Are You a Pseudoscientist?
What do you know about "psuedoscience"?
I can tell you I was definitely in the dark until this week! Beyond knowing that it is a slur used by modern $cience against scientists they don't like, I hadn't looked any further.
After our recent run-in with the FDA, I was inspired to go searching for a list of things that are accepted as pseudoscience. What I found was enlightening... and it put my whole career, and my run-in's with the establishment, in a whole new perspective!
Pseudoscience Defined
Pseudoscience is defined as beliefs or practices that cannot by disproven using the modern practice of the scientific method. I see a very clear divergence between modern $cience and what I would consider to be "real" science. I think that split balances on the head of whether or not you believe in a higher power. That is a MUCH bigger discussion and I will be exploring it in future blog posts. Today, let's just start with the basics.
The official list of pseudoscience grows daily I'll wager. It includes some sensationalized things as you might expect- flat earth theories, ancient astronauts, astrology, etc. It also includes things you might find surprising.
I'm going to share all those that my family has used and practiced, I've heard about from friends, I've taught about, or that I am interested in testing out for myself. There is a preference in my list for health practices that have gained the pseudoscience label. So, this list is only a fraction of the official list of pseudoscience that can be gathered.
In full disclosure, I am not sharing those I don't know anything about (and don't have interest in researching) and those I have tested and found not to be universal truths- such as holocaust denialism.
Do You See Yourself?
- Acupuncture
- Chiropractic
- Ear Candling
- Faith Healing
- Healing Crystals (including EMF blocking)
- Homeopathy
- Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
- Qigong
- Reflexology
- Reiki
- Aromatherapy
- Creationism
- Lunar effect (believing the phases of the moon have a physiological effect on the body)
- Climate change denial
- Flood geology
- Biodynamic agriculture
- GMO skepticism
- Adrenal fatigue
- Alternative cancer treatments
- Alternative or fringe medicine (alternative medicine, complementary medicine, integrative medicine, holistic medicine, natural medicine, unorthodox medicine, fringe medicine, unconventional medicine)
- Anthroposophic medicine
- Apitherapy (believing that substances produced by the honey bee have healing properties)
- Applied kinesiology (muscle testing)
- Ayurveda
- Balneotherapy (water therapy)
- Body Memory (cellular storage of memory)
- Candida hypersensitivity
- Chelation therapy
- Chronic Lyme
- Colon cleansing
- Colloidal silver
- COVID-19 misinformation
- Craniosacral therapy
- Cupping therapy
- Detoxification
- Earthing or Grounding
- Electromagnetic hypersensitivity
- Facilitated communication
- Functional Medicine
- Germ theory denialism
- Hair analysis
- Flower Essence therapy
- Iridology
- Leaky gut syndrome
- Macrobiotic Diet
- Moxibustion
- Naturopathy
- Oil pulling
- Osteopathic manipulative medicine (OMM)
- Pulse diagnosis
- TCM
- Promoting a link between autism and vaccines (specifically names Wakefield)
- Wind turbine syndrome
- 5G conspiracies
- EMDR
- Dowsing
- Channeling
- Affirmative prayer
- Exorcism
- Intelligent Design- (Irreducible complexity, Specified complexity)
I've started my YouTube channel to explore all of the science behind these supposed shams, and I'll be exploring them further here in the blog.
Are you surprised?
