Download or read book Snake Oil and Other Preoccupations written by John Diamond and published by Vintage/Ebury (a Division of Random. This book was released on 2001 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At his death from cancer, journalist John Diamond had completed six chapters of "an uncomplimentary look at the world of complementary medicine". Written with total candour and his usual wit, they appear here together with a selection of emails, press articles, and excerpts from his final notebook.
Download or read book Snake Oil Science written by R. Barker Bausell PhD and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007-10-31 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Millions of people worldwide swear by such therapies as acupuncture, herbal cures, and homeopathic remedies. Indeed, complementary and alternative medicine is embraced by a broad spectrum of society, from ordinary people, to scientists and physicians, to celebrities such as Prince Charles and Oprah Winfrey. In the tradition of Michael Shermers Why People Believe Weird Things and Robert Parks's Voodoo Science, Barker Bausell provides an engaging look at the scientific evidence for complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) and at the logical, psychological, and physiological pitfalls that lead otherwise intelligent people--including researchers, physicians, and therapists--to endorse these cures. The books ultimate goal is to reveal not whether these therapies work--as Bausell explains, most do work, although weakly and temporarily--but whether they work for the reasons their proponents believe. Indeed, as Bausell reveals, it is the placebo effect that accounts for most of the positive results. He explores this remarkable phenomenon--the biological and chemical evidence for the placebo effect, how it works in the body, and why research on any therapy that does not factor in the placebo effect will inevitably produce false results. By contrast, as Bausell shows in an impressive survey of research from high-quality scientific journals and systematic reviews, studies employing credible placebo controls do not indicate positive effects for CAM therapies over and above those attributable to random chance. Here is not only an entertaining critique of the strangely zealous world of CAM belief and practice, but it also a first-rate introduction to how to correctly interpret scientific research of any sort. Readers will come away with a solid understanding of good vs. bad research practice and a healthy skepticism of claims about the latest miracle cure, be it St. John's Wort for depression or acupuncture for chronic pain.
Download or read book Suckers written by Rose Shapiro and published by Random House. This book was released on 2010-09-30 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Alternative' medicine is now used by one in three of us. In the UK we spend an estimated £4.5 billion a year on it and its practitioners are now insinuating themselves into the mainstream. There are methods based on ancient or far-eastern medicine, as well as ones invented in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Many are promoted as natural treatments. What they have in common is that there is no hard evidence that any of them work. Treatments like homeopathy, acupuncture and chiropractic are widely available and considered reputable by many. Ever more bizarre therapies, from naturopathy to nutraceuticals, ear candling to ergogenics, are increasingly favoured. Endorsed by celebrities and embraced by the middle classes, alternative medicine's appeal is based on the spurious rediscovery of ancient wisdom and the supposedly benign quality of nature. Surrounded by an aura of unquestioning respect and promoted through uncritical airtime and column inches, alternative medicine has become a lifestyle choice. Its global market is predicted to be worth $5 trillion by 2050. Suckers reveals how alternative medicine can jeopardise the health of those it claims to treat, leaches resources from treatments of proven efficacy and is largely unaccountable and unregulated. In short, it is an industry that preys on human vulnerability and makes fools of us all. Suckers is a calling to account of a social and intellectual fraud; a bracing, funny and popular take on a global delusion.
Download or read book Sociology and Health written by Peter Morrall and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2009-03-04 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This lively, introductory text provides nurses with the foundations of a sociological understanding of health issues, explaining the key theories and debates with humour and imagination in a way that will encourage an inquisitive and reflective approach.
Download or read book Hippocratic Oaths written by Raymond Tallis and published by Atlantic Books. This book was released on 2015-01-01 with total page 446 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, the physician and philosopher Raymond Tallis yokes together his diverse intellectual interests to address important questions about our well-being. In a series of stimulating and impassioned arguments, he establishes the truth about, among many other things, recent health scares, explains why patients compete for our doctors' and nurses' time; why the exploding popularity of alternative therapies is actually bad for our health; and how one man's view of the MMR vaccine influenced a nation. This is the summation of a lifetime's thought and medical practice, by one of Britain's most original thinkers. It will, quite simply, change for ever the way we think about ourselves and our health.
