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Comment by _nedR | Hacker News Reader

Oh God. This is sounds like the cruelest prank in the world.

From the wikipedia article is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ADE_651

" It requires no battery or other power source; its manufacturer claimed that it is powered solely by the user's static electricity. To use the device, the operator must walk for a few moments to "charge" it before holding it at right angles to the body... According to Husam Muhammad, an Iraqi police officer and user of the ADE 651, using the device properly is more of an art than a science: 'If we are tense, the device doesn't work correctly. I start slow, and relax my body, and I try to clear my mind.' In one promotional video McCormick claimed that the device could detect elephants from 48 kilometres (30 mi) away."

They should be charging this guy with murder. Not fraud.

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>its manufacturer claimed that it is powered solely by the user's static electricity.

He missed out on a great opportunity to sell proprietary magic battery packs, then. A lump of concrete and a coin cell to shine a LED, all wrapped up in plastic with an oddball connector.

The reason they like the dowsing rod (because that's basically what it is) is that they just like being able to justify any action they take.

The police here in the US would doubtless love these things. A "scientific" reason to search anyone you feel suspicious of? Sign them right up!

It's merely a less baroque version of "drug-sniffing" dogs (who cue from their handlers) and polygraph tests.

The problem with drug sniffing dogs is that these dogs can detect drugs, however it is difficult to prove that they haven't also been trained to alert on other signals (or are specifically trained to do so).

Unfortunately until someone invents a handheld device which can "smell" as well as a dog's nose, I don't see this changing.

I dunno, 85% failure rate seems like they aren't actually capable of detecting at the level you're claiming.

http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/crime-courts/legal-challen...

Who needs a dowsing rod when can actually control media outlets?

I agree that he should be charged with fraud.

However the purchasers should be charged with criminal negligence. It's up to them to check the claims of the device in question and test it before putting it in the hands of people.

Are you sure?

If I buy floor cleaner based on a sales brochure describing a safe and sanitary cleaning product, and it turns out to be Hydrofluoric Acid - am I supposed to double check? How? By sending samples to a private lab?

What about software, I can't see the plugin source code, I can't see any tests done, should I have my own internal team test every possible code path before deploying as part of my app (said plugin might leak GPS data and something something idk I'm straw manning).

Essentially "Buyer Beware" is a very limiting ethos, because buyers cannot be experts in everything.

If people will be eating off that floor, or conducting surgical procedures on that floor, then yes: You're supposed to send samples to a private lab, and you would be negligent if you were buying soapy water without checking.

Do you send samples of your dish-washing liquid to a private lab?

When one makes decisions about what to purchase for a large organization, for a product which needs to perform well or people die, one assumes a degree of due diligence. A novel product requires more stringent due diligence than one which is a market standard. If no plausible mechanism of action is purported for a novel product that attempts to do things with several orders of magnitude more efficacy and less complexity than competitors, then yeah, I'm not buying it without independent testing.

If an underling at my restaurant replaced all dish-washing liquid and bleach solutions with a series of small metal figurines taped to the dishwasher and the prep tables, and told me "It cleans the surfaces galvanically", I'm not going to say "Brilliant!", I'm going to say "Brilliant, now prove it before it's allowed near my kitchen."

BOOM

(Let it go @mapt)

What about the lab itself? What if it's fraudulent? Do I need to send reports from that lab to another private lab?

More seriously though, at some point you need to stop. Capitalism is a fun game for adults, and entrepreneurship is a prestigious sport, but when people start dying because someone sold them something built with the purpose of earning him money by making other people die, one should stop hoping for the market forces to bankrupt him and just jail the murderous SOB directly.

Absolutely. The argument is not that he should be free to defraud people, the argument is that credulous buyers may still be liable for negligence charges (and certainly a civil suit and firing) after we prosecute this muppet for something in the vicinity of second or third degree murder / manslaughter by gross criminal negligence, plus fraud.

If I'm a large institution buying floor cleaner, I'll probably wash a floor or two before buying. If I notice holes being burned in my floor, maybe I'll go with an alternate vendor.

For this device, it's pretty clear how to beware of it for anyone who took stats 101. Put a grenade or a soda can (depending on a coin flip) into a bag. Point the detector at the bag, record the # of times the detector goes off when grenade vs soda can. Do this double blind.

Use this calculator to determine how many times to do this: http://www.evanmiller.org/ab-testing/sample-size.html

Then type the results into this calculator:

http://www.evanmiller.org/ab-testing/chi-squared.html

Don't buy if it says "No Significant Difference".

