Skepticism

Today is the big day for SkeptiCamp Phoenix, starting at about 12:30 p.m. this afternoon. Magic Tony, one of our presenters, will be live-blogging the event at his blog, and there may also be twittering at #skepticamp. No live video this time, but there will likely be video of at least some talks put online after the event, along with photos, presentations, and recaps. I received the t-shirts last night (the back of which is shown in the photo) and the official SkeptiCamp 2009 banner earlier in the week, and I’ve got boxes of Skeptic magazine, Skeptical Inquirer, and some books for distribution to participants. Thanks to the generous contributions of our sponsors, the Skeptics Society/Skeptic magazine, the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry/Skeptical Inquirer magazine, and the James Randi Educational Foundation, who provided the materials and funds for the t-shirts (which will also defray a portion of our dinner tonight after the event at Tempe’s Rula BulaBoulders on Broadway). It looks like we’ll have about twenty people physically present at the event, and twelve or thirteen presentations, some 30-minute presentations and some 10-minute presentations. The current list of presentations: Tony Barnhart, Methods of the Pseudo-Psychic Abraham Heward, What’s the difference between skepticism and denial? (led discussion) David Jackemeyer, Henry Hazlitt’s Thinking as Science Don Lacey, Words Important to Skepticism (PowerPoint 2007) Jim Lippard, Positive Side-effects of Misinformation (SlideShare) John Lynch, Academic Freedom and Intelligent Design (SlideShare) Shannon Rankin, Skepticism for Dummies David Weston, Creating Skeptical Happiness (PowerPoint) Jack Ray, Skeptical Dating Mike Stackpole, Practical Techniques for Street Skepticism Charlie Cavanaugh Toft, Teaching Critical Thinking Xarold Trejo, Why I am a Skeptic SkeptiCamp Phoenix will be the first live-blogged SkeptiCamp event, and this is also the first day on which there will be two SkeptiCamp events in the same day–the other one going on today is SkeptiCamp Vancouver, which is occurring this afternoon at Langara College, with the sponsorship of the BC Skeptics. UPDATE (April 2, 2009): Don Lacey of the Skeptics of Tucson, who participated in SkeptiCamp Phoenix, offers his thoughts at the James Randi Educational Foundation’s Swift blog. ScienceBlogger and SkeptiCamp Phoenix participant John Lynch gives a recap at his blog. ...

On March 28, SkeptiCamp Phoenix 2009 will take place at Arizona State University in Tempe. Participants include Mike Stackpole of the Phoenix Skeptics on “Practical Techniques for Street Skepticism,” John Lynch on “Academic Freedom and Intelligent Design,” and Tony Barnhart on “Methods of the Pseudo-Psychic." The event is sponsored by the Skeptics Society/Skeptic magazine, the Center for Skeptical Inquiry/Skeptical Inquirer magazine, and by the James Randi Educational Foundation. It will be the fifth SkeptiCamp, after two in Colorado, one in Vancouver, and one in Atlanta. For more information on the event, see the SkeptiCamp Phoenix 2009 wiki page, the SkeptiCamp Phoenix registration site, or the SkeptiCamp Phoenix Facebook page. For more on SkeptiCamp, see Reed Esau’s “The Skepticamp Bargain” in JREF’s Swift and his article “Raising Our Game” (PDF) published by the Skeptics Society. (Previously, previously, previously.) ...

