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Your Skeptic Stories

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[Editor’s Note: “Your Skeptic Stories” is an ongoing series written by readers like you, people who have, through one means or another, discovered skepticism and critical thinking. These stories remind us that we all started somewhere and some of us are still finding our way as skeptics If you are interested in contributing your own story, please submit your piece of around 1000 words to maria (at) randi.org along with a short 2-3 line bio.

Today’s story comes from Mason]

Mine is not a dramatic, suddenly-saw-the-light-of-skepticism story.  I did not have a single epiphany that won me over.  The journey to skepticism took a while, but the seeds of the journey were planted early.

My family was somewhat religious but not fanatically so.  We attended a local Presbyterian church, and in my early teens I went through the church's program to become a member.  As I got older, though, I began to wonder more and more about the truth of stories I had been taught to believe, such as a world-wide flood, people living to be hundreds of years old, and the like.  By the time I had reached my late teens I had lost interest in this church and did not pursue membership in others.

As a young boy I was fascinated by science, especially dinosaurs and outer space.  As I got older I never lost interest in these and other scientific topics.  Looking back, I can see that as I reached my late teens and early college years, what I learned about science made much more sense to me than what religion was teaching me.  Even in my younger years, I was starting down the road of skepticism without at that time knowing to call it that.

As time passed I continued farther down the road of skepticism.  I well remember several events that gave me that extra push down this road, such as these:

*  The so-called psychic from way back, Jeane Dixon, published one of her annual set of predictions for the coming year when I was around 14 years old or so.  One of her predictions I knew I could easily commit to memory was the one that said neither Hank Aaron nor Willie Mays would break Babe Ruth's career baseball home run record.  Once Aaron did so many years later, I remembered her prediction and had my own personal evidence that she was wrong.

The fact that I wanted to commit this prediction to memory was evidence I was already skeptical of psychics at a young age.

*  I recall seeing Uri Geller on Tom Snyder's Tomorrow show go through his set of tricks, including his spoon bending and restarting stopped wind-up watches.  The next night Snyder had James Randi and one or two other magicians on his show, and of course they repeated all of Geller's tricks, demonstrating that yet another person I had seen or read claiming paranormal powers did not possess them.

*  During my undergraduate years I took two elective courses in religious history.  This was the first time I had been taught about the Christian bible as accurate history (at least, as accurate as was known a few decades ago).  I learned that the book of Genesis was assembled from multiple authors' writings intermingled together; that proclaiming people to have lived hundreds of years was merely a gesture of respect; and that the escape of slaves from Egypt was probably through the Reed, not Red, sea and was more of a trek through swampy areas than across a large body of water (far less dramatic than the depiction in the Charlton Heston movie "The Ten Commandments").

What I learned in those two classes certainly made more sense to me than being taught that the biblical stories are inerrant.

For me, the trip down the road to skepticism was an accumulation of events and experiences over the years coupled with my own interest in learning more and digging into details, rather than accepting things at face value.  The journey, of course, never ends since there is always more to learn and opportunities to discuss these ideas with family members and friends.  I look forward to its continuation!


Mason Deaver is a senior software developer who develops software for satellite communication systems.  He has a BS and MS in Computer Science.  He's married and the father of two grown children.  He's helped his family members and others be more skeptical, and will continue to do so.  He feels a little odd (dare he say spooky?) writing about himself in the 3rd person.