https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4 Dangers of Pseudoscience en-us 2020-09-09 21:16:31 UTC 2020-09-12 22:34:30 UTC hello@padlet.com alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/733101955 Alexander McWilliams]]> 2020-09-09 21:22:14 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/733101955 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/733104504 Description:
This article goes over how one of the largest mail scams caused multiple elderly, and others. Over the course of 2008 to as recent as July 2018, the scam of sending the elderly letters promising that through trinkets and by-mail readings, a psychic could help them reconnect with the dead, but only if Maria Duval, the figurehead of the operation, was paid exorbitant amounts of money, eventually totaling to the estimate of $200 Million, leaving some elderly homeless and/or feeling defeated on the ground of being duped with false kindness from a stranger.

Connection:
This article connects to the danger of bleeding yourself dry of money on the premise of an Emotional Connection by promising that through the powers of Mystical Powers you could be cured or could be reconnected with a dead friend/family, but it only led to the bankruptcy of those who fell for this scam by being duped with good faith. 
Due to how vulnerable the elderly can be, due to mental illnesses or just too much trust in strangers, it's not much a surprise that so many were fooled, yet the moment Money was involved, they should have backed away and reported this scam before it became too late.]]> 2020-09-09 21:23:51 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/733104504 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741145785 Description:
Within this article, it goes over the events of a Calgary woman, believing her natural remedies could cure her child of an unnaturally high fever, later found to be meningitis and a strep infection, but unfortunately the child passed. Later accounts in the article say she was arrested and prosecuted for her negligence.
Tim Caulfield, a University of Alberta professor, says that this could have been solved with proper knowledge of when to take a child to a doctor, and even though the parents did what they were doing in good faith, it does not abstain responsibility for the death of a child, and the law agrees.

Connection:
Although the article goes over the matter in short, it is clear that due to the belief that Ancient Wisdom and All-Natural were at play in the result of a death, as these people, specifically this Calgary woman, was convinced that these home remedies, usually much cheaper than medical bills, were cure-alls, which is very tempting for those who don't have all that much money in life to begin with.

]]> 2020-09-12 18:18:00 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741145785 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741146145 Description:
From National Geographic, they recount a small excerpt of Chinese history with their Traditional Medicine that utilized parts of animals thought to be a boon for the human body, yet as the years have gone on and most of these remedies have become less in demand as society advances with science, there is still the demand for animals who are slowly becoming, or are already considered, endangered, poaching animals like Pangolins. whose scales are ground up and said to be enhancers for lactation and arthritis and many other illnesses.  The same type of thing goes for the horns of rhinos and sometimes the balls of tigers.
Luckily over time the governments, where these animals reside within, have been trying to take measures to protect a small population of these animals who have slowly become endangered through setting up protected land monitored by armed officials to ensure these animals aren't killed to extinction.

Connection:
Due to past Confusion with certain causes it has been believed that these different animal parts can be a boon to the human body, where in some areas it is believed that the heart of a mighty beast, like a tiger, can give you immense strength and courage, and as such it has caused some species to go extinct in areas where this type of thing is believed to be true, mostly based on the unexplained circumstances of where an individual has gained the courage or is now able to birth offspring.]]> 2020-09-12 18:18:36 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741146145 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741163959 Description:
Sally and Jacob talk about the past Ebola Virus back in 2014, explaining their methods have fast results  by spouting off different examples of other instances where themselves and others have been 'healed' of other diseases/viruses perceived to be similar to Ebola.

Connection:
Throughout the video Sally and Jacob remain calm and verbose amounts of evidence, rather perceived evidence, to draw connections between their alternative medicine and how effective it could be to help your body against Ebola. Furthermore, they keep involving money into their lecture, saying if you buy your kits they you will survive this and any other illness out there, and in what they say they make it seem like what they peddle is a cure-all, saying it cures this and that but never claim its a direct cause of what they do, but instead it does, it just influences your immune system to become stronger and fight on its own, yet their own statement contradicts what they say the moment they mention they aren't the cause, because if they did then it'd be a crime against the common person. ]]> 2020-09-12 18:43:56 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741163959 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741164572 Description:
Featured in this video, Oprah has invited some couples onto her stage and given them a voice to promote their anti-vaccination belief, stating the common point of bodily illnesses like autism and asthma to be caused by the multiple vaccinations a child should have by a certain age, or weeks or days after they are born.

Connection:
A clear connection here is an Appeal to Authority, as by Oprah letting her speak, and later agreeing with this lady's belief, has given this lady a similar influence than that of Oprah, as Oprah's popular show is seen as gospel to people, and while this lady spouts on it inclines the viewer to feel compassion for her, an Emotional Connection if you will, yet at the start of her segment you hear her say she was rejected by multiple doctors to, what I can only assume, sign off on fraudulent papers to say her child was vaccinated, or to support her stance, right there it should have been a red-flag, essentially another form of Suppression by Authorities.]]> 2020-09-12 18:44:55 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741164572 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741164925 Description:
in 2018, ABC reported on conversion therapy and during the featured video they interview a Brian Sullivan, a currently straight man who stated the thinking of the time of when he had been put into his Conversion therapy, a psychologically abusing program that forces young to suppress gay thoughts as the common religious thought at the time was that being gay wasn't something you were born to be. A pastor, Greg Bullard, stated that due to the unwise mixing of Religion and Psychology it can cause mental stress like anxiety, anger, pain, and sometimes suicide as individuals begin to hate themselves as those involved in Conversion Therapy believe that God hated them for having 'impure' thoughts that did not conform to the norm at the time.

