Bio-Bunk? - The Final Episode!

Biorhythms

The Skeptic's Dictionary by Robert Todd Carroll

With comments by Russ Streiffert - BioMap^tm

Biorhythms con't.

One of Dr. G.'s favorite proofs for biorhythm theory was his claim that Mark Spitz, who had recently won a phenomenal number of Olympic Gold medals in swimming events, achieved his successes while at biorhythmic peaks! I asked Dr. G. if anyone had checked the charts of all the other winners and losers at the Olympics. He was unimpressed with my question and apparently saw no need for such an investigation. It seemed to me, however, that if there was anything to these biorythmic peaks and criticals that a statistically significant number of winners' charts would resemble Spitz's chart and a statistically significant number of losers would show charts at critical lows. My gut feeling was that any such study, if properly done, would probably show that there was a chance distribution of where anyone's chart lines were on the days they won or lost. But the true believer needs no such test to assure him of the validity of his theory.

According to the results of a recent study published in a medical journal - the popular "anti-depressants" prescribed widely to the tune of possibly millions of dollars in this nation alone, "..only work if the patient believes they will work." Actually a skeptic = a doubter.

Again, to true believers, tests that have not been able confirm the theory are rejected in favor of tests which create new cycles to fit the data or which make correct retrodictions.

"...tests that create new cycles to fit the data?" What is this man talking about?

They reject cases which do not fit their theory by the ad hoc hypothesis that some people are "arhythmic" some or all of the time. To the skeptic, there is nothing in the literature that indicates that biorhythm theory has any validity and a great deal in the literature which indicates that the theory is false.

Here they mean their own literature of course. "Arhythmic" is really spelled "arrhythmic." By the way, new evidence could indicate that many people with low levels of neurotransmitter substances (melatonin, serotonin and dopemine) could have heightened sensitivities to beat frequencies. Beats are interference patterns that can be created by inadequate synchronization between a circadian sleep-wake cycle (unsupported by low levels of neurotransmitter substances) and an external queue such as a daylight pacemaker. In years past researchers used the term arrhythmic to mean less sensitive not non-cycling.

 

There have been several meaningful tests of the theory, all failing to support it. "note 4" One of them dealt with Thommen's claim that he could predict with 95% accuracy the sex of a child by the biorhythms of the mother. If, during conception, the mother's physical (masculine) cycle was at a high point, a boy was likely. If, during conception, the mother's emotional (female) cycle was at a high point, a girl was likely. (I wonder how many couples fell for this and scheduled their sexual relations according to their desire for a boy or girl child?) A study done by W.S. Bainbridge, a professor of sociology at the University of Washington, concluded that using the biorhythm theory your chances of predicting the sex of the child were 50/50, the same as flipping a coin. A defender of the theory suggested to Bainbridge that the cases where the theory was wrong probably included many homosexuals who have indeterminate sex identities. The defender's husband claimed to be an expert in biorhythms and was unable to predict accurately the sexes of the children in Bainbridge's study based on Bainbridge's data. Little wonder.

We should point out that radical ideas accompanied many emerging sciences. Ideas ran the gamut regarding the influence of bio-rhythm and as with all references to other published materials, we are not attempting to defend these ideas. We simply do not want to throw out the baby with the bath water.

 

Let us not forget what these "skeptics" consider to be a meaningful test. Certainly not a double blind study.

 

Freud's involvement in the infancy of this discipline was certainly unfortunate yet, the attention even incorrectly gave rise to a tidal wave of experimentation and the results will outlast the press. In those days many men were searching for universal theories and to be sure some of Freud's work is still very valuable. But mainly within the field of psychoanalysis. Biology and more recently physiology have absorbed the chronobiologic disciplines and provided a respectable scientific structure.

 

Indeed the last chapter of our understanding on the human timing structure has not been written. It would be strange to finally discover genetic differences in our sensitivities to inherent and consequential cycles based on gender. We have already found many physiological and psychological differences between the sexes previously attributed to social roles and perceptual differences. Programming versus preprogramming is really the question.

