His grandmother Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, lived to the ripe old age of 101, his father Prince Philip was 99 when he died in 2021, and his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth, reached 96 before her death in 2022, so King Charles, now 75, obviously has the benefit of good genes.
I'm encouraged by news from the Center for Inquiry (CFI), a skeptical organisation in the US. They are suing the CVS and Walmart pharmacies for their placement of homeopathic products alongside real efficacious medical products.CFI refers to Homeopathy as “Fake Medicine”, which it surely is.
After some investigation it seems that this magazine (it's a stretch to call it a journal, a title which should be reserved for scientific publications) is being purchased by at least one public library (Titirangi).
I can't help but wonder what 2021 is going to bring us, given that we've already started the year with the US Capitol being invaded by right wing extremists and QAnon conspiracy theorists. Closer to home, Billy TK's Public Party appears to be coming apart at the seams, with staff members taking over the party's website to detail Billy's financial mis-management.
Understanding marketing tactics is a good way to learn how to be more skeptical about them. Knowledge can help you take off that wool you didn't know had been pulled over your eyes, and see the truth behind the lies, and hopefully be able to make a better decision about where and how to spend your hard earned cash.
The NHS recently decided to stop funding homeopathy. Until recently, taxpayers' money was used in the UK to fund homeopathic hospitals (in London, Bristol, Glasgow, Liverpool and Tunbridge Wells) and prescriptions for homeopathy. In part of a suite of changes in an effort to avoid paying for ineffective treatments (including herbal remedies and fish oil), the NHS decided to stop paying money for these pseudoscientific medicines that don't work.
Georgian College in Toronto has cancelled a course in homeopathy, due to negative feedback.
18 classes of health product are being de-funded by the NHS in the UK, including 7 that are blacklisted:
Mark Hanna at the Society for Science Based Healthcare has complained recently about the Napier Courier's column written by a local homeopathy business, called "Homeopathy Hub". the weekly column made many daft claims about the effectiveness of homeopathy, such as:
Mark Hanna at the Society for Science Based Healthcare has complained recently about the Napier Courier's column written by a local homeopathy business, called "Homeopathy Hub". the weekly column made many daft claims about the effectiveness of homeopathy, such as:
A petition on change.org has been signed by 1,000 vets asking for the UK to blacklist homeopathy as a treatment that vets can prescribe for animals. Over 2,500 people have signed it in all.
Last year professor Paul Glasziou from Bond University in Australia headed up a team that wrote a systematic review of systematic reviews on homeopathy as part of a report for Australia's National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC).
Australian Anti-vaccination activist's 11 week old daughter hospitalised for whooping cough, which kills 1 in 200 children who pick up the infection.
In early October the NZ Skeptics submitted a response to the Pharmacy Council's consultation on a proposed change to their Code of Ethics. It had recently been pointed out to the Pharmacy Council (by the Society for Science Based Healthcare) that many pharmacies sell unproven health products, in breach of their current Code of Ethics. The Pharmacy Council's proposed solution is to alter their code to remove the part of the clause that is being breached.
Martin Harris is a previous winner of Best Complementary Healthcare Campaign, in 2012:
In November Wellington's Dominion Post newspaper ran a piece (in my opinion...) of misleading propaganda they passed off as a cartoon which can be summed up as naturopathy vs science.
Keith Garratt finds the NZ Homeopathic Society is capable of change.
A drug awareness programme run by the Church of Scientology has received government funding to spread its views through schools and community groups (Sunday Star Times, 19 February(.
On a recent visit to New Plymouth I was rather taken aback to see a billboard outside a central city church posing the question: "Evolution? How come we still have apes?" It wasn't so much surprise that someone could know so little about evolutionary theory that they would think this was a persuasive argument - versions of this are often to be seen in the less sophisticated creationist publications - it was more that they should feel the urge to display their ignorance on a busy street corner.
Concerns over animal welfare issues on farms have seen Rural Women New Zealand and Fonterra rapped with the Bent Spoon, the annual recognition of gullibility and a lack of critical thinking awarded by the NZ Skeptics.
