The Shroud of Turin has been in the news a bit recently, and I blogged about how it can be replicated using completely natural methods (something many Shroud-proponents say cannot be done – whoops).  Well, now the Shroudies are back, with one of them claiming that she has seen ancient writing on the actual Shroud which “proves” it was the funeral covering for Christ’s burial.

Researcher: Faint writing seen on Shroud of Turin

A Vatican researcher has rekindled the age-old debate over the Shroud of Turin, saying that faint writing on the linen proves it was the burial cloth of Jesus. Experts say the historian may be reading too much into the markings, and they stand by carbon-dating that points to the shroud being a medieval forgery.

Barbara Frale, a researcher at the Vatican archives, says in a new book that she used computer-enhanced images of the shroud to decipher faintly written words in Greek, Latin and Aramaic scattered across the cloth.

She asserts that the words include the name “(J)esu(s) Nazarene” — or Jesus of Nazareth — in Greek. That, she said, proves the text could not be of medieval origin because no Christian at the time, even a forger, would have mentioned Jesus without referring to his divinity. Failing to do so would risk being branded a heretic.

Of course, the claim of “proof” here flies in the face of much other evidence which clearly shows the Shroud’s origins as a pious fraud in the 1300s A.D., way past the burial date of Christ.  This includes evidence from independent radiocarbon dating tests, as well as evidence from historical, iconographic, pathological, physical, and chemical sources that points to its inauthenticity. As one of the foremost skeptical Shroud researchers, Joe Nickell, has concluded: the shroud is a 14th century painting, not a 2000-year-old cloth with Christ’s image.  And, concerning these most recent claims of seeing writing in the Shroud, they are dubious for multiple reasons…

From the article:

On one hand, it is true that a medieval forger would label the object with Christ’s name, as were all relics produced at the time, said Antonio Lombatti, a church historian who has written about the shroud. The problem is that there are no inscriptions to be seen in the first place.

“People work on grainy photos and think they see things,” Lombatti told the AP. “It’s all the result of imagination and computer software. … If you look at a photo of the shroud, there’s a lot of contrast between light and dark, but there are no letters.”

Further criticizing Frale’s work, Lombatti said that artifacts bearing Greek and Aramaic texts were found in Jewish burials from the first century, but the use of Latin is unheard of.

He also rejected the idea that authorities would officially return the body of a crucified man to relatives after filling out some paperwork. Victims of that form of execution used by the Romans would usually be left on the cross or were disposed of in a dump to add to its deterrent.

Lombatti said “the message was that you won’t even have a tomb to cry over.”

Another shroud expert, Gian Marco Rinaldi, said that even scientists who believe in the relic’s authenticity have dismissed as unreliable the images on which Frale’s study was based.

“These computer enhancements increase contrast in an unrealistic way to bring out these signs,” he said. “You can find them all over the shroud, not just near the head, and then with a bit of imagination, you see letters.”

In other words, the “writing” that Frale claims to be seeing & translating in the Shroud is likely nothing more than a classic case of pareidolia. There are numerous well-documented cases of this phenomena – many of them related to religious symbols such as the Shroud – whereby through self-delusion and sometimes “computer enhancement” people convince themselves that they’re seeing something familiar which isn’t really there.

So, taking Occam’s Razor out and applying it to the full amount of evidence, it is most likely that – even in the presence of these latest claims – the Shroud of Turin is still not what a lot of Shroudies claim it is.  But then, that won’t stop the true believers from engaging in goalpost moving or special pleading, because one of the last things they think could be possible is that they could be wrong.

Howdy all.  I just wanted to pass along a quick little note to everyone about a regular occurrence among skeptical blogs on the Internet – the Skeptics’ Circle, which is a biweekly blog carnival hosted at Circular Reasoning. Once every couple of weeks or so, a skeptical blog will host a variety of posts about various topics at their site as a way of connecting & sharing info with the wider skeptic community.  The latest edition of the Skeptics’ Circle is at Beyond the Short Coat, a blog about “medicine, skepticism, and other cool stuff as needed”

Anyhow, read on for some good stuff in this latest edition… The 124th Meeting Of The Skeptics’ Circle

Hooray!   The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) in Europe has switched back on after being offline for a year…

Europe: Proton beams circulate in Big Bang machine

GENEVA – Scientists switched on the world’s largest atom smasher Friday night for the first time since the $10 billion machine suffered a spectacular failure more than a year ago.

