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Alan Dove responds to his XMRV/CFS/ME critics... from TWIV podcast..

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
There are quiet a lot of posts there that in no way attack Alan. In fact most of them. He sees what he wants to.
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
He's like the British parliament when Churchill was warning them that Nazi Germany was re-arming.

No, don't be daft, it's this way.
It's this way because I have heard it's this way.
What read something.
No, it's this way.
 

gracenote

All shall be well . . .
Messages
1,537
Location
Santa Rosa, CA
This is from the same page:

Welcome to Dovdox
Dovdox is the personal site of Alan Dove, Ph.D. (who actually writes the blog), and Laura Dove, M.D. (who keeps Alan in line). Physically, the Drs. Dove live near Springfield, MA. If you want to contact one of us, please use the contact link above.

Laura, my dear, you have some work to do!
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
I really wish we could get this guy to listen. There is nothing worse then telling and speaking the truth, and for others to stick to their prejudices.
 

parvofighter

Senior Member
Messages
440
Location
Canada
Busted

I was happily writing another magnum, and didn't realize the big news had broken. Way to go Laurel! Here's what I posted on the Doktor's website: and TWIV:

From: http://alandove.com/content/2010/08/xmrv-cfs-and-the-nature-of-science/comment-page-1/#comment-54

WHY THE HEAVY PSYCHIATRIC BIAS?
Initially I was perplexed on reading Dr Alans strident, unscientific, and illogical comments about patients with ME/CFS here (http://www.twiv.tv/2010/08/08/twiv-94-xmrv-with-dr-ila-singh ,http://dovdox.com/content/2010/08/xmrv-cfs-and-the-nature-of-science/comment-page-1/#respond ). To whit a few gems:

1) A couple of other studies have tried to reproduce those results, and failed.
Clearly Dr Alan hadnt done his homework or didnt know that a reproduction (aka replication) of science required that the same patient cohort definition be used (it wasnt); and that the same testing methods be used (they werent). Puzzling, to have this apples-and-oranges confusion coming from a PhD in Microbiology, and from an ostensibly prepared interviewer.

2)Theyre ill (the ME/CFS patients) often debilitatingly so and want clear answers and a cure immediately, if not sooner. Im not ill (thankfully), and I think like a scientist. And thats the real problem. The great Doctor clearly determined that he cornered the market on scientific thought, while the rabble those pesky patients were mired in emotion. An entertaining comment albeit false. Time after time, patients attempted to educate the good Doctor on ME/CFS cohort definitions; glaring methodological flaws in the failure studies (i.e. patients with persistent viral symptoms were explicitly eliminated from the BMJ study); sweeping and unscientific conclusions made in liberally-interpreted CFS studies that have historically obliterated precise scientific into ME/CFS; and the myriad of physical studies that support a viral etiology (http://dovdox.com/content/2010/08/xmrv-cfs-and-the-nature-of-science/comment-page-1/#respond ). Interestingly, Doctor Alan was incapable of grasping the scientific reality that if you pack enough depressed or out-of-shape patients with no physical findings of illness into Graded Exercise Therapy they will get better! And the minority of genuine ME/CFS patients swept up in the excitement of this CFS cohort will appear as a tiny blip of background noise. Their often devastating immunological response to exercise will be ignored as it has been for decades.

3)The second feature of science is its unique claim to truth. Its conclusions are equally valid for Christians, Muslims, Jews, and atheists.. What Dr Alan has adoringly missed is that science is a product of humans, and at the end of the day, human frailties can railroad the best of science and its interpretations. Just ask Galileo. Thus scientific conclusions are NOT equally valid for retrovirologists versus psychiatrists in the bizarre inferno that is ME/CFS research. Thats the whole problem! If this podcast were This Week in Psychiatry, I could understand Doktor Alans segues into the psych domain. But the TWIV podcast should have been an objective discussion on the retroviral and lab science on XMRV without psychiatry-infused overtones, such as that embodied in Alans comment on nausea being an example of an outbreak.

4)Following the scientific evidence means following all of the scientific evidence, not choosing only the studies you like. The extremely vocal CFS community (just look at this comment thread) is not shy about shaping policy to favor their views. Thats acceptable practice in politics, but I wouldnt call it scientific validation. And I wouldnt call the psychiatrists who believe CFS is psychosomatic a small group. I started to get that Spidey Sense about HERE. As Alan noted himself, he left laboratory research to become a science journalist, a job better suited to his short attention span (http://dovdox.com/content/about-2 ). Why then was he so clearly invested with the psychiatric paradigm of ME/CFS? Why was he using emotive and motivational lines such as, Many folks here seem to be laboring under some serious misconceptions. First, and by far most disturbing, is the subtext that calling a disease psychiatric is tantamount to calling it bullshit. (http://www.twiv.tv/2010/08/08/twiv-94-xmrv-with-dr-ila-singh ). Would the good Doctor expect any other reaction if he were to say that another retroviral illness say AIDS was psychiatric - and that hence "treatments" should be psychiatric? Would he expect any different reaction if AIDS patients had almost exclusively been offered exercise-and-mind-control-as treatment for nigh on 3 decades? Arent interviewers supposed to be scientifically impartial?

