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Children can be disgusting, and often they can develop extraordinary talents, but I’m yet to meet any child who can stimulate his carotid arteries inside his ribcage.

Ben Goldacre

I think you’ll find it’s a bit more complicated than that.
BEN GOLDACRE

Bits Complicated Thinking
Yes. I’m a doctor, an epidemiologist, and lots of my professional colleagues flip back and forth between industry and medical roles. I know them; they are not bad people. But it is possible for good people in bad systems to do things that inflict enormous harm.
BEN GOLDACRE

Doctors People Roles
You cannot reason people out of a position that they did not reason themselves into.
BEN GOLDACRE

Argument People Reason
These corporations run our culture, and they riddle it with bullshit.
BEN GOLDACRE

Bullshit Culture Running
Data is the fabric of the modern world: just like we walk down pavements, so we trace routes through data, and build knowledge and products out of it.
BEN GOLDACRE

Data Fabric Pavement
Real science is all about critically appraising the evidence for somebody else’s position.
BEN GOLDACRE

Inspiration Motivation Real
I spend a lot of time talking to people who disagree with me – I would go so far as to say that it’s my favourite leisure activity.
BEN GOLDACRE

Activities Leisure People Talking
Just just because there are flaws in aircraft design that doesn’t mean flying carpets exist.
BEN GOLDACRE

Design Mean Pain
You are a placebo responder. Your body plays tricks on your mind. You cannot be trusted.
BEN GOLDACRE

Body Mind Play
Transparency and detail are everything in science.
BEN GOLDACRE

Details Everything Transparency
I’ve detected myself using a new rule of thumb: if you don’t link to primary sources, I just don’t trust you.
BEN GOLDACRE

Linking New Rule Source Transparently
As it is a major component of blood, water is vital for transporting oxygen to the brain. Heaven forbid that your blood should dry out.
BEN GOLDACRE

Blood Oxygen Water
Positive findings are around twice as likely to be published as negative findings. This is a cancer at the core of evidence-based medicine.
BEN GOLDACRE

Cancer Inspiration Motivation
One of the things I always found interesting is the same tricks are used to distort medicine in all of those domains.
BEN GOLDACRE

Interesting Medicine Trick
Amazing things happen when you pull individual pieces of information together into larger linked datasets: meaning emerges, as you produce facts from figures.
BEN GOLDACRE

Facts Pieces Together
The plural of anecdotes is not data
BEN GOLDACRE

Anecdotes Data Plural

Children can be disgusting, and often they can develop extraordinary talents, but I’m yet to meet any child who can stimulate his carotid arteries inside his ribcage.

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Children can be disgusting, and often they can develop extraordinary talents, but I’m yet to meet any child who can stimulate his carotid arteries inside his ribcage.

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Popular Authors

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