It took a year of repairs before beams of protons circulated late Friday in the Large Hadron Collider for the first time since it was heavily damaged by a simple electrical fault.

Circulation of the beams was a significant leap forward. The European Organization for Nuclear Research has taken the restart of the collider step by step to avoid further setbacks as it moves toward new scientific experiments — probably starting in January — regarding the makeup of matter and the universe.

And, as I’ve blogged about before, where there is science being done by physicists via particle accelerators like the LHC, there are also pseudoscientific nuts who maintain that it’s going to destroy the Earth. Balderdash! Here are 3 good reasons why the LHC experiments are no danger to our planet.

I should also point out one more piece of good news regarding the re-starting of the LHC: despite all of the doomsday scenarios by the conspiracy-mongering pseudoscientists – the Earth survived

I’ve blogged here before about various claims made & tactics used by climate science deniers (I refuse to call them “skeptics” because they are not guided by evidence, merely ideology), but what I have to share in this post is truly damning stuff.  One of the things which is really interesting is what happens when a group of pseudoscientific ideologues (like global warming deniers) gets caught red-handed playing fast & loose with the facts…

Exhibit A: Statisticians Confirm Reality of Global Warming in Blinded Tests

Recently, one of the claims making the rounds has been that, contrary to the consensus within the climate science community, the Earth is actually entering a period of global cooling – this claim is patently fallacious, and anyone who has a basic understanding of statistics knows it.  But what happened recently, as reported in a widely-circulated AP story, really slams the door shut on this bogus claim: the temperature data for the planet was analyzed by a series of independent statisticians, all of whom found a warming (not a cooling) trend in the data.  And here’s the kicker: these statisticians didn’t know what the data were – in other words, the examination of the Earth’s temperature data was a blinded test!

Have you heard that the world is now cooling instead of warming? You may have seen some news reports on the Internet or heard about it from a provocative new book. Only one problem: It’s not true, according to an analysis of the numbers done by several independent statisticians for The Associated Press.

The case that the Earth might be cooling partly stems from recent weather. Last year was cooler than previous years. It’s been a while since the super-hot years of 1998 and 2005. So is this a longer climate trend or just weather’s normal ups and downs?

In a blind test, the AP gave temperature data to four independent statisticians and asked them to look for trends, without telling them what the numbers represented. The experts found no true temperature declines over time.

“If you look at the data and sort of cherry-pick a micro-trend within a bigger trend, that technique is particularly suspect,” said John Grego, a professor of statistics at the University of South Carolina.

This result puts paid to the oft-repeated claim by GW-deniers that there is a cooling trend in the data.  Of course, the only reason why these pseudoscientists were able to get away with their false claims for so long was because they, as professor Grego said, have been cherry-picking the data and presenting it incomplete & out-of-context in order to give the impression that the Earth is cooling.  But, as we’ve seen, once the experimenter & statistician bias is removed from the analysis, which is the whole purpose of doing blinded tests, a very real and consistent warming trend is revealed.

But it gets even worse for the GW-deniers…

Exhibit B: An anti-GW petition & campaign “on behalf of” the American Physical Society has been exposed as fraudulent.

In the summer of 2008, a widely circulated story in GW-denier circles claimed that a large portion of the membership of the American Physical Society (a professional organization for physicists of which I am a member) had signed onto a petition rebutting the scientific consensus on global warming, and – further – that the APS leadership itself had reversed its stance on the issue…

The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming.  The APS is also sponsoring public debate on the validity of global warming science.  The leadership of the society had previously called the evidence for global warming “incontrovertible.”

In a posting to the APS forum, editor Jeffrey Marque explains,”There is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the IPCC conclusion that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution.”

At the time, my b.s. detector went practically off the scale, because the day after publication the APS had released a statement (on that same page!) that was directly contrary to the claims in this article…

Update 7/17/2008: After publication of this story, the APS responded with a statement that its Physics and Society Forum is merely one unit within the APS, and its views do not reflect those of the Society at large.

When this annoying fact was pointed out to the deniers, many made claims about how there were “thousands” of physicists signing onto the petition claiming that GW-science was false – the implication being that the rank-and-file membership of the APS was revolting against the “establishment” (a variation on anti-scientific conspiracy mongering).  At the time, my b.s. detector went off again, because such a claim smacked so strongly of similar claims made by creationists that numerous scientists had “dissented from Darwinism”. Of course, such a claim is nothing more than an argument from popularity, but it’s even worse than that – it’s just a bald-faced lie, and it always has been!

