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The Skeptics' Guide To The Universe - Podcast 332 - 11/26/2011
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The Skeptics' Guide To The Universe
The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe is produced by SGU Productions, LLC - dedicated to promoting critical thinking, reason, and the public understanding of science through online and other media. The first episode of the SGU podcast went online on May 4th, 2005. It soon became a popular science/skeptical podcast, and remains one of the most popular science podcasts on iTunes.
SGU Podcasting Awards: SGU on XM: You can listen to the SGU on America's Talk XM 166 every Saturday night from 8-9pm Eastern.
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Podcast
332
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November 26, 2011
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This Day in Skepticism: JFK Assassination
News Items: Power Balance Bankruptcy, FTL Neutrino Follow Up, Does Water Prevent Dehydration, Food Color and Taste
Who's That Noisy
Your Questions and E-mails: SILLY Bias in Scientific Reviews
Science or Fiction
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Segment: This Day in Skepticism
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Segment: News Items
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Segment: Who's That Noisy
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Who's That Noisy
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Answer to last week: Law & Order
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Segment: Questions and Emails
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Question #1: SILLY Bias in Scientific Reviews
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Ha ha! A subsequent review article perhaps poking fun at those believing in the BMJ Christmas articles?...
Christopher Morello
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From the PubMed link: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20018155
Ugeskr Laeger. 2009 Dec 14;171(51):3784-9.
[A new scientific source of bias: SILLY bias. Analysis of citations of BMJ's Christmas articles].
[Article in Danish]
Felding UA, Jørgensen KJ, Hróbjartsson A.
Det Nordiske Cochrane Center, Rigshospitalet, København Ø. ah@cochrane.dk
Abstract
We analysed the scientific impact of systematic reviews and randomised trials published in the BMJ Christmas issues 1997-2006. The articles were mostly interpreted correctly as humorous, but the humorous dimension was overlooked with surprising ease. The result from one ironic-absurd trial on the effect of retroactive remote intercessory prayer for patients already dead or dismissed was taken at face value in 12/36 of the citing articles, and mortality data was unconditionally included in three systematic reviews. Thus, we document a new type of bias in medical research: Serious Idiopathic Loss of Ludic ironY (SILLY) bias, both in citation practices and in metaanalyses.
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Segment: Science or Fiction [ Click Here to Show the Answers ]
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Segment: Skeptical Quote of the Week
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Skeptical Quote of the Week
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"At every croasroads on the road that leads to the future, tradition has placed against us ten thousand men to guard the past."
- Maurice Polydore Marie Bernard Maeterlinck
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