Repeat performance

There are at least two differences between me and your typical woo-woo.

One is that I at least try to apply the principles of scientific induction to what I see around me.  Insofar as I'm able, given the limitations I have as a non-specialist, I base what I believe, say, and do on evidence and logic.

The second is that when I do say something egregiously wrong, I apologize and back down.

As far as the second goes, there seems to be an unwritten rule in all different disciplines of woo-woodom that goes something like "death before recision."  Even confronted by incontrovertible evidence that they're in error -- or worse, that they've cheated and lied -- they never change their stance.  The most they do -- such as the hilarious snafu "Psychic Sally Morgan" got herself into when she used her mediumistic skills to get in contact with the spirit of someone who turned out to be fictional -- is to remain silent for a while and hope everyone forgets what happened.

But before long, they're back at it, undaunted, and once again raking in accolades and money from the gullible.

No one is a better example of this than the redoubtable Uri Geller.  Geller, you probably know, is the Israeli "psychic and telekinetic" who claimed to be able not only to "see with his mind," but to manipulate objects remotely.  Geller has been called a fraud by many, most notably James Randi, whose book The Truth about Uri Geller resulted in a fifteen million dollar lawsuit against Randi and his publisher.

Geller lost.

But nothing was quite as humiliating as his 1973 appearance on The Tonight Show, where he was asked to demonstrate his most common claim, which was that he could bend spoons with his mind.  The problem is, Carson himself was a trained stage magician, so he -- literally -- knew all the tricks.  He suspected that Geller was pre-preparing his props (specifically, bending the spoons repeatedly ahead of time so they had a weak point), and refused to let Geller handle them before the show.  As a result, Geller couldn't do... well, anything.  Even if I'm completely on Carson's side, watching the sequence is profoundly cringe-inducing.

Geller, obviously humiliated by his (very) public failure, stammered out a lame "I'm not feeling very strong tonight," along with telling Carson that the host's doubt was interfering with Geller's ability to concentrate.

Which is mighty convenient.

What's most remarkable is that after this, Geller didn't do what I'd have done, which is to join a Trappist monastery and spend the rest of my life in total silence.  After a (brief) period to regain his footing, he just went right on claiming he could perform telekinesis...

... and people kept right on believing him.

What is truly extraordinary, though, is that over fifty years later, he's still at it.  An article in The Jerusalem Post two days ago describes his claim that Greta Thunberg's ship Madleen, which is on the way to Gaza to provide relief for the embattled region, had mechanical problems because he remotely damaged their equipment.

"I stopped the navigation systems of the ship," Geller said.  "I will use my psychic powers to stop [her] ship...  Remote viewing is sending your mind through space and time.  If I attach my psychokinetic energy through remote viewing, I can locate exactly where the navigational instruments are on her boat...  It's like a laser, like the IDF's new weapon, the Iron Beam.  That's how powerful the mind is for some people...  I can navigate my mind into whatever I want to."

Convenient, too, that he said all this after the Madleen was already having equipment problems.

So Geller is very far from giving up, despite a fifty-year track record of chicanery.  What's even more appalling, though, is that The Jerusalem Post is giving this guy free publicity.  They're not exactly an unbiased source -- the fact that Thunberg's flotilla is trying to get support to Gaza didn't make her any friends in Israel, and the Israeli defense minister Israel Katz came right out and called her an antisemite -- but the fact that they're even printing something like this without appending, "... but of course, keep in mind that he's a proven fraud" is reprehensible.

I did find it heartening that in the comments section, while a number of people criticized Thunberg for trying to help out Gaza, more than one of them made remarks like, "What's Geller gonna do?  Bend all their spoons so Greta can't eat her corn flakes in the morning?"

Anyhow, this is a further demonstration that Uri Geller apparently agrees with the Thermians of the Klaatu Nebula on their motto "Never give up, never surrender."  I still don't quite understand how shame-faced silence hasn't kicked in for him, but at this point it probably never will.

I guess it's kind of like a liars' version of the Sunk-Cost Fallacy.  Once you've lied long enough, may as well keep going, and just make the lies bigger and bolder.  Explains not only Uri Geller, but Donald Trump, Stephen Miller, Pete Hegseth Kegbreath, and the Bullshit Barbie Twins Karoline Leavitt and Pam Bondi, doesn't it?

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Secular indoctrination and spoon-bending

It used to be that when I was accused (usually because I teach evolution) of "indoctrinating students into a secular, materialist, rationalist worldview," that it would set my teeth on edge.

