To the Editor:
I’ve been watching the water fluoridation argument over the last several months with a certain disdain for the quality of scientific arguments from the anti-side of the debate. If those persons seeking to remove fluoride from our water have proven anything to me, it’s a fundamental lack of understanding of scientific process and terminology.
Over the last several months, the anti-fluoridites have cited various studies claiming that the bio-accumulation of fluoride causes anything from carpel tunnel to cancer.
The first problem with this argument is that it cites causality from a scientific study. This caused that. Any reputable scientist could tell you that causality cannot be proven in science. Science deals primarily with two concepts: association and correlation. The latter is a strong and hard to prove term.
If you can prove correlation, say, between obesity and heart disease, you can confidently say that lowering the rate of obesity will lower the rate of heart disease because heart disease is often related to obesity. However, the more common result of a scientific study is association, which is more along the lines of, “well, the two things might possibly have something to do with each other but I’m not really sure,” which is what the studies behind the anti-flouride argument say.
The anti-fluoridites are using an ancient structure of argument here: post hoc ergo propter hoc, or in English: after this, therefore, because of this. Basically, this argument states that because B happened after A, A caused B. Almost all the time, this argument is wrong.
The anti-fluoridites cite one particular study performed in urban Southern California that claims to have proven a weak association between water fluoridation and cancer. The study claims that cancer rates have climbed in the observed region since fluoridation began, and claimed that there are higher rates of cancer in these regions than in regions where water is not fluoridated.
The study, and subsequently the anti-fluoridites, assume this association arose due to fluoride and didn’t consider any other factors. They didn’t consider that the largely impoverished people studied are far more likely to eat processed foods, are far more likely to be subject to other toxins in their drinking water, and that they are far less likely to get medical care when they need it. Not to mention, the study didn’t account for the fact that water fluoridation began at the same time that the fast food industry was taking off.
Anti-fluoridation arguments are pseudo-science at best: the only truly scientific studies done on fluoride have found a slight correlation between improved dental hygiene and the presence of fluoride in the water. Please, don’t gamble on pseudo-science when you vote.
Timm Gormley
Damariscotta
