E equals Mariah Carey “times two”, according to Ms Carey
Sense About Science, a charitable trust set up to promote to promote good science and evidence-based thinking to the public, has just published its Celebrities and Science 2008 report, naming and shaming those in the public eye whose attitude to science is, shall we say, “casual”. From their website:
Scientists have responded to celebrities including: Kelly Osbourne on avoiding cancer risks, Tom Cruise on psychiatry, Demi Moore’s promotion of detoxing with leeches, Ivanka Trump and ‘spit’ parties, Amanda Peet defending MMR, Mariah Carey’s use of Einstein’s equation, Jenny McCarthy misunderstanding MMR, Nigella Lawson on special diets, Delia Smith on sugar addiction, Carole Caplin on food supplements and more! Scientists also couldn’t resist a response to US presidential candidates on the subjects of the MMR vaccine and fruit fly research.
While UK celebs have improved and are taking more care when discussing science and medicine, their international counterparts haven’t done so well. Sense About Science’s files are still too full of examples of pseudo-scientific claims.
We’ve also discovered this year that the subjects have changed: the most common misconception of the last couple of years was how products or food can be ‘chemical free’, something which doesn’t appear this year. References to the effectiveness of detox have however remained steady. New topics appear too, including genetic testing, psychiatry, maths and international celebrities have resurrected inaccurate claims about the MMR vaccine. There have been big improvements amongst the UK celebs in medicine and health and nutrition and food production.
We don’t expect people to know everything about science; the problem comes when they don’t consider checking it or asking a few questions before they speak out. With the internet, and 24-hour news media, celebrities’ misleading claims travel widely. They add disproportionately to the stock of misinformation that we all then have to wade through to make sense of a subject. A little checking goes a long way.
You can download a copy of the report here (PDF).
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3 responses
God bless the BBC.
Celebrities can do a lot of good in raising awareness for certain causes, but they should just shut up if they know nothing about what they are talking about.
Aw come on, man! Sure, the United States is filled with Christofascist terrorist and traitors with the average IQ of George W. Bush, sure, but we can’t help it! Many of us were educated in California! We have the notorious Scientology cime syndicate here, also, which helps to lower the national average. I mean come on, be fair! For Xenu’s sake, take heterosexual Tom Cruise out of the calculation and our national average here in the United Hates would jump up seven points!