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Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Medicine Naturopathy Quackery

A paean to naturopathy on—where else?—The Huffington Post

If you’re a skeptic and supporter of science-based medicine (SBM), as I am, no doubt there are times when you ask yourself in exasperation, frustration, or curiosity just what the appeal of quackery is to so many people. Why do people fall for this stuff? you no doubt ask yourself at times. Certainly I do […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Naturopathy Politics Quackery

The insinuation of naturopathic quackery into law

If there’s one thing that practitioners of pseudoscientific medicine crave more than anything else, it’s respectability. Believing that science-based medicine is corrupt and that their woo is as good or better, they delude themselves into thinking that they can function as well or better than primary care doctors practice and therefore should be given the […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Naturopathy Quackery

Naturopathic cancer treatments versus reality

Well, I’m back. It’s always a bit weird to try to get back into the swing of things after even just a week off and even when during that week I didn’t actually stop blogging but merely slowed down a lot and succeeded (mostly) in restricting what little blogging I did to brief posts. (Yes, […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Medicine Naturopathy Pseudoscience Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Two sad stories about the state of medicine

Medical therapies should be based upon science. That is a recurrent theme, indeed, the major theme, of this blog. Based on that simple thesis, I’ve spent the last decade examining “unconventional” treatments and evaluating the scientific basis (or, much more usually, the lack of a scientific basis) for various treatments. Yes, I’ve looked at other […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Homeopathy Medicine Naturopathy

More on “integrating” pseudoscience with science

Naturopathy is at least 99% woo. That has to be said at the outset. Naturopaths might brag about all the science they take in naturopathy school, claiming that it’s as much as MDs take. Even if that were true, the question is not how many hours of basic science naturopaths take, but rather what’s taught […]