 The
Skeptic's Dictionary Newsletter
36
January 5, 2004
"Language, to be memorable, dispenses with
accuracy." --Dermot Healy
In this issue: crop circles in my backyard; some disingenuous genuine
skeptics; alternative science in our National Parks; a new page on the harm
done by Bad Thinking; The Amazing Meeting; and Darwin Day 2004.
News
The date on the newspaper says December 4, 2003. I meant to tell you
about this story in the last newsletter but it was buried under a couple of
books and I completely forgot about it. Anyway, to the point. Last summer,
in Fairfield, California, about 20 miles west of where I live, there was a
crop circle report. I meant to mention it in my July or August newsletter
but forgot about it. I'm sure in some people's minds this was the biggest
story of the year and I should be criticized for being so skeptical that I
didn't investigate it further. I'm as good at rationalization as the next
person. I didn't investigate this exciting event, even though it is only a 30 minute drive
from my house, because (a) all I would see from the ground would be some bent
wheat in roughly circular shapes; and (b) either the pranksters would come forth
or they wouldn't: If they did, they'd say they did it but some cerealogist
would say they were lying. If they didn't, the cerealogist would say these
are authentic, meaning they are of non-human origin. Anyway, the pranksters
did come forth: four local teenage boys. The night before they messed up
farmer Balestra's field they had watched a Discovery Channel show on how
pranksters make crop circles in England.
It so happens that Fairfield is the home of Psi Applications, which
consists of a man named Steve Moreno and a few friends who have the motto:
Exploring the Unknown in a Universe of Unlimited Possibilities. According to
Jeff Mitchell of The Davis Enterprise ("Crop circle debate goes on,"
December 4, 2003), Moreno and his friends investigated the site and
concluded that the circles were most likely not the work of human beings.
They drew this conclusion for two main reasons: the intricacy of the design
and their belief that the wheat had been exposed to electromagnetic
radiation that caused the stalks' structural nodules to lengthen or burst.
The design was so intricate, said the Psi Applications folks, that only
someone with an advanced knowledge of Euclidean geometry could have made
them. How advanced? Well, an aerial photo of the circles reveals that you
would have to know that a circle has a radius. This kind of knowledge, as we
all know, is very rare among human beings. To believe that some 18-year old
humans have such arcane knowledge defies credibility.
The Psi App folks are right, however, about it not being natural for
wheat nodules to lengthen or burst. However, using ropes to pull a plank of plywood with
the weight of a teenage boy riding on top might just do the trick.
No matter what the pranksters or the Psi App folks had to say, some
visitors to the site would think independently--out of the box, if you
will--and draw their own conclusions. For example,
Fariba Bogzaran, 45, of West Marin County, a professor of dream studies
at J.F.K. University, traveled from Berkeley after hearing of the crop
circles. Before getting a firsthand look, Bogzaran contacted the farmer's
family members to let them know that "after 10 years of watching crop
circles, they would not be harmed by it." In fact, "if it's a genuine one,
next year his crop will grow two inches higher," she said. Bogzaran traveled
to England last year to study crop circles "with experts in the field." She
has been studying the phenomenon for 10 years and spoke in Berkeley a couple
months ago on the subject. "The layout of this particular crop circle looks
very similar to early crop circles of early England," Bogzaran said (Woodland
Daily Democrat, July 5, 2003).
Yes, very similar. Perhaps that is because that is what the boys saw
on the Discovery Channel.
I am sorry to report that I have not followed up on the woman who brought
her paralyzed dog to the circles, hoping for a cure. I guess I am not cut
out to be an investigator. However, Casey Brossard, the spokesman for the
pranksters, said he is willing to duplicate the feat for the Psi App folks.
If that happens it won't be for several months. The fields in this area are
not ripe for circling at this time of year. If the replication does occur
and the local media report it, I will certainly let you know all the
exciting developments. In the meantime, I can report that Mr. Moreno says he
is very excited about the possibility of meeting the teenage pranksters. He
doubts they did it but he says that "our minds remain open." What more could
we ask for?
I suppose we could ask for a proper investigation. Joe Nickell of CSICOP
says that
there is plenty of corroborative evidence to back the boys' claims.
They had a history of mischief and all four were on probation. The mother
of one boy confirms that the four arrived home in the early morning hours
of June 28, 2003, establishing a clear opportunity to make crop circles in
Balestra's fields.
