Bad Science

This book is hilarious. The author roasts the media, big pharma, and quacks for misrepresenting evidence-based medicine and science in general. The key learning lessons:

1. Sciencey-sounding stories/expectations and sciencey-looking text (e.g. terms, references) can mislead people into thinking that claims are legit.

2. Alternative therapy, medicine or programmes that are not supported by science: Detox, ear candles, homeopathy, and nutritionism.

3. I stand corrected on the following myths:
   1. Antioxidants help to prevent cancer/disease
   2. Vitamin C prevents colds
   3. The media can be trusted to present medical research accurately

4. The placebo effect is real. There are psychological and physiological effects from the treatment of illnesses. In fact, there are also effects from being placed in an experiment, knowing you’re being monitored.

5. “Bullshit” is a form of falsehood distinct from lying. The liar knows and cares about the truth, but deliberately sets out to mislead. The truth-speaker knows the truth and is trying to give it to us. The bullshitter, meanwhile, does not care about the truth, and picks out or makes up information to suit his purposes.

6. There are many statistical tricks to manipulate results:
   1. Take any correlation and claim causation
   2. Choose the lowest baseline possible
   3. Ignore trial subjects who drop out
   4. Delete outliers where beneficial
   5. Stop (or extend) the trial when you get (or don’t get) favourable results
   6. Torture the data and it will confess to anything
   7. Run many tests and pick out a positive one