Last week the Daily Mail carried an article by Rupert Sheldrake suggesting that psychic powers such as telepathy and premonitions are more common than we think. What’s the evidence? Read the rest of this entry »
Are We Psychic?
January 15, 2012Deflecting Criticism 3 – Whataboutery
January 8, 2012Another very common means of deflecting criticism is ‘whataboutery’ where the supporter of the criticised viewpoint leaps up with a tangental or even totally unrelated problem you have not criticised. For example, you might criticise homeopaths for making dodgy claims and a homeopath comes back with “What about thalidomide?” with the intention of derailing the discussion to thalidomide and away from homeopathy. Read the rest of this entry »
Eternal Youth Is Just Around The Corner. Not.
January 4, 2012
According to certain tabloid newspapers this morning (4 January 2012), the age-old dream of eternal youth is almost upon us, via a modern sciency method of stopping the aging process by means of stem cells. Read the rest of this entry »
2011 in review
January 1, 2012The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 31,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 11 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
A Fourth Year of Steam
December 31, 2011It’s New Year’s Eve and time for my review of the year. Read the rest of this entry »
Detox Footbaths Make A Comeback
December 27, 2011In his book “Bad Science”, Ben Goldacre refers to a ‘detox’ footbath in which you put your feet in a bath of salt water and an electic current passed through the salt water suposedly causes ‘toxins’ to be sucked from your body. The mark client can see the water turning a yucky brown colour so if s’he knows no chemistry s/he is going to believe that the brown stuff is indeed toxins. In fact it is a complex salt produced by electrolysis causing a reaction between the salt solution and the electrodes and will be produced without anyone’s feet in the bath. I produced a similar effect with two 9V batteries in series and a couple of steel nails as electrodes. A similar treatment is still on sale. Read the rest of this entry »
Professional Councils and the Chilling of Dissent
December 22, 2011It is hard not to take the verdict of the Health Professions Council’s case against Stuart Jones as a warning to medical professionals not to raise criticisms. Even if it was not intended, it is bound to have a chilling effect on whistleblowers. Read the rest of this entry »
Deflecting Criticism 1 – Legal Threats
November 28, 2011So you’ve got some sweet deal going – might be alternative medicine, might be hi-fi tweaks. Whatever it is, some twat of a journalist or blogger is pointing out holes in your scientific arguments and suggesting that your product is not as good as you say. This could be a threat to your income stream. What do you do? Read the rest of this entry »
The GMC Owes Stuart Jones An Apology
November 26, 2011If anyone ever wondered why ‘Jonas’ chose to make his complaint about Dr. Sarah Myhill to the GMC ‘anonymously’, then they are now being answered by the extemist wing of the CFS/ME activist movement. Read the rest of this entry »
