Categories
Biology Evolution Medicine Pseudoscience Science Skepticism/critical thinking

Move over, Deepak, there’s a new woo-meister at HuffPo

Anyone who’s been reading this blog for any length of time longer than a few weeks knows what I think of Deepak Chopra. Indeed, he’s been a recurring topic here since the very beginning (just type his name into the search box for this blog if you don’t believe me). In fact, Chopra has “distinguished” […]

Categories
Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Science Skepticism/critical thinking

Knowledge versus certainty in skepticism, medicine, and science

“I don’t want knowledge. I want certainty!” –David Bowie, from Law (Earthlings on Fire) If there’s one universal trait among humans, it seems to be an unquenchable thirst for certainty. This should come as no surprise to those committed to science and rational thinking because there is a profound conflict between our human desire for […]

Categories
Cancer Medicine Quackery

Natural Cancer Treatments That Work: A wretched hive of scum and quackery

Back in the 1990s when I first dipped my toe into the pool that was Usenet, that massive, wild, and untamed frontier where most online discussion occurred before the rise of the web and later the blogosphere, I was truly a naif. I had no idea–no inkling–of the depths of quackery to which people would […]

Categories
Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine

A horrifying breast cancer “testimonial” for “holistic” treatment, part 3

(NOTE ADDED 12/7/2010: Kim Tinkham has died of what was almost certainly metastatic breast cancer. Also note that, when it was publicized on the Internet and on the blogosphere that Tinkham’s cancer gave every indication of having recurred and she was dying, her “practitioner” Robert O. Young removed the videos embedded below from YouTube.) Remember […]

Categories
Antivaccine nonsense Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Naturopathy

Yes, there really are people who don’t accept the germ theory of disease

The longer I’m in this whole skepticism thing, the more I realize that no form of science is immune to woo. For example, even though I lament just how many people do not accept evolution, for example, I can somewhat understand it. Although the basics of the science and evidence supporting the theory of evolution […]