The boys had the proper circle-making tools, including a 75-foot rope
and "stalk stomper" devices (boards with rope attached) and blue tape.
Only after it was reported that they had blue tape in the July 14, 2003,
Vallejo Times-Herald, was the fact that Balestra's wife found bits
of blue tape on the scene published.
The teenagers claimed that there was little moonlight on the night in
question, which was the case. They showed a reporter a wrinkled paper with
a diagram of the formation. They exhibited first-hand knowledge, knowing
that wheat lies down easier than grass.
Case closed? I doubt it. The Psi App folks will certainly claim that
Nickell has built his case on circumstantial evidence. None of it proves
the boys did what they say they did. Maybe they're just trying to get
attention.
These kinds of stories keep the news media busy
on slow days and they offer folks like Mr. Moreno an opportunity to fuel the
hopes of people desperate for a miracle or something mysterious to spice up
their lives.
a photo of the Fairfield circles
crop circles
Psi Applications
CSICOP press
release December 30
What is skepticism?
I ran across a site called Skeptical Investigations as I was searching for
some skeptical evaluations of Dean Radin's The Conscious Universe -
The Scientific Truth of Psychic Phenomena. Skeptical Investigations
is the brainchild of the Association for Skeptical Investigation and
describes itself as "Genuine Skepticism, Enquiry and Doubt, Within Science."
At last, I've found the genuine skeptics. So what do they have to say about
Radin's book? According these genuine skeptics,
Holding up such anomalies as ESP, psychokinesis, prayer, near-death
experiences, and reincarnation under the cool light of scientific scrutiny
can be a daunting task. Dean Radin, director of the Consciousness Research
Laboratory at the University of Nevada, rises to the challenge in the
pioneering and exhaustively researched The Conscious Universe.
That didn't sound too skeptical to me, so I investigated further and found
that Dean Radin is listed as one of the Associates and Advisors for these
genuine skeptics, along with Larry Dossey (who has scientific proof that
prayer heals), Gary Schwartz (who has scientific proof that John Edward gets
messages from the dead), and Rupert Sheldrake (who has scientific proof that
people know when they're being stared at and that some pets are
psychic). (The site is registered to Dr. Sheldrake who seems to have
discovered an interesting way to deal with critics.) These and other
like-minded genuine skeptics say that in addition to promoting genuine
skepticism their purpose "includes an open-minded investigation of
unexplained phenomena, a questioning of dogmatic assumptions, and a
skeptical examination of the claims of self-proclaimed skeptics." They even
list a dead man as one of their advisers (Marcello Truzzi). No one can say
they aren't an open-minded sort of group.
They even have a Field Guide to Skepticism, which consists of a defense of
Radin and an attack on his skeptical critics. There is also a page called A
Who's Who of Media Skeptics - Skeptics or Dogmatists? The first on the list
is Susan Blackmore. I was tempted to write Dr. Sheldrake and inform him that
her latest book isn't the one on memes but is on consciousness. I'd like to
ask him about Radin's claim that “the nature of human consciousness” has
been a “taboo topic.” I'll bet that's news to Dr. Blackmore. I know it was
to me.
I have read large chunks of Dossey, Schwartz, and Radin, and the only thing
they are skeptical of is skepticism. They all think that science made a
wrong turn in the 17th century (by accepting a mechanistic philosophy based
on materialism and determinism) and that we should redefine science so that
it includes the paranormal and the supernatural. (Sound familiar? This is
the same lament of the Intelligent Design folks at the Discovery Institute.)
In their view, this would require adopting some sort of eastern mysticism or
ancient philosophy that holds the world to be an organism with a mind. I
suppose a Mind directing the organism would work just as well. Perhaps Ken
Wilber is one of their advisors and has convinced them that returning to
these ancient views would be progress. When one compares what science has
accomplished over the past 400 years, it boggles the mind to think where we
would be if the scientists of the 17th century had adopted Wilber’s or
Radin’s vitalistic worldview. Do they really think we would have made
progress? That we would have learned much about the world by chasing after
volitional chimeras? That's something these folks should meditate on. Would
science really be better off if it turned to mysticism?
