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Tetyana Obukhanych

Peter Doshi

Peter Doshi, vaccine denier, sees a conspiracy about VAERS

I am not a fan of Peter Doshi, one of the go-to “authorities” for the anti-vaccine crowd. He has no credentials that would indicate that he is an expert in vaccines, yet one of his opinion pieces (not real science lacking data and evidence) is used as “proof” that flu vaccines don’t work. And of course, like all zombie memes of the anti-vaccine universe, it comes around every year or so, requiring a new debunking.

So what is he going on about now? The Poxes Blog reports that Doshi seems to think that something foul and evil is going on with the VAERS database. Sigh.

Let’s talk about Peter Doshi and his latest conspiracy theory. It’s always fun.

 

Read More »Peter Doshi, vaccine denier, sees a conspiracy about VAERS

Gardasil vaccine safety

Gardasil vaccine safety – under attack again by a false authority

Here we go again – another lightweight “science paper” attacking Gardasil vaccine safety. Now, I have to spend time debunking it because we all know that this new article will be used as “proof” that Gardasil is dangerous.

As I have written dozens of times, there are precious few ways for us to effectively prevent cancer. Exercise regularly. Eat a balanced diet. Stay out of the sun. Quit smoking. Don’t drink alcohol. And get vaccinated against hepatitis B and the human papillomavirus (HPV). That’s it. No kale blueberry almond milk shake is going to suddenly make your risk of cancer drop to zero. Avoiding gluten, cleansing your colon, or smoking a joint will have no effect on your risk of cancer.

But the HPV cancer preventing vaccine, known as Gardasil, is a well-researched, scientifically-based medication to prevent a long list of cancers. So we’re going to take a critical look at this new article.Read More »Gardasil vaccine safety – under attack again by a false authority

vaccine open-mindedness

Vaccine open-mindedness – confessions of a science nerd

Sometimes a reasonably intelligent anti-vaccine troll will show up to an internet discussion. Although they’re filled with various logical fallacies, like cherry picking, they will often say “you should be open-minded about vaccines causing autism.” The thing is my vaccine open-mindedness is the precise definition of what should be open-minded.

People conflate “open-mindedness” with “you should accept everything stated, because of insert logical fallacy here.”

Let’s use my favorite example, sasquatch, the mythical ape-like creature that inhabits everywhere, as far as I know.

A close-minded person would say, “sasquatch exists, damn the evidence.”

A pseudo-open-minded person would say, “sasquatch exists, because the Federal government is suppressing the evidence. Furthermore, just because we don’t have evidence today, we know we’ll find it tomorrow.”

A real open-minded person would say, “sasquatch does not exist, because of the utter lack of evidence. However, if someone brings irrefutable evidence, I will reconsider my position.”

In other words, a really open-minded person doesn’t have to be open-minded to the hypothesis proposed, just open to the evidence. I am pretty certain that sasquatch does not exist – that’s not being close-minded. Because what I would actually say is that “I reviewed the highest quality evidence, and I found nothing that would support the hypothesis that sasquatch exists.”

As someone once said, “keep an open mind, but not so open that your brains fall out.” In fact, scientific progression is utterly dependent upon open-mindedness.

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pseudoscience examples

Google search terms – pseudoscience examples

Google provides me with the search terms that result in clicking on a link to this website. I rarely look at them, but today I looked to find all of the search terms that were pseudoscience examples – some of them were hysterical.

I wanted to do something completely different – away from the anti-vaccination hate-filled creeps, away from the anti-science GMO beliefs, and everything else. Let’s amuse ourselves with some of my favorite search terms over the past three months.

Read More »Google search terms – pseudoscience examples