http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/uzc56d00

Pag 62 provides a flavor for Heckman’s left turns: “because you are talking about their preferences between today and tomorrow today and between tomorrow’s today and the next day and those can be different”.

Pages 154 to 157: after explaining his rational addiction theory, where smokers know their risks, and claiming that the public knows the risks of smoking, Heckman is unable to state the risks of a smoker dying from lung cancer.

Page 205: Heckman gives his expert opinion that advertising has no effect on smoking; its only effect is on brand choice. An opinion convenient to his sponsor:

http://www.tobacco-on-trial.com/archives/2005/04/06/its-only-brand-switching

The trick of course was the standard of proof, which the industry conveniently set so high that by that standard virtually nothing could be proven a cause of disease.

The industry uses the same trick today on secondhand smoke:

“they establish a standard of proof that is impossible to meet, such as suggesting that the only way to be sure of a conclusion is to conduct an experiment such as a randomized controlled trial. It is simply ethically and practically impossible to randomly assign people to be exposed to controlled levels of ETS for a given length of time, wait for them to die (or kill them), then conduct autopsy to verify the precise cause of death.”

http://www.tobacco.org/Misc/oshapost.html

The great thing about this trick: it’s not a denial. Instead it’s a magnificent obfuscation, dressed up as commitment to scientific rigor. And it accomplishes two things for the industry: doubt and delay.

It’s pretty easy to see how doubt is the aim here today: the industry wants to persuade the judge that we just can’t be sure advertising causes smoking. No denial, no one says it doesn’t, we just can’t conclude it does. The evidence that it does, doesn’t meet this standard of proof. This standard that’s conveniently high.

However, delay is an aim today, too. The evidence mounts and mounts that (surprise) advertising increases consumption for this product. At some point the evidence is compelling. The industry aims to put off that day as long as possible. The industry wants today not to be the day.

“A demand for scientific proof is always a formula for inaction and delay of the guilty…in fact scientific proof has never been, is not and should not be the basis for political and legal action”

An example of (private) candor from BAT scientist S J Green.

http://www.ash.org.uk/html/conduct/html/tobexpld1.html

So, Heckman says the research evidence isn’t proof. No proof! No scientific proof! By this standard of proof.

I would love to see Heckman apply that same standard to the tobacco industry’s own economic “research” that claims to show that smokefree workplaces hurt business. For instance:

http://www.tobaccoscam.ucsf.edu/fake/fake_ctb_internal.cfm

It seems that when this industry has something that’s in its interest to regard as proven, the standard of proof is very different. Opinions are facts, anecdotes are data, and this constitutes economic research. The industry does not invoke the same standard here. I call this “the amazing shifting standard” of tobacco research.

A related trick: that third factor! You measure advertising and smoking, you see a relationship, well, could be that advertising and smoking go up together because of it’s a third factor that causes them both:

“pre-existing ‘preference’ for the allure of smoking. Such a preference, then, would influence BOTH attention to such advertising/merchandise AND initiation of smoking later.”

This is quite a flashback — industry PR on smoking and cancer for decades pushed a third factor:

“[tobacco industry] research projects attempted to show that both lung cancer and smoking were caused by some other ‘third factor,’ such as a person’s psychological makeup, religion, war experiences or genetic susceptibility”

http://www.prwatch.org/improp/ctr.html

I find the similarity striking. Decades ago, the third factor was proposed to get tobacco product off the hook. Turns out smoking doesn’t cause cancer after all — no, turns out you can’t be sure that smoking causes cancer. Today the third factor tries to get tobacco advertising and promotion off the hook. Turns out smoking ads don’t cause smoking — no, turns out you can’t be sure that smoking ads cause smoking.

The industry likewise pushes the third factor on secondhand smoke. You measure exposure to secondhand smoke, you measure disease, you see a relationship, well but it could be a third factor. A confounder.

In this too, the amazing shifting standard appears. Tobacco industry consultant Lee’s “inconsistent application of his standards to papers that agree and disagree with the tobacco industry’s position” has standards shifting so fast and so far, it’s, well amazing:

http://www.tobacco.org/resources/documents/960123oshapostpost.html

Like Lee, Heckman is very good at pointing out possible confounders in research that disagree with his sponsor’s position.