Not a Book Club book, though I don't think there is any specific rule why I can't talk about other books I have read.
Anyway, as I said, not a Book Club Book, but I have just finished Bad Science by Ben Goldacre. It has taken me a while - it has been my Toliet Book, so I have read it in fits and starts. I actually manage to read quite a lot on the loo - I work from home, and am vegetarian......
Anyway, Bad Science is, at heart, a critique of how the press trivialises science, getting non-scientific writers to cover the major science stories of the day, to take as Gospel half-baked medical scare stories without investigating whether any real evidence underpins them.
Goldacre is a great writer - really entertaining, who viciously pursues the many targets of his ire, which include MMR, Gillian McKeith, complementary medicine, those who do not publish findings in reputable journals...
He writes for The Guardian, as well as badscience.net which has many loyal readers who help him to track down and mercilessly track down purveyors of pseudo-scientific bullshit.
Well worth a read.
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Glad to see you resisted the obvious *hits & farts gag. ( Although clearly I couldn't )
ReplyDeleteIt's a great book. Whilst the MMR-autism hoax and Mrs Gillian McKeith ( "to give her her full title") are probably the centre-pieces it also covers Nutritionists, Omega3 / Vitamins , MRSA & "Brain Gym".
It covers them so well that I half wish that my kids' school was using the "Brain Gym" so I could, in a fit of righteous indignation, harangue the head and hand out copies to the rest of the governing body.
Yes, he's very entertaining - saw him on Newsnight a couple of nights ago ripping into the whole 'children who spend too much time looking at screens are re-wiring their brains' chestnut. (At least that's what I think it was about - since I've been using my PC more I seem to be really struggling with my short term memory....)
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