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In my mind I had always thought of “tumors” as somehow not as bad as “cancer.” In fact, tumors may be benign or malignant, depending on how encapsulated and contained they are versus tentacled and spreading. After four craniotomies in two years my mom’s tumor got upgraded to an “invasive malignant meningioma.” It was even more invasive than her physicians realized. In 1999, she unexpectedly developed two tumors in her lungs. Could it be that the invasive malignant meningioma had migrated out of her brain? Impossible, we were told. By Folkman’s theory, however, this is possible, because the plethora of micro blood vessels that infuse a tumor increase the probability of single cells escaping the encapsulated tumorous mass and invading the general circulatory system. Not likely, was the response we received to this suggestion, since there is no known case of such a migration by a meningioma tumor, benign or malignant.

Here is yet another insight into the nature of the scientific process. At a dinner party one evening, hosted by my friend the social psychologist Carol Tavris, I was recounting my mom’s plight, including this latest turn of events. Quite by chance, also dining with us was Dr. Avrum Bluming, a practicing medical oncologist who also specialized in the dissemination of medical information via the Internet, having founded Los Angeles Free-Net, a nonprofit organization providing extensive medical information online. “Just a moment.” Avrum interrupted my story. “I believe I have seen a paper documenting the movement of meningioma out of the brain. Let me see what I can find out for you.” Within twenty-four hours I had a faxed medical paper at my office, documenting two such cases. How is it, I wondered, that my mom’s oncologists and surgeons, among the very best in the world (and all remarkably humane throughout this ordeal), attending her at the USC/Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center and Hospital, one of the leading institutes for cancer research and treatment in the world, did not know about these cases? Worse, I thought, what if I had not gone to Carol’s dinner party that night? Luck favors the hungry mind.

Lung surgery in October 1999, and a fifth craniotomy that also permanently removed an infected skull plate in January 2000, kept our emotional balance sheet in the black, but it was short-lived. The invasive malignant meningioma was on the march again.

In addition to the five craniotomies, my mom endured four gamma-knife radiosurgery treatments (September 1996, February 1998, January 1999, and March 2000), utilizing a powerful machine resembling a nineteenth-century phrenology contraption that fits tightly over the head, which can zero in on a pinpoint spot in the brain from all sides of the head, killing the cancer cells with a minimal amount of damage to the surrounding tissue. Finally, we were told that the risks of additional surgery and radiation outweighed the benefits. There was nothing more to be done.

What is a skeptic to do? An ideological commitment to science is one thing, but this was my mom! I turned to the literature on experimental drugs and, with the help of Avrum, determined that we would try mifepristone, a synthetic antiprogestin better known as RU-486 that operates by blocking the action of progesterone, a sex hormone that prepares the womb for the fertilized ovum. At the time, RU-486 was illegal, so we had to go through a Washington, D.C.-based women’s rights advocacy group—the Feminist Majority Foundation’s Mifepristone Compassionate Use Program—to obtain treatment dosages. A small-sample study suggested that it might retard the growth of tumors. It didn’t for my mom, so we then tried temozolomide, a cytotoxic agent designed to prevent the replication of cells that divide rapidly, such as cancer cells. That proved equally ineffective.

The problem with such experimental treatments is that by the time patients get to the point of needing them their cancer is so far advanced that normal treatment