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Renowned Indian astrologer Ajai Bhambi writes a very popular column published in several leading newspapers. He's also author of the bestseller "Be Your Own Astrologer." This sage declared, pre-election, that he saw the stars and planets favoring US Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry over President George W. Bush in the November 2 polls. Said he:
Bush's horoscope shows Saturn, Venus and Mercury. They are all placed in Cancer Lagna and all of them are seen uncomfortable, which is why his election and his tenure have been controversial. These three planets are unfavorable to Cancer Lagna and create problems from time to time.
Kerry's horoscope was far better than Bush's, he said. "The whole configuration definitely makes for a charismatic leader," he told the press, running on about the exact star positions and aspects, concluding that those would "prove unfortunate and give Bush a clear defeat."
Another prominent Indian astrologer, Lachhman Das Madan, the "King of Astrologers," agreed. "I reveal the cosmic writ that George Bush cannot become the president of the US again." Well, not now, after four years has passed, but that's not what I think guru Madan was trying to get across. This astrologer boasts that he's "the world leader in astrology with unbeatable record of printed accurate predictions."
Prominent astrologer and mystic S.R. Krishnamurti, said that not only would Kerry win but his tenure as president would "bring peace to the world." We're also told that ancient "palm leaf astrology" — also from India — predicted "a Kerry win in the midst of turmoil," with
...foul play due to a money scandal and dirty politics by a woman. The predictions state that the vice-president will become the interim President, and some time later, President Kerry will come to power.
This special form of astrology, we're told, was written by saints and seers thousands of years ago. Oh. I see.
On November 3rd, following the actuality, astrologers Krishnamurti and Lachhman Das Madan were hard at work trying to explain what went wrong. The elements they'd seen as favorable for Kerry were now seen as "not strong enough to take him to victory," said Krishnamurti, and that "the Sun and the Moon, that were earlier on Kerry's side, also appear to be not favoring him." Madan, a favorite of the Indian political class, said that he would "wait till the final results are out," he said. News Flash: they're out. You lose.
Astrologer Bhambi, who had also predicted a Kerry win, was traveling in the US and could not be reached for comment.
Yep, astrology has performed as predicted....
Here at the JREF, a strident applicant for the million-dollar prize has been screeching at us for months now, and you might find this very typical tirade informative, extensive grammatical and spelling mistakes corrected so that you can wade through it. On October 12th he wrote:
#1. The New York Yankees are going to win the World Series this year of 2004.
#2. Paul Harvey is going to talk about me and my prophecies and my history on his radio show before Halloween. He will ask his audience to support the president, meaning president George W. Bush in the upcoming election. Paul Harvey will burn to death soon after this broadcast, probably this year or at the latest early 2005.
#3. Senator John Kerry will win this year's presidential election on November 2 of 2004.
#4. President John Kerry will raise taxes before he dies.
#5. President John Kerry will die in office only in a few days into his term of office. Maybe February.
#6. John Edwards will not become president.
#7. Jimmy Carter will become president.
#8. Jimmy Carter will change his name.
#9. Jimmy Carter will divorce his wife.
These prophecies will come true. And this is not just a lucky guess. And these prophecies cannot be faked or imagined. And I don't see how you are going to test my abilities in some clinical office. I just want credit for what I do. I don't want people saying after these things come true that I am a liar. Because I have been a prophet giving prophecies all my life to many people. And they always come true.I am a prophet of God! And here are some of my prophecies in chronological order.
Believe me, all these blatant failures of prophecy, whether by the applicant above or by the Indian astrologers, won't cause any of them to pause or reflect on whether or not they should continue to pursue their delusions. They'll bounce right back with excuses, rationalizations, and inane explanations of powers that weren't there in the first place.
Oh yes, Sylvia Browne — the Unsinkable Browne — predicted a Kerry victory in the election, but we might have expected that, since she also predicted that Bill Bradley would win the 2000 election. One thing you must admit: Sylvia's consistent.
Reader Don Riefler reviews "Ghost Hunters" for us:
[Your recent] commentary included a letter detailing the SciFi Network's new program "Proof Positive" as well as a brief mention of "Ghost Hunters." Sadly, that letter writer beat me to the punch as far as contacting the JREF about such nonsense, but really, "Ghost Hunters" was hardly hit on at all. I myself have taken to watching these shows every Wednesday night, though it seems to do little more than incense me to greater heights of skepticism. But then, I suppose that's a good thing.
