Quote (Gastly @ Mar 20 2016 07:53pm)

I'm surprised that you had the time to read all the 892 papers of the meta-analysis that was referred to in such a short amount of time. Not only did you manage to do that, but you also somehow managed to discover the "obvious bias" of the researchers and throw a temper tantrum at the "obviously biased" researchers.
I'm not sure where you've gotten your ideas about modern psychology, but it probably involves very little modern psychology.

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No science reduces to "plain logic" or math apart from logic itself, and even that's not a science in the English use of the word. I don't know what you're talking about.

Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 20 2016 07:35pm)

If your science can't reduce to math and plain logic, if its dependent on throwing ten billion uncontrolled variables into a black box and seeing words in your alphabet soup come out, its junk science.

Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 20 2016 11:18pm)

So I'm not allowed to discuss this subject on PARD unless I read your 892 different papers? Whats next, got some rand paul youtube links to post with no description? :rofl:



Plenty of fields of science have rigorous proofs for their concepts. Its not enough to merely say "We can correlate these two things but don't have a clue how they interact"
A chemist can identify how a reaction takes place, what the outcome will be, and why, due to a detailed understanding of particle physics and chemical bonding. The reaction will be reproducible and logical.
An electrical engineer can lay out how a logic circuit works and why. A doctor can tell you the purpose of each body part, what it does, what governs its interactions and what binds to what receptor. Except, for the most part, the brain.

Because psychologists have no such footing in grounded fact. Their field of study is a complete black box to them. They can't simulate a human brain and experiment upon it to prove this does that or this behavior leads to that. All they can do is postulate and try to torture statistics to agree with their theories.
The science behind building a bridge is well understood and absolute. The 'science' of how a human develops psychologically is anything but.

Quote (Thor123422 @ Mar 20 2016 10:26pm)

There isn't a science out there which is as you describe it. Even particle physics is contingent on certain observations being reliable. Derivation of quantum mechanical principles is contingent on observations at the macro level in physics, including the behavior of wave-like entities and the attraction between oppositely charged particles. Biochemistry, which I imagine you would consider a hard science, is full of difficult to control variables and undefined interactions.

Quote (Goomshill @ Mar 20 2016 10:31pm)

Theres a difference between being unable to handdraw a perfect circle and having no arms. These sciences have isolated their variables beyond all doubt, identified what works and why down to the most infinitesimal scales. To quibble over the breakdown in the GUT and relativistic particle physics doesn't change the fact that a computer scientist can prove the halting problem unsolveable or a clockmaker computer the ratio of gears turning. They don't deal in wishy washy abstract concepts on a day to day basis, it doesn't govern the very real implications of their work.

Quote (duffman316 @ Mar 20 2016 08:05pm)

tax credits based on a body composition calculating machine perhaps?

we could call it a fat tax but that'd seem too oppressive

Quote (dark-soul @ Mar 20 2016 11:33pm)

I think there should be tax credits for being in healthy levels for body composition. Overweight people are a burden on the healthcare system so motivation to lose weight is a good thing.

Quote (Thor123422 @ Mar 21 2016 01:01am)

I'd actually be interested in an analysis of productivity lost to obesity and increased medical cost versus the cost of medical care for an additional few decades and end of life care. Is it really more expensive? I'm curious

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The adverse workplace effects of obesity are also daunting. Obesity is associated with substantially increased rates of absenteeism (i.e. more days out of work) and presenteeism (i.e. reduced productivity while at work) [11,13,14]. Obese workers take more sick days, have longer sick leaves and incur greater productivity losses than do non-obese workers. Some analyses estimate that the costs to employers of obesity-related presenteeism are greater than the direct costs of the medical care required by those workers [13].

Obesity also increases workers’ compensation expenses. Obese workers file more compensation claims, have more costly claims and have more lost workdays than do non-obese workers. For example, a study of compensation claims at a US university compared two worker groups, those with class III obesity (BMI ≥ 40 kg/m3) versus those with recommended body weight (BMI 18.5–24.9 kg/m3) [14]. The obese workers averaged twice as many claims [11.65 versus 5.8 per 100 full-time equivalents (FTEs)] and had roughly 10-fold increases in loss of workdays (183.63 versus 14.19 per 100 FTEs), medical claims costs ($51 091 versus $7503 per 100 FTEs) and indemnity claims ($59 178 versus $5396 per 100 FTEs).[/quote[

Quote (duffman316 @ Mar 21 2016 02:28am)

http://occmed.oxfordjournals.org/content/61/4/220.full

it's hard to measure lost productivity with exact numbers

Quote (Thor123422 @ 20 Mar 2016 21:04)

First you said pure logic, now it's isolating variables. What is your point anyway? You're just kind of jumping around without a real point.