Posts

May 18, 2013

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6:06 PM | ‘Is ‘cloning’ mad, bad and dangerous?’ – an argument revisited

Seven years ago, to mark the then tenth anniversary of the announcement of the birth of the folkloric Dolly the sheep, and in the still reverberating wake of the South Korean cloning scandal, I practiced my fledgling/intermittent/debatable/wanton science communication skills with the penning of an article on the issue of ‘cloning.’ It being an anniversary with a ’0′ on the end, combined with topical relevance, suggested I might be lucky enough to get it published. And I was thus very... […]

Tachibana, M., Amato, P., Sparman, M., Gutierrez, N., Tippner-Hedges, R., Ma, H., Kang, E., Fulati, A., Lee, H., Sritanaudomchai, H. & Masterson, K. (2013). Human Embryonic Stem Cells Derived by Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer, Cell, DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2013.05.006

Citation

May 14, 2013

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4:25 PM | Grammar and gender

This is the letter that landed 100 academics the inaugural Idler Academy Bad Grammar award. Well, we might pedantically recoil at a missing comma and a misplaced apostrophe in the very first sentence of the clunky first paragraph; and frown quizzically at the unlikelihood of 100 failed cursory proof-readings of an early draft (which suggests to me that most of the signatories did not see the final version). Feel free to pick me up on any grammatical slips here. But... Read more

May 07, 2013

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8:20 PM | No such thing as ‘Allopathy’

Over at FreethoughtBlogs, an uncharacteristic petit faux pas in the prolifically excellent ‘A Million Gods‘ motivates me into publicly scratching an irritation. The first time I think I heard/read the term ‘allopathy’ was in the context of something discussing homeopathy. And it seemed quite reasonable to me at the time: homeopathy = ‘like cures like’; ‘allopathy’ = err, something other cures it; or it cures something other. Until I got wise on who coined this term, and why? One […]

May 03, 2013

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11:46 AM | Yet further comment…

(I know at least one reader will be interested in this, thus making it a topic theme worth continuing…) I have of late been banging my head at the ongoing frustration borne of repeat attempts to post comment on a pretty questionable, seemingly homeopathy-lauding paper published in a scientific medical journal. Yesterday, my eye was caught by something over at the BioMed Central blog, whence appeared an interesting post, entitled ‘Can open peer review work? Biology Direct suggests it […]

April 24, 2013

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7:29 PM | Another comment on BMC Cancer, WDDTY and homeopathy

Well, I don’t know what bugs are at play in the BMC Cancer system. Almost three weeks since submitting the latest re-worked version of my comment (which I append below so it may be read by somebody), not only has it not appeared under the paper in question, but the continued lack of response (excepting one message informing me that – again – my query has been forwarded to the Editorial team) to my interim e-mails to the relevant provided... Read more

April 23, 2013

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11:21 AM | Libel reform – Lords Amendment 2 reinstated…?

Ping Pong today sees the Defamation Bill back with the Lords, who will hopefully extract the fascistic spanner hurled into its works last week. Scroll down here to Motion B Lords Amendment No. 2 to see the moves to (re-)insert reparative clauses/wording. But that wording… still includes ‘… or is/are likely to cause…’. Which I still find somewhat specious.

April 16, 2013

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6:43 PM | Libel reform – Lords Amendment 2 rejected

MPs have just voted to reject Lords Amendment 2, which would have required corporate bodies to obtain court permission to bring libel cases against individuals (ie, that requiring that they first demonstrate proof of (likelihood of) financial loss; the only measure that would have prevented Simon Singh being sued by the British Chiropractic Association). The interests of corporations have today overridden individual freedom of speech.

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12:01 PM | Pseudoscience Awareness Week

Today is the last day of ‘World Homeopathy Awareness Week‘, which commences every year with cult-like commemoration of the birthday of its movement’s founder. The site informs us: ‘WHAW (World Homeopathy Awareness Week) was created to promote homeopathic awareness around the world. During this week homeopaths and friends of homeopathy share with the world the miracles of homeopathy.’ The miracles of homeopathy. Hmm. They are a confused bunch, these people. Trying to couple the […]

April 13, 2013

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9:43 AM | Libel reform at risk… again

In case you’re not aware, the Defamation Bill is at Ping Pong, due to be debated again next Tuesday, 16th. However, despite the recent good news of the agreement to remove the ‘Leveson’ amendment to the Defamation Bill, it seems that there are still some who seek to derail the Bill. The Conservative MP, Sir Edward Garnier, a former(?) libel lawyer, has moved to scupper the Bill through an amendment to remove a central plank – that which protects individuals... Read more

April 05, 2013

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3:08 PM | BMC Cancer, WDDTY and homeopathy: ‘new’ comment

It took (me) a month to get a comment posted on a paper on BMC Cancer’s site. My abbreviated version (which appeared five days after re-submitting it) has now sat there for three weeks alongside Kausik’s, both seemingly being roundly ignored. As is my query concerning the full text of my original blog post. What to do? Does it matter? Well, actually, as a QuackRag deems that the paper in question constitutes subject(ive) matter for (re-)citation, then yes, I think... Read more

March 20, 2013

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2:39 PM | Libel reform – further update…

Libel Reform Campaign urges Government to set date for next stage of Defamation Bill...

