Narrated by: Jonathan Cowley
Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins

I bought this in a sale, I heard the sample, and it seemed pretty decent.

The author, Ben Goldacre, is a doctor who is basically pissed off with the epidemic of stupidness the has permeated throughout the UK.  And as many of the issues he deals with are very similar to issues in the USA.. obviously his point is meant to ring out to America as well.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4MhbkWJzKk

I would recommend watching his TED talk before you read the book to be honest.

This is one of those books… and I’ve read a couple that are like this, that I’m not entirely sure he’s getting his message through to the right people.  That essentially it just becomes a ‘preaching to the choir’ activity, or ‘providing more ammunition’ to those that are already able to figure this stuff out…for argument points to those that are not able to figure this stuff out for themselves.

Essentially Ben Goldacre covers topics such as Homeopathy, Big Pharma, Journalists & understanding statistics, Nutritionists, the nature of trials and how companies can rig them for positive results, the art of publications to ensure the ‘right ones’ are picked up, and then the Measles Mumps Rubella MMR vaccinations with regard to autism scares in the UK.

I would suggest you read the Wikipedia article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_Science_(book)  1st as well.

I think unfortunately most of us have given up on those kind of people, because they’re clearly set in their ways.
In my honest opinion his topic of homeopathy is completely unneeded, some of us have friends, or family friends that believe this kind of stuff… but once you don’t get through to the person after 2 discusisons you realise that they are impervious to logic and reasoning… and that any further discussion is going to go nowhere.
If Goldacre could emphasise anything more it would be to ensure that these kind of illogical idiots that don’t want to let scientific studies or evidence guide their choice are NOT provided an equal voice in the governance of the country to ensure others adhere to their balls-for-brains thinking.  Ben Goldacre certainly does emphasise that journalists are to blame for a lot of the mis-information, and the skewing of information that is already out there, and I think that is important.

If you’re reading this now… I imagine you’re mildly intelligent, and hopefully you’re not believing everything that’s stated in newspapers or televisions ‘Current Affair / 60 minutes’ like programs. You’re not believing that alternative medicine is the stuff to use… because after-all if it was effective…it would just be called medicine.
You’re surely not one to believe that everything published with statistics like “this disease/ condition has increased 50% in the last 3 years” , yet doesn’t state the original level, is anything to live your life by, or that trained professionals opinions with all their associated degrees behind them are on the same level as ‘experts’ who merely have an interest & an unfounded opinion just because a journalist wants to come across as providing a balanced argument.

Anyone that seriously believes simultaneously that drinking a glass of red wine a day is good for you, and that red wine also causes cancer and trying to do all of these bullshit recommendations from clearly bullshit ‘feel good / click bait’ stories at once is generally not going to be the smartest cookies in the room…Nor, are they going to be listening to a book like this that would educate them at WHY they should be thinking more.

The authors main gripe is that there seems to be a dumbing down of society, and that journalists are embellishing situations in order to create a story, and that people that don’t know what they’re talking about… or that have a product to sell that isn’t necessarily good for your health, can create ‘the need to have a conversation’ for something that really doesn’t require a conversation in order to sow seeds of doubt and eventually sell their products, opinions, services or even air-time taking advantage of those that rather unfortunately can’t grasp scientific principles, or can’t see through the obvious bullshit.

A point of interest, apparently before 1935 most of the medical things that we really had were Morphine & insulin.  However, between 1935 & 1975 the results of real science and clinical trials came through, we suddenly had antibiotics, dialysis, transplants, heart surgery, intensive care.  We learnt that smoking caused almost all lung cancer, and in fact almost all modern medicine came from this time period… at least the biggest advancements.

I would also thoroughly recommend watching ‘Merchants of Doubt’ documentary, as many techniques used are similar to the ones the author is speaking about for the dumbing down of society to be able to push their own opinions, products etc.

Watch that online here  https://fmovies.is/film/merchants-of-doubt.ll4n/9mvwkq

If you want to listen to a sample of Bad Science or read other reviews, click here: https://www.audible.com/pd/Science-Technology/Bad-Science-Audiobook/B006WRE0IS

Get a free trial of audible with 2 free books, listen to books like this for free, & then if you want….just quit before 30 days & you get to keep everything… sounds like a pretty good deal to me.