oracknows

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David Gorski

Orac is the nom de blog of a humble surgeon/scientist who has an ego just big enough to delude himself that someone, somewhere might actually give a rodent's posterior about his copious verbal meanderings, but just barely small enough to admit to himself that few probably will. That surgeon is otherwise known as David Gorski. That Orac has chosen his nom de blog based on a rather cranky and arrogant computer shaped like a clear box of blinking lights that he originally encountered when he became a fan of a 30 year old British SF television show whose special effects were renowned for their BBC/Doctor Who-style low budget look, but whose stories nonetheless resulted in some of the best, most innovative science fiction ever televised, should tell you nearly all that you need to know about Orac. (That, and the length of the preceding sentence.)

DISCLAIMER: The various written meanderings here are the opinions of Orac and Orac alone, written on his own time. They should never be construed as representing the opinions of any other person or entity, especially Orac's cancer center, department of surgery, medical school, or university. Also note that Orac is nonpartisan; he is more than willing to criticize the statements of anyone, regardless of of political leanings, if that anyone advocates pseudoscience or quackery. Finally, medical commentary is not to be construed in any way as medical advice.

To contact Orac: oracknows@gmail.com

Posts by this author

April 3, 2011
Fetid, filthy, pus-filled cup? Your goblet of death? Green Hitler? Children of death? Mixed metaphors, anyone? Yes, there's a reason why the occasional Alex Jones rant amuses me. It shouldn't, but it does. On the other hand, the fact that he has quite a fan base for his short wave radio show, his…
April 1, 2011
Ah, April Fools' Day! I had thought of trying to do a typical April Fools' Day post, you know, something like trying to write something but the last time I tried to do that it fell really flat, so flat that I'm not even going to link to it. It's better not to remind my readers of my jokes that…
March 31, 2011
I realize this is two weeks old, but I had this hanging around, making it still worthwhile to discuss, because it's been bothering me, and last week Coulter wrote a blisteringly stupid followup to her blisteringly ignorant column from two weeks ago entitled A Glowing Report on Radiation. She wrote…
March 31, 2011
Sometimes I complain on this blog about grammar Nazis. I had no idea at the time that grammar Nazis might actually be a real phenomenon. Of course, I'd be dead because my unedited material all too frequently contains multiple run-on sentences. True, I almost always find them later when I reread my…
March 30, 2011
Yesterday, I learned of how animal rights terrorists are targeting college students as the "soft underbelly of the vivisection movement." As an example of their new strategy, these thugs gloated over the "recantation" by a Florida Atlantic University student named Alena Rodriguez, who, because of…
March 29, 2011
I've made no secret of my disdain for self-proclaimed "animal rights" activists, the ones who are more than willing to terrorize scientists doing research to understand disease better and thereby develop better treatments and even cures. None of this means that I am some sort of "animal abuser" (to…
March 29, 2011
Well, it's over. The grant is in, but it was painful, and I was exhausted, both in brain and body, last night. That's why there's no Insolence right now. Last night, I chilled, cracked open a cold one, watched some utterly mindless TV, and crashed early in order to be ready for a day in the OR. So…
March 28, 2011
Grant time again! Since today--yes, today!--is the deadline for a rather big grant I'm writing (not quite R01 level, but a respectable three year project if I can get it), I was up until the wee hours of the morning trying to put this sucker to bed. Being the ever-benevolent blogger, though, far be…
March 27, 2011
Grant time again! Since today--yes, today!--is the deadline for a rather big grant I'm writing (not quite R01 level, but a respectable three year project if I can get it), I was up until the wee hours of the morning trying to put this sucker to bed. Being the ever-benevolent blogger, though, far be…
March 27, 2011
These are two videos that appeared to have disappeared from YouTube for a while, thanks to takedown notices from the distributors of the film. Fortunately, they appear to be back, which is pure awesomeness. Unfortunately, because I'm busy putting the final touches on a grant today, the first one…
March 25, 2011
One of the major tactics of the anti-vaccine movement has been a disingenuous demand for more "informed consent." Of course, their idea of "informed consent" is anything but informed. Indeed, I have referred to it as "misinformed consent," because what the anti-vaccine movement does is a pathetic…
March 24, 2011
Remember Dr. Jay Gordon? I haven't written about him in a while because, well, as much as he's descended into anti-vaccine apologia over the last few years, he really has nothing new to say. However, apparently he's been Tweeting a lot lately, and he hasn't exactly been doing himself proud. Earlier…
March 23, 2011
