one, not even an expert, can prove a negative.
The thing about the “MMR causes autism” scare is that there is absolutely no evidence for it, and its
principal author, Andrew Wakefield, has been discredited. We could just say that.
After all, The Independent has no need to appeal to outside “experts”: we and Jeremy Laurance, our former
health editor, played a proud role in debunking Wakefield’s irresponsible and damaging claims.
Go forth and divide: This was the headline on a report about fracking this week: “UK has five times less
shale gas than previously thought.” Thanks to Philip Nalpanis for pointing this out. It is not wrong, and we
know what it means, but I think it is ungainly.
“Times” is a term for multiplication, whereas here we are dividing. The conventional way to express it
would be: “UK has one-fifth as much shale gas as previously thought.”
Mixed metaphor of the week: “Jofra Archer derails Australia to keep England’s quest judderingly on
course.” I don’t know much about cricket, but here we have the Australian train coming off the tracks while
the English ship, possibly bumping into the train, manages to keep its bearings.
Clichewatch: The Labour leader peremptorily summoned leaders of other opposition parties, and
prominent Conservative opponents of a no-deal Brexit, to his office for a meeting next Tuesday. Several of
those invited said that they wouldn’t attend. In a comment article, we said: “Despite the lukewarm reaction
to Mr Corbyn’s proposal, it might not be dead in the water.”
This was a dramatically evocative phrase once, conjuring visions of gritty crime dramas (or Ophelia in
Hamlet, according to taste), but it has become a cliche. Time for it to join all those other hackneyed phrases
in – where else? – the “dustbin of history”.