 the
Skeptic's Dictionary Newsletter
43
July 20, 2004
"The scientist who yields anything to
theology, however slight, is yielding to ignorance and false pretenses, and
as certainly as if he granted that a horse-hair put into a bottle of water
will turn into a snake." --H. L. Mencken
In this issue: a few changes;
Quantum Touch quackery; electric
chairs for your health; the transit of Venus and the
end times; more action on passive smoke;
New Age Healer Meets the Skeptical Inquirer;
Randi's Amazing Meeting 3 is in the works;
the Skeptic's Toolbox; my talk in
Dublin, Ireland; and a few words on advertising
in the SD.
What's New?
Since the last newsletter, I posted
comments
on the efforts of a retired Air Force General and an attorney to get
Southern Baptists to pull their children out of public schools because
they have become too secular. I posted a
link to an article about a psychic criminal. I posted
comments on
Rico, the new Clever Hans. I posted a note that The Scientist
reported that The Journal of Reproductive Medicine has withdrawn
from its Web site a September 2001
study that
allegedly demonstrated the benefits of prayer on fertility treatments.
I also posted
comments on the Supreme Court's decision in the Newdow "under God"
challenge. I updated the Atlantis page by adding a
link
to a BBC story about the discovery of Atlantis off the coast of southern
Spain. And I updated the dianetics page to include a link to an
article about how Scientologists are getting their beliefs into our
public schools via pseudoscientific anti-drug programs.
Quackery of the Hour
This hour's award goes to Richard Gordon for
Quantum Touch,
which he calls a "breakthrough in hands-on healing." He teaches
folks how to focus and amplify their
chi or
prana. Gordon's gimmick is
in "combining various breathing and body awareness exercises." You know
you are dealing with a quack when you read such nonsense as "all healing
is self-healing." Gordon promises results such as "spontaneous structural
realignment" and claims to have cured a child's bowed legs in five
minutes. What I don't understand, though, is Gordon's claim that all healing
is self-healing yet "Quantum-Touch works wonders post-surgically, as well
as on trauma, burns, and even poison oak." he claims that "One nurse told
me that a physician asked her to stop using Quantum-Touch post-surgically
since he could no longer predict how much pain medication to give the
patient." Why not just skip the surgery and go right for the Quantum Touch
miracle? Or, if all healing is self-healing, why is there any need for
Quantum Touch?
Electric Chairs are Good for You
David Harrington of Fujisawa City, Japan, writes:
A number of people I know here in Japan swear by the effectiveness of a
kind of electric chair widely sold and used here. Even my local senior
center has a bank of them in the foyer, and they appear to be quite
popular. Urged to try one, despite my thoroughgoing skepticism, I did so
several times to please my hosts. I could feel nothing in particular, but
admit to giving it not much of a fair trial, as it was only a spotty
approach at best. Recently a dear friend who had been suffering from
racing heart problems has experienced a total disappearance of symptoms
upon undergoing "treatment" with such a chair. I realize that many factors
might be involved which I know nothing about, as I have paid little
attention to the details of this chair, and have had little interest in it
till now. I would appreciate any information you might have run across
about electricity being used for health purposes, as I am now often
pestered to give it another try. This chair has a foot-rest and a
head-rest which are claimed to provide the healing electricity in some
way, although there is no feeling of an electric circuit being
established. I am interested nowadays in this chair chiefly because it
seems to be spreading among people I know, who make it difficult for me to
ignore their claims! Any ammunition will be put to good use!
By the way, I find your work to be very helpful in dispelling so many
of the dubious notions that we somehow acquire that "everyone knows"!
Every time I read your site I find another clunker that I didn't know I
had! (Graphology most recently.) I do my best over here with my adult
education classes, but the Japanese are pretty resistant to a skeptical
approach when it comes to matters of fate, luck, and going through the
motions to ensure same. On the other hand, this is the best country in the
world that I know of regarding toleration of various organized religions:
An ordinary modern Japanese is born a Shintoist, marries as a sort of fake
Christian, and dies a Buddhist--really believing in none of them! It's
great! Legacy of WW II defeat and decline of "Emperor Worship", no doubt.
David, over here some states still use electric chairs to execute those
condemned to death.*
(There are six states that still use the
electric chair: Alabama, Florida, Nebraska, South Carolina, Tennessee and
Virginia.) I'm glad to see the Japanese have found a
less inhumane use for the device. Seriously, people have been claiming
electricity as a panacea ever since it was discovered. The fact that you
could feel nothing when you sat in the chair is a good sign, I would think.
