Tom Naughton and his Bad Science lecture

Science for Smart People is really funny while being very serious too. Comedian Tom Naughton makes fun of scientists as he explains some of the problems with results of "scientific studies."  These studies, unfortunately, are what the US dietary recommendations are based on...and they are often intentionally misleading.  You can watch it on youtube or here where I found it on the Authority Nutrition website.



Here's an example from the talk: The Lipitor study showed that over 10 years, 2 out of 100 men taking Lipitor had heart attacks, while 3.05 out of 100 men who did not take Lipitor had heart attacks. Well, telling people that 1 in 100 men might not have a heart attack after taking a drug for 10 years is not very impressive. So they divided the numbers (instead of subtracting 2 from 3.05) to come up with ads claiming Lipitor reduces risk of heart attack by 36%. Hey, now that is impressive! In small print at the top, they tell you the patients were already at risk for heart disease, and in small print at the bottom they mention the 2% vs 3%.

 

 

Another example: "Whole Grains reduce risk of diabetes!" -- compared to what? Compared to people eating white flour. They didn't compare the risk of diabetes by whole-grain eaters to non-grain eaters.  That's like saying smoking filtered cigarettes lowers your risk of lung cancer -- when compared to smoking non-filtered cigarettes, but what about when compared to not smoking at all!

 

So take 45 minutes and watch this video; you'll never look at a "scientific study" the same again.