I am told that the Huffington Post represents the future of journalism. I sure hope it’s not the future of science journalism. Some of their posts on swine flu have caused a strange creaky sound in my skull, and for a few days now I haven’t been able to figure it out. It turns out to have been the prelude to a full-out head explosion, which took place when I just read this by New ager Marianne Williamson:
Dear God,
Please take away the swine flu.
AmenAccording to Martin Luther King, Jr. there is a power in us more powerful than the power of bullets.
King knew that that power was the power of the Spirit. Call it a religious power, a spiritual power, the power of consciousness or whatever – it has to do with the power of the mind, joined with the power of a Divine Creator.
So don’t be fooled when it comes to this conversation about the swine flu. This flu wasn’t created on the level of the body, because no disease is. It was created on the level of the mind, and it is there that we will root it out at the causal level.
[Bang.]
I invite you to read the rest of the post while I sponge up the bits of gray matter on my desk. She actually gets worse.
What’s particularly confusing about the Huffington Post is that not all of their stuff on science is bad. A piece by conservation biologist Alan Rabinowitz on endangered big cats? Fine by me. But surely if there were a sentient being in charge of the science coverage at the Huffington Post, we wouldn’t have to deal with the swine flu of the mind.
Originally published April 28, 2009. Copyright 2009 Carl Zimmer.