{"id":14136,"date":"2018-06-01T15:49:37","date_gmt":"2018-06-01T19:49:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/buzsakilab.com\/wp\/?p=14136"},"modified":"2021-06-16T18:32:17","modified_gmt":"2021-06-16T22:32:17","slug":"cuba-sonic-attack-conspiracy-theories-and-flawed-science","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buzsakilab.com\/wp\/2018\/06\/01\/cuba-sonic-attack-conspiracy-theories-and-flawed-science\/","title":{"rendered":"Cuba \u2018sonic attack\u2019 conspiracy theories and flawed science"},"content":{"rendered":"

Science works best when qualified people can evaluate evidence without political pressure to draw poorly founded conclusions, say 15 neuroscientists and physicists. Read the full story below or at\u00a0theguardian.com<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>

As neuroscientists and physicists we have no reason to dispute that US diplomats living in\u00a0Cuba<\/a>\u00a0heard loud noises, or that they reported feeling ill afterwards. Some US politicians have seized on these reports to construct conspiracy theories in which they imagine a mysterious disease-causing \u201csound ray gun\u201d \u2013 something that isn\u2019t possible with today\u2019s technology. These same politicians have used their positions of authority to present their speculations to a credulous public as though they are fact. The pronouncements, in turn, have led to international confrontation and hysteria, resulting in the removal and expulsion of diplomats, and travel advisories. Now, an apparently analogous incident has been reported in China.<\/p>\n<\/div>

<\/div><\/div><\/div>

A \u201cpreliminary communication\u201d from the University of Pennsylvania, with US government support,\u00a0published in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association<\/a>\u00a0(JAMA), has been used to buttress this putative \u201cacoustic attack\u201d idea with science. In fact, that work is deeply flawed, and does nothing to support the attack theory. We thus applaud the recent paper by Sergio Della Sala and Robert McIntosh, for its thoughtful criticisms of the JAMA report, and praise the effort described in the Guardian (Cuba calls on US and Canada to investigate \u2018sonic attack\u2019 claims<\/a>, 29 May) to engage in an international scientific collaboration to study any connection between the illnesses and sound. Science works best this way, when qualified people can evaluate evidence without political pressure to draw poorly founded conclusions.<\/p>\n

We hope that sober and calmer heads will prevail in de-escalating this frenzy, avoiding a chill in both diplomatic relations and scientific collaboration between the US and Cuba.<\/p>\n

Mark M Rasenick\u00a0<\/strong>University of Illinois College of Medicine<\/em>
\nGy\u00f6rgy Buzs\u00e1ki\u00a0<\/strong>New York University<\/em>
\nMark S Cohen\u00a0<\/strong>University of California, Los Angeles<\/em>
\nAlan C Evans\u00a0<\/strong>Montreal Neurological Institute<\/em>
\nKarl J Friston\u00a0<\/strong>University College London<\/em>
\nJanina R Galler\u00a0<\/strong>Harvard University<\/em>
\nRainer Goebel\u00a0<\/strong>Maastricht University<\/em>
\nSteven A Hillyard\u00a0<\/strong>University of California, San Diego<\/em>
\nMay-Britt Moser\u00a0<\/strong>Norwegian University of Science and Technology<\/em>
\nGregory V Simpson\u00a0<\/strong>Think-Now<\/em>
\nRobert Turner\u00a0<\/strong>Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig<\/em>
\nMitchell Vald\u00e9s-Sosa\u00a0<\/strong>Cuban Center for Neuroscience<\/em>
\nPedro Vald\u00e9s-Sosa\u00a0<\/strong>Cuban Center for Neuroscience<\/em>
\nJohn Darrell Van Horn\u00a0<\/strong>University of Southern California<\/em>
\nArno Villringer\u00a0<\/strong>Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>

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