I have to admit, it hurts me a little–ok A LOT–to write this piece. I’ve probably done a bit more research than was needed because I was hesitant to come to the realization that I’ve lost respect for one of my favorite athletes. This feeling doesn’t take away 4 championships from a franchise with arguably the best NFL coach of all time, but it does still hurt.
Because Tom Brady may just be the newest poster child for pseudoscience. What an idiot.
Mary Roach, author of the weird sciency books Stiff, Gulp, and Bonk, should go on a comedy tour. Her research about human physiology is not simply regurgitated on the page. It is craftily masticated, suspensefully digested, and hilariously delivered for her readership to chew on. Outside of this blog, I write about evidence-based medicine. I do PubMed searches on things like “mycobacteria, prevalence, United States” and “typhoid fever, pathogenesis”. For her work, Mary Roach searches for things like “cadaveric, penis” and “kegeling, urine dribble”. Here are some fascinating curiosities of Mary Roach. Continue reading Chew on this: the curiosities of Mary Roach
There are three things that hit you fast when you watch The Knick, a new Cinemax miniseries directed by Steven Soderbergh. First, Clive Owen has an era-appropriate but annoying mustache. Second, the electronic, intermittently pulsing music is anachronistic – and yet it works (and is arguably the most memorable TV soundtrack since Game of Thrones). And finally, surgeries without gloves are really gross to watch even when fictional. While it would have been dangerous to be a patient at the Knickerbocker (more familiarly known as the Knick in the show), it’s entertaining and informative to watch the shenanigans of early 20th century medicine.
Continue reading Do you have any idea what the going price is for a fresh body these days?
Upon initiating the design of my Yal
e College Residential seminar class, Biomedical Science in the Media, I scoured the interwebs for good and bad science reporting. One of the notable sites I came across, which later served as an inspiration for this blog, was Ben Goldacre’s Bad Science website. In his blog, Dr. Goldacre discusses and discredits science that is inappropriately reported and often misconstrued in the news. Along the way he presents the facts, if they are known, and highly educated conjecture if they aren’t. Goldacre is also an active broadcaster, campaigner, medical doctor, and academic that still manages to find the time to update his blog and write books. His first book, Bad Science, has sold over 500,000 copies worldwide and just happened to be on my personal summer reading list.