rss

Tag: "scam"

1
I was just awarded $100,000 from the United Nations Foundation!

I was just awarded $100,000 from the United Nations Foundation!

I was just awarded $100,000 from the UN Foundation, according to the email I just received. If anyone wants to go collect it for me, you can keep 90% of it for doing the footwork

It is a bit strange that they awarded me $100,000 without taking the trouble of knowing whether I’m a man or a woman (see the “Dear Sir/Madam”). Here’s the email:

United Nations Foundation
Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Suite 400
Washington, D.C. 20036

Dear Sir/Madam,

UN Foundation Grant.

This is to notify you that you have been chosen by the board of Trustees of the above International (Charity & Human Developmental Organization) as one of the final recipients of a Cash Grant/Donation of $100,000.00 (one Hundred Thousand Dollars) for your personal development. The UN Foundation was created in 1998 with entrepreneur and philanthropist Ted Turners’ historic $1 billion gift to support UN activities. The UN Foundation builds and implements public-private partnerships to address the world?s most pressing problems and broaden support for the UN through advocacy and public outreach. The UN Foundation is a public charity.

The ITIL Foundation, UK has been appointed to oversee this development affair. You are required to expeditiously contact the Executive Secretary of The ITILFoundation with the details below for documentation and release of your cash aid, your Qualification number is (UNI/ITIL-816-1119G-987-94) quote it in all discussions.

Executive Secretary:ITIL Foundation, UK - Barrister STEVEN CARLOS

Email:itil.ungrant@yahoo.co.uk,
itilfoundation11@gmail.com
Phone: +447045769825

On behalf of the Board,

faithfully,
Cherryl Oconnor
Unit Co-ordinator
UN WORLD GRANT DEPT.

Maybe it’s time to call Paul Kinsella, the guy who excels at scamming the scammers.

1
Backhanded celebration of homeopathy

Backhanded celebration of homeopathy

It’s homeopathic awareness week! Neurologica wants to take full advantage:

According to the British Homeopathic Association . . . June 14-21 is Homeopathy Awareness Week. I would like to do my part to increase awareness of homeopathy. . . I am all in favor of homeopathic awareness. The scientific community should use this week to make the public acutely aware of the fact that homeopathy is, put simply, utter rubbish.

Neurologica has put together a detailed account of the world’s most over-embellished version of the placebo effect. Consider the homeopathic advocates’ arguments for why homeopathic drugs can’t be tested:

Many homeopaths have argued that homeopathy cannot be subjected to the same type of studies as are conventional drugs. This is because each patient, from a homeopathic perspective, is unique, and cannot be lumped into a single category. Whereas conventional medicine can compare treatments of 1000 diabetics with two different medications, homeopaths cannot produce large numbers of patients with the same totality of illness requiring the exact same treatment. In making this argument, that of untestability, such homeopaths are securing their position in the halls of pseudoscience, for if their is one single quality which separates scientific theories from nonscientific ones, it is falsifiability. If homeopathic remedies cannot be tested, then they can never be grounded in science.

Neurologica’s article is well written and well documented. I agree entirely.

1

Woman falls for Nigerian email scam

I have assumed that most people delete the numerous Nigerian Scam emails that they get.  Here’s a sad story about the scam succeeding, though. It’s a reminder to be careful whenever you are presented with a deal that’s too good to be true.

2
George Bush has fixed our ailing economy!

George Bush has fixed our ailing economy!

Thanks, President Bush, for taking care of the problem!  Now all let’s get back to our wasteful, ignorant, self-indulgent American lives!  Let’s add another new big screen TV to the credit card!
What else is a reader of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch supposed to think when scanning this headline: “Stock market smiles, thanks to bailout.   Administration [...]

4
Earth Day is (mostly) a salve.

Earth Day is (mostly) a salve.

The best way to get people to neglect a cause is to dedicate a Special Day to that cause each year. On that one special Day, we will hold thousands festivals where we treat the cause in a trite way and we will ignore that cause the other 364 days. We’re just too [...]

8
How to create a diploma mill: How to legally become the President of a fake college.

How to create a diploma mill: How to legally become the President of a fake college.

I once created a fake college and I’m proud of it.
This might strike you as odd, because most people who create diploma mills are doing so to make a quick buck by passing out bogus degrees.  These fake diplomas, in turn, allow unqualified people to get promotions and or get jobs for which they are [...]

5
How about Tylenol for your child’s cold or fever?  How about Tylenol ADVERTISING to rev up a parent’s anxiety?

How about Tylenol for your child’s cold or fever? How about Tylenol ADVERTISING to rev up a parent’s anxiety?

Check out this current website from Tylenol. You’ll see that McNeil (maker of Tylenol) has heroically and voluntarily removed all of these medicines from the market:

Concentrated TYLENOL® Infants’ Drops Plus Cold
Concentrated TYLENOL® Infants’ Drops Plus Cold & Cough
PediaCare® Infant Dropper Decongestant
PediaCare® Infant Dropper Long-Acting Cough
PediaCare® Infant Drops Decongestant (containing pseudoephedrine)
PediaCare® Infant Dropper Decongestant & Cough
PediaCare® Infant Drops Decongestant & Cough (containing pseudoephedrine)

Why remove all these children’s medicines? According to Tylenol,