March 18, 2013

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2:36 PM | Libel reform – latest…

Please see here for update from The Libel Reform Campaign.

March 13, 2013

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12:23 AM | Further comment on ‘Comment on protracted moderation of a comment: BMC Cancer, WDDTY and homeopathy’

Feb 21st (twenty days ago): I posted here a critical review of a paper purporting to research the effects of homeopathy on cancer patients, prompted by its citation in QuackRag What Doctors Don’t Tell You. Concurrently, I attempted to post question/comment on the paper – with a link to my blog piece – via facility for the purpose at BMC Cancer. Feb 28th (thirteen days ago): I followed-up on the non-appearance of my comment at BMC Cancer. The paper, my... Read more

March 09, 2013

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1:21 PM | Libel reform – Don’t kill the Bill!

http://www.libelreform.org/dontkillthebill?

March 08, 2013

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2:27 PM | Libel reform – this concerns YOU!

Dear [MP], Thank you for your letter of 5 March 2013. As time is of the essence, I will respond by e-mail. I also here acknowledge your letter of 11 February 2013 in response to my query as to your reasoning for your vote following the recent same-sex marriage debate. In the latter (to which I will be replying separately), you confusingly apologised for potentially offending me. I can assure you I was not offended in the slightest. What I... Read more

March 04, 2013

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9:32 PM | Libel reform – urgent!

For those not on the Libel Reform Campaign e-mail listing, I reproduce here the text of an e-mail I've just received from the campaign organisers. Your help is needed. ----------------------------------------------------------------- Dear Friends We need your urgent help this week to get the libel reform bill back to the House of Commons. There is the real risk that unless we act it will be dropped. We have all worked hard to win the case for reform – to show the chilling... Read more

February 28, 2013

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7:50 PM | Comment on protracted moderation of a comment: BMC Cancer, ‘WDDTY’ and homeopathy

Concomitant with airing my recent take on QuackRag WDDTY's clumsy referencing, I proceeded (after previous attempt to contact the corresponding author via the e-mail address provided for the purpose proved fruitless) to post the following as a Reader comment on the cited paper at BMC Cancer: 'Without homeopathic remedies, is care 'homeopathic'? I came across this reference in an article entitled 'Homeopathy is more than placebo' in the latest issue of the magazine 'What Doctor's Don't Tell […]

February 25, 2013

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4:51 PM | Libel Reform: Defamation Bill – Third reading: House of Lords… again

Dear [MP], Thank you for your e-mail of 20 February 2013, as provided by your Caseworker, XXX, in response to mine of 12 February. May I commence by stating that this response is disappointing? With the exception of the brief final paragraph, it is copy-pasted entirely from the text of a letter from Lord McNally of 18 July 2012, forwarded to me by yourself, following my previous communications (e-mails: 11 and 18 June 2012) to you on the Libel Reform... Read more

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12:01 PM | Libel Reform: Defamation Bill – Third reading: House of Lords… today!

The Defamation Bill receives its Third reading in the House Of Lords today. Those who might have assumed that its passage has been progressing all tickety-boo would do well to catch up.

February 21, 2013

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3:41 PM | ‘What Doctors Don’t Tell You’ cites paper that demonstrates there is no such thing as homeopathy

Back in that supermarket a few days ago, I again found myself driven to taking a thumb through the latest edition of QuackRag What Doctor’s Don’t Tell You, whose unscrupulously permissive advertising policy is being systematically exposed by The Nightingale Collaboration. Though I didn’t buy the rancid rubbish, I alighted on a small piece entitled ‘Homeopathy is more than placebo’, from which I noted the reference cited as voucher for that statement. From BMC Cancer, no less. I’ll […]

Rostock, M., Naumann, J., Guethlin, C., Guenther, L., Bartsch, H. & Walach, H. (2011). Classical homeopathy in the treatment of cancer patients - a prospective observational study of two independent cohorts, BMC Cancer, 11 (1) 19. DOI: 10.1186/1471-2407-11-19

Citation

February 08, 2013

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11:58 AM | Junking ‘Junk Science?’

