Just as chemist August Kekule, in 1865, had a dream which revealed to him the structure of the benzene ring — look it up, it's interesting — I have had an epiphany that I'd like to share with you. While hardly approaching August's inspired revelation, I think it gives a good picture of how this situation survives. I'm beginning to see the whole structure of the paranormal fantasy as a pyramid, with those on each level feeding from those below them.

The new technological monster that has materialized as a vigorous product of the burst of development in media, communication, and the facilitated availability of technology to almost everyone, has created a unique situation in most of our lives. While any such dramatic change in paradigm can — and does — serve to benefit us in general, this can be the two-edged sword that we've seen emerge repeatedly throughout history. The Industrial Revolution gave rise to exciting and beneficial aspects for society, along with the Luddites in the early 1800s who paid an unexpected price for those benefits, fought the inexorable flow of history and were absorbed in the flood of progress. Today, universal access to global travel has allowed wonderful possibilities for the spread of cultural and scientific advantages, but also for the proliferation of HIV infections and the SARS epidemic — along with many other diseases — which we are battling with the new tools that are also available to us from the other edge of that sword. Each giant step forward involves some side-stepping and some small retreats, though we find ourselves somewhat ahead each time.

Today, there is a complex, powerful, and determined industry in place that keeps believers in such nonsense as astrology, spiritualism, homeopathy, prophecy, and pseudoscience comforted with a steady diet of literature, mythology, false but attractive "discoveries" and titillating notions. It's the actual practitioners — those who make public appearances in the media and on the platform, who write the best-seller books and provide personal one-on-one encounters with those needing reinforcement of their delusions, who are at the top of this pyramid, this social construct. John Edward, Sylvia Brown, Uri Geller, Derek Acorah, Masuaki Kiyota — along with not more than a few hundred others — occupy this apex, carefully avoiding interpersonal strife in such a crowded environment and rarefied atmosphere. They carefully support one another, while always — wisely — watching their backs.

Immediately below them in the pyramid are the sub-contractors like Brian Josephson, Harold Puthoff, and Gary Schwartz, who receive enough crumbs from those feasting above, to survive, and they eagerly support their benefactors. Blinded by the glare from the academic medals they flaunt, they do not hear the chortling and snickering above them, and are serenely grateful for the occasional recognition they are granted by the vultures who feed on them. They seldom stray too far from their appointed positions in the structure.

Next down, we find a layer of eager believers typified by George Owen, David Icke and Montague Keen, who have overdeveloped notions of their cleverness and discernment, and will hyperbolize freely and righteously to maintain the fictions that they cherish. Their partron saint is the Man of La Mancha, and they are among the countless Sanchos who support the madness that they see going on above them.

An intermediate, and much larger, level in the pyramid is crowded with the media. Educated mainly in the humanities, thus lacking hard scientific training or savvy, and with the constant goal of finding the "perfect story" always applied to their backs, this crowd snatches at any and all scraps of propaganda that filter down to them from the heights above, gratefully embellishing and flavoring them before presenting them to the consumers below, in return for appropriate tribute, of course. Larry King, Montel Williams, and David Frost are among their willing ranks.

At the base of the pyramid we find the consumer public. This, the largest of all the groups, makes up the structure that supports all the others. But, as with any pyramidal structure, if and when this level thins out, begins to erode and crumble, the upper levels tremble and begin to slip. I hope to bring about the collapse of this insidious structure.

Since three weeks ago, when I offered apologies to those who might have found my publication of laudatory letters here on our webpage to be rather self-serving, I've received many messages encouraging me to continue this inclusion. It appears that finding similar situations in other persons' lives, has a useful reinforcing effect, so I'll continue the practice. A reader known only as "Seth" writes us:

I have noticed your "coming awake" stories lately on the Commentary section of your website on Fridays and wanted to share a bit of my experience.

