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“Space Oddity” (Lucifer Project)

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NASA space probes and the works of Arthur C. Clarke can both be appreciated on their substantial merits. But some feel the need to fuse these elements, with the result being the creation of new habitable worlds. Only a select few will be allowed to access these worlds, which will be on the moons of a former gas planet that transformed into a star. Meanwhile the rest of us will be pulled or pushed into a fiery or icy death by the creation of this second sun.

The idea seems lifted from Clarke’s Space Odyssey works in which an alien monolith orbits Jupiter and replicates itself billions of times by using Jovian matter to condense the planet until nuclear fusion is attained. This leads to a freshly-minted star, which is capable of sustaining life on the moons it pilfered from Jupiter. The central feature of the associated conspiracy theory is that NASA is attempting the real thing in a project uncreatively named the Lucifer Project.

Theorists say this was first tried in 2003 when NASA plunged the Galileo probe into Jupiter. Scientists were worried that allowing it to crash into a Jovian moon would run the risk of contaminating any potential microbial life that resided there. Theorists, however, dismissed this as a cover story and said the real intent was to turn Jupiter into a star.

In what would seem a fatal blow to the theory, Jupiter maintained its planetary status. But apocalyptic soothsayers seldom settle back into the fabric of their extant planet when their panicky predictions fizzle. So the destruction of Galileo was written off as a practice run and, fortunately for the theorists, our solar system houses more than one gas giant, so they can afford a doomsday do-over.

The isthmus of common ground shared by NASA and the theorists is that the administration will end its current Cassini mission in nine months by plunging it into Saturn. NASA says this is to avoid contaminating the planet’s moons, while theorists say Freemasons, Illuminati, or Bilderbergers have ordered its plunge in order to create nuclear fusion that will produce a sun capable of sustaining the elites’ life on Saturnian moons.

Some astronomers believe that if Jupiter or Saturn had much more mass, they could have become stars, and the theorists weld this plausible scenario with the notion that space probes could serve as a the fuel that ignites this nuclear fusion.

In order for Gemini and Cassini to travel, they require a non-solar fuel source once they get about three blocks past Mars. Hence, these probes are propelled by the radioactive decay of plutonium 238 pellets inside of Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators (RTGs). But this fuel source also plays the key role in Saturn’s manmade fusion, according to the theory. Astronomy blogger Ian O’Neill explained how the theorists think this will work:

“Dropping Cassini into a place with large atmospheric pressure will compress the probe and detonate it like a nuclear bomb. This will trigger a chain reaction, kick-starting nuclear fusion, and turning Saturn into a fireball. This second sun will have dire consequences for us on Earth, killing millions from the huge influx of radiation by this newborn star.” By then, the elite will be aboard their salvation spaceship and headed to this new home.

There are several reasons why using NASA probes to create new suns and habitable zones will remain in the realm of science fiction. The first sizable obstacle is that plutonium 238 is not weapons grade. Also, the tiny pellets of plutonium 238 that are used to heat and power the probes are in separate, damage-proof cylinders. Finally, the probes burn and break up, eliminating any chance of the plutonium reaching critical mass.

Brian Dunning at Skeptoid further explained, “This critical mass has to be imploded with a simultaneous explosion from all sides, applying sudden pressure precisely from all angles at the exact instant. This couldn’t happen with an RTG design. Although each RTG does theoretically have enough plutonium to make up a critical mass, there isn’t any way that it could all be brought together into the right shape. Any type of pressure or crash event has already sent all the separate impact shells scattering about space, and each is far too small to ever achieve critical mass and implode.”

And even if this all magically happened, Saturn wouldn’t morph into a star anyway. Unless nuclear fusion can be maintained within a stellar body, the reaction would quickly fizzle out. Astronomers estimate this would require a body at least 80 times the size of Jupiter in order to have adequate gravitational confinement.

In response to his column, Dunning received an e-mail from someone identifying himself as Conrado Salas Cano. Cano explained that these obstacles will be overcome because of the advanced knowledge of aliens with whom NASA is secretly working. This enables Cano to confidently assert that in nine months we will see “the sudden appearance of a second bright star in place of Saturn when Cassini is disposed of in the atmosphere of this giant ringed planet.”

So you can look at the night sky next September to see if this has happened. But if feeling the need for unrealistic space entertainment, I suggest reading Clarke instead.

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“Satellite deceiver” (Black Knight)

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Many myths originated by combining unrelated tales and this method continues today. One example is the Black Knight Satellite, said to be a 13,000-year-old alien spacecraft that perpetually orbits Earth and teases us with glimpses of its existence every decade or so.  

This tale has been cobbled from various reports of satellites, signals, and UFOs. Most of these reported activities are attributable to human actions or astronomical phenomenon so there’s no reason to assert the existence of nearby ancient alien technology.

In fact, science is fascinating enough without trying to to weave science fiction into it. For instance, we can gaze in awe at Nikola Tesla’s contributions to Mankind without riding his ample coattails and making him the retroactive starting point for Black Knight Satellite contact.

But that’s what some people have done with Tesla’s 1899 report that he had detected signals from space. He thought these might be of alien origin, but scientists later realized he had picked up electromagnetic radiation from a pulsar. These are magnetized, rotating neuron stars that, again, are amazing enough on their own that there’s no need to try and finagle an alien technology angle. But Black Knight Satellite believers identify Tesla’s discovery as the starting point. From there, a series of  unrelated events have been assembled piecemeal to form a hodgepodge timeline.

The next event in this fabricated history was in the 1920s when Norwegian scientists detected Long Delay Echoes from a still-unknown source. Possible explanations include reflections from astronomical bodies, ionized gas clouds, and reflections from Earth’s ionosphere. It could also be an alien satellite, but its existence is not supported by the evidence that distinguish the other possibilities.

Next, newspapers in 1954 reported that two satellites were found to be orbiting Earth in those pre-Sputnik days. This was later shown to be a spoof peddled by a UFO hunter who was promoting his new book, but this revelation hasn’t dissuaded Black Knight Satellite enthusiasts from counting it among their pieces of evidence.

In 1960, the U.S. Navy detected an object that was initially thought by Washington to belong to neither superpower, which were the only nations who had the ability to project spacecraft into orbit. But it turned out to be a capsule casing from the previous year’s Discoverer VII launch. This switch in the “official” story is supposed to be proof of a cover-up, but why the Black Knight Satellite would need to be hidden or why the second story wouldn’t have been prepped and ready to announce if this were a conspiracy is left unexplained.

In 1963, astronaut Gordon Cooper was said to have reported a UFO while aboard Mercury 9. Cooper denied this and provided transcripts from the mission to show he had been misquoted.

Ten years later, researcher Duncan Lunan analyzed  Norwegian scientists’ data and deduced that it revealed a chart pointing toward a double star in the Boötes constellation. He decided the signals constituted an invitation from the inhabitants of a planet near the constellation, an invitation that took 12,600 years to reach its recipients. Lunan later acknowledged that his conclusions were unscientific and error-laden, but his work gave the satellite the age that is associated with it.

The final piece of the disparate puzzle came in 1998, when the space shuttle Endeavor made its maiden voyage to the International Space Station. Astronauts photographed a strange object that was likely a thermal blanket lost on a spacewalk, but which was interpreted by believers to be the first photographic proof of the Black Knight Satellite. Astronaut Jerry Ross told reporters that he and others were trying to wrap thermal blankets around four trunnion pins on the ISS node when one got detached from its tether and floated away.

