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A review by nikkimcgee
Bad Science by Ben Goldacre
3.0
As a God believing, female, humanities graduate I suspect that I am not the target audience of this book. For a start I cannot examine my sperm under a microscope from Toys R Us. Being a doctor you would think that he would realise that about 1/2 of his readership can't do that.
if I was rating this as a source of information, for Goldacre's valiant battle to improve our scientific knowledge and to encourage an atmosphere of healthy scepticism I would be giving this a 4 or a 5. As someone who considers myself quite well informed I was quite shocked to discover the truth about the many " scientific" claims that I have read about in the media and taken to be true. I have always been sceptical of brain gym, which I have used as more of a settler activity than to encourage brain activity. I have quite a lot of time for Goldacre and have been interested in his recent calls for more evidence based action research in education, I did think therefore that I would love this book.
However this is a book review and to be honest I did not really enjoy the book. It is patronising and comes across as an anger fuelled rant, a little like the Dawkins books - only in this case I actually agree with a lot that Goldacre says. It needs a good edit, he goes on and on and on about the same thing. I know he is building evidence but in my view that takes away from the enjoyment of the book. If I hear the word meta- analysis again I will scream. I listened to the audio version with my husband so we are not quite sure if Goldacre is hugely arrogant and egotistical or the narrator, I suspect the former.
Am I glad I read it - Yes.
Did I enjoy it? No
Would I recommend it to others? Yes
Would I read it again? No - but I I will keep it just incase!
if I was rating this as a source of information, for Goldacre's valiant battle to improve our scientific knowledge and to encourage an atmosphere of healthy scepticism I would be giving this a 4 or a 5. As someone who considers myself quite well informed I was quite shocked to discover the truth about the many " scientific" claims that I have read about in the media and taken to be true. I have always been sceptical of brain gym, which I have used as more of a settler activity than to encourage brain activity. I have quite a lot of time for Goldacre and have been interested in his recent calls for more evidence based action research in education, I did think therefore that I would love this book.
However this is a book review and to be honest I did not really enjoy the book. It is patronising and comes across as an anger fuelled rant, a little like the Dawkins books - only in this case I actually agree with a lot that Goldacre says. It needs a good edit, he goes on and on and on about the same thing. I know he is building evidence but in my view that takes away from the enjoyment of the book. If I hear the word meta- analysis again I will scream. I listened to the audio version with my husband so we are not quite sure if Goldacre is hugely arrogant and egotistical or the narrator, I suspect the former.
Am I glad I read it - Yes.
Did I enjoy it? No
Would I recommend it to others? Yes
Would I read it again? No - but I I will keep it just incase!