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A review by helenfrench
Bad Science by Ben Goldacre
3.0
This book has a lot of interesting, valuable things to say about 'Bad Science' - exploring how people call themselves doctors despite no relevant qualifications (Gillian McKeith) to the way science stories are portrayed in the media (the MMR controversy). The author is angry and he's right to be. Lives are lost because of this sort of nonsense.
But he's also smug, repetitive and clearly HATES humanities graduates, who he blames specifically for all the weak and unsupported science stories out there. Fwiw, there are journalists from all sorts of educational backgrounds, a mix of good and bad.
He constantly tells the reader that his words will enable them to understand scientific reports, yet insists that humanities grads 'don't have the skills to critically appraise a piece of scientific evidence on its merits'. So Ben, what happens when a humanities graduate reads your book then?
In my case, they read it despite the building rage, but take twice as long to finish the damn thing as they normally would, because they put it down every time they get annoyed.
But he's also smug, repetitive and clearly HATES humanities graduates, who he blames specifically for all the weak and unsupported science stories out there. Fwiw, there are journalists from all sorts of educational backgrounds, a mix of good and bad.
He constantly tells the reader that his words will enable them to understand scientific reports, yet insists that humanities grads 'don't have the skills to critically appraise a piece of scientific evidence on its merits'. So Ben, what happens when a humanities graduate reads your book then?
In my case, they read it despite the building rage, but take twice as long to finish the damn thing as they normally would, because they put it down every time they get annoyed.