If it was instead the Black Knight Satellite, it was remarkable serendipity that it happened to come along at the same orbit, altitude, and time that the ISS was whirring by. The fact that the object sauntered away after six minutes is consistent with what an object the size and weight of a thermal blanket would do.

That wasn’t enough for YouTube commentator Mercenaries512, who insisted that image-conscious NASA would never release a video of its mistake. So while conspiracy theorists accuse NASA of cover-ups, they also consider the lack of cover-up to be proof.

Then there is the online commentator who called all this a fulfillment of Nostradamus’ vision that “Mankind will discover objects in space sent to us by the watchers.”

The ISS is an excellent example of international cooperation and serves as a long-term laboratory to conduct studies on biology, physics, astronomy, medicine, and meteorology, with capabilities that exceed that of traditional manned spacecraft. But to some it is merely another square on a quilt woven together with overactive imagination, self-importance, and paranoia.

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“Spooky Truth” (Ghost hunting equipment)

ghoststuff

There are three primary explanations for supposed ghost photos. They could be the result of a defect, a hoax, or a ghost.

In the case of defects, the image normally looks like whatever ghosts are said to look like in a given time and place. Photographs of allegedly inexplicable bright orbs are sometimes said to be a person’s spirit, and such shots are frequent consequences of today’s technology. By contrast, the orb would merely have been a distraction in 19th Century photos since ghosts were then thought to be transparent, floating apparitions who kept their clothes on when they passed to the other side.

Hoaxes are easy to pull off today, but it is also easy for PhotoShop experts and other professionals to detect them. Before the ubiquity of cell phones and camcorders, still film images were allegedly the primary means for spirits and souls to manifest themselves. In truth, the science behind photography could always explain the anomaly. Even if a case ever came along that baffled the foremost photographers, it would not be proof of a ghost. It could be a world class hoax, an innovative photography technique, or something else. Passing it off as a ghost because we aren’t sure what it is would simply be negative evidence. If ghosts could be captured in still or moving pictures, we would see many instances of this, especially in morgues, hospitals, and scenes of fatalities. Photos and videos taken during and after 9/11, Oklahoma City, Waco, D-Day, and natural disasters are all ghost-free.

Which is why the final explanation is by far the least likely. Also, how a ghost would manifest itself on film or video has likely never been tested via the Scientific Method, and these ideas have certainly never been confirmed. Believers have likewise proffered no explanation for the process by which a person becomes a ghost. Even undertaking these challenges would be to embrace Tooth Fairy Science, which is when the specifics of a phenomenon are investigated before the phenomenon is confirmed to exist.

This shortcoming has been no issue for paranormal investigators. Ghost hunting has been around for at least two centuries, but séances with mediums have largely been replaced by a glut of programs on third-tier TV channels, YouTube, and other mediums. Besides small video cameras and phones, the hunters are invariably wielding an assortment of other electronic gizmos and doohickeys.

Most of these pieces do indeed function as detectors, as they are intended to detect light, heat, movement, or electromagnetism. The substantial problem arises when one interprets those readings as ghosts as opposed to readings of what they are meant to measure. There is no science to suggest that ghosts emit anything in measurable amounts.

So when ghost hunters uses an infrared thermometer or motion detector to pinpoint a cold spot in a room, they might find such a location. While there is no reason to think ghosts are responsible for temperature changes, those chasing them might be causing it since more persons in the room will raise the temperature. Changes are also caused by heating, air conditioning, insulation, studs, wiring, pipes, radiant heat, sunlight, and wind.

Another item, particle detectors, make infrequent appearances in ghost hunts. But as Brian Dunning at Skeptoid put it, “For a ghost to emit ionizing radiation, it would have to be an awfully sick ghost or be composed largely of unstable radioactive metals.”

EMF meters are said by hunters to detect ghosts, though this claim is never augmented with any suggestion of what the deceased wanderer’s power source is. Also, Dunning wrote that, “Given the massive amount of EMF pollution on a TV ghost hunting set, the idea of being able to detect the EMF field of a ghost who’s not carrying any batteries is ridiculous.”

Skeptic Kenny Biddle found he could set off an EMF detector with just a computer mouse. But what should be seen as a major flaw is seen as a plus by ghost hunters. Their devices are erratic, highly susceptible to false positives, and have blinks and beeps that make it seem to believers like something ghostly is happening. Throw in some strange sounds that seem even more frightening in a darkened castle or mansion and you’ve hit poltergeist pay dirt.

Though they haven’t been used much since being brushed aside by electronics, dowsing rods are still utilized by a few ghost chasers. Whether the rod moves, and in what amount and in what direction, is determined by the hunter, who also interprets and announces what this movement means. His claimed ability cannot be tested, measured, or duplicated by another person, nor has any dowser proposed a plausible hypothesis for how this would work.

Usually touted as the spookiest fruit from hunts is ghostspeak on audio. These mystic missives might seem unsettling, but that’s only because they are so garbled and distorted. They are drenched in static, vary in pitch, and produce an unpleasant sound that can come across as someone who is pained, scared, or angry. In the many thousands of hours of these recordings, we have yet to have a ghost articulately announce in plain language, “Here I am. I am the ghost of King John’s tailor.” Ghost hunters claim that their prey speak on a plain that can only be captured by recording devices, providing another example of how they fundamentally misunderstand what these items are for and how they work. The proof of ghostspeak is so tenuous it has  included rationalizations that the same ghost is speaking in different languages within the same sentence, or that it will speak backwards only some of the time.

The Atlantic related the tale of what was likely the first ghost story of the photography age. In 1861, William Mumler noticed the shadowy figure of a young girl on a plate he was developing. He knew the cause was that he had inadvertently reused a plate that had been insufficiently exorcised of its previous image. He showed it to his spiritualist friend as a prank, which the friend gullibly swallowed. When Mumler tried to explain what had really happened, the friend refused to believe it and even had the image printed in spiritualist publications.

This started a trend that continues today, as almost any new recording or electronic device can be used to further the ghost hunter’s agenda. Beginning with Mumler’s double-exposed photo, telegraphs, telephones, cassette recorders, radios, televisions, camcorders, the Internet, iPhones, and Fitbits have all been seized on by believers as a means to access the paranormal realm. The only medium they haven’t penetrated is a peer-reviewed journal.

 

 

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“Doctor Hooey” (Anti-medicine arguments)

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Today we will go over some of the criticism of mainstream doctors that is sometimes leveled by proponents of Supplementary, Complementary, and Alternative Medicine (SCAM).

Critics will sometimes use past science failures, real or imagined, to suggest that it can’t be trusted. But as comedian Dara Ó Briain noted, if science knew everything it would stop doing science. But gaps in knowledge cannot be filled in with whatever the listener finds most appealing.

When science screws up, it admits it. In fact, attempting to falsify a hypothesis is a cornerstone of the Scientific Method. Conceding one does not have all the answers and changing one’s mind when presented new evidence is better than wrongly insisting that one has all the answers.

For an example of the latter, I offer this Ken Ham Tweet: “I’m glad the Bible is not a textbook of science like those used in public schools, as it would change all the time. Many ideas have come and gone but God’s Word remains the same.” This word includes a declaration that the moon has its own light. There is nothing admirable in refusing to admit this is wrong. Science is a process, not a set of rules or dictates, and this fluidity is one of its strengths.