I blame this at least partially on their methods. Watching this show, it hit me for the first time in all the years that I've studied the paranormal how absolutely laughable the methods of "ghost hunters" are. They work from a system of assumptions, none of which have any proof of veracity, and pawn off what they do as "scientific" even though their very "science" presupposes some sort of soul and "life after death." It seems to me that every "ghost investigator" on television has copped their methods from another "ghost investigator" on television. From measuring electromagnetic fields ("This works because spirits are pure energy," they knowledgeably explain to an ignorant public) to tape-recording "spirit voices" (called "EVP" for "Electronic Voice Phenomena;" I suppose it sounds more learned that way) they seem to be an absurd parody of everybody else in their own little community.
There seems to be some sort of feedback loop in which each ghost hunter's faith in the methods is reinforced by the faith of another ghost hunter and vice-versa: "This works because Bob says so," says William, and Bob believes because William does. They all use the same methods, none of which has any claim to actual reliability or proof. The slightest human voice-like sound on a heavily computer-altered piece of audio tape is grounds to immediately believe that spirits are present, and if an electromagnetic field fluctuates, well, sir, you had better call Drs. Venkman, Stanz, and Spengler.
The two main men (the aforementioned plumbers) are accompanied by a panoply of interesting characters, from a super-credulous "paranormal expert" who lost his job because he spent too much time with TAPS, to a pair of "demonologists" (where do I go to get that degree?) who, though they aren't priests, pastors, or preachers, regularly perform exorcisms and discuss for the camera vaunted, imbecilic theories of ghostly presence. Overall, it is more a strange, paranormal soap opera as the "investigators" yell at each other and try to sound educated than it is anything else; I must question whether or not even the SciFi channel takes it seriously, as evidenced by the intermittent clips of the plumbers waxing eloquent about the paranormal whilst installing some PVC or unclogging a toilet. There's also the advert that states something along the lines of "Two investigators plumb the depths of the paranormal..." Accidental coincidence, or bad pun intended to highlight the absurdity of the program? Decide for yourself.
The new "SciFi Wednesday" has had an unintended positive effect, however. The combination of these pathetic television shows, my rereading of Michael Shermer's "Why People Believe Weird Things," and my class titled "Critical Analysis of Parapsychology," (or as the professor said on the first day, "Skeptical Analysis is more accurate, but they wouldn't let me use that title") have all added up to stir my skeptical humors into an unprecedented unrest, in turn causing me to found a new organization at my home of Purdue University: The Purdue Skeptics Society. The only other comparable organization is the "Lafayette Ghost Trackers," a thoroughly credulous group that, by all appearances, is even worse off than my new favorite plumbers.
The mission of the Purdue Skeptics is to investigate and debunk claims of the paranormal (as well as set up tightly-controlled experiments for those in the area who want to test their "psychic" abilities) in and around the Purdue area, and I've made it my personal mission to avoid like the plague the tired and useless "methodology" favored by "ghost hunters" everywhere. I'm only "hunting" ghosts in that I'm trying to destroy them, using science and rationality as my weapons. Wish me luck, and suggestions are not unwelcome.
Anyway, the show "Ghost Hunters" is about two plumbers who run an organization called "TAPS," an acronym for "The Atlantic Paranormal Society." Along with their buddies and compatriots in TAPS, these two plumbers investigate claims of the paranormal across New England and even as far west as Pennsylvania. They go into an investigation, they say, with the intent of debunking the paranormal claims. Despite this, however, they seem to be amazingly credulous, and though the show documents investigations in the order that they happen, and it is obvious that they aren't skipping any and simply ignoring negative cases, TAPS has yet to debunk a single ghostly claim.
Reader George W. Maschke of AntiPolygraph.org gets feisty:
So, I've publicly challenged Dr. Rovner to support his claim, pointing out scientific research that contradicts it along with the examples of several notorious spies and a serial killer who have beaten the polygraph. See, A Public Challenge to Dr. Louis I. Rovner.
Dr. Drew C. Richardson, who until his retirement was the FBI Laboratory Division's senior scientific expert on polygraphs, has a standing Polygraph Countermeasure Challenge to the polygraph community to prove its claimed (but never demonstrated) ability to detect polygraph countermeasures (techniques for passing or beating the lie detector). Dr. Richardson's challenge has gone over 1,000 days without any polygraph operator having mustered the self-confidence to accept it.Dr. Louis Rovner, a prominent California polygraph operator, has (through PR Newswire) issued a press release titled, "Polygraph Unbeatable, Says California Psychologist." All too often, such publicly-made claims by those with vested interests in the perpetuation of polygraphy (a make-believe science that offers make-believe security) go unchallenged.