I spent 13 years in a martial arts school that worshipped the Earth as Goddess and feminine, as well as unmeasurable energies and the power of dreaming to reshape our lives, as real events. In terms of actions, not all of this is bad. Seeing the Earth as something that is alive and God(dess)-like may help us make better decisions about how we treat our rivers, animals and air quality, although it now seems to me that years of scientific study would lead one to the same conclusion (which does not make, post hoc, the "religious" understanding correct). Working with unmeasurable energies in a martial arts setting can lead to a deeper sensibility in relating to our fellow humans, although it now seems to me that "unmeasurable energies" that do not exist seems a lame reason to learn to be sensitive to others and to treat people well. And the power of seeing dreams as a message from the unconscious can possibly be an effective way of reflecting on one's self development, although now, again, it seems to me that an undue focus on one's unconscious motivations may lead to far more problems than solutions or insight. I now find evolutionary and biological explanations far more informative and exciting as a way to understand dreams.

My time at this school was filled with false promises that never came to pass. One of those, made to me as a central member of the school and a senior teacher, was "the Goddess will materially provide for you if you simply serve Her." This was passed on by the leader of the school, who has studied with a whole slew of gurus from the 70's. I was told I would have my own class to teach and would be paid to teach those classes. I waited for that Goddess to provide. It never really came to pass even though I taught there for 9 years. In fact, for 5 of those years I lived on site in a commune type setting. Tens of thousands of dollars passed from my pockets to the teacher's pockets.

My breakdown/enlightenment actually came about as a result of a drug trip. I ate some hash brownies, the only time in my life I have ever indulged in an illicit drug, and went on a pretty powerful journey. Being a bit frightened, I went to a recovering alcoholic/drug addict friend who was full of bizarre beliefs that mostly served the purpose of self-aggrandizement to lead me through it. Upon reflecting on the trip a couple of days later, I realized I could not tell the difference between what "actually" happened, as told to me by my friend, and what was simply a switch being thrown in my own mind by the drug. The only logical conclusion is that my mind completely created all of the trip, influenced by the drug. Seems pretty self-evident, I know, but the point is that this led to further reflection of everything I had been told about "chi" and "the Goddess" and "energy." None of it stood up to the simple logic test: is there a legitimate external reason for this to occur? If not, how can a fabrication of the mind be an infallible guide to what I am perceiving in terms of "energy," "chi," and whatever else I had accepted? Clearly, it cannot. Therefore, it seems valuable to apply the only thing that seems to tell us anything about the nature of the universe we live in — skepticism — as mediated by reason and science.

I have always read science books and even have an MA in religious studies. I suppose I set up an inescapable Houdini trap of contradictions for myself. I even remember hearing you on Wisconsin Public Radio years ago, and berating you for not opening your mind to the possibility of astrology. I think I was concerned with your direct approach to a woman believer who called in. I now use a similar direct approach with many people, while at the same time trying to really understand why they might believe such ridiculous things. My apologies for the beratement in my car years ago.

My belief structure came apart for me about two and a half years ago. I have to thank Carl Sagan and his excellent book, "The Demon Haunted World" for "saving" my rational mind from the ravages of irrational belief systems. I had criticized his book and had never read it. After my little experience with the brownies, I picked up his book and re-discovered the thing I always enjoyed about Sagan and science when I was a kid — the unbelievable complexity and awe available in the existence of the universe itself, without any need to extend to some supernatural power that....what?... I don't know what those powers are supposed to do, anyway.

I am still struggling emotionally with letting go of that giant construct of falsity I accepted for so many years. It is a bit like a death in the family, except that it is a family of make-believe, created in the basement under the stairs to alleviate the oppressive loneliness of youth, that disappears to reveal the reality of relationships and world that is right in front of us as it is, with no need to appeal to anything except what it provides, namely the tools to study, analyze, understand and, most of all, think clearly.

Thanks for keeping the candle of rationality burning for the world. It is my hope that everyone who sees through the veil of such things as I have believed in will become a voice of powerful skepticism whenever they can use it. As far as I can tell, we live in a world of superstition that rivals anything we have ever experienced as humans. Maybe it is just the result of too many people...but far be it from me to presume such cynicism! Perhaps it is more likely the result of cumulative blots of mustard in the stomachs of those "too many people."

