#646: Michael Ellner

Michael Ellner is an “aids critic”, and his erudite criticisms of contemporary science related to HIV – and its corresponding conspiracies – have earned him his very own page at whale.to. According to Ellner: “Just look at us. Everything is backwards; everything is upside down. Doctors destroy health, lawyers destroy justice, universities destroy knowledge, governments destroy freedom, the major media destroy information and religions destroy spirituality …,” though more reality-apt people would probably note that when Ellner perceives everything upside-down it says far more about his perception of things than it says about the things he perceive. Ellner is crazy. “As far as ‘AIDS’ goes, we have been subject to the most heinous and genocidal fraud in medical history,” and he suggests that instead of ordinary medicine (which kills people) we must renounce evidence, science and reality and go for holistic treatments without the faintest trace of supporting evidence of efficacy. Accordingly, Ellner can offer nothing but anecdotes and imagination to support his claim, but such limitations hwve never stopped a crank (by definition). Then there is POMO: “AIDS is not a disease. It is a social agreement,” writes Ellner and one Tom DiFerdinando; “[t]here are others who need AIDS also. Do not forget. Medicine is a business.” In other words, people are dying because they accept the conceptual scheme on AIDS and death pushed by the establishment. And fortunately Ellner can offer you safe, affordable treatments.

Ellner considers himself “an internationally prominent Certified Hypnosis Practitioner and Pain Relief Educator,” and claims that there is considerable scientific evidence that hypnosis can help reduce, even eliminate pain (assessed here). He doesn't tell us where this evidence may be found, admittedly, but asserts that the “medical establishment” have been spreading lies about hypnosis. It is unclear whether he thinks that hypnotherapy can cure AIDS, but by the power of POMO it probably can.

Diagnosis: It is noteworthy that on his hypnotherapy homepage Ellner writes nothing about his HIV-“skepticism”, almost as if he dimly realizes that there is something less than convincing about it and that it may contribute to undermining his reputation in the field of hypnotherapy. In any case, Ellner is a woo-meister and denialist, who should definitely not be lent an ear in the most desperate of circumstances.

#612: Stephen Davis

Ray M. Davis, Jr., a.k.a. “Florida man with no background in science”, may have been qualified for an entry on the basis of his remarkably fallacy-filled and incoherent letter to the Gainesville Sun – it’s a fairly typical rant displaying no understanding of any of the matters involved, and may represent a rather wide-spread kind of ignorance and denialism.

The purpose of the Encyclopedia is, however, primarily to expose the movers and shakers behind this kind of denialist anti-science attitude rather than confused, local clodpates, and Ray Davis is hardly an example of the former. Stephen Davis, however, is a good one; he may not be a creationist, but he is a HIV denialist, which is probably an even more insidious form of denialism. Davis is (at least allegedly) also a former Arizona State Senator and US Army “Physician’s Assistant” and author of a novel that claims to be “the true story of how government lies and incompetence, gross medical malpractice, and unbridled greed by a drug company cost 300,000 American lives in just ten years.” Yes, he is a crackpot conspiracy theorist and no, he has no background in science, any more than the above-mentioned Florida man. He is a little more zealous, however, and has produced some rather incoherent screeds in which – naturally – information made up and posted on his own website trumps anything published in peer-reviewed journals. His book Are You Positive was at least endorsed by Liam Scheff, who calls himself “The Conspiracy Realist”, and who praised it for his contribution to the literature on “morbid flaws in today’s quasi-religious medical establishment.”

A list of prominent HIV denialists (including Davis) can be found here. To get a feel for the level of incoherence among your general HIV denialists, you could peruse the comment threads on the otherwise excellent posts here, here, and here, though it is definitely a challenge to your mental health to do so (Stephen Davis’s claims are both, uh, defended and discussed in said comments).

Diagnosis: Appallingly crazy conspiracy theorist and jughead denialist. He is not among the most prominent proponents of this particular brand of madness, but his influence is substantial enough to be a real threat to civilization.

#590: Kevin Craig

Kevin Craig is a perennial candidate for the House of Representatives from Missouri representing the Libertarian Party (one wonders what kind of persons he would have to beat in the nomination process). More precisely, Craig describes himself as a “Christian Libertarian”, which does not mean Christian and libertarian but that he belongs, in his own eyes, to a particular brand of libertarianism. In fact, Craig seeks to establish what he calls a “Christian libertarian Theocracy”, so his brand sounds like a very, very special brand of libertarianism indeed. He is described here (this one ought to be seen, by the way).

