The Sound Of Settled Science

22 Replies to “The Sound Of Settled Science”

1. That explains why country kids are so much smarter than city kids, and why city kids have less cavities.

   1. As always, words matter – the article states at twice the recommended level… Gosh, if you (I am looking at you civil servants!) do not follow the recommended guidelines, then yes, “stuff happens”. I still think adding fluoride at the recommended levels helps with dental health. I know it certainly did for my siblings and I back in the early 1960’s.

      1. Don’t think so. Kids don’t drink a hell of a lot of water these days. If you want the stuff, by toothpaste with fluoride in it. By the way, my brother had real problems with his teeth due to fluoride…. fluorosis.

2. I think it’s worse than that. Fluoride disrupts the natural process of creating testosterone within the male body. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the “teeth whitening” products exploded on the shelf about the same time it became trendy for more than a handful of males to start “wearing dresses”.

   1. Whitening toothpaste has the same Fluoride in it as regular toothpaste. The whitening comes from peroxide.

      Fluoride also doesn’t fit with the rise of bottled water. Have you ever seen a soyboy drink tap water? Hormones in plastic, maybe. Except PET (water bottles) never used BPA.

      1. I was looking at it from a perspective of focus. Go back a couple decades and check out some photographs. Everyone had yellow teeth. They might have brushed daily or twice daily, but it wasn’t a focus…and most didn’t brush after every meal like they do now. I know some younger people who are obsessed with the whiteness of their teeth. It’s a vanity thing I guess. Always brushing.

         And, that bottled water….over half of them are tap water (at least in the US….something like 65%). The cheaper ones (and more popular ones as a result).

3. Just starting the walk back. From “that’s crazt conspiracy talk” to “it requires more study” to “in certain circumstances” to “we meant well”.

4. Gee, unexpected risks and consequences from Big Government mandates? How surprising.

   But also, this is a report about a CORRELATION. They -do not- know if flouride at any level really and truly affects brain development. They have at most a suspicion that maybe there might be something worth looking at.

   As in, this is more bullsh1t to scare the peasantry. Same as “wear a mask to fight the covid!”

   1. Well there is the old saying that if you have to use statistics to prove a point, you haven’t done the right experiment.

   2. Quite right: correlation means nothing unless causation has been shown. This report produces nothing about causation. It contains no biochemistry work which would suggest such a cause. It’s a mere statistical study in which the numbers surveyed and the method of survey selection is NOT revealed. Nor does it contain the relative risk in the analysis. If the RR is low, it’s mere nonsense.

      Like you I suspect this is pure BS.

      1. You can’t have one without the other. C & C as it were.

5. The United States Department of Education at any level lowers the IQ’s of children.

6. This is one of the areas of science where the results are mirky. Much of the research is plagued by poor quality, confounding factors, and fluoride levels far higher than is recommended:

   https://www.nature.com/articles/s41432-024-01022-6

   “Needs further — and better — research” is not the most satisfying conclusion, but in this case it’s warranted. In the mean time, erring on lower levels of added fluoride is probably advised.

   1. How about NO fluoride added at all?
      The occasional fluoride rinse, no problem, but in our drinking water? No thanks!

   2. Ohhhhhhhhhh mommaaaaaaaa … fluoride in the water is the LEAST of the educational and intellectual worries of The Oakland Unified School District …

      https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/elevated-lead-levels-detected-water-fixtures-22-19713069.php

      No, it’s lead in the drinking water that has (evidently) caused crashing test scores and sagging graduation rates. Phew! For a minute there … the MAGA types were blaming the OEA Teachers Union. Yes … lead in the drinking water … in 2024. And just like elevated levels of fluoride … the 5 parts per BILLION of lead in the drinking water must be causing Oakland students to become stupid … and pursue lives of crime.

   3. You spelled “milky” wrong.

7. Yes, A nice cloudy glass of low IQ female hormone water.. I feel my man boobs growing as my brain shrinks.. Compelled to vote liberal..

8. The television is a contributor to IQ decline, I’m sure. Double the TV dose will really make an idiot of you. When I was a kid we had no TV, and when we finally got one it was an old B&W, and we had one channel available. ONE. We spent lots of time outside, and we read a lot. I had to search the local libraries for books on the stuff I was interested in, a process that brought me into contact with many other interesting subjects. Library surfing.

   I’m still a sucker for used-book stores. So many treasures in them, once you get past the mountains of Stephen King and Danielle Steele paperwasters. They can hardly give those away.

9. Is it odd that lists of ingredients or contents never include % of fluoride?

10. Precious bodily fluids and fluoride… Was Kubrick another future-seer?!

    1. That’s why I avoid water except to shower.

    2. Turns out the crazy general was a real guy. Kubrick included him in the story, based on the real crazy general.