Total resources needed: 2 soldiers, 1 grenade, 1 coin, internet.

The most important requirement for the testing methodology is double-blindness. Only someone familiar with proper scientific testing procedures would know that, and even scientists who should know better have gotten this wrong. Most people would probably think that single-blind testing would be enough to confirm whether this works or not (assuming you couldn't judge its plausibility on pure physics principles), but you would be amazed at the ability of humans to pick up informational cues unconsciously. The way dowsing works, in general, is through ideomotor responses[1]. The stick moves due to unconscious muscle movements that are amplified by the instability of the rod itself. The muscles move unconsciously based on what the person believes.

Even if the person who is operating the device doesn't know if the grenade is present, they may be able to pick up unconscious physical tells from the person who does (if he is present during the test). When the person who knows sees the tester approaching, they may unconsciously reveal this knowledge through body language that could be picked up by the tester. A similar phenomena occurred with a horse[2].

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ideomotor_phenomenon [2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clever_Hans

This is all true. But on the other hand, this is all knowledge accessible to any college graduate who majored in a STEM field. Any army or other large organization should have at least one or two such people on hand.

    > 2 soldiers, 1 grenade, 1 coin, internet.

You forgot the soda can. :-)

Maybe.

But if a couple of hundred janitors and building occupants have died from breathing hydrofluoric acid fumes, and someone still chooses to order the continued use of the floor cleaner in question, that someone should in my opinion be charged with manslaughter if not murder.

You're expected to have some knowledge of what you're buying. And at every level above retail, you're paying enough to get some kind of demonstration or trial. And during this, you're supposed to demonstrate or try it and see if it actually works, and works for your organization.

You can't expect a seller to be at the beck and call of every buyer, especially ones who seem unconcerned about the sale.

Selling magic sticks should not be illegal.

Buying them with public funds for public safety applications, however...

Lying about what your product is and does should absolutely be illegal.

Tell that to the "super food" industry.

Pomegranate drinks, I'm looking at you.

I don't know the examples you are talking about, but yea, in an ideal world I'd fine the crap out of "super food" companies. The problem is that they tend to have copywriters talented enough to phrase things in such a way that it is just barely not a totally obvious lie.

For context: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bml8KwCmob8

Yes, and at least there you can pick up on the marketing double-speak and guess that it doesn't work.

Also: "low fat" or "low sugar" products that normally don't contain much fat or sugar to begin with. Like "low fat" ice cream that compensates the reduced fat with more sugar (d'oh).

Yeah, that sounds like a recipe for failure... You can eat low fat ice-cream and low-sugar cake and end up eating more fat and sugar than you would get from regular ice cream and cake.

Funny you should mention that: http://consumerist.com/2015/01/30/appeals-court-sides-with-f...

Part of the problem is that the FTC is only so big, with only so many people, and the entire market is huge. I agree that even the allowable claims are suspect, but there are limits, even if they're not always enforced.

The problem is that there's no way of holding the buyers accountable if their own countries and the taxpayers whose funds they are misappropriating refuse to do so.

It turns out the American World Police isn't so effective in things that could actually use some policing. And even sections of their proper police bought into the scam.

Being able to sell magic/fraud legally only means that client will be more cautious when buying.

Regulation is not to protect the dumb, it is to promote competition when the majority of consumers are clever enough to not try a service that has not been proven not to be a fraud.

For example, Amazon would never have worked if it was legal to sell book online and not sending them. People would only shop in local shop where they pay for the book they have in their hands and we would be all laughing at the (few) morons that thought they could trust a website. And that works for simpler things too - would you try a different brand of food if it is legal to poison stupid people, would you even try another shop than the one you trust the owner ?

Yep. And you can see this firsthand in Third-world countries, where people are very reluctant to do business with anyone who isn't a close friend or family member for this very reason. The result is an enormous amount of inefficiency.

That's pretty dark/cynical view of the reasons for regulations.

The tone of the comments at the time when I replied was more like "fool and his money are easily parted" and I framed my reply focusing on why not allowing the fool being parted with his money is really good for everyone.

But you are right, I overdid it.

Spot on. I am very reluctant to try supplements from unknown brands, because I've heard previous scandals (in my country) where the amount of supplement has been way off (both too much and too little), without any serious action taken against them.

'supplements' in general are snake-oil, so I wouldn't worry about it too much...

Selling bomb-detecting magic sticks to military knowing in full that they are not working and people will be put in life-threatening situations trying to use them is malicious and sociopathic, not just fraudulent. If anyone got hurt because of his bullshit detectors let a bomb pass, he should be fully responsible.

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