That’s because evidence directly contradicting the GW-denier claims that the APS rank-and-file has revolted against the APS “establishment” on climate science has come to light:

Only 0.45% of Physicists sign Denier Petition

Despite seven months of intense effort to recruit physicists to sign a politically motivated petition disputing anthropogenic climate change, a mere, 0.45% of the American Physical Society’s 47,000 members signed on.

It’s a humiliating defeat for the climate change Deniers who make such false claims as ”many scientists dispute’ and ‘there is no consensus. The Petition drive was announced in the prestigous journal Nature, APS publications, numerous popular and electronic media, as well as heavily promoted by the petition organizers. Despite all of that effort and publicity, a mere 0.45% was all that they could manage.

Consider that the success rate for Nigerian email scams is estimated to be 0.1% to 0.2%, ie roughly speaking about the same. (Tip of the Hat to Grumbine for the genesis of seeking a comparison)

• • Physicists firm on climate change
  • APS rejects plea to alter stance on climate change
  • APS Council Overwhelmingly Rejects Proposal to Replace Society’s Current Climate Change Statement

Of course the reason for that APS Council’s rejection is unrelated to the number of the signatories, but rather was based the quality of the alleged “science” justifying the call. The “scientific” claims are a sad cobbling together of the argumentum ad ignorantiam and appeal to authority logical fallacies, along with the unbelievably idiotic “it’s happened in the past” argument. As “science” it should embarrass a freshman.

**BTW, this graphic nicely illustrates the utter fail behind this stupid anti-scientific petition campaign…

Whoops – looks like the anti-GW science denialists got caught on this one with their pants down.  But that’s what happens in scientific circles if you make things up – whether it be the cold-fusion hoax, the global cooling myth, or lying about the number of legitimate physicists who agree with your pseudoscience – sooner or later the truth will catch up to you, and you’ll be revealed for what you really are… cynical, lying bastards with an ideological & political agenda.

Here’s a message to all you GW-deniers who’ve been pushing this crap over the last couple of years:

Over the years you’ve no doubt heard claims that the Apollo Moon landings were an elaborate government hoax. Of course, this is one of the silliest conspiracy theory claims I’ve ever heard, but then once people start to venture down the rabbit-hole of conspiracy mongering I’m of the opinion that logic & reason go right out the window.  In any case, ever since these CT-lunatics (pardon the pun ) have started making their hoax claims a decade ago, one of their most oft-repeated mantras is: “If we really did send humans to the Moon, then why doesn’t NASA show us pictures of the landing sites?”

Well, here you go, an image of the Apollo 11 landing site as seen by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO)…

A detailed description of this photo is given over at the Bad Astronomy blog:

We’ve seen it before, but this time LRO is in its 50 km mapping orbit, so the resolution on this image is far higher — about 50 or so centimeters (20 inches). In this image, the tracks made by Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin as they scampered on the Moon for 2 hours and 31 minutes are obvious. You can even see the lander footpads, each just less than a meter (a bit over a yard) across.

The bright spots south of (below) the lander are various scientific packages they installed, including the Lunar Ranging Retro Reflector and the Passive Seismic Experiment. If I’ve got the scale right, the faint dark trail going to the upper left is where they put the TV camera. Somewhere between that and the lander is the flag. The Sun was shining straight down in this image, so the flag isn’t visible.

The image above is a piece of a much larger photo taken by the LRO…

Hat tip to the Rogues at the Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe and Phil Plait at the Bad Astronomy blog for giving me the heads up on these new photos from the LRO.  Incidentally, Phil has a really detailed blog post on this new development – I recommend you check it out.

It’ll be interesting to see what sort of reaction the Moon hoax CTers will have to this news, seeing as how it addresses a critical claim they’ve been making all along (that no direct photos of the Apollo landing sites exist).  Of course, I predict that the CTers will engage in all manner of special pleading and goalpost moving to explain away this damning evidence – even going so far as to appeal to the conspiracy theory (i.e. NASA faked the photos) to rationalize their delusions.  Such thinking displays the unfalsifiable nature of conspiracy theories and shows how misguided & separated from reality these folks can be.