SO I DID SOME DIGGING.
All it took really was one click from Alans petulant and ponderous XMRV, CFS, and the NATURE of SCIENCE page (http://dovdox.com/content/2010/08/xmrv-cfs-and-the-nature-of-science/comment-page-1/#respond ) to his About Us page (http://dovdox.com/content/about-2 ) and presto, things started to fall into place.

THE IMPACT OF SCIENTIFIC DISCLOSURE ON SCIENTIFIC CREDIBILITY
One of the marks of an objective scientist is that (s)he will openly and freely make disclosures about factors that may impact their scientific objectivity particularly when they are serving as an interviewer in a hotly contested subject. If ever there was a time to make such a disclosure, Alans TWIV interview on XMRV (and his grandiose, sweeping statements on ME/CFS) was IT!

Yet he chose to remain curiously silent on the fact that he is not only married to a psychiatrist, but that her Areas of Interest are uniquely:

Areas of Interest
Consult/Liaison Psychosomatic Medicine (http://www.baystatehealth.org/AcademicAffairs/Main+Nav/Departments/Psychiatry/Faculty/Dove)

Knowing how much Alan loves science, and in the interests of transparency, I thought it might be helpful for his followers to see the following:

Psychiatric Fellowship

Dr. (Laura) Dove completed a fellowship in Psychosomatic Medicine at the Yale University School of Medicine in New Haven, CT. (http://www.umassmemorial.org/WingIP.cfm?id=5470 )

And so it is with tongue wedged firmly in cheek that I provide the following exact quote from Allans About Us section http://dovdox.com/content/about-2

Dovdox is the personal site of Alan Dove, Ph.D. (who actually writes the blog), and Laura Dove, M.D. (who keeps Alan in line).

This pun is just too good to pass up. Did someone mention sleeping with the devil?

Postscript: Does the fact that Dr Alan Dove is married to a psychiatrist with a specified Interest in Psychosomatic Medicine automatically render his comments on ME/CFS null and void? No. Not automatically. And certainly not if his interview and subsequent comments on ME/CFS and XMRV reflect thoughtful, objective science and an unfettered thirst for the truth.

However given Doktor Alans unscientific comments on XMRV and ME/CFS and his pro-psychiatry bias presented without disclaimers nor disclosures we might be heading in that direction.

Busted
 

parvofighter

Senior Member
Messages
440
Location
Canada
Put your comments on Doktor Dove's website

P.S. I think you can still post on Doktor A's website here: http://alandove.com/content/2010/08/xmrv-cfs-and-the-nature-of-science/comment-page-1/#comment-54

My update:.... Or not... just read Otis' post #19. FYI I did get a screen cap for posterity, of that lovely comment by the Doktor:
Update: Comments are now closed.... Now you can go yell at someone else and then wonder why they stop listening, too.
Quite the objective scientist, eh? Can't wait to use this screencap in one of my presentations when I get better.:Retro wink:
 
Messages
58
My response to Alan Dove -- I doubt it gets posted -- below:

You really should have disclosed your wife's specialty interest in "Psychosomatic Medicine." (An oxymoron if there ever was one.) You should definitely have disclosed it on TWIV, where I felt your approach to the topic and to Dr. Singh were shallow, uninformed, and condescending, and also bewildering since the interview was with a retrovirologist about her XMRV research. Your focus on any possible psychiatric explanation for CFS was inappropriate and confusing in that context. I believe TWIV needs to follow up with your open disclosure of a distinct conflict of interest, in the interests of maintaining any kind of journalistic standard or ethos.

Additionally, your comments in the above blog -- comparing a CFS patient's dismay at being labeled mentally ill, by analogy to some women's sensitivity about the size of their butts -- and urging CFS patients to "try not to step off any balconies," in which you suggest their "craziness" and suicidality through your choice of metaphor -- are patently offensive. You try to trivialize the illness by feminizing it -- a time-honored ploy. Since your wife also has a degree in Comparative Literature, maybe she can help you understand just how hostile, misogynistic, and insensitive you sound.

You are neither a scientific thinker, nor an ethical journalist. You produce propaganda, and dress it up as being somehow "scientific," "objective," and "unbiased." No journalist would behave as you have done, by concealing your own conflict of interest and bias.

Here's to your future exposure as a hack, and your wife's future exposure as a quack.
 

Daffodil

Senior Member
Messages
5,875
i wish dr. timothy luckett would post on his blog...his sister suffers with CFS and he was very informative.
 

Wayne

Senior Member
Messages
4,300
Location
Ashland, Oregon
I just showed this article to my partner. Her quick take: "Sounds like he's nothing but a muckraker". Which begs the question, how much time should we waste on muckrakers?