Yet SCAM proponents criticize science for what they call this wishy-washy nature, then turn right around and call science dogmatic, unyielding, and set in its ways. This more accurately describes reflexologists, chiropractors, and other SCAM practitioners, who continue to use methods that rely on meridians, auras, and chakras, all of which have never been shown to exist. Mainstream medicine does change when warranted, which is why it has embraced vaccines, CAT scans, anesthetics, antibiotics, and organ transplants.

Doctor detractors also frequently employ a number of ad hominem assaults. These may include charges of bias, being a shill, being closed-minded, or trying to protect the mainstream. None of this has any bearing on what is true.

Or we may see an ad blaring, “Doctors are TERRIFIED of this!!!” However, the first question to ask when trying to see a doctor for the first time is, “Is the doctor accepting new patients?” About half the time they aren’t. Most have more patients than they can handle and are regularly 90 minutes behind schedule by the end of their office day, at which point they head to the hospital for another round of work, although they should be checking themselves in for exhaustion. The only fear doctors have over someone using an unproven, untested miracle panacea stems from their human compassion about a patient treating a serious illness with wheatgrass and craniosacral rubs.

One of the more hackneyed claims is that doctors only treat symptoms, not the underlying causes. I’m not a doctor, nor do I portray one on this blog, so here’s what a genuine one, Harriett Hall, had to say about this charge: “If a patient has pneumonia, doctors don’t just treat the fever, pain, and cough; they figure out which microbe is responsible and provide the appropriate antibiotic. If a broken bone is painful, they don’t just treat the pain, they immobilize the fracture or insert a pin so it can heal. If a patient is in agony from pain in the right lower quadrant of the abdomen, they don’t just treat the pain, they try to figure out if the underlying cause is appendicitis, and if it is, they operate.”

The sad irony here is that a SCAM artist would give patients suffering from pneumonia, broken bones, and abdominal pain the same treatment. Applied kinesiologists, reflexologists, iridologists, and the like all assert that a certain body part is key to all health, and that manipulating the flow of Qi (which has never been shown to exist) can cure or prevent almost any malady.

A similar argument is that mainstream doctors fail to do anything to keep the illness from arising in the first place. Yet mainstream medicine offers vaccines, encourages annual checkups, gives preventive screenings, and advises breast cancer self-checks. Doctors also advise patients on lifestyle choices like diet, exercise, weight control, handwashing, alcohol, drugs, tobacco, and helmet use.

Another SCAM tactic is to point to failings like adverse drug reactions, treatment complications, or blunders like amputating the wrong leg or sewing the patient back up with medical equipment inside.

But if safety is the overriding concern, medicine is the way to go. Medicine saves far more patients than it kills and many patients who develop complications would have died sooner without the treatment. These treatments will all have potential side effects, but the effects of doing nothing is likely worse. Doctors conduct a risk/benefit analysis when deciding which treatments to administer.

Finally, even if all these criticisms were legitimate, it would say nothing about SCAM’s efficiency and would be no reason to have your tonsillectomy performed by a shaman instead of a surgeon.

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“The defense never rests” (Irreducible complexity)

alienevolution

There are a few problems with the creation vs. evolution debate. The first is how fundamentally it misrepresents what evolution is. As I’ve had to explain to a depressing number of 21st Century adults, it is the change in inherited characteristics of biological populations over time. It never addresses how the first living form developed, which is a separate field of study, abiogenesis.

Creation vs. abiogenesis would make more sense. Creation vs. evolution is something of a false dilemma since a higher power could have created the first single-celled organism, then either guided evolution or let nature take over. A few enterprising souls (or soulless ones, depending on which side of the debate one is on) have used this notion to try and marry creation and evolution. This attempt is rejected by biologists for its total lack of evidence, while most creationists reject it because it dismisses the narrative of fully-formed, upright, walking, Hebrew-speaking homo sapiens being zapped into existence 5,000 years ago.

As far as I know, no one has attempted to fuse evolution with any creation myth except Genesis, which likely speaks to motivation. Those doing so have likely accepted the scientific evidence for evolution and the age of the universe, but are desperately trying to cram Genesis into the equation. This is possible if the book is taken as a figurative tale of Mankind’s fall and redemption. But reading Genesis literally, it is impossible to square it with what we know about evolution and astronomy.

A small sampling of the mountain of evidence we have for evolution would include: 1. Islands that have never been a part of a continent having no terrestrial mammals, amphibians, or freshwater fish; 2. All but one marsupial being native only to Australia; 3. The Geologic Column containing less-evolved fossils the farther down it goes; 4. Richard Lenski’s ongoing e. coli experiment; 5. Comparative anatomy between species; 6. Transitional fossils such as Archaeopteryx, Tiktaalik, and Lucy; 7. The Florida lizard that was observed developing a beneficial toe pad that enabled it to escape an invasive species; 8. Vestigial traits;  9. And species that exist only on isolated locales such as Iceland, Palau, and Madagascar.

Which brings me to the second problem of the creation vs. evolution debate, which is how lopsided it is. I refer not to the massive amount of evidence for one side over the other. I am referring to how virtually every piece of “proof” that creationists offer is instead a question about, or objection to, evolution. They are almost never asked to provide evidence for their side. Even if there is a legitimate question raised about evolution, that is not a point for creationism any more than it is proof that aliens left behind eggs when they visited 5 billion years ago.

Perhaps evolution, creation, and alien eggs are all wrong ideas and no one has yet come up with the right one. But I don’t build support for my position by challenging alien egg believers about the lack of verifiable wormhole travel, I bring up the evidence raised in the previous paragraph. By contrast, creationists almost invariably frame their argument not from a pro-creation standpoint, but from an anti-evolution one.

These arguments almost always take the form of questions that have been successfully answered many times. For instance, a meme shows chimpanzees and humans on an evolutionary path chart, with four alleged transition creatures in between. The meme’s author notes there are plenty of living chimps and humans, yet none of the other four creatures, and he then triumphantly asks why this is.

The answer: Because your chart is all wrong. Humans did not evolve from chimps, but Man and chimps share a common ancestor, which we know due to comparative anatomy and the animals having 98 percent identical DNA. Man and chimps became independently isolated from the main family they split from and both eventually gained characteristics that make them distinct. That is why humans and chimpanzees are very similar, but still have notable differences.

Though infrequent, sometimes a genuine problem about how evolution works can arise. For instance, the Two-Fold Cost of Sex is an evolutionary conundrum that has yet to be definitively answered. Since an asexual population has an innate ability to grow more rapidly with each generation, it would seem to be evolutionarily disadvantageous for a species to develop two sexes. Yet all the most successful species, including the most advanced by far, do not reproduce asexually.

But whereas biologists (most notably George Williams) have researched this and conducted experiments to try and unravel the answer, Ken Ham and his ilk are content to declare victory. However, “I don’t know, let’s find out,” is more admirable than, “I don’t know, therefore God did it.”

There are many examples of challenges to evolution and I cannot go through them all here. My point is that even in the infrequent instances that a legitimate question about evolutionary mechanisms is raised, it is not a point for creationism. To achieve that, one would need to find evidence for creation through employment of the Scientific Method.