Well, the JREF will add a million bucks to Dr. Richardson's offer to sweeten it, but we'll still have no takers. They're very big on talk, short on stepping up to the plate.... I wonder why?
Many were a-flutter with the Royal Navy's recent decision to allow a seaman to embrace Satanism as his declared religion. There were cheers for religious freedom — although one wonders if a declaration of atheism would have elicited such delight — and there were dire warnings of the calamities that were sure to attend on this relaxation of vigilance. Not to my surprise, correspondent John Atkinson informed me that one of the most naïve persons on Earth has recently leapt into the discussion with all common sense abandoned — as usual. Author Colin Wilson (see www.randi.org/jr/060702.html) has written in The Daily Mail/UK:
In 1959, for example, renowned photojournalist Sergei Kordeiv got mixed up with such a group in Burnham-on-Crouch, Essex. He and his wife paid a subscription of £100 and were taken to a large Victorian house; they were told to strip, then led into a black tiled room with the magical symbol of a white pentagram on the floor and black candles on an altar.
They were blindfolded and went through a ritual initiation. After several more similar evenings among naked initiates, they were made to kneel in front of a masked man and swear allegiance to Satan, after which they had to seal the oath in their own blood.
They experienced a curious electrical tingling in their bodies. After their commitment to Satan, Sergei Kordeiv's luck became truly remarkable. Money flooded in and his career took off.
But the enthusiasm of Kordeiv and his wife began to wane after they were forced to watch the ritual punishment of a girl who was accused of betraying secrets in loose talk with non-believers. A Black Mass was said as the girl was raped by a masked man. Then a black cockerel was sacrificed, and they all had to drink its blood. It also transpired that the businessman to whom the girl had betrayed the Satanists' confidences collapsed and died of a heart attack at the exact time they were performing the mass.
The Kordeivs withdrew from the group, and suddenly their good luck ceased. Kordeiv came close to bankruptcy and his wife to a nervous breakdown. And one night his studio was wrecked, although there was no sign of a break-in.
Now I agree that this could have been just a run of bad luck. But there is another instance where Satanism has been cited as having a direct connection with a man's decline....In the second half of the 20th century, many bored middle-class people began to join satanic groups in the same spirit that they went in for wife-swapping or taking cocaine.
Enough! I expect that Wilson will next be hearing the patter of tiny reindeer feet on the roof. He adores these bizarre stories, and in fact makes a living blindly accepting and repeating them in print. He even believes that some chap in the UK named Geller bends spoons with his mind! Yep, that's how bad it is with him.
Reader Mario Tamboer, in Oostkapelle, Netherlands, tells us the latest about "Jomanda," the currently-popular Dutch "psychic" who pretty well has the entire field to herself in that country....
I've seen it mentioned in your commentaries that all those mediums who speak with the dead never seem to get any bad news. Everybody is always happy, send their love etc. But today, this has all changed! The "Telegraaf," one of Holland's largest newspapers, had on the front page breaking news: a warning from the medium Jomanda. She had received word from "the other side" that you should never be cremated because it is extremely painful. She's had contact with several dead people who told her so. According to her "the invisible cord connecting the body and soul will burn very quickly. A horrible process." And in case you wondered, she also said that you "will not feel being eaten by worms in the ground, because that goes very slowly." According to the spokesperson of the National Association of Crematoria: "We have never heard this from other people with Jomanda's gift. It's in her head."
But note that "other people" — perhaps with less grim notions — are presumed to have this "gift." I guess Jomanda was having a slow day, and knew that the media would snap up any silly thing she came up with. You can depend on that, Jo! Mario continues:
Some four years ago, a well-known TV personality named Sylvia Millecam was diagnosed with breast cancer. Jomanda told her it wasn't breast cancer, but a bacterial infection from her silicon implants, and that she could help her, together with some other alternative healers. According to the official report from the health authorities, Millecam was treated with almost every quackery known to man, including homeopathy and magnetic fields, almost until the end. When she finally was brought into the hospital she was in great pain, and could barely breathe, stand, sit, or lie down. All the doctors could do was to tell her that she had two weeks to live at the most.
