Simon Singh

Simon Singh

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Simon Singh (1964–) is a British science author who wrote many books, including one on the solving of Fermat's last theorem.

BCA lawsuit

Singh was sued by the British Chiropractic Association (BCA) following allegations of libel due to his (correct) characterization of chiropractic woo as "bogus". The offending article was removed from The Guardian pending the result of the legal process, but is now available again. It's possible that the litigation raised the profile of the more crank positions of chiropractic medicine well above what people previously thought.

In a more recent turn, the BCA published (and quickly retracted) an allegation that Singh was motivated by malice — a defamatory statement that opens up the possibility for Singh to counter sue the ass off the BCA (we at Rational Wiki aren't saying he should follow such childish litigation, but we won't lose sleep if he does). This was summed up quite nicely in the Science, Reason and Critical Thinking blog.

On April 1 2010, Singh won an appeal that granted him the right to use a defence of fair comment. Although the BCA vowed that they would appeal, on April 15, they finally dropped the case.

He is the chair of the Good Thinking Society.

Books

• Fermats Last Theorem (1997) — on the namesake theorem in number theory. ISBN 978-185702521
• The Code Book (1999) — a history of cryptography. ISBN 978-1857028799
• Big Bang (2004) — origins of the universe. ISBN 0007193823
• Trick or Treatment?: Alternative Medicine on Trial (2008) (with Edzard Ernst) — critical of alternative medicine. ISBN 0593061292
• The Simpsons and Their Mathematical Secrets (2013) — mathematics in The Simpsons. ISBN 1620402777

See also

• Ben Goldacre
• Chilling effect
• Skeptics in the Pub
• Vereniging tegen de Kwakzalverij

External links

• Singh's website
• Website of the Good Thinking Society
• See the Wikipedia article on Simon Singh.
• See the Wikipedia article on Good Thinking Society.