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Bad science: two thousand years of snake oil

A journey through the history of pseudoscience and medical quackery.

Good science has steadily improved human health and happiness since Aristotle invented the scientific method in Ancient Greece. Why, then, is pseudoscience still with us in the 21st century? From using leeches to remove "excess blood" to modern "digestive detoxifiers", medical quackery has evolved in parallel with real advances in medical science. Join us for a journey through two thousand years of questionable medical claims and a discussion on why they persist today.

David Law is an associate professor of biology at Lakehead University in Orillia. He has a PhD in biology and has been with Lakehead since 2004. He has performed research on the history of biology, university student learning, human chromosome structure, gauging the toxicity of industrial wastewater using fish, using genetically modified plants to produce drugs, and the developmental changes in ripening fruit. He has worked in the agricultural biotechnology industry and for the U.S. federal government. 

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