Seth: many thanks for your excellent account. I hope your story might foster other similar "recoveries," and I'm grateful to you for sharing this with us. Your mention of Sagan's last book gives me the opportunity of suggesting it once more to all our readers. Briefly, I list these three books as among the most valuable references I can find for those who truly want to get turned around and re-directed toward reality:

"The Demon-Haunted World" by Carl Sagan
"Why People Believe Weird Things" by Michael Shermer
"The Blind Watchmaker" by Richard Dawkins

Anyone who can read these and not come away with a better understanding of the real world — in which we are all immersed, despite ourselves — is not capable of casting off the chains of ignorance and poverty of mind by which we are all beset.

Do as reader Mark Bell did, and visit www.electronichealing.co.uk/products/energy.htm to see a "microprocessor-controlled bioresonance unit [that] uses advanced electronics to deliver the homoeopathic resonance patterns stored within." As Mark comments,

I am now very worried as I haven't checked my "homeopathic resonant patterns" for some time. I have, however been exposed to the normal electromagnetic field produced in any appliance on the domestic AC supply so I should be OK. If this is anything other than an extremely expensive rheostat with a needle then I shall gladly eat my hat. Or should I say "Cosmic ray emission augmentor"

I see here a great leap forward for pseudoscience. Homeopathy, by itself, is total claptrap, and here it's being inserted into yet another form of "vibrational" quackery! This is only one of hundreds of such devices being touted to the naïve, and selling very well. Of course the biggest danger posed by such devices is the possibility that those really in need of assistance will abandon legitimate means and depend on this useless quackery...

I've mentioned before the fact that the dozens of tests of power-of-prayer that are carried out every year, often at great cost, only produce a fraction of positive results, well within the expected range of error — but those are the results — the only results - that media editors choose to feature. Obviously, just another failed test of faith, if it ever gets reported at all, is simply another "non-story" for the media. That way, the impression is given that prayer has been tested and found effective.

Well, a three-year series of very comprehensive and wide-ranging tests have been carried out by a team of cardiac specialists from Duke University Medical Centre in North Carolina, involving 750 patients in nine hospitals and twelve prayer groups around the world. Those praying for the patients included American Christian mothers, nuns in a Carmelite convent in Baltimore, Sufi Muslims, Buddhist monks in Nepal and English doctors and medical students in Manchester. Prayers were even e-mailed to Jerusalem and placed in the Wailing Wall.

In accordance with proper double-blind procedure, names of patients were selected at random by a computer and were sent to the prayer groups, who began praying immediately for the recovery of those patients selected; neither the staff nor the patients knew who was being prayed for, and who was not. An analysis of the results found that there were no significant differences in the recovery and health of either group of patients.

As expected, these rather definitive results were rejected by those such as the Bishop of Durham, the Right Reverend Tom Wright, who said: "This is like setting an exam for God to see if God will pass it or not." Yep. And God failed, Reverend. Ah, but Wright pointed out that the Bible warns that you must not put God to the test. This is science, Reverend, not mythology. As reader Dan Morrison points out to us, when other, much smaller, studies in former years seemed to indicate positive results for God's powers, that divine injunction was not brought to our attention. As Dan says, "It seems that when it comes to experiments, God is a fickle participant."

Reader "Jack" writes me:

I'm Chinese, and the Shaolin monks have been part of our culture for hundreds of years, Shaolin being the origin of all martial arts today. However, to my experience and understanding, the Shaolin shows that have been touring the USA, Hong Kong, and here in Australia, plus other countries, are not genuine Shaolin monks as such. Rather, they are students of martial arts schools that reside near the real Shaolin Temple.

My apologies, of course, if this is so. However, it would be quite a surprise for me to find any martial arts group that does not use supernatural claims and old tricks to sell its philosophy. Long ago, I challenged readers of several martial arts magazines to come take the JREF prize with a demonstration, and not one answered...

On our Oct. 10/03 page we showed you an exchange between a "free energy" company named "Energia," and reader Mike Lilley. There was a follow-up exchange in which Mike accused the claimant, a Theodore Karavassilis, of being an outright fraud. Karavassilis responded in a somewhat puzzled tone, not quite understanding why he would be thus accused. He promised:

The 1st live demonstration will take place in Athens 1st week of December and all the measurements will be done by CRES (Center of Renewable Sources of Energy).