It's seems pretty apparent we'll never get through to him. Is it worth it to try to get through to others who may read his missives? Even though I did respond to his blog earlier, I'm now thinking not.
 

jspotila

Senior Member
Messages
1,099
Most people were very happy that Dr. Racaniello invited Dr. Singh to come on the show and discuss XMRV. Most people were really happy with Dr. Racaniello's analysis of the recent study on XMRV in seminal fluid. A few people (who may or may not be CFS patients) have posted comments on the TWiV blog and Dr. Dove's blog telling him he is ignorant, unfeeling, misinformed, etc. And the comments in this thread about his wife and his career are unpleasant.

Regardless of what you may think of Alan Dove, Dr. Racaniello seems to consider him a friend. How do you think Dr. Racaniello will react to CFS patients having a go at his friend? Do you think that talking about Alan Dove's alleged ignorance, bias, and his wife endears CFS patients to Dr. Racaniello? To TWiV? To the press?

We have this conversation every time CFS patients engage in discussions with a heavy dose of scorn and disdain. Some of the comments about the show were professional, well-reasoned and polite. That helps us. Making cracks about this guy's wife DOES NOT. And do not hide behind the forum and say that these nasty comments were not on his blog - THE MEDIA READS THIS FORUM, and draws conclusions from what they read.
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
jspotila, can I ask, has the CAA sent any educational material to Racaniello and Dove? It would be really helpful if they were made aware of the real situation.
 

LaurelW

Senior Member
Messages
643
Location
Utah
People get pretty hot under the collar about these issues, Jenny, with good reason, as I'm sure you well know. It would be best if everyone were impartial, just discussed the facts, and wasn't rude about it. I'm not disagreeing with you that people should be civil. But let me just point out that Dr. Dove has persistently made comments on TWiV that show that he is not an unbiased scientist, he has an agenda, and that he is close-minded. Every well-reasoned, informative response on his blog was met with the same close-mindedness and contempt that he has previously demonstrated. It's very difficult not to get frustrated with this type of person, as we have had such a huge overdose of this in the last 30 years. In contrast, Dr. Raccaniello is impartial, fair, well-informed, open to new ideas, and is an example of the kind of scientist that I wish they all were. I don't see anybody getting incensed about his comments.
 
Messages
13,774
edit: LaurelW posted while I was typing, and I agree with he points too.

I think jspotilla is partially right, in that we should think about how and why the responses of CFS patients so often turn people against us.

But I also think Dove's writings on CFS seem pretty poorly thought through, and that his wife's work could well be relevant to that. Ideally we could find a way of raising the problems we have with his posts without dipping into personal attacks and the sort of emotional responses that turn so many against us.

Also - lots of the replies to him do exactly this! But people's attention will always be drawn towards the weakest attacks, and the least well thought through replies. I think that we should all try to encourage each other to only post replies when we've been able to take the time to calmly work out exactly what we want to say, and to be sure we're making compelling points.

I know that I certainly churn out the odd angry response to things - but when posting on a site likely to be read by those previously unfamiliar with CFS I always try to stop myself from posting until after I've calmed down and been able to read it through again later (I normally just delete them anyway). The immediacy of the internet can be good, but it can lead us astray too.

It's a shame he has not taken the time to reply to the thoughtful responses that he has received, but has instead been reduced to straw-manning his critics. It's irritating, but still worth trying to avoid posting irritated replies imo.
 

V99

Senior Member
Messages
1,471
Location
UK
An impartial observer would look at the responses and clearly see the wide range and diverse opinions of patients, careers, and perhaps even some doctors. They would then understand that there is no specific personality type for ME/CFS, and the comments are a cry for help.

I suggest that people should send Alan evidence of the current situation, i.e. scientific literature that demonstrates the thinking behind ME/CFS, and how McEvedy and Beard changed this. We have the truth on out side, we should use it.
 

Sam Carter

Guest
Messages
435
Most people were very happy that Dr. Racaniello invited Dr. Singh to come on the show and discuss XMRV. Most people were really happy with Dr. Racaniello's analysis of the recent study on XMRV in seminal fluid. A few people (who may or may not be CFS patients) have posted comments on the TWiV blog and Dr. Dove's blog telling him he is ignorant, unfeeling, misinformed, etc. And the comments in this thread about his wife and his career are unpleasant.

Regardless of what you may think of Alan Dove, Dr. Racaniello seems to consider him a friend. How do you think Dr. Racaniello will react to CFS patients having a go at his friend? Do you think that talking about Alan Dove's alleged ignorance, bias, and his wife endears CFS patients to Dr. Racaniello? To TWiV? To the press?

We have this conversation every time CFS patients engage in discussions with a heavy dose of scorn and disdain. Some of the comments about the show were professional, well-reasoned and polite. That helps us. Making cracks about this guy's wife DOES NOT. And do not hide behind the forum and say that these nasty comments were not on his blog - THE MEDIA READS THIS FORUM, and draws conclusions from what they read.

I'm 100% with Jennie on this issue.

Effective advocacy / communication requires suasion and diplomacy.

When I read an ill-tempered "correction" I cringe and think "Pyrrhic victory".