cats do.
A cat will become scared but they will never think it's your energy, they'll think it's something somewhere else and look for it. We become attached to our own ego and our perception, and if our perception is based in ignorance, we will look for truth outside of ourselves, rather than where it truly lives: Within.
Final thoughts on the paranormal:
I think it's all pretty silly, but can be enjoyable, a journey into the imagination... but if you take it all too literally, lilke religion, can be an exploitation and exploration of human fear, ignorance, and externalization of that fear... all physical sensations people call evidence are very easy to recreate oneself... the darkness causes disassociation from the body, so that external sounds feel closer, but that disassociation is what raises the fight or flight, and thus creates the physical sensations... it's all very elementary really. Now, that is my opinion, and I don't believe in 100% certainty, I mean anything is possible, but I think people get carried away, I mean we have so little understanding of the universe, yet we think we have a grasp on the paranormal? It just seems a bit childish, and a huge disrtaction from facing reality. Simply, what I'm saying is, I believe people are greatly delusional for lack of personal power, financial security, and creative empowerment... this gives them a distraction, and a sense of knowing, and power, even if it's all most likely bullshit.
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OUIJA BOARDS
I think if Ouija was real and not just mental illness and delusion, we'd see as many suicides amongst paranormal investigators as we do amongst porn stars.