Science Gone Wild
| Hey my friend! I hope you’re having a great Sunday! Sorry I missed you last week. I was just getting back from a trip to Columbus Ohio (Brrrrr!) where I got to spend some time at Physicians Fitness, shadowing and being worked on by a man who is truly at the cutting edge of our industry. Not only was it eye opening to watch him work with his clients, but I also had a pretty eye opening experience of my own. |
On day one Greg had me do a circuit of exercises to measure the strength of my right and left sides. I did single sided bicep curls, tricep extensions, knee extensions, leg curls, shoulder presses, calf raises, and several others. They were all on machines or with body weight, they were all timed with recorded reps, and they all had measurable loads.What we discovered was that my right side…my dominant side…my “feel good” side that never has any pain at all…was significantly weaker in nearly all the tests. 5,6, and even 10 rep differences. In fact, in some exercises I would feel the effort coming from muscles that were not even the prime movers. I was shocked. As I shared my history with Greg, two things came up that really caught his attention. One was a concussion I’d had when I was young and the other was a major neck and spinal cord injury I had in 2017. He theorized that there might be a communication issue from my brain and spinal cord to my right side, so he began to muscle test me to see if that was the case. We found that nearly every time any part of my body was moving to the right, my ability to control muscles would change. His hypothesis was that my brain needed to re-recognize those movement patterns so that I could coordinate other muscles while doing them. He began a series of exercises that were meant to reconnect me with my right side, and the muscle control tests that were previously weak got much stronger. After this we finished the session and I rested for the day. The next day we did the weighted strength tests again to see if any of the changes on the table translated to the machines. I did the same exercises, with the same loads, on the same pieces of equipment. To my amazement, this time, my strength in nearly every exercise was equal. My right side had matched my left. And, I also felt the correct muscles in nearly every exercise. It was truly amazing. What we did is an example of good science in action. Do some tests. Measure some things. Formulate a hypothesis as to why you saw what you saw. Test the hypothesis. Remeasure the same things via the same tests. Formulate a conclusion based on the results. If all science were like this, we’d have a much different world. Sadly though most science nowadays seems to be less for exploration and learning and more for proving what is favorable to the researchers. I call this “science gone wild.” The first example of science gone wild comes from the sugar industry. Do you remember back in the 60’s and 70’s how people were eating tons of sugar in cereals, desserts, sodas and candy yet very few people really thought it was that bad? Do you remember that around the same time (and even more as we got into the 80’s and 90’s) people thought fat was the only thing in food to stay away from? Remember how dozens of companies were even making “fat-free” versions of their signature foods with way more sugar and people thought it was healthy? Well, it was brought the light in 2016 that the reason people overlooked sugars harms and were overly focused on fats was because “scientists” in the 1960’s were paid the equivalent of $50,000 to manipulate experiments and data to make sugar look less unhealthy and make fat look more unhealthy. Now we know otherwise and sadly heart disease caused more by overconsumption of sugar has claimed countless lives that could possibly have been saved if we had all the facts from the beginning so we could make better choices. You can read about that here- Science Gone Wild: The Sugar Industry How about this science gone wild? Do you remember the days when people thought margarine was a healthy alternative to butter? That was based on a false assumption that hydrogenated vegetable oil (which is not naturally occurring but rather created through a chemical process) is somehow better for you than naturally occurring fats. This gave rise to products like crisco and margarine, and opened the door for companies to use “trans-fats” in the processing and cooking of their foods. Over time, it became more and more evident that “trans-fats” were also a major contributor to heart disease in society (these should not to be confused with “normal fats” studied against sugar in the above study). This eventually led to a virtual outlaw of trans fats, but God only knows how many heart disease deaths could have been prevented if trans fats had been banned sooner. You can read about that here- Science Gone Wild: The Trans Fat Industry Here’s another example. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for decades, you know that society has been suffering from a major opioid epidemic that is claiming thousands of lives every year. At the center of this epidemic is the pharmaceutical industry who has flooded our world with extremely potent and dangerous opioid drugs. At the center of this controversy is a company called Purdue Pharma who invented and patented the drug OxyContin back in the 90’s. The first step in their plan was to use “science” to “prove” that opioid drugs were safe and rarely addictive, which turned out to be totally wrong. Many patients became physically addicted after just days of use. Purdue has since been sued by hundreds of people because of their lies and cover ups that led to this explosion of opioid drug addiction and death. The lies and cover ups have been so well documented that even scientific journals have published information on it. Read more about that here- Science Gone Wild: The Pharmaceutical Industry Here’s yet another example of science gone wild leading to suffering and death. Have you ever heard of the company Monsanto? If you have, you probably don’t get a good feeling when you think about them. They have been some of the biggest liars and false science users we’ve ever seen. It’s been known for years that their flagship product “Roundup” contains ingredients that can contribute to the development of cancer cells, yet they had successfully litigated most of their lawsuits, which left much of the public unaware of its dangers. However, in 2018, shortly after the company was sold to German Pharma giant Bayer, the wheels started to come off. One man in California was awarded a $289 million dollar settlement and this opened the door for more lawsuits. Another person was awarded $2 billion, another $80 million, and now thousands more people are coming forward to sue them for failing to adequately warn the public of what internal documents show they knew for many years. Read more about that here- Science Gone Wild: The Herbicide Industry By the way, Monsanto/Bayer is one of the biggest producers of genetically modified seeds, which produce crops that independent studies show are dangerous for human health. There haven’t been many lawsuits on this yet, but I’d read up about it anyway because you are likely consuming genetically modified food and don’t even realize it. Read about that here- Science Gone Wild: The Genetically Modified Food Industry Now of course, this is just a short list of science gone wild. I could get into so much more if I had the time. The take home here is that there is one single common thread in all of this. Ready???? $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ That’s right, the common thread is money. There was a profit motive to all this “research” and it was all meant to prove that a particular thing was safe and effective. Remember those words “safe and effective.” That’s what so much science these days is trying to prove, and many scientists are willing to lie in order to do it. “For the love of money is the root of all kinds of evil..” 1 Timothy 6:10 So, when people ask me about whether I want to take this new medication, or get this new vaccine, or try this new product…this is the type of stuff that goes through my mind. Will I give things a chance to prove themselves? Sure. But I have one acid test- if God didn’t create it, I am highly skeptical. God didn’t chemically alter the poppy plant to form oxycodone, man did. God didn’t genetically modify seeds, man did. God didn’t pour acid on sugar cane and chemically separate and bleach the sugar molecules in it, man did. God didn’t create trans fats, man did. God didn’t create pesticides, man did. I see all these man made things as guilty until proven innocent. And it must prove itself OVER TIME. I encourage you to do the same. Do the homework for yourself and look at all the dissenting opinions and why they dissent. You will probably find, as I have, that much of what passes for “science” these days is not as reliable as we think. Yours in truth, Chris |