As a cancer surgeon, one aspect of the infiltration of quackademic medicine into academic medical centers that bothers me more than most others is how willingly academia has been to "integrate" quackery with science-based oncology to form the bastard stepchild known as "integrative oncology" that…
March 23, 2011
I don't like quackery. I know, I know. Big surprise, right? After all, I've only spent the last six years laying down a nearly daily dose of Insolence, Respectful and not-so-Respectful, on the anti-vaccine movement, alternative medicine practitioners, quacks, and pseudoscientists of many different…
March 22, 2011
Calling all Texas skeptics! Well, at least Texas skeptics who can find their way to Galveston on March 29. The reason? Well, the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston is hosting the Nicholson Round-table Integrative Lecture Series: "Complementary and integrative medicine in cancer care…
March 22, 2011
For years now, one of the major themes of this blog, between laying the cluestick on anti-vaccine loons and examining quackery and pseudoscience in all its forms, has been to examine the infiltration of quackademic medicine into medical academia. The reason, as you might expect, is because, as an…
March 21, 2011
Here's something for you all to check out. Trine Tsouderos, the journalist from The Chicago Tribune who's distinguished herself as being one of the few reporters who "gets it" when it comes to quackery and the anti-vaccine movement (just put her name in the search box of this blog for some examples…
March 21, 2011
I graduated from the University of Michigan Medical School in the late 1980s. Back then, U. of M. was really hardcore about science back then, so much so that it was viewed as seriously old-school. No new (at the time) organ system approach for us! During the first two years, ever four weeks, like…
March 20, 2011
Well, well, well, well. Last week, I wrote one of my usual patented bits of insolence directed at "America's doctor," Dr. Mehmet Oz. What prompted my irritation was a recent episode in which Dr. Oz featured psychic scammer John Edward, the self-proclaimed "psychic" who claims to be able to speak…
March 18, 2011
Many are the times when I've pointed out that many "complementary and alternative medicine" CAM or "integrative medicine" (IM) modalities are very much more based on religion or mystical ideas akin to religion than on anything resembling science. I realize that my saying this is nothing new, but…
March 17, 2011
You know, I really know the feeling described in this song: I really do. How about you?
March 17, 2011
People believe a lot of wacky things. Some of these things are merely amusingly wacky, while others are dangerously wacky. Among the most dangerously wacky of things that a large number of people believe in is the idea that germ theory is invalid. Perhaps a better way of putting it is that among…
March 15, 2011
There are times when I'm wrong again and again. No, I'm certainly not referring to my writings about vaccines which, as much as anti-vaccine loons like to claim they're wrong, are not. Nor am I referring to my writings about "complementary and alternative medicine" (CAM) or "integrative medicine" (…
March 15, 2011
Our (mostly) benevolent but unfortunately all-too-uncommunicative Seed Overlords have finally bestowed upon us another report regarding the ongoing DDoS attack. Believe me, I know many of you can't access ScienceBlogs and, most important of all to me, this blog, the better to read every word of…
March 15, 2011
Yesterday, I did a post about ethics in human experimentation. The reason I mention that is because in the comments, a commenter named Paul pointed out an editorial of the sort of variety that we frequently see whenever there is a revelation of misdeeds in human research and a response to that…
March 14, 2011
Today is the Monday after Daylight Saving Time started. I always hate this day. Getting to work on time is always that much more difficult, and I always feel a bit run down for the few days afterward until my body adjusts. This time of year also predictably produces idiotic screeds about Daylight…
March 13, 2011
Progress in science-based medicine depends upon human experimentation. Scientists can do the most fantastic translational research in the world, starting with elegant hypotheses, tested through in vitro and biochemical experiments, after which they are tested in animals. They can understand disease…
March 11, 2011
In many ways, the anti-vaccine movement is highly mutable. However, this mutability is firmly based around keeping one thing utterly constant, and that one thing is vaccines. No matter what the evidence, no matter what the science, no matter how much observational, scientific, and epidemiological…
March 10, 2011
Not too long ago, I posted a rather amusing little video called Immunize! One line in the song that amused me went something like this: Don't give Chuck Norris shots! That'd be dim. Chuck need vaccines? Naw Vaccines need him? Actually, not too surprisingly, it turns out that the word "dim" should…
March 9, 2011
You, my readers, have been complaining about flakiness in Sb that goes above and beyond the usual technical flakiness of the site. So have many other readers, in particular PZ's. After a couple of days where the blog loaded slow as the proverbial molasses in Minnesota in January, our benevolent but…