16 responses

  1. Terry
    May 1, 2023

    Keep doing what you’re doing. I’ve recommended your book to many, including my veterinarian (horse). You’ve helped me know how to explain health science to others. What you do does ripple out!

    Reply

  2. Ben Balser
    May 1, 2023

    I’m a dog trainer, I know the scientific method, and I am a huge fan of Skepvet. Keep up the amazing work you’re doing. I use your articles with my clients all the time. You are absolutely helping to bring dog training and care into the modern age. Keep giving us the facts and science, we appreciate you!

    Reply

  3. Andrew
    May 1, 2023

    Wow.
    Still, somehow this one is particularly disturbing for me:
    “I am a vet student- how they teach you to keep your pet healthy is actually scary. what they teach you is how to cut into your pet, how to remove tumors, how to give chemo, how to make money…”

    Reply

  4. Frank Clements
    May 1, 2023

    I love your evidence based articles. I know from experience that one can not change a persons mind once it has been made up. It’s hardly worth the effort.

    Reply

  5. Robin Scarborough DVM MSFS
    May 1, 2023

    I’ve read and enjoyed your blog for years. Sometimes your perspective really helps when the pharm reps come calling. You need to eye new drug releases with the same vigor as you would alternative medicine and various fads…alkalinized water? Seriously?
    I too am inherently skeptical, and when the latest and greatest protocols are presented to me, I metaphorically cross my arms and say, “Prove it!”
    I just can’t believe how much energy some of your readers put into hating your blog; if I don’t like a blog, I simply don’t read it rather than letting it twist my innards so tightly that I must vent my spleen!
    Congratulations on your recognition by VIN. (maybe I should leave 10+ exclamation points.)

    Reply

  6. Rene
    May 2, 2023

    Thank you for sharing, and shining a light on the anti-science buffoons out there, so willing to disregard authentic facts and proven medicine at the risk of their pet’s health. There’s some scary people out there.

    Keep doing what you’re doing. As a layperson, your blogs have taught me to exercise healthy skepticism about many of the crazy “cures” presented to our community, and I’m glad I can pass that knowledge along to our segment of pet parents who so badly need real information when their dog or cat’s health is on the line. THANK YOU for helping us carry on that service for them.

    Reply

  7. Jack
    May 2, 2023

    About the Royal Family defender, there is at least one past monarch of England and Scotland who would likely be horrified (were he alive today) at defenders of quackery. I speak of King James the I and VI, who did use treatments which are decidedly nonscientific… but as the scientific method and science-based medicine did not yet exist, I think he can be excused for it (he was a contemporary of Francis Bacon, with whom he had a complicated relationship). But King James wrote a pamphlet titled “A Counterblast to Tobacco” wherein he discussed what we would now call the placebo effect and regression to the mean:

    “The other argument drawn from a mistaken experience is but the more particular test of this general one, because it is alleged to be found true by proof that by the partaking of tobacco, very many find themselves cured of diverse diseases, while on the other hand no man ever received harm from partaking of it.

    In this argument there is first a great mistake and next a monstrous absurdity. For is it not a very great error to take Non causam pro causa, as they say in Logic? Because peradventure when a sick man hath had his disease at its worst stage, he hath at that instant taken tobacco and afterward his disease, taking the natural course of declining and consequently the patient of recovering his health, oh then the tobacco was forsooth the worker of that miracle. Beside that, it is a thing well known to all physicians that the apprehension and conceit of the patient hath, by wakening and uniting the vital spirits and so strengthening nature, a great power and virtue to cure diverse diseases.

    “For an evident proof of error in a similar case, I ask you what foolish boy, what silly wench, what old doting wife or ignorant country clown is not a physician for the toothache, for the cholic, and various such common diseases? Yea, will not every man you meet likewise teach you a sundry cure for the same and swear that by that means either he himself or some of his nearest kinsmen and friends were cured?”

    (source: https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/231411/where-can-i-find-a-modern-english-version-of-king-james-s-counterblaste-to-toba )

    Oh, and he also loved his dogs! On the other hand, he was a bit of a dumpster fire (in common with modern royalty???)…

    Reply

  8. Jazzlet
    May 2, 2023

    Having your ideas about how things work challenged isn’t always pleasant, but that is no reason to abuse the person challenging them, if you need to resort to abuse or tone trolling or accusations of shilling you have pretty much admitted you can’t support your position with facts. As I’ve mentioned before I have changed my animal care because of your blog, sometimes grudingly I admit, but at the end of the day science is the best way we have to unerstand the world, and if I don’t follow it I’m the fool. So I’m raising a mug to you, thanks!

    Reply

  9. nutritionrvn
    May 4, 2023

    Thank you for doing all you do – your blog was a huge inspiration for mine, and while I too get some of these…very interesting….comments, it’s so important the work that we do as evidence-based professionals, communicating science and fighting against the sea of misinformation out there.

    Reply

  10. Lisa
    May 5, 2023

    Your work and this blog are very much appreciated in my household. Thank you for answering my questions over the years!

    Reply

  11. Pete
    May 8, 2023

    I cannot put into words how much I appreciate what you do! There is so much misinformation out there on the internet and it is made to sound scary. Your blog has allowed me to be able to look at these websites and articles and know what they are promoting may not be accurate. I am still in shock that people who went to vet school are practicing medicine that could be potentially harmful to pets!!

    Reply

  12. Nick
    May 14, 2023

    Wow, so many well reasoned, cogent arguments… they all sound so stable.
    I’ve been saying for years that sound reasoning and critical thinking should be taught in schools from as early an age as possible.

    The pandemic really highlighted how much more work there is to do.

    Skeptvet has been (and will continue to be) my go to source for evidence based information. Please never stop doing what you do.

    THANK YOU !

    Reply

  13. Candace
    June 20, 2023

    “-Clown” is my fave.

    Reply

  14. anonymous
    June 26, 2023

    I appreciate your blog very much as a regular old employee at a large regional “holistic” pet retailer in the PNW that teaches us that raw is the gold standard of pet nutrition and won’t carry foods with corn, wheat, or soy in store. While I’m sure I won’t be changing any minds among my coworkers, the information here helps give me the language and research backing to do what I can to try to challenge the leadership on the quality of their information and do the least amount of harm possible to customers and their pets from my position.

    Reply

  15. Steve
    July 31, 2023

    It’s damned difficult to reason people out of positions they didn’t reason themselves into.

    I’ve appreciated and valued your blog for years, and have frequently used information gleaned therein to engage with my vets in informed and productive discussions regarding care for my animals.

    Forward!

    Reply

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