This is why Bryan Fischer was mistaken to gloat, “Evolutionists have no answer as to why there is something instead of nothing. We have an answer; they don’t.” An answer, yes. Evidence, no. The Kuba people have an answer that Mbombo vomited the stars, planets, and animals into existence. The Cherokee have an answer that Earth began as a floating island suspended by cords until a beetle investigated what was in the water, displaced the muddy bottom, and caused Earth to expand to its current shape. The Serer in Senegal have an answer that Roog created water, air, and soil, then eventually got around to forming this into a round rocky ball, adding oceans, rotational axis, and critters as the whims set in. By quoting Genesis, Fischer is providing an answer, but not evidence. And most certainly not evidence arrived at through defining the question, developing a hypothesis, making a prediction, testing it, analyzing the results, replicating it, submitting it for peer review, and making his data publicly available.

Due to laboratory test results, there is some speculation among abiogenists that a lightning bolt may have struck a body of water, resulting in the first life form. Fischer answered this by asking where the lightning bolt came from. One could (and Fischer certainly does) keep this up ad infinitum, responding to each answer with yet another question as to what caused still earlier actions. But he is guilty of Special Pleading. He insists each effect must have a cause, yet needs to carve out an exception for the Abrahamic god in order for his position to work.

Which brings me back to the outrageously lopsided nature of this debate. Creationist websites and Facebook posts never put forth any argument for their position using the Scientific Method I outlined two paragraphs ago. They merely bring up supposed deficiencies in evolution. I sometimes answer these challenges, as do many of my fellow science enthusiasts, and many famous scientists like Phil Plait, Stephen Jay Gould, and Neil Tyson have written detailed essays on the subject.

But all this is not like playing football 20-on-5, it’s like a football game in which only one team is ever permitted to have the ball. When the evolutionist manages the equivalent of an interception by answering the chimps-man meme challenge, the play is blown dead and the ball is handed back to the creationist team, which then asks a misinformed question about the Second Law of Thermodynamics. On and on it goes, play after play, week after week, year after year. One side is the only one ever expected to give an answer. I visited the Institute for Creation Research page and under “Creationist News,” there was no such news, but just the expected railings against evolution. Under “Evidence for Creation,” they offered only Bible verses and such observations as “Saturn’s rings still look new and shiny.”

Last week, I saw a creationist on Facebook who belittled peer review, likening it to an echo chamber since there was such strong agreement on evolution. But science reserves its greatest praise and awards for those who upend traditional thinking. Peer review is an essential part of the Scientific Method and without it, one is failing to do complete science. It is woefully inadequate to present one’s finding to a sympathetic audience of lay persons. It is much more impressive to make the same pitch to 100 persons with Ph.Ds in the field. Ph.D.s who then analyze your findings, attempt to replicate them, and ask you detailed questions about them. Someone doing science invites challenges rather than runs from them. Peer review is crucial so that mistakes can be highlighted, incomplete answers refined, and new knowledge confirmed.

I have seen many instances of persons claiming to have disproven evolution, but these are in books, DVDs, or YouTube videos, not in peer-reviewed journals. If evolution is ever disproven, it will be announced by the Nobel Prize committee chairman, not by someone hawking Darwin’s Black Box.

This Michael Behe book is a favorite among creationists. But it presents zero evidence for creation, fails to differentiate between abiogenesis and evolution, and has as its focal point a question that has been answered many times, beginning with Charles Darwin.

That focus is the notion of Irreducible Complexity, which states that some systems are too complex to have evolved through natural selection. The book declares that some systems have multiple parts, each of which must be in place for the part to function, meaning the system could not have evolved that way.

It is true that there are evolved systems that would not function if just one piece was missing. But those parts could have served a different function when the system was less evolved. Biological populations adjust as needed and evolution does not have a goal in mind or an end point. If a random mutation is beneficial, it likely will stick around. Another random mutation may lead to that earlier mutation combining with the new one to serve a different purpose.

Behe uses bacterial flagellum as the poster appendage for his argument. This structure propels bacteria through their environment in a motion akin to a small motor. In most species, it requires 42 proteins to work, and if any one of them is missing, it will not function as a flagellum. But microbiologists know useful functions that these proteins perform elsewhere in the cell. This means each protein could have initially been selected to perform a different function than its current one of helping propel flagellum. As the Logic of Science blog noted, “Mutations do not need to be useful for some ultimate endpoint in order to be selected, they just have to be useful at the time they evolve.”

The Irreducible Complexity argument also relies on Special Pleading. It asserts that organisms are too complex to have not been created. But whatever would have created that complex system would have to be still more complex and adherents have no problem with that creator just being there without explanation or cause. 

I got tired of playing defense all the time, so I designed an offensive play. When someone claims proof for creationism, I challenge them to, “Describe the Scientific Method and use it to explain how creationism works.” I’ve used it dozens of times and have yet to receive an answer. If I ever do get a response, I hope it incorporates alien eggs. 

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“Deep Blue Nothing” (NASA image)

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Two weeks ago, photos from a NASA spacecraft were released on the administration’s website, with a couple of the images appearing to show a huge blue sphere passing in front of the sun.

How this was handled depended on which group one was in. The UFO enthusiasts, Nibiru believers, and New Age conspiracy theorists made impetuous declarations of vindication, which they accused NASA of trying to cover up. Astronomers and skeptics, meanwhile, considered what we know about how these photos are taken and processed, then solicited input from experts. 

Scott Brando at Doubtful News learned that the blue sphere was nothing more captivating that a computer glitch. It turned out that not everything that makes it onto the images are related to the sun. Some quirks are caused by telescope optics, camera characteristics, or spacecraft operation.

NASA further explained: “On rare occasions, the image processor onboard becomes overloaded and produces corrupted images. Generally, these take the form of images from one telescope processed as if they were from another telescope. Because the images from the Heliospheric Imager (HI) telescopes are built up from a large number of exposures added together, this sometimes results in double exposures, where data from several telescopes appear in the same image.” Put most simply, two images from two different cameras can be combined into one.

As this explanation makes clear, these images did not “mystify scientists” as the ironically-titled Sun newspaper claimed. The publication might have known that if it had bothered reaching out to NASA scientists, mystified or otherwise. That’s what astronomer and Slate columnist Phil Plait did, interviewing those involved with the spacecraft and the images it sends back.

As to why the sun appears blue, which is obviously not its true color, there is a simple answer. Because our eyes are unable to see in the ultraviolet, each wavelength is displayed using a different color to help viewers distinguish them. That means the images in question are of an object that has been artificially colored and are not really of a massive, floating azure sphere.

Plait also noted, “Planets are bright and overload the detectors a bit, bleeding light into neighboring pixels. This happens all the time in digital detectors, including spacecraft that observe the sun. UFO hunters and Planet X conspiracy theorists tend to go bananas over such things.”

Leading this Elongated Yellow Fruit charge is Pamela Johnson, a formerly unknown Facebook user whose post on the blue image went viral. Her lone accuracy was noting that “this huge object was captured on NASA’S SECCHI STEREO HI1 satellite on November 17, 2016. Our sun is casting the light that is coming in from the left side of the frame.”

From there, she made a sharp veer into lala land: “I have added a photo that clearly shows NASA has tried and failed to use images of the sun to hide the sphere. NASA tried to cover it up by overlaying images of the sun on top of it.”

As to what specifically NASA was trying to hide, Johnson suggested it might be the latest Gaia Portal, not explaining what that is, why she would know that, or why NASA would want that kept secret. She did let us know, however, that “Astro-glances compel the masses to action. Whatever it is, it wanted to be seen and the Galactics wanted me to see it and make it go viral.” While she did not contact NASA, she did query one source, noting, “I consulted my divining rods.”

As to the more measured response Plait received from NASA, Johnson considers this proof of the cover-up. That leaves unexplained why the administration would try to keep something hidden by means of a taxpayer-funded source that operates under a mandate that images be made available immediately.