The last electric cure-all that I recall being marketed over here was
the Stimulator,
which was marketed as a device that would send an electric current into
acupressure points to relieve pain. The device was actually a modified gas
grill igniter. Some 800,000 of these gizmos were sold between 1994 and 1997
with the help of national TV infomercials featuring celebrities like
daredevil Evel Knievel, basketball star Bill Walton, and actress Lee
Merriweather. A judge ordered Paul M. Monea to refund the $82 price to all
the customers who bought one. The device didn't work. What a shock! At least
with the electric chairs in bank lobbies, one can relax and enjoy the lack
of feeling anything while getting a subjective lift, even if it is only
temporary.
Once again I recommend Barry Beyerstein's little article
"Why Bogus Therapies Often Seem to Work."
Venus Transit and Catastrophe
Kerrie Dougherty sent us an article from the
Australian Broadcasting Corporation about a Chinese alarmist, Geng
Guoqing, known as "an expert on natural calamities," who claims that the
recent transit of Venus across the face of the Sun may lead to disastrous
flooding along China's Yellow River. It seems that Geng has compared
historical records going back 2,187 years and found "a clear correlation"
between Venus transits and major floods along the river's middle and lower
reaches. Never mind that China has a "flood season" every year and that in
the first nine months of last year the flooding caused nearly 2,000 deaths
in China. It seem that there are too many scientists these days who leap
from correlations to theories about causation.
Geng has a theory that "Venus blocks part of the Sun's radiation that
should have been transmitted to Earth" and this causes climatic disturbances
across the globe, according to a Mr. Guo, a researcher at the Special
Committee on Natural Calamities Forecasting under the China Geophysics
Society. I'm no astronomer, but my guess is that the amount of radiation
blocked by Venus was insignificant. So, even if fluctuations in solar
radiation could cause climatic disturbances on Earth, the transit of Venus
wouldn't hurt a fly on this planet.
I checked out
Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy page but could find nothing about fears of
worldwide disturbances, though Phil did have links to a page by someone who
wonders whether the transit could be a sign that the
Antichrist is on his way
and to a page of a group desperately seeking any excuse to celebrate
Oneness.
(Update: Phil says I shamed him into writing
a brief
piece on the transit of Venus and flooding.)
More on Smoking
Larry Lynch writes:
I just finished your
newsletter
that dealt with smoking, among other subjects.
There is another issue that hasn't been addressed concerning smoking in
addition to the health and economic issues. Does one person or group have
the right to foul the air, body, clothes, and space of another person? In
an enclosed environment, i.e., bar, restaurant, car, etc., smoke smell
sticks in one's hair and on one's clothes. Both have to be washed to
remove the smell. The smell is offensive and has a cost for removal. Does
the smoker have the right to deposit this smell on others? He/she can't
spit, urinate, or defecate on others. Can he/she blow smoke on others? Is
the nonsmoker's only alternative to choose to go elsewhere?
I think most of the non-smokers would agree with Larry. What was
upsetting to many of us was not the ban on smoking in public places but the
use of a very weak scientific study to defend the ban. It would have been
more honest to have argued along the lines listed in Larry's comments
(except for the part about spitting, urinating, or defecating on others,
which I believe is protected behavior under the First Amendment) than to
have pretended to have strong scientific evidence that 3,000 people a year
were dying of lung cancer from inhaling secondhand smoke.
New Age Healer Meets the Skeptical Inquirer
Karla McLaren's article "Bridging
the Chasm between Two Cultures," published in the May 2004 issue of
the Skeptical Inquirer has been posted on the CSICOP website. Karla
has been bouncing ideas off me for the past year or so and gives an
interesting account of how an educated, intelligent New Age healer
views the efforts of skeptics to debunk and enlighten.
Amazing Meeting 3
Join James Randi and Richard Dawkins in Las Vegas, January 13th to
16th, 2005, at the Stardust Resort and Casino, as The James Randi
Educational Foundation hosts the Amazing Meeting 3. The focus will be on
the public understanding (or misunderstanding) of science.
Speakers include Michael Shermer, Julia Sweeney, Penn & Teller, Joe
Nickell, Banachek, Brenton Ver Ploeg, Jamy Ian Swiss, Frederik
Pohl, Rick Maue, and many others.
Special events and workshops will also be available. Check for the latest
information at www.randi.org.
I attended the first two Amazing Meetings and would not miss this one.
Register early.
Skeptic's Toolbox
And don't forget the
Skeptic's Toolbox
at the University of Oregon in Eugene, August 12-15, 2004. What a faculty!:
Jim Alcock, Barry Beyerstein, Ray Hyman, Loren Pankratz, and Wally Sampson.
The focus is going to be on "the unconscious" according to the latest
research in cognitive science, social psychology, and neuroscience.
The Scientific Evidence for the Paranormal
I hope to see some of you this Thursday, July 23, in Dublin at the
Davenport Hotel for my talk on "The Scientific Evidence for the Paranormal"
sponsored by the Irish
Skeptics.
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