Air Jordans

New from the I Swear I'm Not Making This Up department, we have: a company selling "Jesus sneakers."

Brooklyn-based design company MSCHF has launched a new concept in trainers, which are Nike-emblazoned athletic shoes which have several interesting features:

• "Holy water" from the River Jordan injected into the soles
• A crucifix on the shoelaces
• The fabric part is made of "100% frankincense wool," whatever the fuck that is
• An inscription saying, "Matthew 14:25" ("In the fourth watch of the night, Jesus went to them, walking on the sea")

They went on sale on Tuesday, and sold out in a matter of minutes.

Now, for the kicker.  I haven't told you how much they cost.

Three thousand dollars a pair.

[Image is in the Public Domain]

It is hard for me to fathom that there are that many people with enough disposable income to blow what for many of us is at least a month's salary on a pair of holy shoes.  I mean, did they think the shoes would actually allow you to walk on water, or something?  Because that at least would be kind of funny, combining loopy religious beliefs with the Darwin Awards.

Turns out, the Chief Commerce Officer of MSCHF, Daniel Greenberg, thought the whole thing was a joke.  He'd been amused by "collab culture," where two companies with unrelated products will team up for some kind of marketing drive (a good example is Uber and Spotify).  MSCHF thought they'd push it one step further, with a collab between a company and a divine entity.  "[W]e wanted to make a statement about how absurd collab culture has gotten," Greenberg said.  "We were wondering, what would a collab with Jesus Christ look like?"

Myself, I don't think they were "making a statement," or in fact, gave a rat's ass about the "absurdity" of collab efforts.  This was a money-making effort, pure and simple, and as such succeeded brilliantly.

There's a lot about this that bothers me, though.  It's not that I'm not sometimes critical of religion; any long-term readers of Skeptophilia know that I don't believe in giving a bye to hypocritical or immoral behavior simply because it comes under the heading "this is part of my religion."  But this isn't criticism of religion, unless you take it as some kind of twisted jab at people wanting to spend lots of money for something that they think will confer a blessing on them.

This is using people's beliefs and devotion to make money.

On the one hand, it's easy to laugh at anyone that gullible, but this is where we run head-on into one of the guiding principles of my life, which is, "Don't be a dick."  I have no problem with skewering sacred cows when it's warranted, but ridiculing people's cherished beliefs for no good reason -- even if you don't share those beliefs -- is nothing more than smug, self-righteous nastiness.

And it's a little hypocritical to lambast multi-million-dollar celebrity preachers like John Hagee and Franklin Graham for their smug, self-righteous nastiness, and then engage in the same behavior yourself.

So I find the whole thing distasteful, and Greenberg's blithe attitude toward using people's beliefs to rip them off is a little sickening.  You might expect, given my staunch atheism, that I would have joined in the laughter at people willing to fork over three thousand bucks for a pair of Jesus sneakers -- if so, sorry, I'm not laughing.  There's plenty about religion and politics and the world in general to criticize, or even to laugh at.  This one is just self-congratulatory cupidity -- and, honestly, says more about the people selling the shoes than it does about the ones buying them.

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I am not someone who generally buys things impulsively after seeing online ads, so the targeted ad software that seems sometimes to be listening to our conversations is mostly lost on me.  But when I saw an ad for the new book by physicist James Trefil and astronomer Michael Summers, Imagined Life, it took me about five seconds to hit "purchase."

The book is about exobiology -- the possibility of life outside of Earth.  Trefil and Summers look at the conditions and events that led to life here on the home planet (after all, the only test case we have), then extrapolate to consider what life elsewhere might be like.  They look not only at "Goldilocks" worlds like our own -- so-called because they're "juuuuust right" in terms of temperature -- but ice worlds, gas giants, water worlds, and even "rogue planets" that are roaming around in the darkness of space without orbiting a star.  As far as the possible life forms, they imagine "life like us," "life not like us," and "life that's really not like us," always being careful to stay within the known laws of physics and chemistry to keep our imaginations in check and retain a touchstone for what's possible.

