Pennyworth Books

Ben Goldacre is an English medical doctor and author of “Bad Science.” He’s beside himself with indignation at what he sees as the unscientific nonsense that passes for science information in the popular press. He’s particularly concerned about what people are led to believe about their health. He observes that the public is obsessed about health issues–half of all science stories in the media are medical. He says we are “bombarded with scary sounding claims and stories.” But, he claims, these stories we get are from reporters who don’t understand scientific evidence.

Take homeopathy, Goldacre’s favourite whipping boy. Samuel Hahnemann devised homeopathy in the late eighteenth century. He decided that if he could find a substance that could induce symptoms of a disease in a healthy individual then it could be used to treat the same symptoms in a sick person. His first homeopathic remedy was cinchona bark, which he suggested…

Their names are lost to the ancient depths of history, their stories muted by the centuries, but the women portrayed in the Old English Epic Beowulf were critical to any understanding of both the poem and the culture of that ancient time.

The pattern was this. Men’s affairs were prefaced by a narrator, then articulated through all manner of poetic and narrative conventions, until the deed that was prophesied was played out to the last. Then, when the matter was put to rest, and men gathered in their mead hall for celebration and reward, the women emerged for a number of reasons.

First was to fulfill a crucial role of recognizing the bravery of their men, and to perform the ritualistic passing of the mead cup among those same battle weary troops. This served the purpose of nurturing the men’s bodies and souls, a distinctly female role. But the act of service…

Today as I was selecting a book to read or reference in my personal development time I was drawn to a chapter from The Cashflow Quadrant by Robert Kiyosaki dealing with the question of, how do I get rich? As with so many teachings in goal setting, success or achievement the mindset or way of thinking seems to be the Achilles heel for the majority of people. Nearly everyone wants to create a ‘to do list’ that will allow them to get to their goal or their have and that’s where the disconnect happens.

Let’s look at an example of the golfer mentioned in the book. A lousy golfer chooses what he thinks he has to ‘do’…buying a new set of clubs vs. who he needs to ‘be’…learning the mindset and beliefs of a professional golfer in order to fix his game. You know the results on this one…a lousy golfer…