Indeed, one YouTube commenter stated that NASA would never carelessly allow this image to reach the public. He asserts it was done on purpose, by means of a hologram, to mess with our minds for unspecified reasons.

According to the imaginative sky gazers at UFO Sightings Hotspot, the object was either “a giant extraterrestrial or interdimensional spacecraft or an unknown celestial body like Nibiru.” If it was the latter, this object precisely as large as the sun managed to keep its gravitational pull in check when it passed by Earth.

While Nirbiru believers, UFO enthusiasts, and New Agers rejected NASA’s explanation, they could get excited about it if they would let themselves. As Plait put it, we have these images because “a space probe launched on a huge rocket that took it around Earth’s orbit to the other side where it uses a complex and sophisticated suite of powerful scientific instruments to track our sun in wavelengths invisible to the human eye so that we can better understand what it’s like to live in the outer atmosphere of a star.”

That makes it fascinating enough and negates any reason to concoct a tale about spacefaring aliens from a secret planet accessing a Gaia Portal.

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“Family fiendly restaurant” (Pizzagate)

pzz

Some conspiracy theorists make claims whose extraordinary size is matched only by the theorists’ arrogance and resistance to reality. They exhibit a combination of paranoia and narcissism that cause them to believe that anyone who expresses a different opinion is being paid to do so. Those who are slightly more charitable to their opponents will concede that those who see it otherwise are genuine, but that they are too stupid to realize they are being duped by scripted newscasts that cover up government and corporate corruption. These theorists paint themselves as independent thinkers even though they uncritically swallow whatever conspiracy mongers peddle.

They cannot be laughingly dismissed because they do not limit themselves to online forums and echo chambers. They also harass, threaten, and sometimes physically confront those at the center of their twisted thinking.

The most recent example of this centers on a Beltway pizza joint, Comet Ping Pong. This bizarre tale got its start with the Wikileaks exposure of John Podesta’s e-mails. One of the e-mails contained a reference to spirit cooking, which some persons impetuously took as proof Podesta was involved in a Satanic ritual of blood drinking with children.

Anonymous posters next targeted James Alefantis, the pizzeria owner who casually knows Podesta’s brother, Tony, and who was listed by GQ as the 49th most powerful person in Washington, D.C. Believers have dubbed this alleged story “Pizzagate.”

The Washington City Paper explained: “The Wikileaks release of John Podesta’s hacked e-mails inspired a feverish and mostly hapless search for salacious scandal evidence. Why, they wondered, did Podesta get so many e-mails about eating pizza? The answer to any reasonable person would be that Podesta eats pizza. To the alt-right, though, ‘pizza’ became a suspected code word for illegal sex trafficking. Theorists also drew attention to the restaurant’s murals, which they declared ‘creepy,’ and the sliding doors in front of the restaurant’s restrooms, dubbed “hidden rooms” where sex abuse could take place.”

So with extremely elastic thinking, conspiracy theorists turned some references to flatbread with sauce and cheese into a child sex abuse ring led by Hillary Clinton and Podesta, and run out of Comet Ping Pong. Little of what the theorists produced could be investigated or falsified. One cannot disprove the notion of creepiness, which is a subjective quality. And examining the rooms for hidden compartments and coming up empty could be dismissed on the grounds that they are so well hidden.

Moreover, Snopes noted that 90 percent of child molestation is done by family members or friends, with most of the other 10 percent being done by random sickos. There are no documented cases of it being facilitated en masse via coded pizza menus.

I spent 90 minutes I’ll never get back looking into the alleged evidence, which consisted almost entirely of photos taken from social media accounts of Comet Ping Pong’s employees and patrons. Without exception, these purported pieces of evidence were manifestations of the appeal to ignorance fallacy. This is when a lack of evidence to the contrary is touted as proof that the allegation is true. For instance, there is a photo of a smiling girl with her hands loosely taped to one of the restaurant’s tables. The photo contains no context and we have no idea who she is or what this means. And this ignorance is touted as evidence the pizza joint is running a mass pedophile ring.

Another photo is of a young girl standing in a small basket and a theorist asks, “Are they going to sell her???!!” Over the years, I have noticed a direct correlation between the number of punctuation marks a person uses and their level of paranoia.

A photo of a pill bottle is assumed be the date rape drug, while one of a baby holding Euros is said to symbolize traveling internationally to molest children. Another shot is of a man innocently holding a girl. The child has grabbed the man’s bead necklace and pulled it over the top of her head, which a poster declared “weird.” The poster then noted that the photo contained the hashtag #chickenlover and insisted this was slang for a man who likes boys. That it could refer to man who loves wings is never considered and the fact that the child in the photo is a girl is likewise glossed over.

Commenters on these conspiracy theory sites praise the “journalism” of those who posted these photos. Yet true journalism would include tracking down the persons who took the photos and asking them whey they did it, then seeking to confirm or refute this. Evidence for child sex abuse would be victims coming forward, eyewitnesses, or DNA. None of that is present on these sites.

Their investigations were so shallow they failed to realize that most of the photos did not come from Alefantis’ account, but from persons who had tagged the pizzeria, along with employees and their family members and friends. No connection was too tenuous to be excluded as theorist fodder. So what was presented as damning evidence was instead a hodgepodge of unrelated Instagram screen shots and images from random websites.

The rest of the “evidence” reads like a contest for which contributor could draw the most absurd conclusion. Someone with plenty of free time figured out that the owner’s name is a near-anagram of the French phrase for “I love children.” When someone pointed out this name was given at his birth, the counter was that this was a pseudonym he had created to subtly announce his pedophilia. No evidence was given for this, nor was any requested by those who belittle others for blindly accepting mainstream media stories.

Another absurdity was noting the words “Play-Eat-Drink” on the menu form an acronym for the first three words in pedophile. Crossed ping pong paddles on the menu are said to resemble a butterfly, which is then assumed to be a pedophile symbol. The theorists attribute hidden meaning to words, drawings, or hashtags, and if they can’t come up with anything, they decide the code has yet to be broken. All this is not jumping to conclusions, it’s taking a quantum leap.

The appeal to ignorance abounds throughout these sites, such as asking, “Why would the 49th most powerful man in DC need a pizza shop?”  Probably because he is a successful businessman, which helped him achieve that ranking. But these questions aren’t meant to have answers, they are meant to be unquestionably accepted as more proof.

In the wake of this misinformation release, hundreds of death threats and menacing phone calls have been made to the restaurant. Even band members who played there and family members of employees have been targeted. At least two persons have shown up at the restaurant to confront the workers and diners.

The hysteria threatens to envelope anyone who has ever left a review of the restaurant or referenced it on social media since. The accusation is that they were there not for a calzone but for child rape. Images of patrons’ children have already been posted to dozens of conspiracy theory websites. The parents are working with attorneys to get them removed but are doing so anonymously for fear of retribution. One believer wrote, “Everyone associated with the business is making inferences towards sex with minors.”

This provides a window to the sick thinking of conspiracy theorists. In this case, they applaud themselves for being independent citizen warriors out to eliminate a danger, yet they are actually a mob that has created the danger by anonymously targeting innocent parents and exploiting their children.

The somewhat right-leaning news site Heatstreet explained some of the theorists’ errors that I have mentioned here. But there was no fooling reader Goldcoath, who fumed, “It’s clear the author of this article is actively part of the cover-up.” While theorists portray their questioning of the media as a sign of their independence, they afford no such distinction to anyone who questions their conclusions. In this corner of  humanity, anyone who doubts the theory is part of the conspiracy.

