Are We Psychic?

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?

Deflecting Criticism 3 – Whataboutery

Another 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.

Eternal Youth Is Just Around The Corner. Not.

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.

Deflecting Criticism 2 – Ad Hom Attacks

A favoured tactic of people who are finding the evidence against them a little overwhelming and difficult to refute is to resort to an ad hom (from the Latin ad hominem – to the man) attack i.e. attack the critic not the arguments s/he is making. It has certainly been popular among some who post comments here (and indeed on other sceptic blogs).

2011 in review

The 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.

Click here to see the complete report.

A Fourth Year of Steam

It’s New Year’s Eve and time for my review of the year.

Detox Footbaths Make A Comeback

In 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.

Professional Councils and the Chilling of Dissent

It 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.

Deflecting Criticism 1 – Legal Threats

So 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?

The GMC Owes Stuart Jones An Apology

If 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.