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Simon Singh To Appeal In UK Court Today
TACD writes "Simon Singh, author, television presenter and known critic of pseudoscience, is in court today appealing the decision made against him last May over his use of the term 'bogus' to describe the methods used by the British Chiropractic Association. Today's decision could have far-reaching implications for the movement to reform Britain's horrifically outdated libel laws (that even America is making moves to protect its citizens against), and to begin taking steps to elevate Britain above the likes of China when it comes to open debate and freedom of speech."
Seriously, anyone who can claim with a straight face that Britain has less freedom of speech than China (and hence is only beginning to take steps to elevate above it) is living in a fantasy world.
Simon Singh is the author of VERY COOL books:
Fermat's Last Theorem
and
The Code Book
(those are the ones I read, at least)
how long until
This reminds me of the first episode of Penn & Teller: Bullshit! when Penn explains why they call people "motherfuckers" and "assholes" instead of liars, frauds, quacks, etc.
Quoted from Wikipedia:
Since their act is not normally associated with a frequent use of profanity, Jillette explains their choice of using the term bullshit in the opening episode: if they referred to people as frauds or liars, they could be sued for slander, even in the face of overwhelming evidence of chicanery, but as "vulgar abuse" is not legally considered slanderous, referring to them as assholes or motherfuckers ostensibly expresses an opinion rather than a statement of fact and is legally safer for them.
Nothing lasts forever but the certainty of change.
"I crack backs; I cure cancer!"
"I crack backs; I cure deafness!"
Chiropractic is pseudo-0scientific bullshit. Along the lines of Homoeopathy, Acupuncture and "bad humours"
Posted AC cuz I'm in the UK oddly enough.
the fact that on first glance, the former means what you expanded it to, whereas the latter is more commonly used as a generic insult.
FGD 135
There are a few conditions a Chiropractic practitioner is good for, e.g. pinched nerves. However, their contention that manipulating the spine can fix virtually any condition is, er, properly described as "bogus".
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
for the newspapers it's called 'filling the pages with guff about reality TV', for The Eye, it's 'having good lawyers yourself'.
Also, most of us aren't sailors.
FGD 135
1. The libel stuff is fairly new - probably only the last 5 years or so. We always used to consider the USA the place for that, but it seems to have moved here recently. 2. The establishment understands the Streisand effect and ignores the popular press. But now the lawyers rather than the clients are creating the market. They don't care whether they actually suppress the 'libel, they just want to get paid. So they lead stupid people to try. Doubtless they'll get over it eventually.
Everyone knows what bogus treatments are. They are not merely treatments which have proved less effective than they were at first thought to be, or which have been shown by the subsequent acquisition of more detailed scientific knowledge to be ineffective. Bogus treatments equate to quack remedies; that is to say they are dishonestly presented to a trusting and, in some respects perhaps, vulnerable public as having proven efficacy in the treatment of certain conditions or illnesses, when it is known that there is nothing to support such claims.
Please, get this story right, people. It's not about whether these remedies work or not. It's the implication that they offer them, knowing full well that they don't work.
Here's the OED definition of bogus:
pretending to be real or genuine
"Simon Singh, author, television presenter and known critic of pseudoscience, is in court today...
Well, given that it is now approaching 9PM in the UK, it is more correct to say Simon Singh was in court today. And so far things look promising – Lord Judge is less than impressed by BCA's case. See http://www.indexoncensorship.org/2010/02/simon-singh-chiropractic-bca-libel-appeal
This comment is for entertainment purposes only. Any similarity to real insight or information is purely coincidental.
Is "Two And A Half Men" broadcast in the UK? One of the main characters is a chiropractor and most of the other characters say libelous things about his profession. Where are the lawsuits over this?
It is broadcast in the U.K., very regularly (it is on syndication on Paramount Comedy or some channel). No, it is not an issue. The reason you've had to ask this question is because you've been subjected to kdawson's ridiculous idiocy where he compares freedom of speech in the U.K. to China.
In cadaver studies the whole pinched nerve thing was shown to be bogus. The amount a spine would have to be manipulated would cripple the subject.
They now resort to "subluxations" which, again, have been shown to be bogus. In experiments with n subjects, some with and some without diagnosed "subluxations" were examined by n chiropractors.
EVERY subject was diagnosed with a "subluxation" and rarely in the same spot.
Bullshit all around.
1. The libel stuff is fairly new - probably only the last 5 years or so. We always used to consider the USA the place for that, but it seems to have moved here recently.
A lot of it come from one single judge as well: Mr Justice Eady.
If I have nothing to hide, you have no reason to search me
Liar only has one meaning. Motherfucker has many, with incest being just one of them (and in fact, usually it doesn't mean that). It's generic and vague, just the sort of thing to call some litigious motherfucking asshole.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Indeed.
"You motherfucker!"
"Yeah, but it was your mother. She was a lousy lay though"
Britain's senior judges have been begging parliament for reform in the libel and defamation laws due to their stupidity. The three judge appeal panel has Britian's two most senior judes on it, they have specifically requested this case for two reason's
1) To smack down Eady and deliver a sternly worded "No" to him while clipping his nose with a rolled up newspaper.
2) A spot of judicial activism because the politicians are dragging their feet something rotten
Puzzle Daze is now my job
Is it a waste of my time to point out that the UK has had a Bill of Rights since 1689 thus predating the American version by some 100 years.
Not to mention the more recent European Convention on Human Rights which was written in the 1950s by a Brit.
I haven't seen a chiropractor in years. Not because it doesn't work, but because it does. Seeing how big an effect it made for me, I learned to adjust my own spine. That wasn't easy. I can get it wrong. It's a very specific adjustment required, not just some random act for a presumed placebo effect.
And that makes sense. We're physical beings. The alignment, balance, symmetry of ourselves as physical bodies - of course that makes a difference, sometimes a big one, in our health. The anti-chiropractic camp would ask us to believe, what?, that we're pure spiritual essence, to which the body is so secondary even in regards to the body's own health that only our mental attitude - as adjusted of course by whatever drugs an orthodox physician might decide to prescribe - makes an "objective" difference in healing? But mental attitude is the essence of "subjective," not objective. Objectively, that body is what we are, and various bodywork therapies, including chiropractic, approach the body with the respect it's due.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
In fact, the only reason our first ten Constitutional amendments are nicknamed the "Bill of Rights" is by analogy with the original, English Bill of Rights. (Just as the United States Postal Service is commonly called "the Post Office", or one cent is called a "penny".)