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Respectful Insolence

"A statement of fact cannot be insolent." The miscellaneous ramblings of a surgeon/scientist on medicine,
quackery, science, pseudoscience, history, and pseudohistory (and anything else that interests him)

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Who (or what) is Orac?

orac.jpg Orac is the nom de blog of a humble pseudonymous surgeon/scientist with an ego just big enough to delude himself that someone, somewhere might actually give a rodent's posterior about his miscellaneous verbal meanderings, but just barely small enough to admit to himself that few will. (Continued here, along with a DISCLAIMER that you should read before reading any medical discussions here.)

Orac's old Blog is archived at Archived Insolence.

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January 31, 2007

Carnivalia and an open thread

Category: Blog carnivalsGrand RoundsSkeptics' CircleTangled Bank

Three announcements about blog carnivals of interest to my readers: Medical blogging: Grand Rounds, vol. 3, no. 19 has been posted at Envisioning 2.0.Science blogging: Tangled Bank #72 has been posted at Ouroboros.Skeptical blogging: The Skeptics' Circle will be appearing...

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Choprawoo and magical thinking: Two crappy tastes that taste crappy together

Category: EvolutionIntelligent design/creationismScienceSkepticism/critical thinking

I hate to reward the bad behavior of one of Chopra's "admirers" showing up on this blog. I really do. And linking to the latest bit of Choprawoo, which was brought to my attention by the usual suspect who has periodically infested the comments of my blog ever since I first coined the term "Choprawoo" to describe the typical combination of New Age fluff combined logical fallacies that is the phenomenon known as Deepak Chopra and his persistently annoying brand of woo would be doing exactly that, given that the commenter in question clearly wanted a link from me.

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Dichloroacetate: One last time...

Category: CancerClinical trialsMedicinePolitics

At the risk of irritating a fellow ScienceBlogger again, I thought I'd point out this little post forwarded to me by Norm Jenson as yet another example of exactly the inflated hype for dichloroacetate as a "cure for cancer" that will "never see the light of day" because it has little profit potential (and, by the way, that pharmaceutical companies will "probably lobby against it with all their might"). I should have taken a β-blocker before clicking on the link.

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January 30, 2007

Muslims shouldn't be vaccinated?

Category: Antivaccination lunacyMedicineQuackeryReligion

Via Black Triangle, I'm made aware of another example of religious fundamentalism interfering with sound health care: A MUSLIM doctors' leader has provoked an outcry by urging British Muslims not to vaccinate their children against diseases such as measles, mumps...

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January 29, 2007

Last minute warning

Category: AnnouncementsBlog carnivalsSkepticism/critical thinkingSkeptics' Circle

Here's just another friendly reminder that the latest edition of the Skeptics' Circle, that now-venerable blog carnival dedicated to critical thinking and skepticism, is due to appear this week on Thursday, February 1 at Slicing with Occam's Razor. (Hmmm, that's...

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Children's medicine

Category: Blog carnivalsMedicine

The latest Pediatrics Grand Rounds has been posted over at Unintelligent Design: Grand Rounds, Volume 1 Edition 21: What Dreams May Come....

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Acupuncture for Parkinson's disease?

Category: Alternative medicineMedicineSkepticism/critical thinking

Critics who don't like my insistence on applying the scientific method to the claims of alternative medicine sometimes accuse me of unrelenting hostility towards alternative medicine, as though no amount of evidence would ever convince me of the efficacy of...

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Street Anatomy

Category: Medicine

PZ mentioned it, but, after having seen it, I thought I'd give it a plug too, mainly because my readership skews more towards the medical blogosphere than PZ's does, and a new blog this promising should be publicized to other...

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January 28, 2007

A Seed field trip?

Category: Entertainment/cultureEvolutionPoliticsScience

I haven't seen a Broadway play in quite a while now, but it may be time for that to change. In the New York Times, I came across an ad for a revival of Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee´s...

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Donnie Davies "outed"?

Category: HumorMusicNews of the WeirdReligion

Remember Donnie Davies, the "youth pastor" that I wrote about a couple of days ago, who posted a list of gay bands, plus a homophobic video proclaiming that "God hates a fag" that led to a prolonged debate over whether...

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Medical schools going the wrong way

Category: Alternative medicineMedicine

Everyone who reads this blog regularly knows my dismay at the infiltration of the curriculum of American medical schools with increasing amounts of non-evidence-based woo. It's even gotten to the point where one medical school (Georgetown University) has is integrating...

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January 27, 2007

62 years ago today: The liberation of Auschwitz

Category: HistoryHolocaustHolocaust denialWorld War II

I'm reminded by this article that today is the 62nd anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by Soviet troops advancing west towards Germany: OSWIECIM, Poland -- As they do on every anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz by Soviet troops,...

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Dedicated to Donnie Davies...

Category: Entertainment/cultureHumorMusic

I don't know if I'll make this a habit or not, but it's a Saturday, and once again I feel like posting a YouTube or two and dedicating it to one of the "targets" of the week. (Besides, after the...

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January 26, 2007

Katie Wernecke and Teddy Bears for Cancer Kids

Category: Alternative medicineCancerMedicine

I hate to end the week on a downer, but I came across this last night and, given my attention to the case of Katie Wernecke (the girl whose parents chose dubious alternative medical therapy over the radiation therapy she...

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Your Friday Dose of Woo: The hills are alive with the sound of woo

Category: Alternative medicineFriday WooMedicineSkepticism/critical thinking

After posting about the Donnie Davies, an alleged "youth minister" in Houston who has garnered a lot of attention throughout the blogosphere for his website in which he provides a hilariously off-base list of "gay bands" to avoid and...

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January 25, 2007

The difference between the newbie and the old pro

Category: Clinical trialsMedicineScience

Grant season is upon us. Every day that I'm not in the clinic and the O.R., I find myself holed up in my office pounding my head against my monitor trying to write just that perfect mixture of preliminary data,...

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