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Bioethics Clinical trials Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Surgery

Enough straw man attacks on evidence-based medicine to defoliate Kansas

Evidence-based medicine is not perfect. There, I’ve said it. Like anything else humans do in science or any other endeavor, evidence-based medicine (EBM) has its strengths and its weaknesses. On the whole, I consider it to be potentially vastly superior to the way that medicine was practiced in the past, bringing a systematic, scientific rigor […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Friday Woo Medicine Physics Pseudoscience Quackery Science Skepticism/critical thinking

Your Friday Dose of Woo: It’s a marvelous night for a moondance…

I have to confess, the ol’ Folder of Woo was looking a little thin this week. No, it’s not that I’m running out of topics (a.k.a. targets) for my usual Friday jaunt into the wacky world of woo. Far from it. It’s just that, in the run-up to writing this, perusing the odd stuff therein […]

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Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery Skepticism/critical thinking

The return of Dana Ullman, homeopathic apologist

Oh, no, not again. Respectful Insolence™ has been invaded over the last few days by a particularly idiotic and clueless homeopath named Sunil Sharma, who’s infested the comments of a post about how U.K. homeopaths are complaining about all of us mean skeptics who have the temerity to point out the mind-numbingly obvious about homeopathy, […]

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Biology Evolution Intelligent design/creationism Medicine Pseudoscience Science Skepticism/critical thinking

More nonsense about bacterial resistance: Why a little medical knowledge is a dangerous thing in the hands of “intelligent design” creationists

It’s been a while since I’ve visited the cesspool that is Uncommon Descent, a.k.a. Bill Dembski’s home for wandering sycophants, toadies, and lackeys. There’s a good reason for this; I just get tired of the sheer stupidity that routinely assaults my brain every time I make the mistake of taking a look at UD’s latest […]

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Antivaccine nonsense Bioethics Cancer Complementary and alternative medicine Medicine Quackery

Quoth Dr. Rashid Buttar: “The medical board is a ‘rabid dog'”

Dr. Rashid Buttar is a quack. There, I’ve said it. It’s my opinion, and there’s lots of evidence to support that opinion. As you know, I seldom actually invoke the “q-word.” Indeed, for the longest time after I started blogging I tended to go out of my way to avoid using it, even to the […]