The educational system isn't the problem. The problem is the culture. When the majority of Americans completely lack any critical thinking skills, why would we expect our children to magically pick up?

Even when basic logic is taught, it's not real to most people, since they'll leave the classroom and listen to their family & friends blather the same bullshit as always. Teachers can only do so much.

But it's not 'common' sense. That's the whole point. People aren't magically stupider than we used to be. Not by a long shot. We're not significantly more intelligent, but there ya go.

I don't know, this just seems like the kind of thought any human of average intelligence could understand by the time they hit puberty, if they were properly exposed to it.

The educational system selects for obedience, not critical thinking skills anyway. For example, most of the math is so rarefied from its practical applications that when it's taught in high school the student doesn't tend to see any real benefit from it other than something he or she is required to pass.

Then again, I went to high school in Mississippi and there's a proportionately higher population of people who have been told a lot of bullshit and had their own critical thinking skills crushed by that point in life anyway.

Yeah, kingarthur nailed it. In school I found myself liking math for the kind of curiosity factor but I always wondered with algebra and so on "what the fuck do I do with this?" I thought geometry would just be for architects or something. I only used graph paper to make my dungeons for AD&D. It wasn't until I dropped out and started watching anything that was on t.v. that I came across this old show from the 80's called "The Mechanical Universe" that I realized that math has a fascinating history and plugs into the real world in interesting ways. I felt glad to finally know that, but I also felt like my teachers had cheated me of the joy of learning and the power to take that learning and do something more interesting with my life.

My guess is the idea that the calorie reduction from the fat not being absorbed is dwarfed by the calorie reduction from not eating fat to stop you from shitting your pants. In other words, if you ate what you ate while taking Alli you'd probably lose about the same amount of weight, unless you're the sort that binge-eats high fat foods and doesn't care about the splatters.

Definitely. But it's still well-established that orlistat blocks fat absorption. It'll reduce your caloric intake, all else being equal.

His environmental articles are really putting me off. The SUV one starts with him sarcastically calling them "Nazi wagons." It has a single (cherry-picked) fuel economy number, but lots of unsupported references to anti-SUV legislation.

But he's fine on easy targets, and we share 99% of our bullshit lists. I'll throw him a bone and say that "simple answers are seductive" is a great pull-quote.

How do you know about something that shows up thirty minutes in if you only watched about twenty minutes of it?

Because twenty minutes be mostly be mostly.

I jumped around dog.

Why would you care so much about that particular pseudoscience?