Comment by Jimmc414
21 days ago
Why does it matter how the list was compiled? Is the information accurate or not? The first link you referenced with the cherry picked sentence about uncertainty for levels below .7mg/l was a meta analysis of 74 different studies, 64 of which showed a negative correlation between child IQ and fluoridation. This isn’t even taking into account evidence of a positive correlation for early onset puberty, sleep disruption and bone cancer with fluoridation.
It matters because your statement of "Here’s a list of the most convincing studies or meta analyses." assumes some kind of curating. If all you're doing is providing something akin to a google search, it's not really valuable.
> It matters because your statement of "Here’s a list of the most convincing studies or meta analyses." assumes some kind of curating.
Agreed
So what? Asking “What is the best evidence in favor of this” is equivalent to saying I don’t want to google this, so google this for me. Literally all researchers at all levels in all fields use google for this stuff. I was in academia for years.
Yeah finding some random links through google that one does not go through to -to some degree- verify/vouch for is identically bad practice. Researchers do not cite studies that just happen to come up in their google searches, they actually try to assess the quality of the research, understand the methods/results etc. Nothing like this happened here. Giving such a wall of links as an argument to a discussion without checking their quality or relevance is more akin to trolling behaviour than academic research.
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> Asking “What is the best evidence in favor of this” is equivalent to saying I don’t want to google this, so google this for me.
Perhaps I should note that I had indeed (believe it or not) already Googled this before asking the question. I asked not because I was too lazy to search but because I didn't know if my search was turning up the best studies from anyone's perspective.
So, no, this wasn't equivalent to saying "I don’t want to google this, so google this for me."
> So what?
Put simply, it's a wall of links. No quotes. No claims. Its valid to ask if the person posting the links has actually read those articles, or if there is a primary source recommending them. (Or no source if it's LLM copypasta.)
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It matters when you say it has the "most convincing" evidence as if you have read them all and are keeping up with the field and didn't just summarize them with some service like https://consensus.app/
I don't know if what you are repeating is slop, etc. I can't trust the source.
A single recent systematic review is more trustworthy than that.
You don't know, but it is not. Feel free not to read it.
Okay, well, let me know how you came up with the list?
Also, nothing in that list of papers supports your initial claim? I know you'll say you didn't claim anything, so I will say also, that nothing in those links provides for what the prior commenter asked for evidence for.
Other than, fluoride consumption at high concentrations is bad (which is something that was already agreed upon, and is not being questioned in this thread)?