Radin claims there are thousands of experiments that prove psi exists. But
the truth is that there are many psi experiments that have found interesting
statistical data. He calls these anomalies. They aren't anomalies. The
discovery that the statistical data for a random number generator is not
likely due to chance is not the discovery of an anomaly in the same sense
that the discovery of X-rays was an anomaly. Finding a statistic that is not
likely due to chance is not an anomaly. It is an indication that some kind
of causal event is most likely occurring. There is no justification for
assuming a law of nature or a basic scientific theory has been violated when
an odd statistic is discovered. Yet, Radin and some of his fellow psi
researchers treat any statistically significant result in a psi experiment
as proof not only that psi exists but as proof that the fundamental
assumptions of natural science (materialism and determinism) must be
abandoned.
I haven't added anything to my Internet Bunk pages for quite some time but
the Skeptical Investigations pages deserve a place there.
For now my only further comment will be that the only skepticism you will
find on the Skeptical Investigations pages is skepticism about skeptics who
don't agree with them. (I should note that so far I have stayed beneath
their radar.)
Skeptical
Investigations
Field Guide
to Skepticism
Ken Wilber
Discovery Institute
Marcello Truzzi
Internet Bunk
vitalism
***
Changes
In Mass Media Funk, I added a brief comment about an article by Bill
Berkowitz about our National Park Service and its efforts to give young
earth creationists their say in Park bookstores. Christopher Long, a senior
systems analyst, responded to my comments with derision. It seems that Chris
thinks this concern smacks of PC Patrol work. He writes:
They're promoting religion ! They're promoting religion ! No kidding
!!! Load up the lawyers, guns and money and let's get right after the
bastards ! Enough, already, from La-La Land...
I think Chris missed the point. The problem isn't that the Park Service
is promoting religion. The problem is that it is promoting fantasy science
over real science. Here's an excerpt from Berkowitz's article.
Early this fall, the Park Service ... approved a creationist text, "Grand
Canyon: A Different View" for sale in park bookstores and museums. The
book's editor, Tom Vail, writes: "For years, as a Colorado River guide I
told people how the Grand Canyon was formed over the evolutionary time scale
of millions of years. Then I met the Lord. Now, I have 'a different view of
the Canyon, which, according to the Biblical time scale, can't possibly be
more than about a few thousand years old.'"
I thought that was pretty bad but it gets worse. I received the following
e-mail from long-time reader Kerrie Dougherty of Australia.
I was under the impression that it was already a requirement to include
creationist explanations at the Grand Canyon, if not other National Parks.
When I was visiting the Grand Canyon in 1989, the Ranger giving us a talk
about the canyon qualified his statements about its geological age with a
reference to creationist beliefs (and appeared to be very uncomfortable in
doing so). This really stunned me, as there is no National Park in
Australia, then or now, where a creationist explanation would be offered at
all, much less as an alternative to the accepted 'mainstream' view. Anyway,
when I asked the Ranger about this privately afterwards he told me that "by
law" he was required to offer the creationist explanation alongside the
accepted scientific one. Therefore, I thought it was already a
well-established practice to kowtow to the creationist lobby at major
natural sites such as the Grand Canyon, but the tenor of the article you
referenced implies that it is something new. Can you shed any clarifying
light on this?
I've written to the National Park Service asking for an explanation. If I
get a reply, I'll let you know. My theory is that this is Ranger Bob's Law.
(Maybe this ranger met the Lord with Tom Vail and got the law direct from
the source.) Has anyone ever heard of such a law?
***
I added a new web page called
What's the Harm?
***
I posted a letter from a former nurse who describes his first and last
encounter with a colleague's attempt to use reiki to subdue a mental
patient.
***
Events
I hope to see some of you in Las Vegas January 15-18 at the
Amazing Meeting II.
I also hope to see some you February 7 from 2:30-5:30 PM at Curtis Hall,
Sierra 2 Community Center, 2791 24th Street, Sacramento CA, for Sacramento's
7th annual Darwin Day celebration. The featured speaker is Taner Edis,
author of The Ghost in the Universe: God in Light of Modern Science.
The title of his talk is “Intelligent Design: Creationism Evolves Again.”
Tickets are $7 in advance and $9 at the door. Students with ID get in for
half price. For more information or to purchase tickets in advance, contact
Anna Andrews at 916-448-9373 or e-mail
anna_mae@pacbell.net
The Darwin Day poster
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