And yes, the above is an actual quote.  However, the same charge has been levied against me, and other science teachers, using a variety of verbiage.  Teachers should not teach students to doubt, to question authority.  By adhering to an evidence-based, rationalistic approach, we are calling into question faith and spirituality.

Worse still, public schools are "atheist factories."

On one hand, I question the extent to which teachers really can create seismic shifts in students' worldviews.  With very few exceptions, the kids in my classes who come in religious, agnostic, and atheist leave my classes (respectively) religious, agnostic, and atheist.  It takes more than forty minutes a day for 180 days to undermine an entire belief system, even if that was my goal (which, incidentally, it isn't).

On the other hand, though, the critics do have a point.  We science teachers are promoting rationalism as a path to knowledge.  And we damn well should be.  Rationalism has provided us with the medical advances, engineering, and technology that the majority of us are happy enough to use without question, regardless of the fact that they were produced by a methodology that has nothing whatsoever to do with faith or divine inspiration.  If you want to call what I do "indoctrination into a rationalistic worldview," then have at it.

What's funny is that a lot of the extremely religious get their knickers in a twist if someone steps in and tries to teach students a different spiritual, non-evidence-based set of beliefs.  It's okay to let religion into public schools, apparently, as long as it's the right religion.

As an example, consider the odd bedfellows that have resulted from decision by the Bronx Center for Science and Mathematics to allow a self-styled psychic to come in and teach telepathy and telekinesis to high school students.  (Hat tip to the wonderful site Doubtful News for this story.)

Here's how the story was reported:

Mentalist and mind reader Gerard Senehi recently partnered with the Bronx Center for Science and Mathematics to offer classes meant to help students develop life skills like self-confidence and answer tough questions about themselves, such as “Do you have the courage to pursue what you really care about?” and “How much do you have a sense of direction and purpose in life?” 

The program, called The QUESTion Project, kicked off with a Dec. 19 performance at the school where Senehi dazzled students with tricks like bending wine glasses, spinning spoons in other people’s hands and making accurate predictions about the future. 

Edward Tom, the school’s founding principal, was also impressed by how well Senehi managed to keep the students’ attention. "The whole purpose wasn’t to give kids a magic show," he said. "It was to let them know the power of belief, that there are so many things that are possible…"

No, Mr. Tom, you're right about that.  It isn't a magic show.  In a magic show, the magician is clear on the fact that what (s)he is doing is an illusion.  Senehi claims that what he's doing is real.

[image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

This has appalled a number of people, including the very religious (who don't want evil stuff like psychic powers influencing teenagers) and secular rationalists (who are appalled that such claptrap is being presented as reality, and in a science center, no less).  Both, of course, are right, although in different senses.  Such a performance could influence students' beliefs.  Stage magicians (which Senehi is, even if he won't admit it) can be terribly convincing.  They only become famous if they're good enough that you can't see how they do what they do.  Presented with an inexplicable trick, and the message, "You can learn how to do this, if you try hard enough!", I can see how people (not just teenagers!) could get suckered.

Which is why people like Senehi should not be allowed anywhere near school-age children.  Adults sometimes have a hard enough time telling fact from fantasy; encouraging teenagers to further blur this distinction is irresponsible.

Magician and skeptic Jamy Ian Swiss put it most succinctly.  In a piece about Senehi, Swiss said, "If you tell the audience you’re doing anything other than tricks, …you’re not doing entertainment. You’re doing religion."

And to anyone who objects to his characterization of what Senehi is doing as religion, allow me to point out that as a set of bizarre claims with zero evidence, psychic beliefs are clearly religion.

So to the people who would eliminate "rationalist indoctrination" from science classrooms, let me ask: what would you put in its place?  If we allow spiritualistic and faith-based beliefs to guide what we do in schools, we have stepped onto that fabled slippery slope.  Do you really want kids to sit through presentations by people who claim that they can learn how to do telepathy and bend spoons with their minds?  Are you honestly comfortable with allowing any and all faith-based belief systems to guide instruction?

If not, maybe the safest thing for all of us is to let science teachers keep on with the rationalism, and leave the faith stuff -- of all flavors -- to the homes and the churches.

The firestarter

It is the nature of the world that sometimes we have to look at all of the available evidence, and not come to a conclusion.