Jeff Jacobsen and Mark Bunker are hosting a 90-minute Internet radio show on the battle between Scientology and the Internet that took place before Anonymous, and it’s about to start now (4 p.m. Arizona time, 3 p.m. PST, 6 p.m. EST). A number of old-timers from alt.religion.scientology will likely be calling in. It’s on blogtalkradio, show title is “Old-Timers give a history lesson." First guest: Modemac, skeptic, SubGenius, and author of an Introduction to Scientology website, on the early history of alt.religion.scientology. Second guest: Paulette Cooper, author of The Scandal of Scientology, an early major book-length criticism of Scientology, who was the victim of dirty tricks including framing her for a bomb threat and filing 19 lawsuits against her. Third guest: Ron Newman, author of the Church of Scientology vs. the Net web pages and alt.religion.scientology regular. Fourth guest: Yours truly. UPDATE (January 5, 2009): A few clarifications and additional links: The “Miss Bloodybutt” story Modemac referred to is described in the article Jeff and I wrote in Skeptic magazine, which includes dates. The -AB- posting didn’t predate the event and included information from the police report. I interviewed Tom Klemesrud and Linda Woolard as part of my research for that story. I was taken out to lunch by Scientology’s Mesa Org OSA Director, Ginny Leeson, who asked what they could do to stop the criticism and pickets. My reply was that if they stopped suing people and trying to stop criticism, the pickets would probably stop. Ginny Leeson was soon replaced by a new OSA Director, Leslie Duhrman, who was a lot more hostile and aggressive–she went after picketer Bruce Pettycrew with legal action. I have received legal threats from Scientology and a DMCA notice, but nothing ever came of them; I periodically see Church of Scientology IP addresses visiting my web sites (also here). My Scientology private investigators page is still online, though woefully out-of-date. I wasn’t the one who first called for coordinated international pickets, that was Jeff Jacobsen. I did issue (on behalf of the “Ad Hoc Committee Against Internet Censorship”) the first coordinated press release about why the picketing was occurring, in response to Scientology’s “Cancelbunny” that was issuing cancellations of Usenet posts containing their secrets. There was a Salon.com article in 1999 about Susan Mullaney (“xenubat”)’s posted audio files of L. Ron Hubbard saying embarrassing things, which Scientology used the DMCA to shut down. She issued a counter-notice and the material came back online. Some of those clips were used in very funny Scientology-critical songs by “Enturbulator 009” or the “El Queso All-Stars." I’ve previously posted a “Scientology sampler” of my history of Scientology criticism and some posts about the “Anonymous” protests. This blog has a “Scientology” label you can click to find all my Scientology-related posts.

The creationist video I was filmed for, Creation Ministries International’s “Facing the Fire,” a documentary about the 1988 creation/evolution debate between Ian Plimer and Duane Gish, is available on YouTube in four parts (and embedded below). I first appear around 4:34 in the first segment, at 1:06 in the second, at 1:04 in the third, and at the very beginning of the fourth segment. I described my experience being filmed and reasons for appearing in this documentary here, my reaction to the result here (which includes links to critiques of Gish), and you can find the articles I refer to in the documentary here: “Some Failures of Organized Skepticism," The Arizona Skeptic vol. 3, no. 1, January 1990, pp. 2-5. “How Not to Argue with Creationists," Creation/Evolution vol. 11, issue XXIX, Winter 1991-92, pp. 9-21. “How Not to Respond to Criticism: Barry Price Compounds His Errors," talkorigins.org FAQ, 1993. “Criticisms from an Obscure Corner of the World," review of Plimer’s Telling Lies for God. Part 1: Part 2: Part 3: Part 4: ...

If there was any doubt that the SkyMall catalog is full of bogus products that are complete ripoffs for idiots, that should be removed by this product–a “wine and liquor accelerator” that “surrounds the beverage with a powerful triangular-shaped magnetic field, and in just 10 seconds, you’ll taste a premium drink’s smooth, mellow flavor equal to years of traditional slow aging." And here, Alex Chiu has been telling us that magnetic devices slow aging, not speed it up. Not to mention that aging is not something that tends to improve the quality of wine. ...

“Captain Disillusion” has produced a re-edited version of a news story about a ghost caught on a gas station security camera that is much better than the original. Historical Comments Einzige (2008-10-30): Hilarious!

Keith Augustine’s “Hallucinatory Near-Death Experiences” article on the Internet Infidels website has been updated to reflect its publication as a three-part series of articles in the Journal of Near-Death Studies, where it was published along with commentary from leading researchers of near-death experiences. The online version of the article includes content that was not published in the JNDS due to space considerations. Keith has done a great job of reviewing the evidence that near-death experiences contain elements that are demonstrably hallucinatory, and therefore not evidence for survival or for consciousness leaving the body.