Jomanda may suffer from self-delusion, but all the same she's not a harmless attention seeker, but a very dangerous woman. The press is being completely irresponsible by giving this woman attention — on the front page, no less. Oh, and the Dutch health-authorities still haven't acted, not against her nor against the other quacks involved....Oh, and in case anybody thinks Jomanda is a harmless nut, be warned, she's not. She's a faith healer whose main gimmick is that she always wears a blue dress. She rose to fame through a TV show called "Tineke's Paranormal World." Tineke, by the way, is selling magnetic quackery on TV these days, the Biostabil 2000. She first gave away "energized" business cards and later sold bottles of "energized" water and did "healings."
Reader Jeff Casey reports:
I just got back from a trip to Hong Kong where I picked up the latest (November) issue of National Geographic Magazine. The cover asks, "Was Darwin Wrong?" This obviously got my attention. A chill went down my spine as I wondered whether National Geographic could have gone to the Dark Side? After all, the TV channel does, on occasion. But a quick scan of the article allayed my fears. The subtitle of the inside article states, "No, the evidence for evolution is overwhelming."
Dr. Philip Gingerich, a paleontologist who has led the research, describes his work as "a spiritual experience"...can I have a "Witness"? Who says that you need a god and religion to experience that feeling? And to make it even better, because of the overwhelming DNA and fossil evidence, Dr. Gingerich had to discard his original theory that whales had descended from a group of carnivorous Eocene mammals in favor of this new theory. And you know what? He was okay with that. How many Creationists would be willing to discard their theories in light of overwhelming evidence? Well, obviously they are not, or we wouldn't be having this debate.
The article is fascinating and helps to explain what a scientific theory is, and how much evidence there is to support this theory in particular. It gives some real-world examples of evidence across multiple scientific disciplines — biogeography, paleontology, embryology, and morphology to name a few — supporting evolution — and shows how the evidence keeps increasing. The best part of the article explains how scientists have found fossil records for an extensive amount of the intermediary forms of whales. Did you know that the whale is most closely related to the antelope? How cool is that?
Jeff, any scientist, as I've pointed out before, has to be willing to discard, modify, reverse, or abandon his/her theory, upon the presentation of better or disconfirming evidence. That's the major difference between science and dogma.
In any event, I wanted to point out this wonderful issue of National Geographic Magazine. I have always loved the magazine and never more than now.There was one very disappointing section of this article. It described a 2001 Gallup Poll survey that indicated that "no less than 45 percent of responding U.S. adults agreed that "God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so." The work is not finished and the fight must go on, but I have to say that so many people remain so ignorant of this proven scientific theory.
Jeff, I saw and enjoyed that article, and for some unknown reason I failed to notify readers of this page. Thanks for prodding me...! In respect to the Gallup Poll findings, and noting the science-bashing that is so popular now, and appears to be in for more use at least for the next four years, I'll tell you that reader Jim Mitchell alerted me that in the Columbia Journalism Review there recently appeared an article by Chris Mooney, "Blinded By Science: How 'Balanced' Coverage Lets the Scientific Fringe Hijack Reality." There, the author discussed in detail the problems experienced by journalists who seek to present fair and balanced views of political and scientific subjects. He pointed out:
Moreover, the question of how to substitute accuracy for mere "balance" in science reporting has become ever more pointed as journalists have struggled to cover the Bush administration, which scientists have widely accused of scientific distortions. As the Union of Concerned Scientists, an alliance of citizens and scientists, and other critics have noted, Bush administration statements and actions have often given privileged status to a fringe scientific view over a well-documented, extremely robust mainstream conclusion. Journalists have thus had to decide whether to report on a he said/she said battle between scientists and the White House — which has had very few scientific defenders — or get to the bottom of each case of alleged distortion and report on who's actually right.
I think that this article, to be found at www.cjr.org/issues/2004/6/mooney-science.asp, should be read by all skeptics, to provide them with data they need to argue the case for better standards and care by the journalists who we trust to inform us.
