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The Skeptics' Guide To The Universe - Podcast 361 - 6/16/2012
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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
361
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June 16, 2012
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This Day in Skepticism - Captain Picard Day
News Items: LiDar, Extremophiles, Moral Behavior, Cervical Manipulation, Ghost Train
Who's That Noisy
Your Questions and E-mails: Pharmacist Homeopaths
Name That Logical Fallacy
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:
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Segment: Questions and Emails
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Question #1 - Homeopathic Pharmacists
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Subject: Pharmacists enthusiastically promoting homeopathy
Message: Dear skeptical rogues,
I want to address a topic of utmost importance: the medical credibility lend to non-physicians.
Pretty much all German pharmacies sell homeopathic remedies. After gathering an relatively big amount of information about current studies and so on, I wanted to confront some local pharmacists with the ethical question: how to justify selling, what obviously doesn't work?
The responses were.. unexpected, to say the least. I went to 4 pharmacies, stating that I'm "interested to learn about homeopathy", setting up a little trap, hoping to get the every-day response to a question like that. All 4 pharmacists I talked to, assured me (enthusiastically), that homeopathy certainly works and that it's a great way to go. They were clear that there is not the least(!) doubt about the effectiveness. (
I was even told that homeopathy was, in fact, real medicine and shall not be confused with nutritional supplements.
When confronted with the studies, they avoided to address any argument I made. Instead their responses became, ironically enough, some kind of liquid. I heard some arguments from ignorance, some false dichotomies and constantly moving the goalpost.
I don't know about pharmacists in the US, but in Germany they have almost the same credibility as physicians. They sell a big variety of (non-homeopathic, actually real) medicine on own judgment and even tell people what dosage to take. Physicians usually only get consulted by Germans, if the state of health appears to be somewhat critical. Most medicine is sold purely on the pharmacists judgment.
Today I discovered how full of crap they really are.
I would love to hear your opinions on the topic. Especially regarding the potential risk of people selling medicine while basically believing in magic.
If you should read from this mail in your show, feel free to change my wording so the grammar is correct. As you can tell, I'm not a native speaker, although I'm trying hard.
Keep up the great work!
Toni Michel
Stuttgart in Germany
PS: The reason I learned about this podcast is my older brother, Andreas Michel. He is a really great guy and a big fan of your show for quite some years now. It would be totally incredible, if you could greet him on the air. I probably wouldn't have to buy him birthday presents for the upcoming years.
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Segment: Name That Logical Fallacy
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Name That Logical Fallacy
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Congruence Bias
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Segment: Science or Fiction [ Click Here to Show the Answers ]
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Item #1  Fiction
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Christian Huygens was the first to postulate, in 1678, the particle theory of light.
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Item #2  Science
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In 1695 he wrote a book expounding on his belief in extraterrestrial life.
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Item #3 Science
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He invented and patented the pendulum clock in 1657.
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Item #4 Science
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He designed a basic internal combustion engine fueled by gunpowder.
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Segment: Skeptical Quote of the Week
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Skeptical Quote of the Week
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"Science does not aim at establishing immutable truths and eternal dogmas; its aim is to approach the truth by successive approximations, without claiming that at any stage final and complete accuracy has been achieved."
- Bertrand Russell's "The ABC of Relativity" (4th revised edition).
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