I’ve practiced martial arts of various styles for 20 years, and in all that time I’ve heard a number of very strange & woo-filled explanations for why people can accomplish the physical feats they can.  One such example is breaking wooden boards with the bare hands & feet – often people provide an explanation by referencing so-called “chi, ki, or qigong energy”. The whole concept of chi is more of a philosophical concept than anything else, and it is little more than a “dragon-in-the-garage” (an untestable notion that cannot be verified through scientific means).

Well, I’m here to tell you that such physical feats as board breaking can be performed & explained simply by referencing the known laws of physics – no woo required.  Take a look at the video of me performing such a break with five pine boards at once…

How do I accomplish this feat?  Here’s how: I hit the boards really hard – the question is how do I generate such a large force of impact?  Read on…

1. Materials: First off, there’s a good reason why I’m hitting pine boards – they are a soft wood.  Whenever I’ve seen martial artists doing breaks such as these, they hit either pine boards or a brittle material like clay bricks or concrete slabs.  In addition, when striking wooden boards, successful strikes always go with the grain of the wood because the wood is structurally weaker in that orientation.  So, in a real sense, karate practitioners are kind of cheating by using these materials – if you really wanted to see something impressive & “supernatural”, perhaps someone could display slicing through a steel I-beam with the edge of their hand.  I think there’s a pretty good reason why we never see a “chi-master” doing that! 

2. Spacers: Notice the spacers that I’ve got placed in between the boards.  This is another common trick that is used whenever board breaking is performed.  By separating the boards like this, I really only have to break one at a time as opposed to one large, massive chunk.  In more technical terms, the momentum of my strike is slightly reduced by breaking only the top board, which allows the remainder of my hand’s momentum to continue to the next board, and the next after that and so on.  This works for the same reason why train cars are slightly decoupled from one another – once the engine gets moving, its momentum helps to move the next car when the coupling catches, and their combined momentum help to get the third car moving when its coupling catches, and so on.

3. Impulse-Momentum Theorem: the rest of it has to do with the physics of impulse & momentum. In equation form, this theorem (which is another way of expressing Newton’s 2nd Law) can be written as follows:

F Δt = m Δv

or

F = m Δv / Δt

where F is the force of impact, Δt is the time of impact, m is the mass behind the strike, and Δv is the change in velocity of striking hand (or foot).  In order to break the boards, one must maximize the force of impact, which can be done in a variety of ways…

*Maximize the mass: instead of merely hitting the boards with my fist, I turn & twist my entire body into the strike.  By doing so the mass (m) is greatly increased, and so too is the force.

*Minimize the impact time: the boards are placed onto solid supports (in this case the stools) which do not give under the impact.  Because the supports are not excessively elastic or bouncy, the time of impact is reduced to a minimum, which has the effect of greatly increasing the force of impact.

*Maximize the velocity: by dropping my body mass so dramatically, I convert a large amount of gravitational potential energy into kinetic energy. And since kinetic energy is proportional to the square of the velocity of an object, by doing so I provide a great deal of velocity (and therefore momentum) which can carry all the way through all five boards as previously mentioned.

So there you have it, folks – a thorough explanation of how such board breaking feats are done, without a mention of chi/ki/qigong or any other supernatural woo-woo.  This is a very good example of applying Occam’s Razor, and I thoroughly enjoy sharing this lesson with my students.

Sadly, there are those who would rather deny scientific reality & the laws of nature in favor of the delusion that they have some kind of mystical power over “chi energy” and can therefore do physically impossible things.  And even more sadly, these delusions can lead some people into serious injury.  Here are two examples of what I’m talking about…

*The first is of one of these so-called “chi-masters” who believes that he can throw people merely by “projecting his energy” at them, but – interestingly – he only seems to be able to perform these “throws” on his true-believing students.  What happens when he encounters someone who isn’t a true-believer in his abilities?  Take a look at this video to find out:

There is an entire group, almost cultish in nature, called Yellow Bamboo that purports to teach people how to “focus & project their chi” with equal levels of failure.  Just search Youtube and you’ll find plenty of videos of the Yellow Bamboo woo-meisters getting pwned.

*But if that isn’t bad enough, here’s a whole other level of fail… this next clown is so far down the “chi-master” rabbit-hole that he actually believes that by “focusing his chi energy” he can make himself impervious to blades. And to prove it, he hacks into his own arm with a razor-sharp machete!  How do you think it went? (Warning: not for the squeamish)

Folks, in my opinion, it just doesn’t get much more stupid than that.  The moral of the story is simple: when it’s you and your beliefs vs. the laws of physics, physics always wins.

