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Anti-Semitism History Holocaust Holocaust denial Pseudoscience Skepticism/critical thinking

Crank magnetism in action: Astrology, crop circles, and Holocaust denial, oh my!

If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my years of delving into pseudoscience, quackery, and alternative medicine is that conspiracy theories are just like Lays potato chips; cranks can’t eat just one. No, they have to stick their hand in the bag and pull out a huge, heaping handful and snarf it all down. Believers […]

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Bioethics Cancer Clinical trials Medicine

The costs and benefits of the latest, greatest cancer drugs

Last week, The New York Times started a rather unusual series in its medical section entitled, The Evidence Gap, described thusly: Articles in this series will explore medical treatments used despite scant proof they work and will consider steps toward medicine based on evidence. When I first saw the series, I was prepared for a […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Thanks, Jenny McCarthy

The other day, I sarcastically “thanked” Andrew Wakefield for his role in making sure that measles is again endemic in the U.K. At the same time I wondered whether in 5 to 10 years I’d be similarly “thanking” Jenny McCarthy for her role in doing the same thing here in the United States. It looks […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

How about a real challenge for science communication?

Three days ago, ScienceBlogs did something it hasn’t done before. ScienceBloggers were given screener DVDs of a new movie by one of our own, Randy Olson of Shifting Baselines. The movie was Sizzle: A Global Warming Comedy, and the idea was to get as many of us as possible to review the movie and post […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Popular culture Quackery

Vaccine fearmongers versus Steve Novella

I’m envious of Steve Novella. Well, just a little, anyway. The reason is that he’s somehow managed to annoy David Kirby and the anti-vaccine contingent enough to provoke what appears to be a coordinated response to his debunking of anti-vaccine propaganda. For that alone he deserves some serious props. You may have wondered why I […]