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Find reading inspiration on our Book of the Month forum.

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Find reading inspiration on our Book of the Month forum.

Book of the month

Book of the Month: And our Geek Lit winner is... BAD SCIENCE by Ben Goldacre (discussion night Tue 30 March)

120 replies

TillyBookClub · 01/03/2010 11:56

BAD SCIENCE by Ben Goldacre has grabbed the winning title of March Book of the Month with a staggering 50 votes, streaks ahead of his competitors.

We will get together to chat about the book on Tuesday 30 March, 8-9.30pm.

For those that missed it, here were the choices and the March poll results.

And for anyone new to Bookclub, here is how it works.

I'm hoping Ben may be able to join us to answer all your questions - will keep you posted.

OP posts:

Report

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 22:17

Hmm, yes that's a good point and he's probably guilty as charged there, but he wasn't writing a book about fish oils, or homeopathy he was writing a book about bad research practices, or frequently no research practices, about how the media reports science and how we are misled by press-releases passed off as medical breakthroughs.

Bad Science is not a good book to get the be all and end all about any therapy mentioned therein, but it's a good book to get a fairly comprehensive overview of why it's important to have scientific research, what happens when people don't research properly and how to understand statistics that are often used to bamboozle the general public.

And I found it very useful from that point of view.

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 22:22

But it is totally unbalanced and subjective. If you choose one study and conclude there is no positive effect in giving children fish oils then you are ding exactly what you are criticizing others for [media misrepresentations of science]. It is not the whole truth.

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 22:25

Also he calls Aspergers a 'pseudodiagnostic category' which is fairly-jaw dropping. Interesting comments raised on the bad science forum here

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 22:27

No - he chose one study and showed that because of its bad design it couldn't tell us anything about whether fish oils worked or not.

That particular story made the book I suspect because the people behind the trials made him jump through so many hoops to get any information out of them. Which yes, isn't subjective, but it didn't make the studies any better science.

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 22:28

Well I won't stand up for him there (re Aspergers).

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 22:30

But it is the way you present information. He misrepresented the value of fish oil by not mentioning that there are other rigorous studies that prove it has benefits. Which is fairly ironic.

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 22:31

I am wondering if that is why he didn't come on actually...

StewieGriffinsMom · 30/03/2010 22:34

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 22:35

Which is also pretty ironic seeing as the DM were responsible in large part for all the MMR scaremongering...

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 22:37

It is a shame. Particularly if he just didn't bother to get back to Tilly.

Rhian82 · 30/03/2010 22:40

He is a practising doctor. Maybe he had a shift at a hospital?

StewieGriffinsMom · 30/03/2010 22:40

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 22:42

Which would explain why he wasn't here, but not why he didn't tell Tilly he wouldn't be.

MuchaFriki · 30/03/2010 22:42

Well, oily fish are full of fish oils. And other good things.

A often-repeated theme in the book is the benefit of a balanced diet, Jamie Oliver style. And pill companies of whatever flavour are multi-million industries playing on our fear, uncertainty and doubt.

Ben may be a tad arrogant but i don't think he's smirking or dismissive...

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 22:45

but the peer reviewed trials are not of fish, they are of fish oils. So misleading to leave them out.

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 22:47

Pill companies do do that. Big pharma companies do that too.

Doesn't mean there are not some benefits to some vitamins taken in pill form. There are plenty of peer-reviewed studies on Vit C, D and A.

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 22:51

I would have loved to see what his answer would have been to that pofaced, I really would.

I hope, because he would have been able to have argued his case better than I can, and in any case it would have been an interesting debate.

(I notice the last link you gave was to a study about anti-inflamatory properties of fishoils which I suspect he would have rejected as he was talking about claims that they make your children brighter - but I obviously don't know that. Again though, I don't recall at any stage in that chapter him saying that fish oils were useless, don't eat them.)

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 22:52

Vitamin companies & Big Pharma of course are often one and the same..

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 23:00

there was this on the same page Suzi. [small study]

MuchaFriki · 30/03/2010 23:04

I gave the book to a friend who is interested in nutritionism, natural remedies etc and she was intrigued by the debunking of Prof Patrick Holford who is so influential in that scene.

Despite the generalisations or flimsinesses "Bad Science" may contain, it was eye opening to me. I read the blurb claiming the benefits of pills, or the science stories in the papers, with extra critical eyes.

So at least I can look at the link that Pofacedagain posted and think "well, 23 people is pretty small study. Were the patients randomised. How significant were the results really. If i really care, i should go read the original research paper listed on BioMedCentral and look at the methods they used". Which points out that the shorter length of hospital stay is significant only if one excludes the patients who died.

Thank goodness for open access science and now even as a clueless humanities student I can learn to understand at least some of the research if i care to try.

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 23:08

23 people is certainly a small study. Usually means a follow up study is needed, rather than the study itself can be discredited.

But you're right. It is important to learn how to understand how to interpret research.

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 23:09

That study though is looking at maternal supplementation with the theory that the foetus isn't getting sufficient DHA through the mother's normal diet and that DHA is important for brain development.

Similar to folic acid supplementation I suppose.

Anyway, it's not making any claims about fish oils as a "brain food" as such. Just as a way of giving mothers extra DHA when worries about mercury in oily fish have meant that pregnant women are recommended to limit the amounts they consume.

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Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 23:10

thisinteresting too

SuziKettles · 30/03/2010 23:14

But we need reputable studies that show an academic improvement in NT children to truly compare against the Durham studies.

Pofacedagain · 30/03/2010 23:16

Yes definitely we do. There a lots of studies that show and link between fish oil and brain health. Trying to find them. Here is

one

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