I'm told that I'm referred to as a "self-described liar and con artist," and "intellectually dishonest," by columnist Art Dudley in the November issue of Stereophile Magazine. More of that, later, when I undertake to educate Dudley — not an easy task, I can assure you. His article is a perfect example of waffling and obfuscation by an "expert" who apparently escaped committing himself on the Shakti Stones' ability to improve audio quality. He is not one of the mavens that I originally challenged to take the JREF million-dollar prize for accepting and endorsing the product, but I now add him to the list, along with Frank Doris at "The Absolute Sound"; Clay Swartz, Clark Johnson, and David Robinson at "Positive Feedback"; Larry Kaye, Wayne Donnelly, and Bill Brassington at "fi"; Bascom King at "Audio"; Wes Phillips at "SoundStage"; Jim Merod at "Jazz Times"; Dick Olsher at "Enjoy The Music"; Peter and May Belt at "P.W.B. Electronics"; and Benjamin Piazza at "Shakti Innovations," where they make this inane product. You know, not one of these fourteen vociferous commentators have even responded, in any way, to the challenge I sent them, individually, and published here on August 5th, 2004 — fourteen weeks ago! — at www.randi.org/jr/080504string.html#8. Strange, isn't it?
THE U.S. AIR FORCE IN WOO-WOO LAND
I'm robbing this next item directly from the "What's New" [WN] news letter of good friend Robert L. Park dated Friday, 29 October. Bob so efficiently covered the recent widely-hyped nonsense from the U.S. Air Force powers-that-be, that I saw I couldn't do better. To subscribe to this provocative, informative, breezy and hard-hitting news letter — and you should — just send a blank e-mail to: join-whatsnew@lists.apsmsgs.org and then stand back...
The contractor for the study was Warp Drive Metrics in Las Vegas, and the author was Eric W. Davis, PhD, FBIS. We couldn't find Dr. Davis in "American Men and Women of Science," so we Googled him and Warp Drive Metrics. Warp Drive Metrics has no website. We did find an article by Dr. Davis, "Wormhole Induction Propulsion," prepared for the 1997 NASA Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Workshop, which NASA had refused to allow me to attend: www.aps.org/WN/WN97/wn081597.cfm. His affiliation then was the National Institute for Discovery Science, Las Vegas. The NIDS website displays an October 15, 04 notice from its president that the Institute is on an "inactive status."
Desperate for information, we contacted the Project Manager of the study, Dr. Franklin Mead, Senior Scientist of the Advanced Concepts Office. He's not listed in "American Men and Women of Science" either, but he has a 1996 Patent (5,590,031) for a system to convert zero point energy to electrical energy. Apparently it's not available yet. He could not give me the exact cost of the teleportation report, but said the subcontractor, ERC Inc., would know. We called ERC, but teleportation is just one small part of a huge contract. Two weeks ago we learned of the Air Force positron bomb (WN 15 Oct 04). How many fantasy weapons are taxpayers buying?
WARPED SCIENCE: BEAM ME UP SCOTTY, THEY'RE CRAZY DOWN HERE. Making the rounds in Washington this week is a 75-page Air Force Research Laboratory report, Teleportation Physics Study (my spell checker balks on "teleportation," and well it should). This is not the IBM entangled photon stuff; this is transporting people across space. The subway does that, but it's not included in the report. Instead it describes "conveyance of persons by psychic means," and "transport through extra space dimensions or parallel universes."
And, Bob, who's going to pay for this misguided (no pun intended) journey into NeverNeverLand? Never mind, we all know.
I'm getting very tired of essentially this same letter being sent to me, week after week, this example from reader Sverre H. Huseby. I'll take this opportunity to answer it once and for all. Mr. Huseby writes:
I was pointed in direction of this link: www.alternativescience.com/randi%27s-letter.htm containing a letter in which your organization rather rudely turns a prize applicant away. This letter stirred me up, as it was not what I expected from James Randi. Is this letter real, or is alternativescience.com abusing your good name? If the letter is a fake (I would like to know), then please forgive me for disturbing you, and stop reading any further.
Yes, the letter is quite genuine, and I did send it. But note that the claimant's address is blacked out, so that he doesn't have to respond to these attacks....
Due to your reputation, many people will read your web site statement as sort of a proof that the paranormal does not exist. "Hey, even after JR offered them a million, nobody's been able to show anything." It may very well be right, but you do not have any proof when you do not allow people to even try to prove the contrary. If your test should have any scientific merit, everyone must be allowed to try, even the "too far out" ones, because "far out" is what you try to disprove.If the letter is not a fake, then, as an open-minded (as in: I don't believe the paranormal nonsense until you prove it) skeptic, I would like to state the following: You cannot state on your web page that "to date, no one has ever passed the preliminary tests" unless you let people try to prove their claims. Or, of course you can, but it would be very misleading, and it would fit badly with your fight against the misleading.
Wrong. I don't "try to disprove" anything. I ask the claimant to prove their case. Why do people have such a hard time seeing the difference between these two stances? I make no claims; I only ask that others prove their claims, and I offer a million dollars prize if they can. They offer nothing.
