The purpose of this post is to highlight how scientific studies can be biased and propagated for a specific agenda. This is a guest blog post.
The following are a couple examples of how “peer-reviewed independent studies in reputable academic journals” can be complete nonsense which contradict common sense and observable evidence.
1. The regret rate of mutilating one’s body to change gender, a.k.a. “Gender Affirming Surgery,” is supposedly only 0.3%. Click here to read the study.
2. Watching pornography and engaging in masturbation are supposedly fine according to the “scientific experts” and porn-induced erectile dysfunctions are a myth. Click here to read the study.
It doesn’t take much effort for one to debunk both of these studies. One simply needs to understand the flawed methodology of the studies and also trace the funding for them. Proper due diligence will lead the person to real experts with accurate studies on the topics.
Note that the two studies above clearly go against the rulings and wisdom of the Sharī‘a. We as Muslims know from clear and logical proofs that Allah is the Creator and therefore that all of the laws of the religion are for our benefit. Not obeying the laws of the Sharī‘a causes harm in both this life and the next.
Hence we must not be fazed when we see reports/studies/news media which attack or go against our religion. We must remember that science does not exist in a vacuum, free from political and economic agendas. The ruling elites have throughout history always used the guise of ‘science’ to push their propaganda on to the masses.
It is a travesty to see many Muslims, including scholars, who get confused by each new ‘scientific’ and ‘peer-reviewed’ paper. As mentioned previously, some scholars have been duped by the mainstream covid ‘pandemic’ narrative, others think they have to twist Quranic verses and hadiths to fit the evolution narrative, whereas others think global warming is a real crisis and our Fiqh must be altered in light of it.
This is why the following matters are imperative:
1. Everyone ought to study ‘ilm al-kalām, logic, philosophy, and metaphysics thoroughly. As this knowledge is the grounding for one’s world view and everything else one can learn about every other science.
2. Muslims must study not only the ‘hard sciences,’ but also the liberal arts and social sciences on our own terms. The result of divorcing these sciences from the traditional curriculums most people study in madrasas has been a patent disaster on all levels.
The lazy strategy of many scholars and students of knowledge to blindly say “We must follow the experts!” with regards to ‘worldly’ issues must be rectified. It has in fact led to hundreds of millions of Muslims doing taqlid of complete charlatans (and even outright shayāṭīn who wish to harm humanity) on many issues that have impacted their health, wealth, and their imān itself.
You now might wonder: Well, what are the methodological flaws of scientific studies that you claim are present? There are a number of methodological errors with how scientific studies are done today. The three most important ones are:
1. P-hacking
2. Lack of replication
3. Abuse of the peer review system (via bribery and other means)
Here’s a not so well kept secret about most published studies: If you measure a large number of things about a small number of people, you are almost guaranteed to get a ‘statistically significant’ result.
Finding a “statistically significant result” sounds impressive and helps scientists to get their paper published in high-impact journals, but ‘statistical significance’ is in fact easy to fake. This phenomena is known as ‘p-hacking’ or ‘data dredging.’
This is why throughout the past few years there has been an explosion of news headlines citing multiple studies that all give contradictory conclusions. Such as some studies showing that a small amount of alcohol consumption is good for the heart, while others saying that any amount of alcohol is bad. Some studies will claim chocolate is good for weight loss, others will claim it is bad etc.
This is a must-read on this topic: Stanford University’s John Ioaniddis’ landmark 2005 paper “Why Most Published Research Studies Are False.” Click here to read the study.
This rush to publish statistically significant results and thus gain more fame and wealth means that there is practically no interest or funding by anyone to actually replicate other studies in order to verify their results. The vast majority of studies with ‘statistically significant’ results are never replicated. It is even accepted by most mainstream scientists that irreproducible/rare results are almost always frauds. In a large number of notable cases, the peer review process fails because the peers all have conflicts of interest.
To read more about all of the above with far greater detail, check out this link from James Corbett.
One of the most prominent cases of fraud occurred in the 1960s, when the sugar industry paid off scientists at Harvard to show that sugar had no impact on the heart and rather it was meat that was to blame for heart disease. This lie was repeated ad nauseam in all medical schools for several decades. Click here to read about it.
The two studies in the start of this post can easily be debunked by checking the following:
1. The extremely high suicide rate and regret rate of transgenders can be seen in the studies on this site which even includes breakdowns of studies that advocate transition surgery use.
2. Dozens of studies on porn induced erectile dysfunction collated by the excellent YBOP site which has been attacked by porn industry itself. Click here to read more on that.
This is sufficient for the prudent person to not take every headline at face value or to be overly awed by so called ‘scientists’ and ‘experts.’ For information on each of the various geopolitical frauds which have been given the “support of the consensus of the scientific community” such as climate change, covid-19, GMOs, vaccines, overpopulation and more, search through this channel to see the previous posts on the topics.
The Kaafiyah Channel 