Bad Science

1. HCG "Diet": pregnancy hormones in homeopathic doses allow dieters to get by on 500 calories per day, lose weight.


2. "End" of MMR/Autism link, except to True Believers


3. City Council Earmarks Flow to Brain Scan Group
   

   The president of the foundation, Dr. Patrick J. Kelly, a retired New York University neurosurgeon, acknowledged that the potential of his work, which focuses on the early detection of tumors, has not yet been proved. “It just makes sense,” he said in a recent interview. “Can I demonstrate that scientifically? No.”



4. Perhaps inspired by TV favourites such as Doctor Who and Ashes to Ashes, nearly a third of Britons (30%) believe that time travel is actually possible. The results were revealed in a survey, launched at the start of National Science and Engineering Week (11-20 March) by Birmingham Science City, which aimed to see just how blurred the lines between science and fiction really are.
   
   Other findings included:
   1. Over a fifth of adults incorrectly believe light sabres exist.
   2. Nearly a quarter (24%) of people are wrong in their belief that humans can be teleported.
   3. Nearly 50% of adults wrongly believe that memory-erasing technology exists.
   4. More than 40% of people incorrectly believe that hover boards exist.
   5. Nearly one fifth (18%) of adults have the incorrect view that they can see gravity.


5. A study claiming an exponential rise in child sex trafficking was made up.


6. An hysterical article accused plastics of toxically causing all sorts of diseases, but every listed disease has alternate plausible explanations. No cause but correlation was cited.


7. A study which "proved" that women of African heritage are unattractive is fatally flawed.


8. While not denying global climate change, James Taylor examines many global warming predictions which were spectacularly wrong.


9. A Billion Wicked Thoughts: two neuroscientists reach a psychological conclusion by reading fantasies on the internet. They poll some people in a ridiculous leading fashion, and are ultimately disowned by their governing board.


10. Fracking studies trying to show natural gas worse than coal profoundly flawed. Even the Department of Energy disagrees.


11. A Chinese study purports to see brain differences in those with "Internet Addiction Disorder"


12. The Center for Science in the Public Interest condemns salt and calls for government action, even as the American Journal of Hypertension released a full study showing no correlation between salt and blood pressure in otherwise healthy people.


13. French homeopathy giant Boiron sues an Italian blogger for claiming that their product with no active ingredient has no active ingredient, and that the ingredient it claims to have diluted out of existence does not exist at all.


14. Pesticides on produce! Eek! But despite what the Environmental Working Group claimed, the actual amount of pesticide on produce was less than one percent of a dangerous dose, in the worst case cited.


15. Bob Jones Christian schooling uses textbook which tries to explain electricity, fails, and gives up.


16. Despite the World Health Organization's announcement in May 2011, a comprehensive study finally shows that cell phones do not cause cancer.


17. Daylight Savings Time: still stupid


18. Democrats and Republicans even on being anti-science; differ only over issues. For example, Republicans tend to be anti-evolution, while Democrats are more likely to be anti-vaccine. Except for the HPV vaccine, because Republicans link that to premarital sex.


19. The United Nations' International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) routinely cites publications which haven't even been peer-reviewed. World experts on malaria, hurricanes and other topics are excluded because of their skeptical views; while a relatively small clique does the actual writing, including activists from the World Wildlife Fund.