Download or read book Vibrational Energy Medicine written by and published by PediaPress. This book was released on with total page 325 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Analysing Qualitative Data in Psychology written by Evanthia Lyons and published by SAGE. This book was released on 2007-10-25 with total page 410 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Analysing Qualitative Data in Psychology equips students and researchers in psychology and the social sciences to carry out qualitative data analysis, focusing on four major methods (grounded theory, interpretative phenomenological analysis, discourse analysis and narrative analysis). Assuming no prior knowledge of qualitative research, chapters on the nature, assumptions and practicalities of each method are written by acknowledged experts. To help students and researchers make informed methodological choices about their own research the book addresses data collection and the writing up of research using each method, while providing a sustained comparison of the four methods, backed up with authoritative analyses using the different methods.
Download or read book A Devil s Chaplain written by Richard Dawkins and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2004 with total page 278 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first collection of essays from renowned scientist and best-selling author Richard Dawkins is an enthusiastic declaration, a testament to the power of rigorous scientific examination to reveal the wonders of the world. In these essays Dawkins revisits the meme, the unit of cultural information that he named and wrote about in his groundbreaking work The Selfish Gene. Here also are moving tributes to friends and colleagues, including a eulogy for novelist Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy; correspondence with the evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould; and visits with the famed paleoanthropologists Richard and Maeve Leakey at their African wildlife preserve. The collection ends with a vivid note to Dawkins's ten-year-old daughter, reminding her to remain curious, to ask questions, and to live the examined life.
Download or read book Perspectives on Complementary and Alternative Medicine written by Tom Heller and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2005-02-01 with total page 421 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the challenging issues associated with complementary and alternative medicine in the context of the social, political and cultural influences that shape people's health. Divided clearly into three sections, this book: sets out the general context of social change, consumption and debate around the rise of public interest in CAM argues for and against different classifications of CAM critically assesses the importance of ethics and values to CAM practice and how these inform what practitioners do focuses on the question of what people want, the changing and contested nature of health, and the nature of personal and social factors associated with the use of CAM, leading to a focus on 'therapeutic relationships' examines the diversity of settings in which CAM takes place and the social, political and economic milieu in which CAM is provided and used. Together with its accompanying text, Complementary and Alternative Medicine: Structures and Safeguards, it forms the core text for the Open University course K221 Perspectives on Complementary and Alternative Medicine.
Download or read book Minority Religions and Fraud written by Amanda van Eck Duymaer van Twist and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-22 with total page 217 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Analysing both fraud and religion as social constructs with different functions and meanings attributed to them, this book raises issues that are central to debates about the limits of religious toleration in diverse societies, and the possible harm (as well as benefits) that religious organisations can visit upon society and individuals. There has already been a lively debate concerning the structural context in which abuse, especially sexual abuse, can be perpetrated within religion. Contributors to the volume proceed from the premise that similar arguments about ways in which structure and power may be conducive to abuse can be made about fraud and deception. Both can contribute to abuse, yet they are often less easily demonstrated and proven, hence less easily prosecuted. With a focus on minority religions, the book offers a comparative overview of the concept of religious fraud by bringing together analyses of different types of fraud or deception (financial, bio-medical, emotional, breach of trust and consent). Contributors examine whether fraud is necessarily intentional (or whether that is in the eye of the beholder); certain structures may be more conducive to fraud; followers willingly participate in it. The volume includes some chapters focused on non-Western beliefs (Juju, Occult Economies, Dharma Lineage), which have travelled to the West and can be found in North American and European metropolitan areas.
Download or read book Why Statues Weep written by Wendy M. Grossman and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-09-19 with total page 214 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First Published in 2016. Why do statues weep? Did Nostradamus really predict 9/11? Is it true that we only use 10% of our brain power? Does quantum theory explain the mystery of consciousness? For 21 years, questions like these have been posed, and answered, in the pages of The Skeptic magazine, Britain's foremost and longest-running sceptical magazine, dedicated to the examination of science, scepticism, psychology, secularism, critical thinking, and claims of the paranormal – in short, the pursuit of truth through reason and evidence. This collection brings together the best articles from the magazine's archive in one myth-busting volume. It covers a wide range of topics such as psychic fraudsters, claims of psychic healing and alien abduction, near-death experiences, false memories, and much more. Contributors include Susan Blackmore, Richard Wiseman, John Diamond, Edzard Ernst, plus interviews with Paul Daniels and Stephen Fry. With a foreword by Simon Hoggart, this collection will simultaneously provide you with food for thought and keep you entertained.