Answered Mike:

Oh I am looking forward to the published results. Surely you will have credentialed members of the scientific community present as well, right? Skeptics who can examine your test? If you have a real machine that created "free" energy, you won't need any "investors" since you will have several REAL companies bidding billions for your device. I predict the likelihood of this happening at approximately the same as the universe imploding to a point of singularity tomorrow. . . .

I have a question. Are you the inventor of this machine, or the marketer? Why don't you publish a scientific paper on it? Why don't you have universities studying it? Why don't you go to energy companies and sell it for $ Billions $ of dollars since I am sure they would love to find an easier (and cheaper/cleaner), way to make energy and boost their profits, then burning fossil fuels? They spend billions just to comply with all the pollution regulations, think how they would love to pay you many hundreds of millions not to have to do that anymore. Why don't you apply for the $ Million dollar challenge $ by making your claim to Randi's org? The "investment" money is there for the taking. All you have to do is show your machine works. See link: http://www.randi.org/research/index.html

If you are NOT the inventor of this thing, but simply the marketer, (your site implies you are the inventor), then maybe you yourself have been taken in by someone. If so, I have misjudged you and if so, please seek the services of a competent energy scientist immediately. They will help you escape your future internet scam conviction by proving to you how you are being deceived.

Okay. I must take serious objection to Mr. Lilley's attitude here. While I agree with his scientific opinions, I cannot support his conclusion that Mr. Karavassilis is necessarily a fraud, at all. My experience in this field has shown me that most believers in "free energy" or "perpetual motion" are self-deluded, and one cannot fault an honestly deluded person for trying to attract investors — except, of course, that the one offering such goods has a strong obligation to check out his claims before asking for funding. Any competent teacher can dissuade Mr. Karavassilis, easily, if only he'll listen. He's simply not knowledgeable about the matters he's involved in.

While I can understand Mr. Lilley's anger, I believe he may be wrong about Mr. Karavassilis' motives and thus about his character. I've written to the Center of Renewable Sources of Energy, at their London, Athens, and New York offices to inquire about this promised test, and I'll withhold further comment until then...

Dr. Ed Lu is a man with a doctorate in applied physics from Stanford, and an electrical engineering degree from Cornell. He's a piano player, he's fluent in Russian and Chinese, and in aerobatic aviation. In short, he's not your regular guy off the street. But one more important thing makes him stand out — way out — from the rest of us. He's a US astronaut, currently aboard the International Space Station (ISS) zipping around the Earth at 18,000 miles an hour!

On April 26th, Ed Lu and his fellow traveler, cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, roared off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on a Russian spaceship called a Soyuz TMA, the latest in a series of spacecraft based on the design of the spacecraft that the first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, first flew into space over 40 years ago. Since the Challenger facility is currently closed down for safety upgrading, all contact with the ISS has been through the Russian Soyuz technology, and it's served very well to shuttle supplies and crews back and forth.

Back in early April, about two weeks before the Expedition Seven crew was launched, I received a welcome phone call from Ed, who proposed to me that he might be able to convince NASA to let him do a joint project with the JREF, a magic trick done from Earth to Space. That sounded like an excellent idea to me, and it was arranged. Months went by, then the call from Ed; since he had only a few days left in orbit during which he could get the "window" for our effort, he suggested that we'd better hurry up and do it within the next five days. I said that would be fine, and looked forward to doing an Out of This World Trick with Dr. Lu. Then Houston called and told me to be ready in two hours! There was appropriate scrambling and fussing, but in all the rush I couldn't find the Expedition Seven shirts and patches we'd obtained, so we had to go "on air" (on space?) dressed just as we were. Though we'd originally planned to have a split-screen video connection, all the ISS video facilities were being used for more serious official business like watching out for space junk (see our July 4th web page for an item on that) and we settled for having Houston video the ISS-end of the action, while we put two video cameras on our end of the project. The miracle of editing will bring those two ends together. We communicated by telephone, and I'm glad we didn't have to pay the bill...!

