Intellectual Humility: A Guiding Principle for the Skeptical Movement?
“I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.” —Oliver Cromwell, to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, 1650 In November 2019, attendees of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry’s CSICon conference received the following inquiry from an anonymous CSI member in their email inboxes: I’ve been thinking …
This article is available for free to all.Skepticism and Pseudoexperiments
Pseudoscience is something that presents as, or is mistaken for, science—but is not. Pseudosciences are especially resilient and pernicious because they benefit from the hard-earned legitimacy of real science as arbiter of objective truth. From phrenology to astrology, homeopathy to facilitated communication, pseudosciences gain believers conditioned to (rightfully) respect science and its methods. Pseudoexperiments are …
Reasons to Believe’s Continuing Assault on Science
On a Sunday morning in early February 2020, I attended a presentation at a local Baptist church titled “Science and Faith: Finding Truth in All Things.” The speaker was Anjeanette (A.J.) Roberts, a staff member with Reasons to Believe (RTB), a Christian ministry headquartered in Southern California that promotes old-earth biblical creationism. Roberts is a …
Magic in the House of Rain: Cognitive Bases of UFO ‘Observations’ in the Southwest Desert
Certain peoples of the American Southwest plant turkey feathers in their fields, mystically intended to attract rain. Farther south, the wild turkey represents the rain god Tlaloc, whose dwelling beneath the vast American deserts is still, in places, believed to be blessed with abundant water. The dwelling place of Tlaloc is the House of Rain …
What Are the Chances?
Actually, the night had been neither stormy nor dark. But her sleep was restless and fitful; virtually nonexistent. Temperature was a big part of the problem: she must have added to, removed, and adjusted the bedding a half-dozen times. And now, the wee hours—5 a.m., 6 a.m. When the phone rang, she was definitely in …
Evolution Education: What a Difference a Dozen Years Makes!
A lot can happen in twelve years—even in evolution. It took just a dozen years for a population of threespine stickleback fish to evolve to lose the bulk of their armor after colonizing a freshwater lake in Alaska (Bell et al. 2004). Experimental populations of a species of wheat managed in the same amount of …
This article is available for free to all.Six Degrees Author Mark Lynas on Our Warming World
Mark Lynas is a British environmentalist who has written books on climate, nuclear energy, GMOs, and how science has changed his mind. Climate change has been featured in many of his books; his latest, Our Final Warning: Six Degrees of Climate Emergency, is a new and updated edition. It outlines what lies ahead with every …
This article is available for free to all.When Environmentalism Clashes with Science
Protecting the environment is a worthy goal. The quality of our lives depends on the quality of the environment. We all need clean air, clean drinking water, and healthy food to have a healthy life. Poor air quality increases the risks of respiratory illnesses. Degrading soil health and warming global temperatures challenge continued food production. …
The State of Our Nation
Well, here we are. Our country in chaos. The COVID-19 pandemic wreaks havoc across the planet, and the United States, without leadership, fares worse than any other nation. Just as cases were going nicely down, cities, states, beaches, and bars reopened. We ignored all scientific advice and fell right back into full pandemic once again. …
Plandemic Conspiracy Video Goes Viral, Sells Books
Cover Image: Plandemic creator Mikki Willis. Source: YouTube In early May, a YouTube video titled Plandemic was released by Mikki Willis (credited onscreen as “father/filmaker”[sic]). It featured a lengthy interview with virologist Judy Mikovits, who offered scattershot conspiracy-laden assertions about the “truth” behind the COVID-19 pandemic, prefaced by claims of having been framed for …
Richard Dawkins Award Goes to Writer-Lyricist Javed Akhtar
For half a century, India’s Javed Akhtar has been a powerful force for secularism, reason, and human rights, challenging superstition and intolerance through his work in poetry, film, and political activism. To honor his decades of work on behalf of these crucial values, Akhtar is the 2020 recipient of the Richard Dawkins Award. Akhtar will …
CSICon 2020 Conference Postponed for a Year; Online Lecture Series Replaces It
The coronavirus pandemic claimed another victim when CSICon 2020, planned for October 15–18 in Las Vegas, had to be postponed until 2021. CSICon is the big conference on science and reason hosted annually over a four-day period in October in recent years by the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI) and the Center for Inquiry (CFI). …
