Talk:Boyd Haley

Whitewashing?

Does this article really need to be so one-sided? This biochemist (not a medical doctor) has been making claims about mercury, and has complained on the record about being called a quack. Now that appears notable to me, yet this article whitewashes the gentleman uncritically. What has happened to WP:NPOV? JFW | T@lk 19:37, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

This article does need to be cleaned, but I do not appreciate your condescending tone to the fact that he is a biochemist. I would hate to rant here but the fact that Dr. Haley is not a medical doctor is completely irrelevant. Reguardless to the beliefs of the completley uneducated public who think all important discoveries pertaining to health are made by medical doctors, scientists are those who are responsible for intiiating new treatments and researching their toxcicity. Medical doctors have the primary responsibility of treating the sick with pre-developed techniques. While medical doctors are the defacto emmisaries of public health due to their personal contact, they are by no means the end all authority on human health. We all have our jobs. A biochemist attempting to perform cardiovascular surgery would be an overstep, but a chemist with a toxicology background and a chaired university position making a statement about mercury toxcicity is more within his field than a doctor would be making the same claim. Please get your facts straight on the hard sciences before you make a snap judgment about this man's credentials. Very few of the medical innovations of the past century have been made by medical doctors, and without biochemists we would still have no idea how heritable information gets passed on (i.e., DNA.) Stop assuming phd's are med school drop outs and insulting those who are bettering this country. Now, having attended multiple lectures by this man I should be able to find his references in one of my old binders this weekend, and I will type them out when I find them. Mercury and alzheimers have been linked in several studies. Whether this is definitive has yet to be determined, as it is a complex disease that has many possible causes.I do know that he has credible references, he was the chair of the UK chem department for years, a position that is not doled out to "quacks" as you so elegantly put it. I am not saying he is right on all counts, but that enough research has been done for the consideration to be made. Whiteknight521 (talk) 08:31, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

I agree -- it's a bit of an advertisement. Phrases such as "Haley surmises ...", "Haley suggests ...", and "Haley speculates ... " abound, and yet there are no references for any of these "speculations" and no references to scientific articles anywhere in the article. Without citations, there's no way of knowing if Haley even holds any of the views acribed to him in the article, much less knowing anything about the validity of these claims. Scot ^→Talk 05:36, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

"His research results support the contention that mercury vapor exacerbates Alzheimer's symptoms." Really? Where is the reference? Mercury has well known neurotoxic effects, but that is quite different from Alzheimers. This kind of statement really must be backed up by credible references if it is to survive the cut.Jellytussle 22:19, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

This article is severely unbalanced. This guy is very controversial with his fringe POV. His ideas are cited widely by mother's groups and conspiracy theory alternative medicine types, and are likely responsible for multiple child deaths because of failure to get necessary vaccinations. I have tagged the article accordingly. -- Fyslee / talk 15:17, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Reference

I added a reference for Hayley's observations about mercury in the hair of children with autism and substituted it for the autism.net link. In addition, the effects of mercury toxicity are quite distinct from Alzheimer's...I don't think the two of them would necessarily be lumped in the same category. Andrew73 13:56, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Another Thiomersal controversy page

So the people named or described here (and if this is to be a biographical page, surely it should only be about one person) are predicting a decrease in Autism starting 2 years after Thiomersal use declined? Shouldn't that be brought out as well? Didn't Thiomersal use decline more than 2 years ago in the US? Midgley 00:12, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

a medical (pharmacological) digression on the kidney

A quote overleaf tells us that mercury is well known for inhibiting the kidney... The first diuretics were Mercurial. We have lots better stuff now, but unless one is ratehr careful to specify what one is talking about in that connection, one is apt to look like a buzzword generator. Midgley 00:28, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

pretty good description ...

"... Haley has produced evidence supporting his hypothesis ..."

The way to do it though, is to produce a hypotheis that explains the evidence. Midgley 20:56, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

I assume the evidence already existed - then he produced it. Sloppy wording, not an attempt to trick you. 24.128.186.53 (talk) 16:30, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

Gulf War etc

The GW bit needs backing up, rather well.

The quote about adults weighing more than beabies should be refernced to where it came from, not where an un-WP:RS version of it sits. Midgley 11:22, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

so ";Quote

A single vaccine given to a six-pound newborn is the equivalent of giving a 180-pound adult 30 vaccinations on the same day. Include in this the toxic effects of high levels of aluminum and formaldehyde contained in some vaccines, and the synergist toxicity could be increased to unknown levels. Further, it is very well known that infants do not produce significant levels of bile or have adult renal capacity for several months after birth. Bilary transport is the major biochemical route by which mercury is removed from the body, and infants cannot do this very well. They also do not possess the renal (kidney) capacity to remove aluminum. Additionally, mercury is a well-known inhibitor of kidney function.www.vaccination.org.uk/v/haley.html ^{[citation needed]}(WP:RS) Boyd Haley"

Not about him

So shouldn't be in an article declared to be about Boyd Haley, should it...

"Another researcher, Dr. Mady Hornig of Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, is testing gold salts on mice specially bred to be susceptible to thimerosal."