Similarly, when Reddit’s Pizzagate thread was removed because theorists kept violating the website’s policy of not revealing personal information, theorists insisted it was more proof of a cover-up. “The globalists are desperately lashing out,” one believer excitedly wrote. “We have them on the run.” Other users labeled Reddit CEO Steve Huffman a pedophile.

Then we have fired Huffington Post reporter David Seaman who declared that “the entire world is watching” his Pizzagate coverage, which he equated to liberating Nazi death camps.  Now that’s crazy any way you slice it. 

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“Mistake a memo” (CIA conspiracy theory)

tinsheep

There is a claim that the phrase “conspiracy theory” was coined by the CIA in 1967, with agents encouraged to deploy it against those who were exposing government misdeeds and corporate corruption. According to this narrative, the government is desperate to portray the theorists in a negative light so their exposures won’t be taken seriously.

In truth, however, conspiracy theorists have never exposed anything. Genuine government or corporate malfeasance has always been exposed by investigative reporters or whistleblowers. Persons seriously interested in exposing evildoing will be following Seymour Hersh, not Alex Jones.

Examples of wrongdoings exposed by reporters or insiders include Abu Ghraib, Watergate, NSA abuses, and the Tuskegee syphilis experiments. Conspiracy theorists try to use these outrages to bolster claims such as these: The Pulse nightclub shooting was staged; A cancer cure is being repressed: AIDS is a government concoction to eradicate gays and blacks. But the earlier examples came from deep digging or from someone who had access to the secrets. The latter are shallow and kneejerk, and require that the conclusion be crafted first, with alleged evidence then sought, created, mangled, and shoehorned in. No actual journalism is allowed, as contrary evidence is rabidly rejected, sometimes in the form of death threats against those presenting it.

Similarly, there have been false flags before, but it is a non sequitur to conclude that other attacks or incidents are false flags as well. When the Nazis invaded Poland, they invented a story about having been attacked first, and conspiracy theorists will point to this type of example and think it lends credence to their assertion that our  government is doing the same today. However, the Nazis maintained complete control over the German press and there was no social media. A western government attempting a similar charade today would be quickly rooted out.

Conspiracy theorists rely primarily on negative evidence and anomaly hunting.

One negative evidence example is a claim that those identified as the Sept. 11 terrorists are not seen on security camera footage boarding the aircraft. The only exceptions are a duo that are seen boarding a flight from Portland, Maine, to Boston, and this was the first leg so they were not getting on an airplane about to be hijacked for a kamikaze mission.

(Note: Video evidence of terrorists boarding the planes HAS been presented, but my intent here is not to delve into the minutiae of a specific claim, but rather to highlight the theorists’ use of negative evidence).

The fact that a person cannot explain why no footage of terrorists boarding the plane is available is supposed to be a point for the conspiracy theorist. But this absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. It would be more of a point if the theorists had security camera footage of all persons checking in and boarding the ill-fated aircraft, with none of the terrorists visible. But just pointing out the lack of available footage is negative evidence and is of no value.

In truth, every piece of evidence I’ve seen from 9/11 Truthers has been of the negative variety. Granted, I have not poured over every second of the multiple five-hour YouTube videos they have put together for us sheeple. But I have seen plenty from the Truthers, most frequently on the anniversary of the attacks when they are unable to put their zeal on hold for one day in order to mourn the victims, or at least do nothing, as opposed to furthering a personal vendetta.

Another staple of conspiracy theorists is anomaly hunting, where they grab onto something that seems out of place and ignore everything else.

For example, they have noted that a man interviewed about a mass shooting was laughing before the interview, then cried when it began, and present this as irrefutable proof that he was acting. The theorist will then ignore any ballistic evidence, videos of the shooting, death certificates, or police statements. They also gloss over the fact that grief can be a strange, complex, irrational beast that can manifest itself in the form of a man chuckling before breaking into tears.

Also, out of place doesn’t even have to mean that it seems inconsistent with the “official” narrative. Two examples from the JFK assassination are the Umbrella Man and the Babushka Lady. Their relevance to the assassination is nonexistent, but theorists spent decades trying to track down what their presence might mean. Why was the man holding an umbrella? Why was the lady taking photos when most others were sprawled on the ground for their safety? These highly-open ended questions welcome all kinds of speculation and tangents, to the theorists’ delight. They concentrate on these highly trivial issues instead of looking at the ample evidence that Oswald acted alone and certainly wasn’t conspiring with these two historical footnotes.

Getting back to the CIA memo, it was released following a 1976 FOIA request. The key phrase in the memo states, “The aim of this dispatch is to provide material countering and discrediting the claims of the conspiracy theorists.”

The memo did not create the term “conspiracy theorist,” nor did it suggest using those words to discredit those espousing them. It just accurately identifies them as such, goes over their arguments, and offers counters to them.

In this next passage, the memo outlines why it is unsound to conclude that the assassination was  funded by a Bilderberger/Bohemian Grove/Rothschild type:

“A conspiracy on the large scale often suggested would be impossible to conceal in the United States, esp. since informants could expect to receive large royalties. Note that Robert Kennedy, Attorney General at the time and John F. Kennedy’s brother, would be the last man to overlook or conceal any conspiracy. And as one reviewer pointed out, Congressman Gerald Ford would hardly have held his tongue for the sake of the Democratic administration, and Senator Russell would have had every political interest in exposing any misdeeds on the part of Chief Justice Warren. A conspirator moreover would hardly choose a location for a shooting where so much depended on conditions beyond his control: the route, the speed of the cars, the moving target, the risk that the assassin would be discovered. A group of wealthy conspirators could have arranged much more secure conditions.”

Elsewhere, the memo highlights the flaws of anomaly hunting:

“Critics usually overvalue particular items and ignore others. They tend to place more emphasis on the recollections of individual witnesses, which are less reliable and more divergent and hence offer more hand-holds for criticism, and less on ballistics, autopsy, and photographic evidence.”

These two snippets offer good arguments against conspiracy theory claims and are not exhortations to employ a freshly-minted term to belittle those making such assertions.

That is why conspiracy theorist Kevin Barrett was way off when he wrote, “The term was invented and put into wide circulation by the CIA to smear and defame people questioning the JFK assassination! The CIA’s campaign was to popularize the term ‘conspiracy theory’ and make conspiracy belief a target of ridicule and hostility.”

The fact that the agency didn’t bother to define the term shows that it was not a CIA original. Indeed, the Center for Skeptical Inquiry researched the term and found that it was already in use closer to the time of Lincoln’s assassination than to Kennedy’s. Examples of use prior to the CIA memo include:

  • A 1964 New Statesman article that concluded, “Conspiracy theorists will be disappointed by the absence of a dogmatic introduction.”
  • A 1909 American Historical Review piece that read, “The claim that Atchison was the originator of the repeal may be termed a recrudescence of the conspiracy theory first asserted by Colonel John A. Parker of Virginia in 1880.
  • A May 1890 article in a psychical research journal that dubbed the exposure of medium Helena Blavatsky as “a conspiracy theory.”
  • In 1881, a reporter for the Rhodes Journal of Banking wrote, “As evidence of a conspiracy this showing is pitiful, and in any view, the charge is ridiculous, as no conspiracy theory is needed to account for the facts.”
  • From the Journal of Mental Science in 1870: “The theory of Dr. Sankey as to the manner in which these injuries to the chest occurred in asylums deserved our careful attention. It was at least more plausible than the conspiracy theory of Mr. Charles Reade.”

