My written debate with Jonathan Howard MD on whether vaccines cause autism

Howard seems to have forgotten about Morning Report where scientists engage in vigorous verbal debate. Now he demands all discussions be in writing. OK. I'm good with that.

Executive summary

People on our side of the narrative are always happy to engage in oral or written discussions of evidence with our scientific colleagues (e.g., anyone with a non-zero h-index).

But people on their side will only engage in written discussions. This is very odd because, for example, Morning Reports which all doctors participate in, are never done in writing.

Because they cannot think on their feet, I will accommodate their need for time to prepare each response. This will be a living document of my written debate with Jonathan Howard MD.

Presumably, I’ll write on this blog and he’ll reply on his blog. Someone can merge the two documents at the end. This is how he wanted to do it.

Let the discussion begin.

The rules are simple: Dr. Howard must fully answer the question before countering with a question of his own. Just one question on each side at a time. Otherwise, it is too hard to follow. I will adhere to the same rule for questions he asks me.

Dr. Howard should dedicate a single article on his blog for his responses just as

My questions to Dr. Howard

1. Dr. Howard, you have claimed in your writings that vaccines don’t cause autism. I have gathered a lot of evidence that this is flat out wrong. I am requesting you respond in writing to each and every piece of evidence listed in my article here and refute each with evidentiary support and not hand-waving arguments. You can refute each piece of evidence by explaining with evidentiary support why it is wrong and why your evidence is more trustable and reliable. For the 214 papers in the scientific literature showing the link between vaccines and autism listed in the article, simply list those papers you believe are flawed and the evidentiary support for your claim. You can accept them all as valid which will save time; you need only refute the ones you disagree with.

My responses to questions from Dr. Howard

<tbd>

Dr. Howard responds!

The debate is over. It was faster than I thought. It only took minutes.

Dr. Howard has talked about vaccines being safe and not causing autism on Twitter, but Dr. Howard will not engage in a written debate on any topic except what he has written about specifically.

I guess that’s the way science works: you are only allowed to challenge a scientist on what they write on their blogs, nothing else.

The challenge was posted to Twitter

Summary

That was quick.