Bernard Beckett (Skeptic 95 , p8) says the ability of Creationism to make the same predictions as evolutionary psychology shows that the latter is not a scientific process. But the same is equally true of evolutionary biology. ("God made cats resemble tigers, and apples resemble pears, because He felt like it.") The fault is with Creationism, not evolution. An omnipotent Creator can be used to explain/predict absolutely anything, not only the universe as it is, but any other universe, possible or im-. You might say that Creationism, like Nostradamus and astrology, is very good for predicting the past. That is their fundamental failing.
Martin Wallace particularly likes two of the five definitions of 'pitfall' in the OED:
The leading medical journal The Lancet recently published yet another analysis of trials of homeopathy. After examining 110 such trials, the Swiss researchers concluded that there was no convincing evidence that homeopathy was any more effective than placebo. In the accompanying editorial, the editor, Dr Richard Horton, made a comment which has an uncanny, and no doubt intentional parallel with the views of the founder of homeopathy over two hundred years ago:-
PHARMAC is the Government drug-purchasing agency. Pharmac's 2005 Annual Review showed that about eight prescription items were issued per adult in that year. In the course of my work I write a lot of prescriptions but I certainly don't consume eight scripts per year.
The Tertiary Education Commission was suffering from "dilutions of grandeur" when they identified homeopathic training as a nationally important strategic priority for New Zealand. That's the reason the NZ Skeptics have given the TEC the Bent Spoon Award for the most publicly gullible action of 2005.
New Zealand soils are deficient in selenium and this can cause serious health problems for animals. A 500kg animal needs about 1mg selenium daily. There is no evidence that New Zealand adults need selenium supplements and this situation has been described as "a deficiency in search of a syndrome".
Government hypocrisy is rife amid the talk of a "knowledge-based economy"
If the caring practitioner has no idea of what to do next, the decision may be best left in the hands of the Almighty. Too many clinicians, unfortunately, are unable to resist giving God a hand with the decision-making.
For some years the Skeptics have had a collection of videotapes available for members to borrow. These are on topics thought to be of interest to skeptics, including firewalking, spontaneous human combustion (unrelated to firewalking!), homeopathy, UFOs, alien abduction, etc. and have been sourced mainly from material broadcast in New Zealand.
For a host of reasons which the NZ Skeptic will examine further in a later issue, the so-called "natural health" industry is enjoying a remarkable resurgence. One cannot refute the argument that we should take responsibility for our own health and that we should not expect modern medicine to provide on demand pills to cure all our ills, particularly those which are self-induced or the result of old age. Moderation in all things (including moderation) will generally help any of us to lead a vital and active life.
Recent issues of the Skeptic have contained expressions of puzzlement at some subjects being taught to tertiary students in New Zealand. The worst example is the Degree in Naturopathy planned for Aoraki Polytechnic. But is this really all that surprising?
A very interesting look at the state of homeopathy in the UK in the '90s, including its use by some "conventional" doctors and vets. Details are given of a few trials (some double and triple blind) that have been conducted claiming to give support to homeopathic techniques. Unfortunately, relatively little time is permitted for dissenting views, and I am sure many of our rural members will have other explanations for some of the "miraculous" animal cures presented. A thought-provoking programme nevertheless; it should be essential viewing for any skeptic confronting homeopathic enthusiasts.
Grant Duncan in his letter in the June 1989 N.Z. Skeptic has I feel been unfair to me in what I wrote about homeopathy; and he seems bent on being unfair to himself too.
In order to supplement the article on homeopathy by Bill Morris (March, 1989), I enclose copies of abstracts of clinical trials of homeopathic preparations published in reputable medical journals, some of which Morris has overlooked.
" 'Alternative' medicine is usually defended by a 'skeptical' argument, that we should keep our minds open." Petr Skrabanek in his article "Demarcation of the absurd"1 looked for guidelines on quite how open we should leave our minds and for how long. As he put it "Anything is possible. 'You have to keep your mind open'—until your brains drop out." He argues that we should be prepared to express unbelief because we can always change our minds, but by being gullible or keeping the mind too wide open we "lose reason from the very beginning."
A virus has inflicted NZCSICOP, analogous to computer viruses that print messages if mild, but self-destruct if severe. The carrier is the ortho-skeptic, acting as a mole in the secret service, programmed to turn Skeptics into pseudo-skeptics, or pskeptics for short.