Download or read book Soul Matters written by Mabel Aghadiuno and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2017-11-22 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In recent years, many have come to believe that Western medicine has lost contact with 'holistic' conceptions of health as encompassing physical, emotional, intellectual, social and spiritual dimensions. 'Spiritual' may imply religious or faith-based values or experience, but also non-material factors such as an appreciation of natural beauty, art, music, moral values or beliefs from which a person draws meaning and a sense of transcendence. Equally, many people are unaware of a spiritual dimension to life and health until illness or trauma strikes. However, coming to terms with life events, deriving meaning from them and incorporating them into their life philosophy may then be experienced as a deep spiritual crisis, with ramifications in their wider health, and implications for the health professionals who treat them. This book considers the meaning of holistic health care, and explores the spiritual dimension of health through the narratives of fictional and non-fictional patients. It discusses how to discern when a patient's distress has a spiritual dimension, the implications of this for health professionals, and ways in which spiritual factors can be addressed and discussed within healthcare. 'When it comes to questions about meaning and purpose, such as what is the point of all this?A", or why is this happening to me?A", when we meet patients in the depths of despair at the prospect of imminent death, when we ourselves feel hopeless and overwhelmed in the face of an avalanche of human suffering, then we begin to struggle. We do not know what we could do, nor even what we should do. Our professional training doesn't help. We are stuck. With this beautiful book, Mabel Aghadiuno comes to our rescue.' - Christopher Dowrick in his Foreword
Download or read book Problems Are Us written by Colin Feltham and published by Braiswick at By Design. This book was released on 2004-02 with total page 277 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Complementary and Alternative Medicine in Nursing and Midwifery written by Jon Adams and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-06-11 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the historical, social, political and cultural facets of integration between complementary and alternative medicine and nursing/midwifery. It examines the ever-expanding integration in relation to: the role and conceptualization of the patient the role and responsibilities of different professional healthcare providers (nurses, midwives, alternative therapists, etc) the future provision and approach of nursing and midwifery practice the challenges and opportunities currently facing healthcare systems as a result of integration. This innovative book provides the first critical overview of this important field of health research. It is important reading for medical sociologists, nurses and other health professionals - as well as students in these areas - with an interest in complementary and alternative medicine.
Download or read book Denying Science written by John Grant and published by Prometheus Books. This book was released on 2011-10-04 with total page 460 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is global warming just scaremongering by climatologists conspiring to protect their jobs? Is evolution "just a theory"? Is autism caused by vaccinations? The answer to all of these questions is, of course, no. The scientific evidence is now in, and it’s conclusive, on these and many more issues that are fundamental to our knowledge and wellbeing. But you’d never know this if all of your information came from the popular media or your upbringing and immediate circle of influence didn’t include critical thinking and basic scientific literacy. As this witty book with a very serious message shows, our culture has in recent decades been characterized by a widespread antagonism toward science and the not-always-welcome messages it brings. Large sections of the supposedly sophisticated populations in the developed nations are in an active state of denial. Not only do they deny scientific evidence but they also call into question the very competence of science as a descriptor of reality. In short, they deny reality. The author surveys the gamut of clearly unscientific ideas concerning the food we eat, the medicines and potions we are either afraid of or advised to take, our sex preferences, and a host of other issues that are raised by various panics, urban legends, and a general climate of misinformation. He also examines how special interests, from agribusiness to pharmaceutical companies to creationists, actively work to distort or suppress scientific findings. While the tendency may be to laugh at some of the ridiculous notions catalogued in the author's overview of bogus ideas, the overall picture he creates is anything but funny. This book reminds the reader that the future of free, increasingly complex societies depends on an educated citizenry that is able to think clearly and critically based on reliable information.
Download or read book American Jewish Year Book 2002 written by and published by VNR AG. This book was released on 2002 with total page 842 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Scapegoat written by Charlie Campbell and published by ABRAMS. This book was released on 2012-02-02 with total page 109 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A “brief and vital account” of humanity’s long history of playing the blame game, from Adam and Eve to modern politics—“a relevant and timely subject” (The Daily Telegraph). We may have come a long way from the days when a goat was symbolically saddled with all the iniquities of the children of Israel and driven into the wilderness, but has our desperate need to absolve ourselves by pinning the blame on someone else really changed all that much? Charlie Campbell highlights the plight of all those others who have found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time, illustrating how God needs the Devil as Sherlock Holmes needs Professor Moriarty or James Bond needs “Goldfinger.” Scapegoat is a tale of human foolishness that exposes the anger and irrationality of blame-mongering while reminding readers of their own capacity for it. From medieval witch burning to reality TV, this is a brilliantly relevant and timely social history that looks at the obsession, mania, persecution, and injustice of scapegoating. “A wry, entertaining study of the history of blame . . . Trenchantly sardonic.” —Kirkus Reviews
