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Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Entertainment/culture Medicine Quackery Television

Is Bill Maher really that ignorant? (Part III): “Oh, come on, Superman!”

You can read parts I and II first, if you like.

Yet another reason Bill Maher is an idiot can be found in the video below, taken from Real Time With Bill Maher from the February 8 episode. I happened to catch it in reruns and was looking for a transcript or YouTube version. It’s truly appalling. This guy claims to be a rationalist and mocks religion for its irrationality, and here he is spouting off the more of his usual ignorant, idiotic, stupid ideas about medicine and, yes, downright woo, to the point where even his guests start to wonder what the heck is going on. They seem to back away from him slowly, much the way people back away from the ranting homeless guy who gets on the subway (metaphorically speaking, anyway):

Some “gems” from Bill Maher when the subject of the flu somehow came up:

“I would never get the flu on an airplane.” (To which an exasperated Bob Costas retorts brilliantly, “Oh, come on, Superman!” I think that’ll be my retort to Maher whenever I hear his germ theory denialism rants.)

“The model you have is wrong. You’re thinking that the problem is the mosquitos, not the swamp. If there’s no swamp, the mosquitos can’t take root.” (I’ve written about Maher’s denialism of the germ theory of disease before.)

“You all look at me as though I’m crazy.”

Well, why yes, Bill, they do, and I do. On this particular issue, you are crazy. Who’d have thought that Bob Costas would be the voice of rationality, as he tries to set Maher straight on a number of issues, such as when Maher rants on and on about possible drug side effects? It’s just another bit of data to show why Maher is not a real skeptic. Indeed, the older he gets, the more of a crank he appears to be becoming on medical issues.

By Orac

Orac is the nom de blog of a humble surgeon/scientist who has an ego just big enough to delude himself that someone, somewhere might actually give a rodent's posterior about his copious verbal meanderings, but just barely small enough to admit to himself that few probably will. That surgeon is otherwise known as David Gorski.

That this particular surgeon has chosen his nom de blog based on a rather cranky and arrogant computer shaped like a clear box of blinking lights that he originally encountered when he became a fan of a 35 year old British SF television show whose special effects were renowned for their BBC/Doctor Who-style low budget look, but whose stories nonetheless resulted in some of the best, most innovative science fiction ever televised, should tell you nearly all that you need to know about Orac. (That, and the length of the preceding sentence.)

DISCLAIMER:: The various written meanderings here are the opinions of Orac and Orac alone, written on his own time. They should never be construed as representing the opinions of any other person or entity, especially Orac's cancer center, department of surgery, medical school, or university. Also note that Orac is nonpartisan; he is more than willing to criticize the statements of anyone, regardless of of political leanings, if that anyone advocates pseudoscience or quackery. Finally, medical commentary is not to be construed in any way as medical advice.

To contact Orac: [email protected]

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