Science Magazines Violating Their Own Missions

by Brian Dunning
June 30, 2007

Today we're going to sit back with our favorite science magazine, open a cold beverage, and read outrageous pseudoscience claims. How's that? Have they lost their editorial way? Not quite: They've lost control of their advertising departments.

I've been a reader of popular publications like Scientific American and Popular Science for many years. I enjoy the articles but I always have to deliberately avoid the last pages where they tend to run advertisements for blatantly pseudoscientific products: aphrodisiacs, herbal supplements, magic jewelry, and the like. Now obviously, Popular Science has to make money and advertising is one way they do that. If their hands were completely tied and they tried to be too restrictive about what types of ads they run, they might not make the money they need. Even skeptical readers like me would rather see them in business than out of it, so we should probably allow them the leeway they need to make the money they need. Right? Well, maybe. It's a give and take. The more bogus ads they run, the more it cuts into their credibility. These publications put themselves out there as proponents of scientific advances, and when they publish even third-party materials that run counter to this mission, they're contributing to society's built-in adhesion to the Dark Ages.

I contacted Popular Science's advertising department and asked for their advertising guidelines. I wasn't able to get anything on paper, but I did get a verbal instruction that the products they advertise must actually work and must do what the ad says they do. OK, interesting. Let's open Popular Science and see if the advertised products are truly evidenced to do what they claim.

Here's an anti-aging supplement on page 90 that will make you look and feel younger, stronger, perform better, and recover faster. Plus it's "lab tested" and "highest rated". Apparently, that's good enough for Popular Science.

On another page I find a "trust potion". It's a spray that "compels others to trust you" and "fuels intimacy". A trust potion, Popular Science! Shouldn't this be your cover story? Can we get an article about this? Obviously you must agree that it does what it claims.

I actually did find one ad for a useless product that says, as required, that its statements have not been evaluated by the FDA — but only one, and my understanding of the law is that this is required of all ads that make unsupported medical claims. This one's for a "Super Male Pill from Europe". Oh, it's from Europe! We'd better read on. It's an "all natural super sex pill" and it makes some very specific claims for its male enhancement results that are a little too racy for this podcast. I counted 24 exclamation points in this one advertisement. Generally, exclamation point count is considered the hallmark of responsible reporting. But not to worry, this product does promise that it will not cause "blue vision".

Here's an ad for a pheromone additive for your cologne. It says it was published in a "respected biomedical journal". But they are looking out for you: They advise you to "reject cheap imitations".

Here's a two-page spread with facing ads for competing male enhancement products. One of them is "doctor approved", offers 5 inches of "enhancement", and sells for $120 for a three month supply. But the other is "natural", offers only 1 to 3 inches of "enhancement", and sells for $327 for a six month supply. Even though the latter product doesn't enhance you as much, it's worth so much more because it's natural and not doctor approved. Once again we have excellent proof that anything all-natural is much better than anything doctor approved.

One of the most bizarre ads in Popular Science is for a water filter — or something; neither their ads nor their website is willing to tell you exactly what their product is — that claims that pure water, filtered water, and distilled water are toxic, and that their special water machine (whatever it is) is the only way to get water that doesn't "spread disease". Among the mess on their home page are claims that going to the dentist can give you AIDS, pure water causes serious prostate problems, water is "dead", Internet search engines "lie to push their own hidden agenda in spite of human suffering", and my favorite, "sellers of pure water products are breaking the law by hiding facts from buyers that they need to make an informed buying decision!" (exclamation point). Thank you, Popular Science magazine, for alerting us to these dangers.

Scientific American is perhaps not as guilty of spreading this nonsense as Popular Science, but their closet is by no means totally clean either. In nearly every issue they run a full page ad for an outrageously priced exercise machine, and it states clearly that four minutes a day on this machine gives you the same benefit as 20 to 45 minutes of running, plus 45 minutes of weight training, plus 20 minutes of stretching, plus it balances your blood sugar (whatever that means), plus it repairs bad backs and shoulders, plus it will make your body look so good that your friends will all buy one too — all in only four minutes a day. Now I don't want that company to sue me, so I'm not going to make a statement like those claims are all blatantly fraudulent, but I find it bizarre that a magazine with standards for the products they advertise could have read over that copy and found it to be acceptable. And by the way, the same ad is also in Popular Science.

If you make the decision that your mission is to advance science, it makes no sense to undermine that mission by publishing ads for products that are fraudulent or that make unsupported bogus claims. So I can only assume that Popular Science does not have the advancement of science as their mission, or if they do, it's in some kind of "negotiable" status. So, buyer beware, and read with caution. The standards here are basically the same as those for Oprah or Montel.

By Brian Dunning
Follow @BrianDunning