Bernard Dixon, British science writer and former editor of New Scientist magazine, died October 30, 2020, at the age of eighty-two.

Dixon was elected a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (then CSICOP) in 1980. He was also active with the British Association for Science (then the BAAS) and the Council for Science and Society.

Dixon edited New Scientist from 1969 to 1979, bringing his own brand of humor and a concern for issues of science and society to the magazine.

“Thanks to his own blend of curiosity, enthusiasm, and skepticism, he struck a successful—and at the time, unique—balance between accessible science reporting, analysis of new technology, and scrutiny of relationships between science, government, and society,” wrote Georgina Ferry in an obituary in The Guardian.

“Nothing was sacred, as long as it was about science,” said Michael Kenward, who succeeded Dixon as editor of the magazine in 1979.  Kenward wrote New Scientist’s own tribute to Dixon in its December 5, 2020, issue.

Another Dixon recruit, Lawrence McGinty, said, “Under Bernard’s leadership, New Scientist became authoritative and entertaining, the voice of science that everyone could understand.”

Dixon got a PhD in biology from King’s College in Newcastle upon Tyne and after a year of research in microbiology became a science journalist. He joined New Scientist in 1968 and became its editor the following year.

In 1974, Dixon and New Scientist colleague Joseph Hanlon conducted an investigation exposing spoon-bender Uri Geller. Their search for rigorous evidence that he had psychokinetic powers turned up nothing—though they caught him attempting to bend a key on the metal frame of a chair.

Dixon left the magazine in 1979 to take up freelance writing and become European editor of Omni. He later wrote columns for Current Biology. His books include What Is Science For? and Beyond the Magic Bullet, an exploration of the fallacy that there is a pill for every ill.

In 2000, Dixon was appointed to the Order of the British Empire (OBE). He expressed delight but later told the British Library’s Oral History of British Science that he made it clear he would not accept the award from Prince Charles because of his ill-informed statements about the genetic modification of crops. Dixon opted instead to have the medal sent to him from the lord lieutenant of Greater London—through the post in a Jiffy bag.