A dose of common sense

Like most people, I'm sceptical of Big Pharma, commercial scientific organisations and the like (how's the Malaria cure coming on boys? Coming up after yet another treatment for 'erectile dysfunction' or halitosis?) because let's face it, their motivation is profit and that, you'll be amazed to hear, distorts their priorities. 

However, I am fascinated by scientific research - and horrified by supposedly intelligent people who put their faith in quacks (who are also naked capitalists). So I thought I'd point you to two great science communicators, both linked to from my blog list. Ben Goldacre is the acerbic nerd who writes Bad Science in the Guardian every Saturday, patiently explaining to us how and why dodgy corporations, rip-off merchants and the media conspire, through greed, malice or incompetence, to mislead us about pretty much every science story which reaches us. Buy his book.

The other author I'd like to direct you towards is someone whose blog I discovered only recently. Pharyngula is a practising scientist who has a great gift for direct, outspoken communication and the great joy of living in a country seemingly run by obscurantist medievalist cranks, on whom he practises his scorn - like this:

I wrote about the Kara Neumann case last year — it was the tragic story of an 11 year old girl in Wisconsin who died of treatable juvenile diabetes because her parents were faith-healing morons. Morons who still claim they did no wrong by neglecting their daughter when she lapsed into unconsciousness, choosing to call on the congregation of their wackaloon church to pray harder, instead of calling a doctor.

The parents are finally going to trial this spring, and it could be an interesting case. They are clearly and self-admittedly guilty of lethal negligence, but Wisconsin law actually has an exemption for people who choose to treat their children with prayer. It's an evil law, but it is on the books, and that makes this a case where justice and reason are on one side, and narrow legalism and superstition are on the other. I'm not betting on which side will win out, not in America

All hail P Z Myers.