Last night at a party, a few of us were discussing some recent self-published books by crackpots that we’ve seen or had pushed on us. We noted that these books seem to have in common a few features. They seem to often have long rambling introductions that are missing key elements like thesis statements or an indication of what the book is about. They use words in non-standard ways, yet don’t bother to explain how they are being redefined. They claim that the author has some special knowledge, yet don’t provide any reason to believe it is the case. I had a dim recollection of having come across a “crackpot index” before somewhere, and a little bit of searching yielded Fred J. Gruenberger’s December 1962 publication from the RAND Corporation titled “A Measure for Crackpots” (PDF), which offers the following scoring mechanism for distinguishing the scientist from the crackpot: 1. Public verifiability (12 points) Scientists promote public verifiability; crackpots rely on revealed truth. 2. Predictability (12 points) Scientists promote predictability and track their record of failure as well as success; crackpots promote wild predictions and count only successes, not failures. 3. Controlled experiments (13 points) Scientists promote controlled experiments; crackpots avoid them. 4. Occam’s razor (5 points) Scientists prefer the simplest explanation that covers all the facts; crackpots enjoy wildly complex theories. 5. Fruitfulness (10 points) Scientists prefer theories that generate new ideas and new experiments; crackpots prefer theories that produce nothing of value for further research. 6. Authority (10 points) Scientists seek the endorsement and validation of known authorities and tend to obtain it if their work is valid; crackpots usually fail to obtain it. 7. Ability to communicate (8 points) Scientists tend to promote clear (if sometimes dull) communications through approved channels; crackpots tend to be incomprehensible and self-published. 8. Humility (5 points) Humility is a desirable (if sometimes lacking) trait in scientists; it is rare in the crackpot. 9. Open mindedness (5 points) Scientists tend to qualify and carefully couch their statements as tentative based on the current evidence; crackpots tend to make absolutely certain statements that may not be challenged. 10. The Fulton non sequitur (5 points) I’m more familiar with this as the “Galileo Gambit,” or the common crackpot claim that “They laughed at Galileo; they’re laughing at me; therefore I’m right just as Galileo was.” Gruenberger uses steamboat inventor Robert Fulton in place of Galileo. This logically invalid argument is refuted by the Bozo rejoinder, which is that “they also laughed at Bozo the clown.” This is a negative test, lack of the characteristic is 5 points, presence is 0. 11. Paranoia (5 points) Another negative test–crackpots tend to be paranoid about their ideas being actively suppressed by conspiracy. 12. The dollar complex (5 points) Another negative test. The crackpot claims immeasurable value for his discoveries as revolutionary, worthy of the Nobel prize, and world-changing. 13. Statistics compulsion (5 points) The crackpot tends to use and continuously explain statistics allegedly supporting his claim, while the scientist tends to use standard methods and assume the reader is familiar with them. Gruenberger’s index is focused on science crackpots rather than philosophy crackpots, but a number of the above features do apply to the books we were talking about. A more recent “Crackpot Index," also focused on physics, was created by John Baez, a mathematical physicist at the University of California, Riverside: ...

Troy Britain gives John Morris of the Institute for Creation Research a thorough debunking regarding his article in the September 2008 issue of the ICR’s Acts & Facts, demonstrating that Morris really has no idea what he’s talking about.

Conspiracy theorists like to make arguments of the form “A is linked to B, B is linked to C, therefore A and C are in cahoots,” where the links between each entity may be extremely tenuous. P.Z. Myers at Pharyngula, following dogemperor at the DailyKos, maintains that “Sarah Palin’s home church is dominionist, with connections to Joel’s Army,” for which the evidence dogemperor provides is the following: A look at the home website of Palin’s church tends to be revealing. Among other things, a particular Assemblies buzzword associated frequently with Hillsong A/G and New Zealand Assemblies churches shows up (“Destiny”, here, is a buzzword for “Joel’s Army”, and is being preferred even as the phrase “Joel’s Army” is getting enough negative spin that even the Assemblies is now having to do some rather massive spin control); cell churches are promoted (of the same sort that are linked to short-term and longterm psychological damage and are among the most coercive tactics ever documented in spiritually abusive groups). The church, like a number of other large Assemblies churches, is the center of a dominionist broadcast TV center whose programming is carried across multiple channels in Alaska. ...