Sense in science

This seems to be yet another pressure group, providing as a "charity", a seemingless value-free and neutral scientific comment on issues. Why do I distrust groups like this?

Look at the letter on:
http://www.senseaboutscience.org.uk/index.php/site/project/49

"Scientists' responses to Farm Scale Evaluations of GM crops:A letter to the Prime Minister"


"In October 2003, scientists announced the findings of the Farm Scale Evaluations of three GM crops being considered for commercial growing in the UK. These were widely reported as heralding "the end of GM in the UK." In fact, the FSEs did not assess the effects of genetically modifying the crops, but rather the impact of different types of weed control. They had little to do with genetic modification, its processes or potential. Sense About Science discovered that many scientists felt frustrated by the reporting, and by the Government's failure to correct the misinterpretation of the studies it had commissioned. Even scientists working in unrelated areas found it demoralising and unreasonable to see new technologies condemned with little reference to the evidence. Sense About Science worked with Professor Derek Burke, a member of the Advisory Council, to turn these frustrations into a constructive appeal to the British Prime Minister. A copy of the resulting letter and signatories is available here (pdf). The Government responded to the letter by reaffirming its commitment to evidence. While it was helpful for the scientists and the Government to clarify their views in public, the UK's role in this area of science and technology was already damaged beyond recovery. "

The linked letter contains 114 individuals, who it is stated "signed it in a personal capacity and not on behalf of their institutions or funding bodies".

All very well, but is a scientist going to come out and take a stance that will lead to a loss of funding And if scientists are working in unrelated areas are allowed a say, how many of these are in the 114, and what makes their comments more significant than the educated layman? "Many scientists" and the figure of 114 seems good, but what proportion of the total scientists in the UK is this? How many of those would lend their name to this letter?

When we look at autism, for instance, this is part of a comment on Paul Shattock:

"A similar attitude to scientific expertise was displayed in claims about the MMR vaccine and autism
by Mr Paul Shattock, a pharmacist who set up the Autism Research Unit at the University of
Sunderland, which advocates the view that autism is a metabolic disorder. In June 2002, he claimed
to have identified a group of children whose autism resulted from the MMR vaccine. The research,
based on the claim that children with bowel disease have abnormal levels of indolyl acryloyl
glycine in their urine, was not published in a scientific journal but made headlines and Shattock was
cited 41 times in 2002 in newspaper articles about the safety of the MMR vaccine."

You would never know from this that Paul Shattock set up the ARU following his retirement in 1998 from teaching Pharmacy for over 20 years at the University of Sunderland; it makes him sound like a high-street behind the counter chemist, rather than a University teacher. The letters after his name M.R.Pharm.S. also mean he is a Member of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society.

Medline gives 7 citations (see below) of Shattocks work (as a co-author) in peer reviewed medical related publications. Medline is a central database reference source for finding references and it doesn't go in for non-scientific mickey mouse publications. So again, I wonder what the sense in science people are playing at? It certainly seems very like an ad hominem attack on Mr Shattock, probably because Sense in Science is committed to the MMR and Paul Shattock is critical of it.

I think Arrogance in Science might be a better name for this pressure group, which does the same disservice to science that Mary Whitehouse did with her so-called "national" listeners and viewers group. It is perhaps no surprise that Peter Atkins is one of the team. From the Trouble with Atheism by Rod Liddle, he came across as an extremely arrogant man, convinced that he is right and anyone who disagrees with him is wrong. That, clearly, is how we should view Sense in Science!

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?CMD=search&DB=pubmed

Whiteley P, Waring R, Williams L, Klovrza L, Nolan F, Smith S, Farrow M, Dodou K, Lough WJ, Shattock P. Related Articles, Links
Spot urinary creatinine excretion in pervasive developmental disorders.
Pediatr Int. 2006 Jun;48(3):292-7.
PMID: 16732798 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
2: Whiteley P, Dodou K, Todd L, Shattock P. Related Articles, Links
Body mass index of children from the United Kingdom diagnosed with pervasive developmental disorders.
Pediatr Int. 2004 Oct;46(5):531-3.
PMID: 15491378 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
3: Shattock P, Hooper M, Waring R. Related Articles, Links
Opioid peptides and dipeptidyl peptidase in autism.
Dev Med Child Neurol. 2004 May;46(5):357; author reply 357-8. No abstract available.
PMID: 15132268 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
4: Waltz M, Shattock P. Related Articles, Links
Autistic disorder in nineteenth-century London: three case reports.
Autism. 2004 Mar;8(1):7-20.
PMID: 15070544 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
5: Bull G, Shattock P, Whiteley P, Anderson R, Groundwater PW, Lough JW, Lees G. Related Articles, Links
Indolyl-3-acryloylglycine (IAG) is a putative diagnostic urinary marker for autism spectrum disorders.
Med Sci Monit. 2003 Oct;9(10):CR422-5.
PMID: 14523330 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
6: Shattock P, Whiteley P. Related Articles, Links
Biochemical aspects in autism spectrum disorders: updating the opioid-excess theory and presenting new opportunities for biomedical intervention.
Expert Opin Ther Targets. 2002 Apr;6(2):175-83. Review.
PMID: 12223079 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]
7: Anderson RJ, Bendell DJ, Garnett I, Groundwater PW, Lough WJ, Mills MJ, Savery D, Shattock PE. Related Articles, Links
Identification of indolyl-3-acryloylglycine in the urine of people with autism.
J Pharm Pharmacol. 2002 Feb;54(2):295-8.
PMID: 11858215 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]