Even on some best-case assumptions, a 'link' does not tell us which factor
is the cause of which, or whether both factors might be caused by some third
factor.

If they checked the data, they might find that people who eat fish on Friday
have more babies than those who eat red meat on Friday. Wouldn't prove the
fish caused the babies. In fact, both would be effects of a third cause:
being Catholic.


On 22 Dec 2004 19:18:21 -0800, wrote:
/snip/

> Homocysteine has been linked to heart disease by William
> Castelli, senior investigator of the largest clinical heart
> study in history, the Framingham Study.

/snip/

> Neurologists at the Boston University School of Medicine
> obtained blood samples from 1092 elderly healthy subjects
> over an eight-year period. During the course of the study,
> 111 of those subjects developed dementia, diagnosed as
> Alzheimer's Disease.
>
> Those who developed Alzheimer's had enormous increases of
> homocysteine in their blood when compared to those who did
> not develop dementia.

So maybe early stage Alzheimer's causes increase in homocysteine, instead of
the other way round.



Skinny