Keep up the good work, but please, keep it good.I appreciate the work you do (at least what I've seen until I stumbled across that letter), and really hope that you're not just one of those opposite-side fanatics who would deny the proof even if it was in the pudding just in front of you.
Okay. Here's a serious question for you, Mr. Huseby, with a few references about discussions on the claims: If you were running a site that considers unusual claims that might be true, even though they're probably not true, would you accept to investigate a claim that a man can fly by flapping his arms? Do you test a man who claims he can sexually arouse a woman just by looking at a photograph of her? (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=48320) How about a claim that someone is God? (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=1870675521#post1870675521) If a writer told you that he is the Richard Nixon, would that merit your serious attention? And what would you do with a claim that someone could inhale Zyklon B for 15 minutes and survive? (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=47833) A man writes and claims that he and his brother make the Sun rise every morning; do you look into that? A chap says he doesn't eat, and hasn't taken nourishment for many years (http://www.alternativescience.com/randi%27s-letter.html); is that worth your time to investigate? A letter states that no lion will bite the writer (http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?s=&threadid=48126); do you investigate?
Those are just eight of recent ridiculous claims we've encountered that come to my mind; there are literally hundreds more. Do you seriously think that I want to squander the rest of my life examining claims that are very obviously dizzy? When we get dowsing claims, we recognize that these people can be honestly self-deluded, and the hundreds of tests we've done of them — when they'll actually submit to tests — have shown that to be true, in every single case. Dowsing is something that is not, on the face of it, an obviously frivolous notion. Nor is the ability to predict earthquakes, nor to sense the presence of a poisonous substance. Those, we can and will test.
On only one occasion was I actually involved in testing a "Breatharian," as the never-eating people like to be known. We staked out the Holiday Inn where he was staying during the test, and watched as he went out to the local Burger King at 2 a.m. and stocked up on huge bags of goodies; that ended the test right there — but we decided that this was just such a silly activity, that we'd not do it again. We are, after all, grown adults. We have real lives to live.
Recently, in Germany, I watched while a man checked out a huge lab room where we were to test him for the ability to improve the taste of water just by passing his hands over a sealed bottle of it. First, he scanned the room with his dowsing rods for "earth rays" that he said would interfere with the test. He found several spots infested with the "erdstrahlen," and marked those to be avoided. Then he went through a song-and-dance hand-waving procedure that "charmed" the water, and was isolated while another team prepared sets of glasses containing both charmed and un-charmed water. To save you time, I'll sum it up: he got half his guesses right, which is what chance called for. NOW: think for a minute. I and several members of the GWUP — German Skeptics — group, spent two days of our lives just looking into this absurd claim, simply because the man seemed to really believe it. Do you seriously think that we should spend any time on scientifically examining Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny, and guys who say they never eat? Get real!
No, the JREF will not consider such claims as being serious, though some inept and fumbling scientists will waste grant money to do so. To enter into investigating such matters would make us as silly as the claimants. Our refusal does not in any way diminish our validity nor our willingness to examine sensible claims. If you disagree with that statement, I believe that you're in a tiny minority. François, Duc de la Rochefoucauld (1630-1680) had my philosophy down pretty well:
There are people fated to be silly; they not only perform silly acts by choice, but are even constrained to do so by fortune.
I will not voluntarily join the inane in their delusions. That is my choice to make.
AN APPARENTLY GENUINE CONVERSION
Hallelujah! I think that if we were to examine Hell right now, we'd find evidence of frost. A never-before event has occurred that may never be repeated, though we can hope it will. At the end of www.randi.org/research/challenge.html — the actual application form for the JREF million-dollar prize — you'll see the following, in italics:
Please be advised that several applicants have suffered great personal embarrassment after failing these tests. I strongly advise you to conduct proper double-blind tests of any ability you believe you can demonstrate, before attempting to undergo a testing for this prize. This has saved many applicants much time and work, by showing that the powers were quite imaginary on the part of the would-be claimant. Please do this, and do not choose to ignore the need for such a precaution. This advice is offered only so that the applicant might be spared these problems.