Midgley 22:05, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

• I agree. The sentence is irrelevant to Haley and should go. -AED 23:39, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

Change to lead

I recently changed lead to acknowledge what the text of the article already concedes - medical consensus is against Haley's positions. Thiomersal and dental amalgams as a cause of autism/dementia is not widely held in the medical community and rejected by major medical and governmental positions. Yobol (talk) 04:00, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

After reading this I bet that that is why my dentist doesn't use the old amalgam filings. Mercury may not hurt you but my dentist may publicly go along with the "consensus" but he isn't going to take a chance. 24.128.186.53 (talk) 16:33, 8 February 2015 (UTC)

False allegation

As to my recent edit and its reversion, I think that the allegations are false [diff]. Effectively, all I did did was properly cite Haley's view—which the article did not cite—and removed, not added, undue weight. I actually didn't add any "fringe views". So what is the real problem with citing Haley's views via Haley's own publications?

Unreliable sources for medical content, gives undue weight esp. when set against reputable bodies and framed as a mere dispute. See WP:GEVAL. Alexbrn (talk) 09:37, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

To begin with, I did not notably add any "medical content": I rephrased the Wikipedia article's extant content that attributed particular, controversial views to Haley, but which did not source those views. Further, the sources that I added were review articles published, by Haley with colleagues, in journals indexed for Medline. That you call those "unreliable sources for medical content", and favor no sources for the "medical content", suggests that all of the "medical content" ought to be altogether deleted.

What is the substantive difference in my saying that the PHS and ADA have "disputed" his claims—versus "rejected" his claims? I changed it from saying "rejected" to saying "disputed" since, believe it or not, that is how science operates, and even the PHS and ADA would not balk at my characterization. Be that as it may, you could simply revert to saying "rejected", not completely revert my edit. If you cannot come up with better arguments, I will again add the actually reliable sources that I had added earlier to the article, but will defer to your preference for saying "rejected" rather than "disputed". And if that is not good enough, then I will delete the unsourced alleged "medical content". Occurring (talk) 19:05, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

You're not going to play off weak sources like obscure articles in Biometals against mainstream health authorities framing it as a "dispute". This is antivax pov-mongering. WP:GEVAL. Alexbrn (talk) 20:06, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

You're not going to play off no sources at all, and your mere opinions, for Haley's actual views on biomedical topics, framed against common-knowledge views by mainstream healthcare authorities in statements that do not even mention Haley. Occurring (talk) 20:21, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

The putative "medical content" shall be properly sourced, or I'm going to delete the putative "medical content". Occurring (talk) 20:24, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

See WP:PSCI. We are obliged to frame pseudoscience within a mainstream context. Alexbrn (talk) 05:52, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

That is quite correct. Now, please, raise a point relevant in this discussion concerning my edits, and reveal it with an edit differential. Your whole allegation rests on paranoid associations spotting the word disputed (versus the word rejected). — Occurring (talk) 18:46, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Double standard on "medical content" and reliable sources

In this biography-of-living-persons article, Haley's, see my latest edit [diff]. It corrects such putative "medical content" as user Alexbrn has tacitly deemed appropriate and properly sourced: sourced to a fringe journalist, and, at that, misrepresenting that journalists' summary of Haley's view. Is the actual standard of editing enforced here merely to make Haley look, not like a holder of a minority viewpoint, but instead like a holder of only ridiculous viewpoints? — Occurring (talk) 23:26, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

Fringe journalist? Alexbrn (talk) 05:26, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Anti-vaccinationism is now mainstream? Olmsted "edited the Age of Autism website, an anti-vaccine site which he described as the 'Daily Web Newspaper of the Autism Epidemic' " ["Dan Olmsted" Wikipedia article]. — Occurring (talk) 18:44, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

That is how you do it

Alexbrn, I checked the article just now and noticed your newly heeding Wikipedia guidelines—by adding, not deleting, reliable sources. In fact, I myself had gathered the Offit citation yesterday, but was awaiting a day to pass before adding it, merely so that you don't, upon a technicality, post another notice on my talk page—this time for alleged edit warring—when I also add other sources with it. Now I will continue to edit the article via neutral point of view by including, in due weight, all major and significant minority viewpoints found in reliable sources (not merely in your assumptions).

Whatever your sentiments, the journal Biometals, indexed for Medline, is a reliable source to reveal Haley's actual views, and you are not a reliable source for that information. Also, I will correct some of your overstatement, since even the authoritative sources in the Haley article do not indicate that Haley argues "incorrectly". Rather, they state that no scientific evidence validates such claims as correct. In fact, many mainstream scientists, merely in the medical minority, do think that mercury exposure via healthcare may cause neurological impairments and diseases. And despite your baseless accusation that I'm anti-vaccinationist, neither dental materials nor vaccine ingredients require mercury. — Occurring (talk) 20:01, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

I made some changes to the section headings to be more specific than just healthcare. I think thimerosal controversy is an accurate, neutral title for the vaccine section.

I also think Occuring has a point that incorrect is too strong a word for a scientific controversy, although it should be made clear that Haley's claims are against scientific consensus, maybe the article could say "argues counter to the scientific consensus" ?

Also, what do you mean by mainstream scientists in the medical minority? Tornado chaser (talk) 02:21, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

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