Double Blind Randomised Controlled Trials (DBRCTs) are not the preserve of medical science. Increasingly, corporations are using them to enter into a new world of Evidence Based Marketing where massive, continuous and automated trials are being run on us in order find out how to sell more stuff and become more profitable. What does this mean for medicine and our lives? Our beliefs are our internal models of the outside [read more…]
After yesterday’s raids by the MHRA on suspect dodgy pill sellers and their ‘Internet Day of Action’, perhaps one of the largest profiteers from such schemes will get away with it. Google has been quite happy to take money from triamazon.com to show adverts for the site and the hugely overpriced food supplement pretending to be a miracle cancer cure. This is despite the fact that Google has a clear [read more…]
You know, I do not believe that most of the people that feature on this site are fraudsters. No, the truth is far worse than that – most homeopaths, reiki practitioners and herbalists actually believe what they say and that makes then particularly dangerous. But there are people whose motives are particularly hard to believe are just plain deluded. I fear 2008 is going to feature quite a number of [read more…]
So, another vague and preposterous legal threat and my web hosts have caved like bullied ginger children. Pages have been taken down and then immediately duplicated to over 30 (at last count) web sites all over the world. The web tends to react like that. This situation will not last. The Society of Homeopaths did not get away with it and nor will more minor bullies. To be told to [read more…]
Another page or two goes missing. You can read more about this here: I’m not sure that’s ethical and here:Legal threats and extortion to suppress the truth Orac is on the case. Bless him. The BadScience Forum has more details and discussion as does the Randi Forum A few more people looking at the issues raised by this: Science and ProgressRich Speaks…No Nonsense!Ambri–guousThinking is DangerousRich ScopieBrain DuckSoberishSkepticoA day at the [read more…]
The louder a food screams ‘natural’ or ‘healthy’ at you, the further you should run. That is the somewhat counter-intuitive message of Michael Pollan’s essay, Unhappy Meals. Pollan tells us to avoid those food products that come bearing loud health claims. They’re apt to be heavily processed, and the claims are often dubious at best. Don’t forget that margarine, one of the first industrial foods to claim that it was [read more…]
Bertrand Russel said, What a man believes upon grossly insufficient evidence is an index into his desires — desires of which he himself is often unconscious. If a man is offered a fact which goes against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely, and unless the evidence is overwhelming, he will refuse to believe it. If, on the other hand, he is offered something which affords a reason for acting [read more…]
Professor Joan Higgins, Chair of the Federal Working Group on Complementary Therapies, is in charge of setting up the Natural Healthcare Council (Ofquack). From April, this will be a voluntary self-regulated body that will be tasked with protecting the public from the dangers of alternative medicine. The Professor wrote to the Guardian today to complain about Polly Toynbee’s straight talking article, I am sorry that Polly Toynbee feels that the [read more…]
The ambush by the Prince of Wales on the various factions of Alternative Medicine by announcing the set up of the Natural Healthcare Council, Ofquack, is starting to have effects. In the Guardian yesterday, Polly Toynbee ran an article entitled, Quackery and superstition – available soon on the NHS. She argues that we should, Put not your trust in princes, especially not princes who talk to plants. and despairs how [read more…]
It looks like the campaign to clean up homeopathy is having effects! A new supplier of homeopathic remedies appears to have entered the market with the promise that “we won’t lie to you”. They say, “For some reason, many homeopaths feel they have to tell their patients lies and fairy stories, and try to baffle them with pseudo-science. Here at FairDeal Homeopathy, we treat you like adults, and only tell [read more…]
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