Most applicants have insisted that they are so certain of their claimed powers, that they have no need to follow that suggestion, and they refuse to do so. In any case, as you know, no one has ever — yet — passed the preliminary test, and they've gone through the process of rationalization of that event, usually blaming several influences (negative vibes, evil thoughts, bad star configurations, overhead power lines, secret cabals, obscure energy waves, etc.) to cover their consternation. But lo! There has at last been one applicant who voluntarily withdrew his claim before we even began discussing possible conditions and protocol for a test! He changed his mind because he actually did what we suggested. He did a double-blind test of his claim, then he wrote to us:
Thank you for your prompt reply to my application. Please accept my apology for not responding immediately! It is with shame and humiliation that I must ask you to cancel my claim as stated in my application. After having done several double-blind tests I must confess that my claim was apparently based on self-delusion. I should have heeded dear Mr. Randi's advice/warning before mailing you my application; I could have avoided bothering you with yet another silly claim!Dear Mr. Kramer:
Wow! Someone actually bothered to take that advice! Next thing you know, Uri Geller will discover that he doesn't have divine powers! Or is that too much to expect? Seriously, my hat's off to this chap, for wanting to really find out...!
A very nice lady, Marie H. Blood (December 28, 1917 — November 2, 2004) has passed away peacefully. She was well-loved in the magical world. Born in Brooklyn, a niece of the famous magician Harry Houdini, Marie was a member of the Society of American Magicians and of the International Brotherhood of Magicians. She lectured around the country talking about living with her uncle and aunt, Harry & Bess Houdini. She never lost her respect for Houdini, and delighted in telling interesting anecdotes about this fascinating man. I will miss her.
Reader Nigel Dowrick enlightens me about something that I couldn't identify last week. He writes:
Your instinct is sound!Possibly "Birkonian Science" should be "Baconian Science", after Roger Bacon, who was a 13th century English philosopher who "placed considerable emphasis on empiricism" (from the Wikipedia entry relating to him). I've heard him referred to as the originator of the modern scientific method, though I don't know how historically accurate that may be.
And reader and frequent correspondent Avital Pilpel chimes in:
I'll bet the "Birkonian science" that the woo-woo boss "doesn't trust" is "Baconian Science" — after Francis Bacon, the first serious philosopher of science, the first to write explicitly about how the scientific method works. The term is sometimes used to describe modern science in general, but woo-woos used it misleadingly (the same way they use "western science" or "materialistic science", etc.) to imply that there's "Baconian science", which uses the scientific method, and some other sort of science, which doesn't. There is no such thing as a "different" science that doesn't use the scientific method. That's actually only worthless pseudo-science.About your recent (excellent as usual) commentary:
And he goes on:
About polls from TV viewers: I think you should be more careful with taking non-scientific polls seriously. It is human weakness to think: "well, the poll is unscientific, but if it shows an 80% majority, there still must be SOMETHING to that." Not true. The whole problem with nonscientific polls is that they have NO reliable margin of error, even a large one, above all because the sample is not random. In this case, the sample comes from those who (a) watched the paranormal show, and (b) were interested enough to call and express their opinion. I'm surprised it wasn't 99% for investigating the woman. Just about all newspaper/internet/TV polls that depend on the non-random method of interested people calling the pollster (instead of the other way around) are worthless.
Avital, please note that I was only quoting a reader on this subject, who I'm sure is just as aware as I that such polls have to be evaluated with caution, and I was not presenting my own acceptance of those figures. More from Avital:
a). To have made 200 parachute jumps in his three years in the Israeli paratroopers. Actually, paratrooper corporals only have five or six jumps, and a relative of mine who was a Lt. Col. there with 20 years' service had less than 50.
b). That he prevented WWIII by beaming "positive thoughts" to diplomats at an east-west summit. As evidence, he presented the undeniable fact that WWIII hasn't happened yet.
c). To have had his powers recognized by a man, conveniently both unnamed and dead, who was both a battalion commander in the paratroopers and a Mossad agent working undercover in Europe at the same time. I suppose the daily commute from Europe to the Israeli desert killed him.
d). To have worked as a CIA agent sent to erase with his mind computer disks full of stolen information KGB agents were taking to Russia, by seating next to them on the plane.
Of course, he insisted, he would have liked to give us better proof of these stories, but it's all very hush-hush, cloak-and-dagger, top-secret stuff, as he told us with a knowing smile. That didn't stop him from spilling the beans to a roomful of strangers, for some reason.