Not that these examples would have much impact on conspiracy theorists. To them, this likely would just be proof that the attempt to stigmatize them began much earlier than they had expected.

So the phrase was not coined by the CIA and the agency attached no negative meaning to it. Conspiracy theories did not get their stigma from a CIA plot. Rather, that happened because their adherents insisted that a Kenyan birth was announced in Honolulu newspapers, that Antonin Scalia’s pillow is proof he was murdered, and because they threaten family members of mass shooting victims.

 

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“Exclamation point of view” (Evidence analysis)

asp

Today we will look at two examples from the past week that demonstrate how scientists and pseudoscientists react when presented with information they take issue with.

One example centers on a Snopes item about the possible dangers of glysophate, a common herbicide that is sold by Monsanto as RoundUp. Last week, Snopes author Alex Kasparak addressed a report being circulated by the Food Babe that warned of these dangers. At issue was whether glysophate residue was on food at unsafe levels, and whether this was being suppressed by Monsanto and federal regulators. Kasparak concluded the report was mix of fact and fiction, with the fact portion being based on a study that he cited in his post.

University of Florida horticulturist Kevin Folta contacted Kasparak and informed him that what Kasparak was calling a study was actually an activist flyer. Folta added that he had contrary information to what Snopes had published. Kasparak asked to see it, Folta obliged, and Kasparak changed him mind after seeing the evidence.

This evidence included showing that the numbers the Food Babe cited came from non-peer reviewed laboratory tests that were performed on various food items at the behest of anti-Monsanto activist groups. The lack of peer review was a substantial problem, but that by itself would not be enough to disprove claims such as this one: “The probable harm to human health begins at really low levels of exposure, at only 0.1 ppb of glyphosate. Many foods were found to have over 1,000 times this amount!”

Not many scientific journal articles contain exclamation points, so that was a good indicator of bias and shoddy research. If there are shouts of alarm associated with scientific announcements, they should come from those hearing them, not giving them. If results are announced with accompanying charges a cover-up or an insistence that the scientific establishment is afraid of this, it is a virtual certainty that the speaker is more interested in an agenda than in accuracy.

As to the level of exposure, the Genetic Literacy Project noted: “The statement about 0.1 ppb being the lower limit for harm to human health is deceptive and contradictory. It is deceptive because only one of the studies listed actually tested for an amount that low, and that test was performed on mice, not humans, and it used the word ‘potential’, not ‘probable.’ It is contradictory because, according to the lab they performed their analyses in, 0.1 ppb is well below the detection limit of their equipment of 5 ppb, meaning pretty much anything, even noise, would show dangerous levels of glyphosate by their definition.”

This is the type of information that Folta forwarded to Kasparak, causing him to change his mind and the Snopes piece.  

For her counterpoint, the Food Babe shrieked that this was “proof of Monsanto and its cronies burying the story in order to appease the industry.” Being unable to fault the science or the journalism, she attacked the scientist and the journalist, a textbook ad hominem. And what the Food Babe labeled a conspiracy involving corporations, government agents, and henchmen was merely an exchange between two persons, Folta and Kasparak, who did everything via public Tweets.

The second example of science vs pseudoscience reactions centered on another slandered chemical, aspartame. This artificial sweetener was approved by the FDA in 1981 and was hit almost immediately with charges of being dangerous. What’s more, this hazard was being hushed up by usual corporate and government suspects. At first this demonization was in the form of chain letters and word of mouth. But then aspartame became the target of the first wide-ranging Internet smear campaign in 1996, when the pseudonymous Nancy Markle sent out a much-forwarded missive about its supposed dangers.

Social media has impacted the handling of these rumors in two ways. It has made it much easier to spread misinformation, but also made it much easier to challenge false claims. However, the latter’s impact can be lessened by hitting the delete button, banning the user, and retreating to an echo chamber.

Those making a claim should never worry about it being challenged. If it is correct, it will survive the challenge and if it is wrong, the claimant will be enlightened.

Dr. Steven Novella questioned the conclusions of anti-aspartame activists, writing, “Multiple independent systematic reviews over decades have found no evidence linking aspartame to cancer or any serious illness. Aspartame is one of the most studied food additives that exists. The American Cancer Society, the European Food Safety Authority, and and other independent medical and scientific organizations have all come to the same conclusion.”

In the interest of balance, I present the counterargument of nutritionist Janet Starr Hull: “I will never accept the news of aspartame safety.”

Her personal incredulity is unrelated to the studies’ legitimacy and is a common logical fallacy. She continued, “Can you imagine the chaos that will occur when the truth of aspartame dangers is confirmed? The FDA has known about the dangers, the corporations have known about the dangers, and the medical community has known about the dangers.”

To her, the lack of articles about aspartame danger is proof not of its safety, but of complicit journalists. The long run of studies indicating its innocuous nature is her evidence of scientific corruption. And its FDA approval is proof of the agency’s corroboration with malevolent corporations.

Hull came to this way of thinking when she became convinced that aspartame poisoning was responsible for her having contracted Grave’s Disease. Her website claims that “what works in nature can surely work in man,” never explaining how that would square with box jellyfish venom, mercury poisoning, and tornadoes. The website sells kits for detoxifying and pH balance, two notions that ironically are automatically taken care of by the nature she otherwise praises.

The latest manufactured controversy over aspartame is to claim that it has been given a stealthy name change to AminoSweet in order to keep the public in the dark.

However, AminoSweet is merely a brand name a Japanese company gave to aspartame. The FDA has no authority to regulate brand names and aspartame is still called aspartame. This was no attempt at a cover up any more than it was when other companies called aspartame NutraSweet or Equal. The patent on Aspartame has expired so different companies can manufacture it under whatever brand name they choose. Brand names are used because N-dimethylethylamine hydrochloride won’t fit on a label as easily as Benadryl will.

For a counterpoint on the brand name issue, I again to defer to Hull, who asked her readers, “Are YOU fooled?”

What the other side lacks in research and studies, they make up for in capital letters and exclamation points.

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“Taken for a Spin” (Quad Cities Psychic and Paranormal Expo)

Psychic Fair. You know when and where, just CONCENTRATE.

Yesterday, I hit the Quad Cities Psychic and Paranormal Expo, my third trek to this annual gathering of bioharmonic healers, crystal peddlers, and ghost stalkers. Last year, I went to as many booths as I could and related my experience at each. This time I wanted to choose one to concentrate on and relate the results in greater detail.  With so many purveyors of pseudoscience, alternative medicine, and clairvoyance to choose from, the potential for amusement seemed brighter than the auras that were being read.

At a shaman’s station, the despcriptive posterboard proclaimed that he would remove traumatic imprints and enhance enlightenment centers. But it also noted that these were only half sessions, so presumably my enlightment centers would receive only a truncated improvement and the traumautic imprints would only be partially exorcised. That seemed like paying for half a tonsillectomy or root canal, so I continued to stroll.

I next tried an astrologer, who told me that the time of one’s birth determines which planet will most impact a person’s life. Maybe mine is Saturn, hers is Mars, and the past-lives reader in beads, purple hair, and crescent moon dress at the next booth is Jupiter. Curiously, the one planet that would seem to have the most impact on all of us, Earth, is irrelevant to all this. I asked the astrologer how those who are most affected by Pluto were impacted by its downgrade to dwarf planet status. She seemed uncertain what I was referring to, but I wouldn’t expect Neil Tyson to know the inner workings of Sagittarius horoscopes, so perhaps we can forgive her ignorance of astronomy.

