This week we're talking about placebos. We cover placebo clothing, placebo surgeries, and how placebos are getting stronger over time.
- Compression garments provide no measurable performance gain in sports, though they may help reduce muscle soreness if worn for 24 hours after exercise.
- Influence of compressive gear on powerlifting performance: role of blood flow restriction training.
- Powerlifting equipment
- Kinesio Tape
- Kinesio Taping - The Latest Sports Fad
- Nocebo effect
- Nocebo as a potential confounding factor in clinical trials for Parkinson's disease treatment: a meta-analysis
- DoubleBlinded.com - The Self Experimentation Platform
- Arthroscopic knee surgery for osteoarthritis is not an effective treatment, and helps people no more than fake surgery. Current guidelines argue against doing this procedure, however it remains a common occurrence.
- Peristalsis #EverybodyPoops
- QWOP
- The placebo effect has increased over time.
- That Mitchell and Webb Look: Homeopathic A&E
- Diluting the scientific method: Ars looks at homeopathy
Thomas Donoghue
Tom is a PhD student in the Cognitive Science department of UCSD, where he uses computational methods and neural recordings to investigate how the brain communicates with itself. He did a Cognitive Science Bachelor's degree at McGill University and has research experience in neuroimaging and language studies. Outside of being a science nerd, he enjoys travel and music.
Michael Gaultois
Michael is hunting a PhD in Chemistry at the University of California, and is a big fan of fountain pens, smoked gouda, M.C. Escher, and high fives. His interests have taken him to collegiate service organizations, RC helicopters, organizational management, start-up companies, world travels, and scientific endeavours.
Ian Mahar
Ian is a postdoctoral researcher at Boston University, studying neuropsychiatric features of chronic traumatic encephalopathy and other neurodegenerative conditions. He did his PhD in Neuroscience at McGill University in Montreal, doing neuropsychiatry research in the McGill Group for Suicide Studies at the Douglas Mental Health University Institute. He also does science writing and outreach, and his primary interests for all three are how the brain regulates emotions, and what happens when this regulation goes awry.