Does this man have not an ounce of shame... or is he truly deluded enough to believe his own stories? In the past, I would have leaned towards "deluded," on the grounds that con men would try to make up stories that had some verisimilitude, unlike his laughable nonsense. I've now changed my mind. His "target audience" is the kind of people who would believe anything — the dumber, the better.About Uri Geller: I actually heard him speak one time, a few years back, in a "Barnes & Noble" bookstore promoting his latest book... after being 20 minutes late (there were "unexpected traffic jams", the B&N employee who introduced him said without a trace of irony), he claimed among other things:
As promised last week: Previous to my last trip to Germany, I'd become familiar with a strange phenomenon involving a magnetized ball bearing and a piece of copper or aluminum tubing. (The tubing has to be a good conductor of electricity, and non-magnetic.) It was described briefly here on our web page last week, and I mentioned Dr. Rainer Wolf, affiliated with the University of Würzburg. A strongly magnetized steel ball bearing — which will have its north-seeking and south-seeking pole at the corresponding ends of a diameter — when dropped down a straight piece of copper tubing just larger than that diameter, instead of dropping straight through will actually "float" all the way down!
(Just for your information, using a 1 cm-diameter ball bearing and a piece of aluminum tubing with an inside diameter of 13 mm, I've found that the ball travels straight down a six-foot (183 cm) tube in exactly 10 seconds. In freefall, that should take just 6/10 of a second.)
Now, this floating phenomenon is simply due to the fact that a magnet moved relative to an electrically-conducting medium will induce a magnetic field in that medium. The faster the magnet moves, and the more individual conductors are present, the stronger that induced magnetic field will be. This is the principal on which electrical generators work; connecting an ordinary voltmeter to a coil consisting of several turns of wire, then quickly moving a magnet adjacent to that coil, will generate a small pulse that can be seen on the meter. This is one of the basic experiments that students do in science class. In the case of the ball-and-tubing combination that we've described, the induced magnetic field opposes the movement of the ball bearing, thus slowing it down.
This demo is interesting enough in itself, but there are some variations of this phenomenon that call for more complicated explanations. For example, if, rather than the tubing, you use a "channel" of aluminum that consists of three sides — a square "U" shape — the kind of metal extrusion material that can be purchased in most hardware stores for edging Formica shelves — and incline it at about 30 degrees to the horizontal, a magnetized ball bearing that just fits into the channel will — as expected — roll down that channel very slowly; this is the same situation experienced with the tubing, and since the ball-magnet is moving relative to a conductor, we get the same phenomenon of an induced and opposing magnetic field. However — here's what makes the puzzle that I will leave you with this week: if the channel is oriented in an east-west direction, the ball will move along evenly, as expected, but if the orientation is north-south, two possible results can be seen: when the ball-magnet is traveling toward the north, its progress is slow but quite regular. However, when it's traveling southward, its motion is erratic; it moves about the distance of the circumference of the ball, pauses a bit, then resumes that step-by-step motion all the way to the end!
(Again, an observation I made: this southward trip takes about 10 percent longer than the one going north.)
Yes, we have an explanation for this strange behavior, but I thought we'd present it to readers as a test of their ingenuity in solving unusual problems. Even without making an experimental setup, you should be able to figure out what's happening here. Let's hear from you, and please use the word "experiment" in the title of your e-mail message, and address it to "kramer@randi.org" so I can put the tireless Kramer on the job of sorting out the answers.
As if that's not enough, next week I'll discuss the answers and then I'll give you another strange problem that I've noted in connection with this phenomenon, one for which I still don't have a satisfactory answer. Yep, it's got me buffaloed.
Folks, I'm well aware that this to-me-interesting-phenomenon has nothing to do with the paranormal, but I thought you'd like to be told about it as a bit of an intellectual exercise. You should see the JREF library; there are pieces of metal pipe and channeling all over the place, along with various devices to measure angles of inclination. I feel like I'm a character in "Tom Swift and his Wonderful Magnetic Ball Bearing."
A number of readers reminded me after last week's "psychic tests" discussion, that there's another "D" country — Djibouti — that I missed. Nothing like having attentive readers....!
As I predicted last week, we've now over 300 registrants for The Amaz!ng Meeting 3, so don't miss out on Las Vegas in January! Go to www.randi.org/tam3 and send it all in. And then go to E-Bay, do a search on "Penn & Teller slammer" and look at the Slammer Tours we're currently auctioning off — The Slammer is Penn Jillette's fantastic Las Vegas home, and last year that tour — with a gourmet lunch tossed in! — filled up mighty fast. Don't miss it this year....!
Next week, a professional ghost writer haunts us, more psychics infest Brazil, a petulant Stereophile Magazine columnist sounds off, and there's a new Moon on the horizon....
