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'Autism Mouse Models for the Microbiome?' blogs.sciencemag.org/pipeline/archi… - nice, critical blog by @dereklowe.
For anyone wondering why I'm so skeptical of these claims of links of autism to the microbiome, to me it's like having a problem with your wifi and calling a plumber
I mean, maaaaaaaaybe there is some surprising link between your plumbing and your wifi network that would explain it, but it wouldn't be the first place you'd look...
And if someone tried to convince you that it really was a plumbing problem, you'd probably regard that as an extraordinary claim and expect to see extraordinary evidence to support it...
Instead, we get lots of papers like the one critiqued in the blog above, which fall far below even an ordinary level of evidence.
You can see similar trends in other fields, especially ones that just look for "an effect" (any effect) over and over again: Calibrating scientific skepticism: wiringthebrain.com/2018/07/calibr…
In this case there is another danger: these kinds of claims risk reinforcing the fraudulent claims of Andrew Wakefield that gut problems are somehow the cause of autism
And they add to public confusion about what is, in fact, an incredibly highly genetic condition: Autism: The Truth is (not) Out There wiringthebrain.com/2014/10/autism…