In the latest installment of the lame attempts by creationists to stifle and distort the teaching of evolution, Christian evangelists Ray Comfort & Kirk Cameron (yes, that guy on Growing Pains) are giving away copies of Charles Darwin’s Origin of Species. Except they’re doing that thing that too many creationists love to do… they screw up science in an effort to promote their own narrow religious ideology. Specifically, Comfort’s Christian ministry – Living Waters – has begun a new program called “Origin Into Schools” where they are distributing free copies of a special reprinted edition of Darwin’s work, complete with an introduction by Ray Comfort himself.

The Secular Student Alliance is all over this, so allow me to reference their page on the matter:

Living Waters, the evangelical Christian ministry of Ray Comfort (Banana Man) and Kirk Cameron (sitcom star of Growing Pains), is on a mission to distribute 100,000 copies of a reprinted version of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, with an introduction by Comfort attempting to refute Darwin’s theories.  You can see Comfort’s explanation of the project on their website.  Or, you can download and read the Introduction in PDF form.

The highlights of the introduction, according to Kirk Cameron (who explains the project on YouTube), include “a timeline of Darwin’s life, Adolf Hitler’s undeniable connection with the theory, Dariwn’s racism, his disdain for women and Darwin’s thoughts on the existence of God.”  The introduction also “lists the theory’s many hoaxes.”

David Waters’ column “Origin of the Specious” in the Washington Post,  sums up the project quite nicely.

I’ve looked through Ray Comfort’s introduction to Darwin’s work, and I can only say that it – all too predictably – contains numerous tired old creationist arguments which offer nothing new.  I shall list them briefly here…

1. The “Teach the Controversy/Teach All Views” Argument: right off the bat, Comfort goes into this old argument.  He even selectively quotes Darwin himself to lend validity to the laughable notion that creationism should be considered on equal footing with evolutionary science.  Of course, an obvious counter to this argument is to call the creationists’ bluff – tell them you’ll give “equal time” to Muslim creationism, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, Raelianism, Native American creation myths, etc.  Somehow, folks like Comfort & Cameron aren’t very enamored with the idea of truly taking the “teach all views” nonsense to its logical conclusion, which shows their real agenda… pushing their particular religious ideology above all else.

2.  Getting the Science of DNA Wrong: a bit later in the introduction, Comfort begins to butcher the science of DNA, genetics, and its connection to evolution.  In particular, he makes the argument that a complex bio-molecule such as DNA cannot self-assemble by chance, which is a common misconception held by creationists.  This kind of argument is often phrased in terms of “expecting a tornado to whip through a junkyard and magically assemble an airplane” or a similar sounding claim.  The problem is that the assembly of complex molecules & biological structures, such as cell organelles, don’t occur randomly (and scientists never claim this anyway) – the creationists neglect the fact that there are well-defined laws of nature (such as natural & chemical selection) that guide the process along.  For much more detail on this particular point, see the TalkOrigins article on Evolution and Chance.

3. Transitional Forms Fallacies: any creationist mudslinging at evolutionary theory wouldn’t be complete without distorting the record on transitional forms, and Ray Comfort does this quite handily when he writes…

As evidence that Darwin’s theory is correct—that humans and chimps evolved from a common ancestor—we would expect to find something that is half monkey, half man.

The interesting thing is that in his introduction, Comfort actually cites numerous examples of transitional forms, but he refers to that time honored tactic of moving the goalposts whenever a new transitional fossil is unearthed… you see, Comfort and other creationists have their own, non-scientific definition of “transitional form” which seems more like a Frankenstein monster than anything else.  This has got to be one of the oldest & lamest creationist arguments, especially since every year more and more such fossils are discovered continually filling in gaps in the fossil record.  Yet in their quest to ignore evidence contrary to their religious ideology, many creationists will go to ludicrous lengths: even going so far as to state that when such a gap is filled that it simply opens up two more gaps on either side of the new fossil!

4. Distorting the Cambrian Explosion: Comfort tries to get mileage out of an old, defunct creationist argument whereby they distort the timeline and meaning of the Cambrian Explosion. The biggest error is that they imply through their writing that this “explosion” of evolution was extremely sudden and therefore evolution cannot account for it, when in reality it took place over roughly 5 to 40 million years – hardly an “explosion” as they depict!  For more info on this topic, read the TalkOrigins link on the Cambrian Explosion.