From there, it was onto the mediums, those who claim they can communicate with the dead. This took some time since these were by far the most popular tables and longest lines. People want to think they’re hearing from their loved ones or are having an issue resolved and these nattily-attired ghouls provide these assurances.

They always give the answers the recipient wants, the recipient in turn praises the experience to others, and the cycle continues. I asked the mediums if they could speak with those who had passed on and they all assured me they could. I asked if they could reach my older sister. That I never had an older sister would serve as an immediate, handy test of their abilities. They all said yes, with one cryptically offering, “Whoever brought you here knew to bring you to me.” Well, I brought myself and I knew I was going to seek out mediums to see if they could pass the most basic test, so I guess she was right.

Watching them dream up stuff about a person that never existed would have had comedic value, but not $50 worth so I moved on. I decided to attend a class on intuition that was free and being taught by the woman who arranges and coordiantes the expo.

She identified herself with the moniker Mystical Moonspinner and declared, “I am a psychic medium.” Stepping from beyond the podium, she turned to us Muggles and asked, “How do you know if you’re intuitive?” Hmm, well if it’s real, I would guess your intuition would tell you.

Moonspinner, however, suspected that everyone has intuitive abilities but that they can be repressed.

“Most everyone is born with intuition,” she said. “You will sense things when you are a child. Maybe the imaginary friends aren’t as imaginary as we think.” That’s what I’ve said, too. Of course, I was 6 when I said that.

Moonspinner continued. “We start out completey open to the idea, but as we go though life, we are told that we’re not supposed to see things, we’re not supposed to hear things, we’re not supposed to know things. We start thinking it can’t be real so I shut it down.”

But that changed when she 12, as she started having mood swings and couldn’t figure out why. A good guess would be that she was going through puberty. She had entered a fragile time where developing children leave behind the elementary school mentality of most classmates getting along in order to gravitate toward cliques. It is a time of change and new experiences so it can be simultaneously frightening and exhilarating, and those living it are left with a 12-year-old’s ability to comprehend and process it all. But this is a rational explanation, which the audience had not come for, nor was the presenter prepared to deliver.
 
“I figured out that my empathic abilities were coming back,” Moonspinner told us. “It would take the form of my arm hurting and then finding out the person I was speaking with had had a sports injury in the same place.”
 
These experiences are explained by the Law of Truly Large Numbers. With billions of people undertaking several hundred actions per day, the normal goings on will sometimes lead to circumstances such as the arm story. Events like this happen coincidentally and require no supernatural explanation. Believing otherwise comes from selective memory, as Moonspinner is unlikely to recall a time that she started hurting and there was no nearby injury victim, or the time she was talking with someone who had a pain she wasn’t receiving in phantom form.
 
She will remember only the incident she described, and because it has meaning to her, she assigns a powerful connection to it. This phenomenon known is known as subjective validation.
 
Next, she said spirits of the deceased also tried to contact her, but it scared her so she developed two types of netherworld repellent. “Visualize a bubble and the spirits will flee from you,” she informed us. “Or picture a white light coming down and clearing out your psychic clutter.”
 
Back to how the tween Moonspinner began realizing she had a resurgent talent. “I started knowing things. How many of you guys have thought, ‘I should call my friend Barb’ and then the phone rings and it’s her?”
 
Most of us, I imagine. But we have also have had many more times that we thought of Barb without her calling, and many times when Barb called without us having envisioned her first.
 
But to Moonspinner, it means, “Your brain is telling you, and you have to be aware of those things. I just know things ahead of time.”
 
This prescience did not include knowing who was going to fill the 3 p.m slot at the psychic fair she was coordinating, as that time period was listed as “To Be Determined.”
 
Moonspinner continued to regale us with tales, revealing that she had done a reading eight months ago in which she told a customer something big was going to happen, and it did. “Experiences like this give me validation.”
 
Validation, yes, but only the subjective kind. It seems profound because it had a huge impact on her, but it fails to consider any other factors that could be in play, such as “something big” being vague, or the customer who believed in the psychic taking deliberate or subconscious steps to help fulfill this prophecy.
 
Our psychic then opened the floor to questions and an audience member wanted to know why strangers walk up and tell her their life stories.
 
“Because you were an Indigo child. If we took away your shell of a body, we would be left with a ball of energy and yours flows differently and your force field is attractive to people.”
 
And if Moonspinner’s shell was taken away, she would no longer have the body part from where she just pulled that spiel. Other audience members covered any questions I would have had about dream interpretation or future visions, so I went another route.
 
“Is this a testable ability and, if so, do you know if it’s ever been tested or subject to studies?
 
She replied, “I’m a believer, but I’m a skeptical believer.” I felt like throwing up, but guess my spirit bubble held it back.
 
“I do ghost hunting too,” she continued, “but I’m a skeptic until I can’t prove otherwise.”
 
Of course, this inverts where the burden of proof lies, which is always on the person making the claim. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, and negative evidence is no evidence at all.
 
Addressing the lack of studies, she said, “Can you hook me up to a machine and have it proven? Not that I know of.” She then hedged and related, “Well, actually, I was hooked up to an aura reading machine when a customer from a reading I had just finished asked me a followup question. My reader later told me later that my aura had changed when I was answering the question.”
 
Nice anecdote there, one of many she shared in lieu of any data. No, a medium relating what an aura reader had told her is not the type of study I had in mind. Rather, we could try something like this. We could take six subjects, each of whom has one of the following distinctions, all unknown to the psychic: Colorblind, lefthanded, Canadian-born, registered independent, professional fisherman, and hardware store worker. The psychic could spend 30 minutes talking with each person in the presence of neutral observers who would also not know which person had which distinction, making this a double blind study. Afterward, we could ask the psychic to match the person to their distinction. The chance of going 6-for-6 by chance would be one in 46,656, so doing this, especially repeatedly, would be strong evidence for the ability. 
 
So when Moonspinner states, “I have known things that there is no way I could have known, but how do you prove that,” we have the answer.
 
She then moved onto a tale in which she had been thinking about teaching a class, but didn’t know what topic it should be. Five minutes later, she got a call from a fellow psychic who wondered if she would like to teach a class on mediumship. While the audience swooned with this further confirmation of the speaker’s power, I was wondering why two psychics would need a telephone to communicate.
In her final anecdote, Moonspinner told about when her toddler nephew was riding a small motorized 4-wheeler toy. “It could only go about 6 miles per hour, but he is only 3 and I’m overprotective, so I was kind of worried. But his mother said it was OK, so I deferred to her. But after three minutes, I started asking, ‘Where is he? We need to find him now.’ About a minute later, we saw him walking the 4-wheeler back up the driveway with a gash on his knee. He had wrecked it and gotten hurt.”
 
Both she and the audience attributed her insistence that they check on the toddler to her psychic ability and not her overprotective nature. This type of continual communal reinforcement, post hoc reasoning, subjective validation, and selective memory can convince a person that normal occurrences are a gift from beyond, above, or similar preposition.
 
Despite my serious doubt about all this, I didn’t completely shut my mind to the possibility of intuition. Because when Moonspinner asked if anyone had ever had an intuitive experience, I knew I would be the only one not raising my hand.