It's tempting to think that science, and the skeptical approach, will always result in answers, but the sad fact is that sometimes we have to admit that (barring the uncovering of further data) we will never have an explanation.  This is something that often doesn't sit well with people, however.  We like understanding, we like everything to be tidy and clear, without loose ends, and the result is that we will sometimes settle for a bogus explanation simply because it feels better than saying, "We don't know."

Such, I believe, is the strange case of Carole Compton, the Scottish nanny who almost ended up spending decades in jail because of an accusation of attempted murder by pyrokinesis (starting fires with your mind) and witchcraft -- but only forty years ago.

[image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

Compton is from Ayr, Scotland, but had fallen in love with an Italian man she'd met there and followed him back home.  While waiting for him to complete his military service, she took on a job as a nanny for a wealthy family near Rome.  The Riccis welcomed Carole into their home to look after their children, and all went well until a small religious picture fell off the wall as Carole walked by, prompting a maid to make the sign of the cross and raise her eyebrows about what it could mean.

That event was recalled several weeks later when Carole accompanied the Riccis on their annual vacation in the Alps, and a fire broke out in their vacation home, destroying the second floor completely.  Firemen said that the house had a history of electrical problems, and that was undoubtedly the cause.  But the Riccis began to question that explanation when two subsequent fires began in Carole's presence -- one in a trash can and the other in the bedroom of the Ricci's two-year-old son.

Shortly afterwards, the Riccis fired Carole.

Carole was rehired by another family, the Tontis, once again as a nanny.  The grandmother of the family, however, took an instant dislike to Carole, which was intensified to hatred and fear when once again Carole seemed to be the epicenter of bizarre occurrences -- a fire in a mattress, a vase falling from a table and breaking while no one was near it, and objects (including a religious figurine) flying off shelves and walls.  At this point, the word strega (witch) was used, and the talk started in earnest.

But it was all talk until a fire started in another mattress, this time in the room of three-year-old Agnese, the child Carole had been hired to care for.  The grandmother demanded that it be stopped, and the authorities intervened, and arrested Carole for attempted murder.

The media went wild about "the nanny they call a witch."  Some people claimed she was psychotic, and had engineered the incidents; others that there was a poltergeist following her around.  The consensus, though, was that she was possessed, and the demon was visiting its evil on the people she lived with.  It took over a year for her to come to trial (in December 1983), and she was found innocent of the attempted murder charge, but guilty on two counts of arson.  She was sentenced to two and a half years in prison, but was released on time served and immediately left Italy to return to her native Scotland.

What really happened in the Compton case?  It hardly bears mention that I'm doubtful about the "poltergeist" and "demonic possession" explanations, not to mention the phenomena of telekinesis and pyrokinesis in general.  According to an article about Compton and other similar cases in The Scotsman, Compton now is living quietly with her husband, Zaroof Fazal, in a town in Yorkshire, and they have three school-age children.  Nothing further in the way of quasi-supernatural events have happened to her.  "What happened to me is something that never goes away," she told reporters.  "It was a dreadful ordeal...  I have a happy life now.  I try not to think about the past."

Not the sort of thing you'd expect if she suffered from Münchausen's-by-proxy, which is another explanation that has been put forward -- that she deliberately attempted to injure her young charges in order to garner attention and/or care.  Compton seemed horrified at the attention she was getting right from the beginning, and even she denied that anything supernatural was going on, although she didn't have an alternate explanation.  During her trial, noted supernatural investigator Guy Lyon Playfair (the man who did the study of the Enfield poltergeist) offered to look into the case, but Compton didn't want him to get involved, claiming that there must be a rational explanation and surely the Italian legal system would realize that.

No such rational explanation has ever been found.

Of the non-paranormal solutions to the case that have been proposed -- Compton being psychotic or suffering from Münchausen-by-proxy, the fires having a natural cause (nearby electrical shorts, for example), and the falling objects being due to the fact that objects fall down sometimes -- none of them explain the entire story, nor why those events seemed to follow Compton around.  Even the people who accused Compton -- the Tonti grandmother, for example -- steadfastly claimed that the fires erupted and objects fell and broke without Compton touching them.  No one in the Tonti household said that Compton had gone around breaking things and setting fires deliberately; it was only after it got into the courts that this explanation was settled on, because no 20th century European judge would be willing to risk his or her reputation by seriously considering a charge of witchcraft.

So we're left where we started; some weird things happened in Carole Compton's presence in Italy in the 1980s, and no one knows why.

Not a satisfying explanation, by a longshot.  But as skeptics, we have to go as far as the evidence pushes us, and no further.

And in the Compton case, as far as we can get is "we don't know."