5. Mush on Mutations: on this particular point, Comfort just outright states a falsehood…

Contrary to what Darwin suspected, scientists today have discovered that mutations do not work as a mechanism to fuel the evolutionary process. They are random instead of purposeful, and they only modify or remove information, but never add it—an essential component of the theory.

Wrong and wronger.  Not only have mutations been proven, experimentally through lab work with fruit flies for example, to play a key role in evolution, but the notion that mutations can only be harmful is completely fallacious. We have seen plenty of examples in nature of beneficial mutations; a good example is the peppered moth.

6. “Irreducible Complexity” of the Eye: another argument in the creationist bag of tricks is the claim that an organ as complex & intricate as the human eye could not have possibly evolved.  Of course, this is simply a variation on the same theme as outlined in point #2 about DNA – the false assumption is that evolution is a completely unguided & random process.  It isn’t – natural selection plays a critical role, but creationists would rather ignore this fact in an effort to build evolution into a straw man they can easily tear down.  Read more about the failings of the “irreducible complexity” argument at this link.

7. Ad Hominem Against Darwin & Science: the final part of Ray Comfort’s introduction to Origin is a mishmash of ad hominem attacks against Darwin and modern “evolutionists” where he blames them for horrors such as eugenics, suppression of women, the rise of Nazism & inspiration of Hitler, slavery, and the Holocaust.  And to go even further down the rabbit-hole, Comfort then goes on to proselytize to the reader about the importance of rejecting evolutionary theory (along with science in general which is equated with atheism) in favor of saving their soul by, of course, accepting Jesus Christ as their lord & savior.  Just for good measure, he even rips on three other major religions – Hinduism, Buddhism, and Islam – as being inadequate to the task of preventing a sure trip to Hell because only his particular version of Christianity is the true way to Heaven.  At this point, it’s hard not to chuckle at Comfort, because it is obvious he isn’t even attempting to do science – he is interested in nothing more then pushing his narrow religious beliefs.

Yet he wants to have the validity of science, so that this nonsense can be taught in schools to your kids.  It’d be absolutely hilarious if clowns like Ray Comfort & Kirk Cameron weren’t so serious about it.

So there you have it – watch out for this religious & pseudoscientific propaganda popping up in a school near you.  And if you do happen to get a copy of it, just tear out the first 54 pages or so (the introduction) and then you’ll have a really good book

I wanted to let everyone know about an effort I’m helping to organize to bring a Skepticamp event to the Chicago-area on March 6th, 2010 – we’re calling it Skepchicamp…

We are currently in the early stages of organizing the conference, and one of the things we need most right now are speakers.  Please read our latest press release for more information on this, and consider getting involved or at least passing along the news:

Skepchicamp looking for speakers

Skepchicamp, an informal skeptical convention scheduled for March 6, is looking for speakers.  Speakers are welcome to give a 15 minutes speech on any topic related to skepticism, followed by five minute of questions and answers.  In additions to speeches, demonstrations, magic shows, and panel discussions will also be considered.  While speakers are encouraged to focus on women in skepticism or women in science, it is not a requirement.  People interested in speaking should e-mail don@skepchicamp.com

Speakers currently scheduled to appear include Hemant Mehta, creator of the Friendly Atheist blog and author of “I Sold My Soul on Ebay” and Skepchick bloggers Bug Girl, Elyse Anders, and Jen Myers.

Skepchicamp  is an informal convention with the goal of promoting skeptical thinking in the Chicago area.  Unlike formal conventions, everyone who attends Skepchicamp is expected to participate in some way.  That can include giving a speech, serving food, helping to set up a room, or donating money.   The goal is to create a laid-back event driven by the participants.

Skeptics believe that everything should be examined with scientific rigor, and generally choose to suspend belief (or agree to append beliefs) based on the availability of adequate evidence. Many skeptics do not believe in the supernatural simply have not seen enough credible evidence to convince us that they exist. They are not curmudgeons who dislike ghost stories. There are, however, many things that skeptics do believe in. Like love, the power of beauty, art, friendship, humor, and sports because we know these things to be true. Nothing falsifiable is exempt from scrutiny.