Judge Dismisses CFI Suit against Walmart on Homeopathy; Appeal Planned
A judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed by the Center for Inquiry (CFI) against Walmart for its marketing of homeopathic fake medicine. CFI says it will appeal. In May 2019, CFI filed a lawsuit against Walmart, the world’s largest retailer, accusing it of committing wide-scale consumer fraud and endangering the health of its customers through …
Accused Witches Burned, Killed in Nigeria
Although the burning of alleged witches is often identified with eighteenth-century Europe, this horrific violence still occurs in modern Africa. People in pre-colonial Africa used belief in witchcraft to make sense of misfortunes that defied naturalistic or commonsense explanations. Unfortunately, these ancient superstitious beliefs have neither waned nor disappeared over the years. Colonialists tried to …
This article is available for free to all.CFI Investigations Group Raises Paranormal Challenge Prize to $250,000
Can you read other people’s thoughts? Can you move objects with your mind? Can you predict the future? More to the point, can you prove it? If you can, the Center for Inquiry Investigations Group (CFIIG) will give you $250,000. For two decades, CFIIG has offered those who profess to have supernatural, paranormal, or occult …
One of the World’s Most Active Groups, Australian Skeptics Observe Fortieth Anniversary
Cover Image: Tim Mendham (in red shirt), executive officer of the Australian Skeptics and editor of their magazine The Skeptic, before the Australian Skeptics National Convention in Sydney in 2014. Having fun with him are, from left, Wendy Grossman, founder and former editor of Britain’s The Skeptic magazine; Ken Frazier, editor of the Skeptical …
APS Creates Distinguished Award in Lilienfeld’s Name
The Association for Psychological Science (APS) has established a travel award in the name of distinguished psychologist Scott O. Lilienfeld to “honor and extend” his influence on the next generation of clinical psychologists. Lilienfeld is the Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Psychology at Emory University in Atlanta. He is an APS fellow as well as …
The Incredible Saga of Coghlan’s Coffin
The astonishing story of Charles Coghlan’s coffin has been among the most intriguing claims in the annals of the mysterious, raising the very insistent question: Could a corpse actually develop a “homing instinct”? Could it direct its coffin—freed from its vault by a great natural disaster—across ocean waters many hundreds of miles away back to …
How a Drug Is Born
Big Pharma is not a misnomer; pharmaceutical drugs are big business. The United States is the world leader in producing new drugs and is responsible for nearly half of the new molecular entities (NMEs) that come on the market (Lowe 2010). Americans spend well over $300 billion yearly on prescription drugs (The American Academy of …
Are You Afraid of the Thirteenth Floor? Superstition and Real Estate, Part 2
Cover Image: Elevator buttons from the Flamingo Hotel & Casino, site of CSICon 2019. (Author photo) In my May/June 2020 column, I described the influence of feng shui on the Chinese real estate market. Although it would be hard to match the pervasive presence of traditional Chinese superstition in real estate and other areas …
Being Skeptical of Initial Skepticism
Q: Have you ever been skeptical about a finding or assertion, then did your own investigation only to have your conclusions further corroborate the initial assertion? If so, can you provide any examples? —Mike D. A: There are—or should be—many times in a person’s life when their initial skepticism about some claim or other was …
Letters – Vol. 44, No. 5
The Nobel Disease I enjoyed the article “The Nobel Disease” (May/June 2020) so much so that I read it before even getting it into my office or bedroom stack of reading. I also enjoyed and related to the editor’s comments, as I have met quite a number of Nobelists, a few with crank ideas, including …
Turning Magical Thinking into the Magic of Critical Thinking
Strange but True: 10 of the World’s Greatest Mysteries Explained. By Kathryn Hulick. Illustrated by Gordy Wright. Frances Lincoln Children’s Books, Quarto Publishing, Minneapolis, MN, 2019. ISBN 978-1-78603-784-8. 127 pp. Hardcover, $22.99. Kathryn Hulick’s Strange but True: 10 of the World’s Greatest Mysteries Explained is a refreshing addition to the strange-mysteries genre—all the more …
This article is available for free to all.How Does It Feel?
The First Minds: Caterpillars, ‘Karyotes & Consciousness. By Arthur S. Reber. Oxford University Press, 2018, ISBN-13: 978-0-190-85415-7, 296 pp. Hardcover, $35. Imagine we’re robot scientists who have been observing the universe since its origin with the big bang. After eight or nine billion years or so, a remarkable new phenomenon arose: life. We’d have …