Mark Hansen wrote:JREF is the James Randi Educational Foundation. It looks like Tobias posts a lot of stuff about Autism on there. It wouldn't surprise me that someone from this forum also goes on there, and gave Tobias a heads up about the discussion here.

I'm not going to argue the merits of anyone's evidence on this subject, but I don't think it is possible boil down the increase in Autism to any one particular agent. In all likeliehood, it is being caused by a mixture of different factors, such as genetic factors, environment, pre-natal disease in mothers, the increased use of psychoactive drugs in the last 30-40 years, and who knows what else.

If you really want to attack the validity of any particular study, you better have a degree in Bio-Statistics. I'm assuming the vast majority of the people posting about this don't, including myself. I do have a friend who has such a degree, and it a very complicated field, with a lot of nuances that lay people wouldn't understand. Also, a lot of people who do research studies don't necessarily have the training as Bio-statisticians, so they can come to false conclusions quite easily, albeit unconciously. My friend, who is very good in her field, has looked at studies and ripped them apart once she has actually looked at the raw data.

clocker bob wrote:

Mark Hansen wrote:JREF is the James Randi Educational Foundation. It looks like Tobias posts a lot of stuff about Autism on there. It wouldn't surprise me that someone from this forum also goes on there, and gave Tobias a heads up about the discussion here.

So he's their resident pro-pharm kook. Glad to see he's being treated as an objective source here- speaks to the gullibility of some EA members. Do you find his claims to have 'not known who Eli Lilly was' before yesterday credible?

newberry wrote:

It wouldn't surprise me that someone from this forum also goes on there, and gave Tobias a heads up about the discussion here.

Me. I posted at JREF that there was a mercury/vaccine/autism discussion here.

Mark Hansen wrote:

clocker bob wrote:

Mark Hansen wrote:JREF is the James Randi Educational Foundation. It looks like Tobias posts a lot of stuff about Autism on there. It wouldn't surprise me that someone from this forum also goes on there, and gave Tobias a heads up about the discussion here.

So he's their resident pro-pharm kook. Glad to see he's being treated as an objective source here- speaks to the gullibility of some EA members. Do you find his claims to have 'not known who Eli Lilly was' before yesterday credible?

I don't know, and I don't really care. Quite honestly, with his statements about Autism in his family, it wouldn't surprise me if he had a form of it himself, since he seems to have a single-minded focus about the subject. That singlemindedness is one of the markers of the syndrome. If you have Autism, and you are that focused on one particular subject, or a small range of subjects, then it is credible, because it might be outside the subject the person is focused on.

clocker bob wrote:

Mark Hansen wrote:

clocker bob wrote: Do you find his claims to have 'not known who Eli Lilly was' before yesterday credible?

I don't know, and I don't really care.

Well, I care, because it's preposterous to think that someone could have that much data on autism and vaccines at his fingertips and not know that Eli Lilly is a giant pharmaceutical company. It's like someone who researchs gas stations saying, "Exxon who?". I don't like being lied to.

Richard wrote:

newberry wrote:

It wouldn't surprise me that someone from this forum also goes on there, and gave Tobias a heads up about the discussion here.

Me. I posted at JREF that there was a mercury/vaccine/autism discussion here.

Thanks for inviting a commie here.

"TobiasTheCommie"
wtf

Mark Van Deel wrote:

We're seeing an autism epidemic unfold before our eyes

Whether that's even happening is also an open question.

clocker bob wrote:

Mark Van Deel wrote:

We're seeing an autism epidemic unfold before our eyes

Whether that's even happening is also an open question.

Are you in the camp that attributes the 1200% increase over the past 15 years to 'a broader diagnosis'? Or are you in the camp that doesn't call a 1200% increase an epidemic?

clocker bob wrote:Oh, and for the record- I went to JREF forum and read their threads on Autism. TobiasTheCommie is to autism over there what I am to 9/11 here. Here's a thread that was begun by JREF member Mephisto:

http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?p=2038947

Mephisto began his thread with a paste. Here's the beginning of it:

autism thread 'vaccine nation' on JREF forum wrote:A Capitol Hill Mystery: Who Aided Drug Maker?

by Sheryl Gay Stolberg

WASHINGTON, Nov. 28 — Lobbyists for Eli Lilly & Company, the pharmaceutical giant, did not have much luck when they made the rounds on Capitol Hill earlier this year, seeking protection from lawsuits over a preservative in vaccines. Senator Bill Frist, Republican of Tennessee, tucked a provision into a bill that went nowhere. When lawmakers rebuffed a request to slip language into domestic security legislation, a Lilly spokesman said, the company gave up.

TobiasTheCommie was the second reply to the post. Still think Eli Lilly was a mystery to TobiasTheCommie before yesterday? Clocker Bob called him out, and CB was right.

TobiasTheCommie wrote:If you have any specific questions please ask.

clocker bob wrote:My question: you joined the forum on February 9, 2007, and you were armed and loaded with info on the autism question. Are you part of the Eli Lilly 'rapid response' team that goes around the web trying to put out any Thimerosal brushfires?

TobiasTheCommie wrote:I answered that already.

These are all articles i have written on my websites. Go and see, there is a date showing when i wrote them.

I have no idea who Eli Lilly is.

clocker bob wrote:Caucasian, please.

Here's TobiasTheCommie boasting of his contributions to the EA Forum in a thread that Newberry made to alert JREF that there was an autism thread here:

tobiasthecommie at JREF wrote:k, i'm flooding it with data now.

clocker bob wrote:

Antero wrote: That's not a legitimate question, that's paranoiac rudeness.

Read my post before this- do you think it's funny when people with a freaking website named autismmyths.com lie to you about knowing 'who' Eli Lilly is? Anything rude about that?

Why don't you reply to my post following my response that you quoted, where I clearly lay out the case for not ruling out the vaccine link at this early date?

clocker bob wrote: TobiasTheCommie has a site called autismmyths.com- do you think it's beyond the realm of possibility that he has received a little friendly money from the pharm industry? That's a pretty awesome domain name for a private citizen to control.