Before I go any further, I want to specify that NASA's acceptance of this small diversion does not in any way imply their endorsement of the JREF, nor Dr. Lu's endorsement. I'd like to think that NASA loves us, but though I had a thrilling VIP tour of the Houston Space Flight Center some time back, they never said they had my picture up on the wall... Maybe I'll send them one...

> At 18:45 hours GMT last Thursday the 16th, Mission Control called, I popped in the hands-free telephone unit, and Ed Lu was talking to us "down there" quite clearly. Previously to his leaving Earth on this mission, I'd instructed him to take with him a sealed deck of cards for this miracle we were about to perform. (His stories about how he'd had to fight some NASA brass to get this permission, will await another day.) I asked him to now unseal his deck of cards, discard the jokers and any advertising material, and I told him I'd do the same with my own new deck of cards. I couldn't wait for the next step: we both had to shuffle our decks thoroughly. As you'll have read on our July 4th page, doing simple things in space isn't always as easy as we'd think. There was a long pause while Ed struggled with the shuffling process, and then he announced that he was ready. He even announced that he'd cut the deck one more time; that makes me suspect that Dr. Lu is not unfamiliar with the game of poker. I told him that I would place my deck of cards beneath the table at which I was seated, that I would remove one card at random, and that I would replace it into the deck turned over, then return the deck to its box. I asked Ed to do the same, and with a little more difficulty than I had experienced, he did so.

At that point, Ed had selected a card, unseen, and had replaced it into the deck, turned over. He of course had no idea of the identity of that card. I had done the same, and now we were both sitting facing cameras and holding card decks, with all the cards sealed inside. I asked Ed to now remove his deck of cards and run through it until he came to the turned-over card, which he was to show plainly to the NASA videocamera. Feeling appropriately confident, I did the same, removing my pack from its box and running slowly through it on until one card was seen with its back to the camera. Lo! Both of our cards, it turned out, were exactly the same — the 7 of diamonds!

Well, Ed Lu was quite astonished, and told us so. But, to me, the most important part of this little stunt was still to come. I pointed out to Ed that he was a scientist, an astronaut, and a well-educated guy, so he should be able to tell us what the chances were that we would both choose the same card. He answered, and it was the highlight of my day: "If you were any guy just off the street," Ed said, "I'd say one-in-fifty-two, but knowing who you are, I'll say, 100 percent!"

This is the same question that I ask my lecture audiences, and usually I get some statistical answer that simply doesn't apply. You can't apply mathematics to solving a trick!

Yes, you should be asking whether Dr. Lu was "in" on the modus operandi of the trick. He was not. All he knew was that he was to take a sealed new deck of cards with him into space, and that I'd instruct him when the time came. Down on Earth at the JREF library, I had called in a reporter — Hector Florin — and photographer Candace West from the Miami Herald newspaper as witnesses, and they monitored everything.

I have to tell you just how grateful I am to Ed Lu and to Mission Control for their patience and their time at such a busy period in their work-week. However, I'm sure that NASA and Ed both see the value of trying to interest young folks, not only in science and the exploration of space, but in critical thinking. I hope that the JREF has earned some new friends as a result of our little Earth-to-Space adventure, and I can't wait for Ed Lu to buttonhole me and demand an answer on how our card trick was done. My lips are sealed, Ed!

Ed comes back to us in a week or so via Soyuz, and we at the JREF will have just a little more investment in his safe return than we might have had if we'd not had this short encounter. He's one of our modern-day heroes, an accomplished, daring, adventurer who has done things that most of us can only dream of; but young people who would like to be like him and go exploring space and other mysterious parts of our universe, can certainly do so. They will be the replacements for the astronauts and the cosmonauts who are presently supplying us with thrills and new knowledge of our world.

It's been an exciting week...

In closing, I direct our Italian readers to the latest product of our colleague Massimo Polidoro, a new book titled, "Gli Enigmi Della Storia." Everything from Stonehenge to the Holy Grail is in there...