Contact:
William Brinkman
wbrinkman@skepchicamp.com
Ph: 630 663 0194
http://www.skepchicamp.com

Happy Carl Sagan Day… or, to be more accurate, belated Carl Sagan Day

November 7th is the birthday of that great communicator of science & skepticism, Carl Sagan.  In a time when many of his fellow scientists were loath to communicate directly with the public, Sagan was a unique link between the scientific community and the general populace.  He communicated the power, joy, and importance of science to us through lectures, books, and television.  In particular, I think I can honestly say that an entire generation of scientists were inspired by Carl Sagan’s book and television series Cosmos (which aired in 1980) – I count myself among them. Were it not for the inspiration provided to me in my teenage years by my beat-up copy of the book Cosmos, I may have never pursued a career in science…

The unforgettable introduction to Cosmos: The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean is available on Youtube…

And a recently auto-tuned remix of Carl Sagan’s dialog from Cosmos, called “A Glorious Dawn (featuring Stephen Hawking)”, is also available on Youtube.  Check it out…

**Note: You can download your own copy of “A Glorious Dawn” from its creator’s website – SymphonyofScience.com
- where there are many other cool videos & music files available.

Lastly, in the years just before he died in the late 1990s, Sagan made a major contribution to the budding skeptical movement when he published his book The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark. This book is probably one of the most important & readable books concerning an introduction to skepticism and the importance of applying the scientific method & critical thinking in our everyday lives to help us distinguish science from pseudoscience & nonsense.  If you’ve never read this book, I strongly urge you to pick it up…

In closing, allow me to quote the ending to Sagan’s Demon Haunted World, from the chapter titled “Real Patriots Ask Questions”:

Education on the value of free speech and the other freedoms reserved by the Bill of Rights, about what happens when you don’t have them, and about how to exercise and protect them, should be an essential prerequisite for being an American citizen — or indeed a citizen of any nation, the more so to the degree that such rights remain unprotected. If we can’t think for ourselves, if we’re unwilling to question authority, then we’re just putty in the hands of those in power. But if the citizens are educated and form their own opinions, then those in power work for us. In every country, we should be teaching our children the scientific method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency, humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted world that we inhabit by virtue of being human, this may be all that stands between us and the enveloping darkness.

On Tuesday, Nov. 3rd, psychic Sylvia Browne made a surprise guest appearance on The Jay Leno Show. This is very surprising, seeing as how Leno is a definite skeptic when it comes to psychics & their woo (he coined the now famous phrase “Why don’t you ever see this headline: ‘Psychic Wins Lottery‘?”).  So why was Browne there in the first place?

What happened is that his show has a segment called Earn Your Plug, whereby celebrities who wish to have their TV show or movie plugged have to do something on the show to merit the advertising.  Well, last night the celebs were Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat of the movie “Paranormal Activity”, and for the Earn Your Plug segment they decided to surprise Leno by having Sylvia Browne give him a reading.  See for yourself how it went…

Right off the bat, Leno was completely blindsided by the fact that a psychic like Browne was even on his show.  Notice how he makes the crack at the beginning of the reading about replacing some employees in the near future; something tells me that this is one prediction which is likely to come true.  Had he known that Featherston & Sloat had wanted to bring Browne onto the show, Leno would have likely stopped it from happening.

In addition, I want to point something else out that Leno did – he was openly, though playfully (his show is about entertainment, after all), skeptical of what Browne was attempting to do.  Whenever she made a claim, rather than allow her to prattle on and on with all manner of nonsensical “predictions” (often known as cold reading), he would stop her and challenge her on specific points.  It is also worth noting how she reacted to Leno not simply believing what she said or at least playing along with her: she got angry with him.  She didn’t get screaming mad, but watching her demeanor and body language speaks volumes about how upset she was that he even dared to question her supposed divine prowess (she did claim, after all, that her “abilities” were “from God”).  Essentially, she was doing little more than making a blatant argument from authority in this regard, and it was painfully (for her) obvious that Leno wasn’t having any of it.

I think a good example was this exchange:

Browne: “Do you know how many people over the years have told me that I’m wrong about something, but came back later to tell me that I was right?”

Leno: “No. How many?”

In the end, I think that while it was a negative that a psychic scumbag like Sylvia Browne even got onto Leno’s show in the first place, Leno himself turned it into a more positive experience by not treating her seriously & acting openly skeptical and asking questions.  The result was, in my opinion, that by the end of the reading – which was mercifully short – the vast majority of the audience was laughing at Ms. Browne and not with her.  And if there’s anyone who deserves to be laughed at, it is Sylvia Browne and her ilk.

Good move, Jay, for educating people on how to deal with such supernatural claims.  Johnny Carson would be proud of you