One unusual feature of his “libertarianism” is the view that homosexuality should be criminalized. Craig believes that “Congress should: i) Hate homosexuality and homosexuals; ii) Follow God's Commandments with respect to them,” and his reasoning is that homosexuality is just like embezzlement: “Homosexuals attempt to embezzle sexual satisfaction from God's business. The entire creation is God's enterprise. God is the Boss. Homosexuals are disobedient employees. God hates them.” To emphasize that he is a radical libertarian, however, Craig does say that he doesn’t think child molestation should be illegal and punished by the government, because the government has no business concerning what goes on in people’s bedrooms.

Craig is also a global warming denialist because that seems to fit better with his political position, desperately claiming that “there is no consensus”. In fact, his website is a cesspool of New World Order  conspiracy theories, creationism (yes, Craig deploys all the silliest arguments), altmed peddling, and HIV denialism – according to Craig “The government-approved orthodox HIV-AIDS theory distracts attention from the destructive nature of the homosexual lifestyle. There are many scientists, professors, researchers, even Nobel Prize-winners, who are skeptics, and see the HIV–AIDS religion as effective political lobbying, not effective science.” One wonders whether the putatively respectable skeptics are these. That would be too bad, for the people on that list, whatever else they are, are certainly not respectable.

Diagnosis: Virtually a professional Boolean negation operator. “Craig says p, therefore not-p” seems to be a fairly reliable inference rule for the rest of us.

#538: Lawrence Broxmeyer

Lawrence Broxmeyer has been called ”today’s single most perceptive and innovative medical investigator” by himself, and is one of the few signatories to the list of ”scientist” who calls for reassessment of the HIV-AIDS link put forth by the denialist group ”Rethinking AIDS” who also has a medical degree. That’s right; Broxmeyer is an HIV denialist. He claims to be CEO of Med-America Research (not to be confused with MedAmerica), the registered address of which is Broxmeyer’s home address.

Broxmeyer has suggested that mycobacteria might be the cause of Parkinson’s Disease. So, apparently, is AIDS, heart disease, Mad Cow, cancer, Alzheimer’s, Creutzfeldt-Jakob, and even the 1918 flu. SARS, on the other hand, is just misdiagnosed tubercolosis. All the claims have been published in the crank journal Medical Hypotheses. The claims are not generally considered plausible, to put it mildly.

What ”Rethinking AIDS” predictably fails to mention is that Broxmeyer lost his medical license and pharmacist’s license in the mid-1990s, being charged with 13 specifications of professional misconduct and with “falsification of applications” by inflating his credentials. His application for restoration of his license was declined: ”[T]he COP finds that Dr. Broxmeyer continues to be self-absorbed … His misconduct was deliberate and planned and demonstrated disrespect for his profession … the COP cannot assess whether he has taken the appropriate rehabilitative steps to insure that the public would not be placed in danger again were his license restored.”

Diagnosis: Self-aggrandizing crackpot who doesn’t seem to think twice about putting people’s life in danger to forward his garbled ideas.

#499: Harvey Bialy

Harvey Bialy is an American molecular biologist and AIDS denialist, who claims to represent something called the Group for the Scientific Reappraisal of the HIV–AIDS Hypothesis. He has even written a biography of Peter Duesberg. On the other hand, he has written preciously few peer-reviewed papers supporting his denialism. That, of course, indicates a conspiracy or at least heavy bias from the editors of those journals. But Bialy has figured out that opinion pieces and activism may do just as much damage as, you know, scientific investigations.

Insidiously enough, Bialy was also a member of the South African Presidential AIDS Advisory Panel  convened by Thabo Mbeki in 2000. As such Bialy should be held responsible for actual human suffering and death, but probably won’t be. It has been reported that Mbeki’s government was, through denialism and promotion of quackery, responsible for 330,000 deaths.

A useful resource on AIDS denialism can be found here (and the main denialists are biographed here); another one is here. Some of Bialy’s explanations concerning the issue can be found here.

Diagnosis: Raving mad and extremely dangerous – his impact in the West may be relatively negligible (though his brand of denialism is a worry even here), but his impact in Third World countries may have caused extensive harm to real people already, and continues to do so.