Sunday, November 4, 2012

Pseudoscience

I was perusing the news feed on my Google+ account this morning, and came across a post about the definition of Pseudoscience.  Of course, my mind raced past all the standard commercialization of television interruptions (er, commercials), right to, what else? Horses. Or should I say, Humans who are in the Horse Business.
To view the post, go to Google+ and search the hashtag #sciencesunday (Iwish I knew how to link it directly to this blog).  You will also be able to see it on my page (+Mary McGuire Smith), along with some other things that have been interesting to me.
Anyway, back to pseudoscience...
It is rampant in the horse training business, it is rampant in the horse lesson business, and it is rampant in the horse care/products business. 
Our challenge as professionals is to be the critical eye for our clients (both horse and human), and to ferret out the metaphysical science (or true science) from the pseudoscience; to advocate true science in every aspect of our business, and to educate our clients to the difference.
The easy path is the pseudoscience, and the danger is two-fold...you can go down the wrong path for quite a while before everything falls apart (and it will), and when it does, it is catastrophic for a living, breathing animal who looks to their human for their very existence.  It is a big responsibility we bear. Have you succombed to pseudoscience?