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Friday Woo Medicine Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

Your Friday Dose of Woo: I Got Dem Ol’ Kozmic (Beam) Blues Again Mama!

Although there’s been plenty of woo this week (Harriet Denz-Penhey, anyone?), it hasn’t been the truly entertaining woo that I so love, you know, the kind of woo of Your Friday Dose of Woo, my long-standing (albeit now intermittent) excursion into the depths of alt-med silliness so over-the-top that it requires–nay, demands!–some serious not-so-Respectful Insolence, […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Beat the medical odds?

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape You don’t spit into the wind You don’t pull the mask off the ol’ Lone Ranger And you don’t mess around with Jim – Jim Croce I love it when a commenter gives me blogging material. Let’s face it. Blogging is a tough hobby. As much as I do […]

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Cancer Medicine Skepticism/critical thinking

James Randi speaks about chemotherapy

People fear chemotherapy. Some of this fear is not unreasonable, but a lot of it is a vestige of older days, when chemotherapy was much more unpleasant and even at times horrific. However, contrary to the old alt-med trope of chemotherapy as “pure poison” that makes you sicker than cancer, advances in chemotherapy and supportive […]

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Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Sadly, I’m not sure this really is a joke

The Onion or real life recommendations by cancer quacks? You be the judge. Courageous Man Refuses To Believe He Has Cancer Sometimes The Onion cuts a little too deeply, but this is not too far from “Secret” territory. Unfortunately for wishful thinking, reality doesn’t care what you believe and has a way of asserting itself […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Autism Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Religion Surgery

Regarding Dr. Mehmet Oz: Whoops. Maybe I spoke too soon about vaccines

Yesterday, I expressed dismay at how Dr. Mehmet Oz, the protege of Oprah Winfrey who now has his own popular syndicated daily show, recently named the quackery known as reiki as number one in his list of “Dr. Oz’s ulimate alternatie medicine secrets,” leading me to characterize him as having “gone completely over to the […]