Biorhythm Theory is Essentially a Pseudoscience

Another slashing article about biorhythm theory.

Biorhythm theory is essentially a pseudoscience, purporting to deal with biological cycles ignored by those scientists who study biological rhythms, those in the field of Biochronometry, which among other things, involves the circadian rhythms that govern our sleep and wakefulness cycles. In a nutshell, regardless of the variation of the theory used, the idea is the same: to enable people to forecast whether they are going to have a good day or not. Biorhythm theory is supported primarily by numerological jiggery-pokery, media hype, anecdotal accounts, and what is known as the Forer Effect, the tendency to perceive general statements that can apply to anyone as specifically applying to oneself.

In the various mutant strains of the theory that have popped up over the years, a 38 day Intuitional cycle, a 43 day Aesthetic cycle, and a 53 day Spiritual cycle have been added. There are even variants that make use of cycles that are combinations of other cycles, such as a Passion cycle, combining the Emotional and Physical, a Wisdom cycle, mixing together the Emotional and Intellectual and a Mastery cycle, blending the Intellectual and Physical.

Supposedly, each cycle has an integral length in days, and it is assumed that the entire cycle of a rhythmogram will repeat itself after a total of 23×28x33 days, which comes out to 21,252, or about 58 years, though for strict Fliessian biorhythmists this would be calculated at 23×28=644 days, before the entire sequence begins anew. The theory claims that the more ‘positive’ at a particular time a cycle is, the more potent the ‘energy’ of that cycle is, and the greater the success of the interactions of the one the cycle pertains to.

Too bad that science has never been able to find this energy, despite having a good track record for finding other undetectable things, but once again, I digress. Biorhythmists claim that all cycles start at zero at the time of one’s birth, and at certain points on these cycles, an individual will experience great success or great failure. A cycle going through the horizontal zero line on the biorhythm chart (ahh, now we’re getting to it…) is thought to be at a ‘switchpoint‘, or ‘critical point‘ and this is held to be a time when people become accident prone, on so called ‘critical days.’

To date, there have been no scientific studies published in any accredited, peer-reviewed journal which supports biorhythm theory, and indeed it has been tested, though as of 1998 (Hines), in the then 134+ studies that were conducted, the theory has failed all attempts to validate it. The claims of critical points have been shown to be false, and in response, many ‘expert’ biorhythmists have resorted to using questionable math to support their claims. Biorhythm proponents have refused to relinquish the theory even after it has been proven false by empirical data, falling back on the invocation of special pleadings to effectively render the theory unfalsifiable, even to inventing an entire new category of people, the Arhythmic, including the claim that some are arhythmic part of or all of the time.

Also, to save their failed theory, biorhythmists have made major reinterpretations of biorhythm’s mechanisms, again, effectively making it untestable, and therefore, not science. One purportedly scientific study claimed as a finding that, and I quote, about 60% of all accidents happen on critical days, or about 22% of all days, but there is a problem with their methodology, and the reason this study is not valid: Biorhythmists also count the days immediately before and after the so-called critical day, more like 60% of all days, so the statistic would more accurately be stated as ‘60% of all accidents happen on 60% of all days’, which is what you would expect by sheer chance.

Testing biorhythm theory by keeping a journal, and charting each day is useless, as it is subject to a number of methodological problems, such as the well-known phenomenon of the self-fulfilling prophecy, simple suggestibility, and selective validation. As convoluted as biorhythm theory is, with the need to keep track of the rise, falling, and switchpoints of at least two or three cycles, and maybe more, you don’t have to be a math major to be able to tell that its child’s play to find cases to which the theory seems to apply.

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Biorhythmic Predictions

Ancient Chinese people thought that biorhythms can be efficiently used for improving many aspects of our lives.

I'm far away from going to poromote our competitors in biorhythms, but they created a very good biorhythmic introduction I can't miss :-)

The term biorhythm describes the cycle created by emotions, intellectuality and physiology and is based on the idea that any form of life on Earth has a certain evolution that is a response to the cycles of the moon, the sun and the seasons.

Those who study biorhythms think that you can find out things related to someone's past and future by examining the rhythms of the his response to the cycles mentioned above. In other words, the emotional, physical and intellectual levels evolve concordantly to the cycles of the sun, the moon and the seasons.

This interrelation between the human cycles and the natural cycles is told to be irrelevant by the critics who consider that the science based on the biorhythm, named chronobiology, is nothing more than pseudoscience. The biological rhythms refer to the way our vital functions modify along with the time cycles. We have some kind of a biologic clock that determines our body to react differently depending on whether is day or night, winter or summer, for example.

The mechanism is situated in the brain and it does its job, however it is influenced by the environment. The chronobiologists developed some studies which show that the biorhythms can seriously affect the symptoms of a disease or the way our bodies react to different medical therapies. As a consequence, the scientists that are interested in biorhythms try to develop methods for improving our health. We all observe that are moments when we feel highly energetic and moments when we are very bored and moments when we feel that we lack energy.

These kinds of states can last for a few days and can greatly influence our activities during that period. Many people choose to use different vitamin tablets and exercises in order to constantly feel energetic and passionate. On the other hand, other people choose to learn how to cope with all these states, with their highs and lows.

They do that by using the modifications determined by their biorhythms and by maintaining the equilibrium when it comes to the emotional, intellectual and physical levels. There may be no magic when it comes to constantly be active but only taking advantage of your biorhythms. We are programmed to react in a certain way to everything around us, so why won't this be the case as well when it comes to the biological rhythm of our organisms. We all need both active and passive phases in our lives but we need to find a way to properly act in both these situations.

Nowadays, there are some people who try to use this as well for general aspects. Don't think that you can use biorhythms for gaining a great amount of money. However, you may get more benefits when it comes to your physical and mental health, as some scientists think.

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