The Born Free Protocol

[Wyva]

Joshua Leisk's work is impressive and has led to some great achievements: now I have an even lower opinion of his activity, which I didn't think was possible before. Congrats!

 

[Peter T]

If six percent of people with ME/CFS do recover, what percentage of them go on to develop a marketable treatment package which becomes a major source of income?

Given the enormous range of backgrounds of these evangelical recoverees, and the equally large variation in their ‘treatment’ protocols, are the only commonalities between them are that they had sufficient activity levels to invest in their preferred approach and they experience recovery? So we can conclude that no specific approach is necessary to develop a marketable treatment, but that recovery is a sufficient and necessary precursor?

Sellers of these packages urge us to look at recovery stories, but is the only reasonable conclusion of such variety that the only thing they all have in common is recovery? Then surely the only reasonable conclusion is not that package x or package y or package z causes recovery, but that recovery enables individuals to develop their chosen package.

 

[Jonathan Edwards]

So the recovery causes the treatment, not the treatment causes the recovery.

 

[Sean]

Must be some mighty powerful woo if it can reverse causality.

 

[Sasha]

Must be some mighty powerful woo if it can reverse causality.

Personal experience is a powerful thing. People don't think in statistical terms. (That's what we're here for.)

 

[Peter T]

Must be some mighty powerful woo if it can reverse causality.

If someone is experiencing an ongoing steady recovery, but early on in that starts an ‘intervention’, then as they continue to improve they are more able to double down on the intervention. So their commitment to the intervention is associated with further improvement, so it is understandable that cause and effect become confused.

 

[Yann04]

I found what is almost certainly Leisk’s reddit account. Most of its activity is dispensing medical advice related to the protocol in long covid and ME/CFS subforums. There is also plenty of evidence that the user of this account believes in alien visitation and is an antivaxxer.View attachment 29740
His account.

View attachment 29742
Arguing that “alien remains” are genuine.

View attachment 29741
Arguing that the Covid vaccines do more harm than good.

Good detective work. I wonder what’s best way to use this information.

 

[Yann04]

The major costs and effort this protocol take make me wonder if it might create a sunk cost fallacy similar to the LP.

 

[InitialConditions]

I found what is almost certainly Leisk’s reddit account. Most of its activity is dispensing medical advice related to the protocol in long covid and ME/CFS subforums. There is also plenty of evidence that the user of this account believes in alien visitation and is an antivaxxer.View attachment 29740
His account.

View attachment 29742
Arguing that “alien remains” are genuine.

View attachment 29741
Arguing that the Covid vaccines do more harm than good.

This should come as a suprise to no one.

 

[spitshaw]

I was googling this protocol and came upon this thread. I saw Whitney Dafoe released a new video this week where he's had major improvement in his condition (considering the starting point at least) and is talking again which is incredible. He mentions in the post that he thinks his improvement could be down to this protocol so could there be something in it somewhere?

 

[Utsikt]

I was googling this protocol and came upon this thread. I saw Whitney Dafoe released a new video this week where he's had major improvement in his condition (considering the starting point at least) and is talking again which is incredible. He mentions in the post that he thinks his improvement could be down to this protocol so could there be something in it somewhere?

Hi and welcome!

ME/CFS often fluctuates naturally, like most diseases do. I know a person that was about as sick as Whitney, improved to better than mild and got back down to the same level again. That’s an extreme example, but it illustrates that changes in severity doesn’t have to be cause by something you did.

Even so, people have a tendency to attribute improvements or deterioration to whatever they did at the time, because we seek explanations. And it’s nice to think that we have some kind of control over this horrible disease.

Unless they are able to present robust data, there is little reason to believe that they’ve found the needle in the haystack. We’ve seem countless examples of protocols before that have failed (and eventually gone out of fashion), and we will continue to see more of them until we finally get a better understanding of what’s going on.

Keep in mind that Whitney has been constantly trying something for many many years. So you’re bound to have something line up with natural improvements, and therefore look like it was the cause of the improvement.