Connection:
Going into this specific video, I was half expecting it to harp on the current gender conversion therapy and surgery that happens in modern time, which has its own bouts of depression and suicide, instead the story told gave insight into the religious ties that it has, where ideologies of the average person from Brian's youth gave him and others the sense of anger towards themselves where their mental state was just harmed by blaming themselves, where some even believed that suicide was the answer to be forgiven by their god.  During the conversion therapies, most individuals who take part in it are made to hate themselves as those who convert them to the perceived norm build an emotional connection as a way to ensure they don't turn gay.]]> 2020-09-12 18:45:33 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741164925 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741165766 Description:
Mummia Vera, a container of ground up mummified remains straight from the Pyramids of Egypt and bought by the elite during the 17th century as they pillaged the ruins of ancient Egypt and snorted the ground up powder as they thought the remains of the ancient would give them mystical visions of the dead.

Connection:
Even though it isn't as common in modern times, there was a time of where mystical thoughts were rampant from children to the elderly, and as the elite and top members of fashion were doing Mummy Dust, the Appeal to authority stood there as an influential beacon to pillage pieces of history to get a lick of the wisdom from the ancient.]]> 2020-09-12 18:47:00 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741165766 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741171280 Description:
Mad Mike Hughes died on February 22nd of 2020 when he shot his homemade rocket up into the air to try and disprove that the earth was round, but unfortunately he didn't make it higher than 1875 ft into the air before plummeting back down at terminal velocity.
Prior to this, and in the past, experts had criticized Mike, and his peers, on the fact that the earth is flat, and his peers had done tests to prove their biased opinion, yet despite the community's stubbornness, they pushed mike to shoot a metal tube up, believing that gravity isn't all that real and that he'd be fine.

Connection:
This could have easily gone under Death as a topic, but I felt it reasonable to show where a fanatical belief ripe with Confirmation Bias could go. Mike was 64 years old and believed in the flat earth conspiracy, famous for their bias for their belief believing they can't be wrong, so much so that their Perception and Observation regarding the horizon led Mike and a minority of others to belief that their Simple conclusion must be right. Nobody could properly escape the disc and show that we live on a blue marble.]]> 2020-09-12 18:48:03 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741171280 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741171706 1. While going through this I found that almost all of the sub-topics I've decided to cover all contain the potential to cause severe harm and/or death.
2. In real life, I care about my mother and occasionally see her talk about her home remedies for her joint pain due to the fact of as she's getting older she still wants to work, and miraculously still does, but prices for her medications keep rising, so she has lately started shifting from her trust in medical doctors to the more natural kind. In part I wanted to take this course to enlighten myself and hopefully think of a way to sway my mom back towards safer and proven methods.
3. While doing research I found the stuff on Conversion Therapy to be the most interesting as initially my perception of it was that it was all to do with sex changes, as when I hear about it in the news, it's almost always referring to something like 'mother losing custody over trying to turn son into girl through conversion therapy'.
4. Relating back to question 2, I'm going to remember mostly about the home remedy homeopathy stuff as I will need it later to hopefully prevent my mom from killing herself or others unintentionally. I know she isn't that daft, but I fear that with age she may end up becoming such.
5. To me, I would say Homeopathy is the most dangerous one as it can lead to believing in the Anti-vaxxer movement, and I'd say stuff like the Flat Earth Conspiracy theory are relatively harmless to all but themselves if they decide to go to a bar full of scientists, or bikers.
6. Commonsense and be wary of everything that involves the talk of wanting you to pay for anything labeled as to boost your immune system, chances are it is a scam and is most likely salty cabbage water from a motel bathtub.]]> 2020-09-12 18:48:37 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741171706 alexander_mcwilliams https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741217041 Description:
5G towers, a tool for faster and better internet, that is until people began to burn them. The movement of theories claiming it causes cancer, caused the corona virus, mainly stems from the fear that these towers cause radiation to the surrounding area believed to weaken the immune system, while others say its something to do with QAnon and the Deep State, yet all seem to have morphed into what it is now from the introduction of cellphones, or just new technologies.

Connection:
Right out the gate, you notice a Suppression By Authorities feel from this where their Confirmation Bias is rooted in aspects similar to the 9/11 conspiracy theories. By the actions of these people, in their response to Anti-Chinese belief, this has ensured that an advancement will almost certainly not be allowed outside of China, thus stunting the progression for faster internet for the average person, all because some people think they are right and are doing justice by ignoring what officials say, wasting what is usually tax-payer money to fix the towers, or relocate them entirely, in some cases.

]]> 2020-09-12 20:00:59 UTC https://padlet.com/alexander_mcwilliams/cudccliz021a53p4/wish/741217041