where am I?

My absence has been lengthy, but I have not been silent. Rather, I have been making noises elsewhere.

My son was diagnosed with Lymphoma in Feb 2008, and he underwent a course of chemotherapy and was then clear of the cancer for a few months, but by December it had returned. He is now undergoing another treatment plan, and I have started a parallel blog called Joshua Tree (no reference to the band U2) to keep friends, family and interested others informed of his progress. Feel free to visit us there. The past month has been particularly difficult for my family, so I have been focusing my blogging attention over there, but I will be back at Carbon Copy soon.

Who to believe? How to assess the integrity of research.

One of the problems with relying on research presented on Internet sites is that it's sometimes hard to separate the wheat from the chaff - especially if you are not familiar with the researcher or the organisation publishing the material. Here's a useful, easy-to-read paper on Evaluating Research Quality, showing you how to decide for yourself whether what you are reading is just propaganda. The paper also provides a number of online references for those who want to read more on this topic.