I've become aware of David Colquhoun's apology, posted on his DC's Improbable Science, to Chris Woollams, founder of CANCERactive. I am not up to speed with the detailed history of their dispute, a legal matter between them on which I am unable to comment. What I consider appropriate, however, is comment on some of the reaction to this: for example, the gloating, self-righteous opining at Junk Science?, whose editor, Sam Wilson '… openly detests the misleading or downright incorrect […]

January 24, 2013

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12:06 PM | Haled comment

Traipsing to a(nother branch of that) supermarket just before Christmas, I passed an independent bookshop in the throes of its closing down sale, as is the way of this world. Re-approaching later from the opposite direction, laden with some unnecessary extra victuals, I decided to enter and see if an interesting bargain might be had. I managed to check any temptation to more spending until, taking another scan along on the 'Health' shelves, I put my bags down and took... Read more

January 18, 2013

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4:45 PM | A few (unoriginal) words on evidence-based versus complementary and alternative medicine

(A variation on some accommodating words proffered elsewhere, though unlikely to make the cut...) . Science is disingenuously misrepresented by those whose agenda rely on contra-scientific promotional tactics, such as devotees of ‘Complementary and Alternative Medicine.’ Refutation necessitates an appreciation of the psychology underlying people’s needs and preferences. CAM appeals to our intuitive nature. We seek patterns and readily attribute cause and effect: post hoc ergo propter hoc […]

January 01, 2013

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9:36 PM | Ear candling? – don’t be an ass!

If you’ve ever publicly aired an opinion on Complementary and Alternative Medicine, its products, practices and practitioners, and (cough) philosophy, then, not uncoupled from the probability of encountering adherence to fallacious logic and the provoking of irrational wrath, you may well have met with the defensive protestation that you are being offensive. Like that is somehow relevant. But, this entrenching attitude goes, rather than criticise or question, you should perhaps instead […]

December 22, 2012

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4:08 PM | Ever for Never

Just come back from the middle class's likely favourite supermarket, having got up at six in order to get there for a 7 am opening so as to avoid as much as possible the elbowed and elbowing throng storing up their appliance pouches in readiness for a week of sitting around getting drunk and fat (sez me), wherein, after I'd bit the bullet at spending more than I intended, I wandered over, in conversation with my companion about the insidious... Read more

October 13, 2012

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6:37 PM | Libel reform and the public interest

Further to my passing on of the Libel Reform Campaign’s e-mail flagging up the Second Reading of the Defamation Bill in the House of Lords last Tuesday, a further LRC communiqué was sent out – from Simon Singh. It is apposite that Singh is reminding us of the serious limitation of this Bill – specifically, the public interest defence, which, as it stands, would still leave expressers of reasonable opinion exposed to the threat of libel action, such as brought... Read more

October 09, 2012

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10:35 AM | ‘Libel reform Bill goes to the Lords’

I reproduce here, for anyone not on the e-mailing list, the text of an updating message from The Libel Reform Campaign: ‘Dear Friends We’re still waiting for a public interest defence as the Defamation Bill goes to the House of Lords. The Defamation Bill has its second reading debate in the Lords tomorrow*. This will be the first chance members of the Lords have had to talk about the Bill and the problems it was introduced to solve. The... Read more

September 19, 2012

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12:28 PM | Homeopathy, celebrities and advertising III: remit, or not remit?

Further to my frustration with being ping-ponged between the Advertising Standards Authority and the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, I did eventually receive further correspondence from the latter, as follows: ‘Thank you for your emails with further comments regarding the BHA Celebrity Photography Project website, which have been received. We have considered the content of your email and the website again and… discussed the issues raised below with colleagues in […]

September 07, 2012

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2:43 PM | Homeopathy, celebrities and advertising II: the ASA loophole?

Following my recent flagging of the British Homeopathic Association’s ridiculous ‘Celebrity Photography Project’, I cracked on and brought this to the attention of the Advertising Standards Authority: I understand that the ASA is currently not seeking further complaints about homeopathy, and that it is conducting an ongoing monitoring process. However, I have read its letter to homeopathy website holders subjected to complaint, the addressees of which, one might presume, included the […]

September 03, 2012

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11:03 AM | Secularism2012

Are you of the opinion that: church and state should be separate entities, and there should be no established state religion the laws of the land should apply equally to all, without hindrance or privilege or exception people should have freedom of (religious) belief – or lack thereof – without discrimination; and that… free expression – including criticism of those beliefs – is an inviolate right (state-funded) education should be free of religious affiliation, dictates and […]