In all fairness, I must add that the list that follows is straight out of Mr. Carroll's book. I have provided it to show the extent of the integrated thinking that our skeptic authors have devoted to this topic. By all means - read on and decide for yourself.

Further Reading

Gardner, Martin. Science: Good, Bad and Bogus (Buffalo, N.Y.: Prometheus Books, 1981), ch. 11, "Fliess, Freud, and Biorhythm."

Randi, James. Flim-Flam! (Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books,1982), ch. 8, "The Great Fliess Fleece."

Notes

1. The alleged biorhythmic cycles of this theory have nothing to do with real and well-established biological cycles, such as the menstrual cycle or circadian rhythms.

This statement is simply untrue. These cycles are inescapable for many patients and individuals. While in the past they have been described as inherent to all individuals and many factious interpretations were attributed to them - these and other inaccuracies have not eradicated these rhythms.

There are several cyclic patterns of changes in physiology or in the activity of living organisms which are synchronized with daily, monthly, or yearly environmental changes. Rhythms that vary according to the time of day (circadian rhythms), in part a response to daylight or dark, include the opening and closing of flowers and the nighttime increase in activity of nocturnal animals. Circadian rhythms also include activities that occur often during a 24-hour period, such as blood pressure changes and urine production.

These statements are generally true, but watch how fast our friend moves into LaLa land after such a credible beginning.

Annual cycles, called circannual rhythms, respond to changes in the relative length of periods of daylight and include such activities as migration and animal mating. Marine organisms are affected by tide cycles.

Circannual rhythms are thought to be measured out in days. The length of the Earth's rotation has not varied more than a few seconds in over ten thousand years. Mating elk for instance, when moved from the fairly balanced [12hr light-12hr dark] central latitude to the all light or all dark of a polar region will loose weeks according to our calendars but will mate right on time according to their day count. On the other hand, marine organisms will continue to move up and down the beach in response to the Moon even indoors in the absence of a tide.

 

So, do these external cues rule or not?

Although the exact nature of the internal mechanism is not known, various external stimuli including light, temperature, and gravity influence the organism's internal clock; in the absence of external cues, the internal rhythms gradually drift out of phase with the environment. Microsoft Bookshelf & copy 1987 - 1992 Microsoft Corp.

Note: In the absence of external cues, the internal rhythms do not drift out of phase with each other. In recent years, chronobiologists have attempted to reclaim the cycle bands mentioned above. Their efforts have garnered little attention but it has lent credence to some of the original empirical evidence uncovered years ago.

2. During certain 25 day periods you will have nine bad days, the three at the beginning, three in the middle and three at the end. To calculate the odds for the year, assume that the second day of the year is a switch over day. Then there will be seven bad days during the first 23 day cycle [days 1, 2,3,12, 13,14 and 23]. There will be 15 full 23 day cycles in every 365 day year. The 2nd through the 15th cycle will have 6 bad days each. The remaining 20 days of the year will have 4 bad days in them. That yields a grand total of 95 dangerous days a year for your physical health, or 26% of the time you are in physical danger.

Now this IS numerology - or just nonsense.

3. Freud's letters to Fliess were preserved, much to Freud's dismay. They were first published in English as "Origins of Psychoanalysis: Letters to Wilhelm Fliess Drafts and Notes, 1887-1902." Edited by Marie Bonaparte, Anna Freud and Ernst Kris, translation by Eric Mosbacher and James Strachey (London: Imago Pub. Co., 1954). A more recent translation by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson is available: "The Complete Letters of Sigmund Freud to Wilhelm Fliess, 1887-1904" (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1985). Fliess's masterpiece is entitled "The Rhythm of Life: Foundations of an Exact Biology" (Leipzig: 1906).

By listing only these references for the defense our skeptics are excluding almost a hundred years of subsequent research. All they offer as a challenge is a list of other skeptic references to support their own case.

4. Some of these tests are discussed in Randi's "Flim-Flam!", ch. 8. He notes that Terry Hines did a review of these studies and published the results in "The Skeptical Inquirer", but he doesn't mention what issue.

See also Terence Hines, "Pseudoscience and the Paranormal" (Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1990).

The End

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