It's brilliant reading, designed for anyone with an interest in science, science fiction, or simply looking up at the night sky with astonishment.  It doesn't require any particular background in science, so don't worry about getting lost in the technical details.  Their lucid and entertaining prose will keep you reading -- and puzzling over what strange creatures might be out there looking at us from their own home worlds and wondering if there's any life down there on that little green-and-blue planet orbiting the Sun.

[Note: if you purchase this book using the image/link below, part of the proceeds goes to support Skeptophilia!]

Electric footwear

Have you heard of Kickstarter?  It's a neat idea.  The site is devoted to people who have come up with cool ideas for small businesses or civic projects, but lack the funds to get going.  You launch a page on their site describing your proposal, publicize it, offer promotions and prizes -- whatever you can do to get the idea off the ground.  Interested people donate money, and when you have enough, your idea gets launched.

While the general concept (and most of the proposed projects) are good, it also means that crazy, but appealing, proposals can get way more funding than they deserve.  Because, after all, you have to be able to tell if what the person is saying makes logical sense -- and as we've seen over and over in this blog, lots of folks aren't really all that good at doing that.

Enter Earth Runners sandals.

Now, before we get started, let me be specific about what I don't mean in the following paragraphs.  I am not criticizing the quality of the sandals -- I've never seen one, but have no reason to suspect that they're poorly made.  Nor am I going to comment about the benefits (or hazards) of running while barefoot or thinly shod -- I have read a good many articles that lean either pro or con on this issue, and I am not knowledgeable enough about exercise physiology that my opinion would be relevant.

However, I do take exception to a large chunk of the "science" they're using to sell their product.

I put "science" in quotation marks, because once again we have that "sort of science-y or something" use of language, coupled with a good dose of woo-woo metaphysics, that we've seen so often.  Here's a sample:

Earth Runners are the first ever conductive minimalist footwear inspired by the world renowned long distance runners, the Tarahumara Indians of Northwestern Mexico.  Our original conductive design allows you to absorb ever-present subtle electrical energies of the Earth.  This provides an experience similar to that of going barefoot while still enjoying a measure of safety from varied terrains or street hazards.  The soles of our feet are natural access points for life force energy from the planet.  Typical footwear blocks these natural incoming flows of vital ground source energy, and thus impacts our health and how we move and live upon the earth.

What kind of energy are we talking about, here?  The Kickstarter page isn't specific, just using the vague, fluffy "earth energies" phrase without ever really defining it, but fortunately, the Earth Runners Facebook page goes into more detail:

Chances are, 99.9% of your reading this are completely disconnected from the earth right now. This is because you are not grounded to her through any direct physical connection. When we do rarely venture outdoors, we tend to insulate ourselves on top of rubber shoes, which block the infinite flow of free electrons which the earth shares with its inhabitants.

Standing barefoot on the earth (or otherwise connecting to the natural frequencies of the earth) connects the human body with an unlimited supply of free electrons resident in and on the surface of the earth. Standing barefoot on the earth also connects the human body with rhythmic cycles of the earth’s energy field. These appear important for synchronizing biological clocks, hormonal cycles and physiological rhythms.

The cells in your body constantly draw energy from the brain and the Earth's electromagnetic field in an effort to achieve what is called "magnetic resonance". Magnetic resonance occurs when the magnetic frequency in your brain matches a harmonic of the frequencies of the other organs and body tissues.

And lo, in order to promote the "free flow of electrons" that the Earth is "sharing with its inhabitants," the soles of Earth Runners sandals are pierced with copper studs, arranged in a "Fibonacci spiral" that lines up with the "foot's acupuncture points."  That way the electrons are free to flow up from the Earth and into your feet.

Well.  That gives us a place to start, doesn't it?  Here are a few responses I had, right off the bat:

1)  Yes, the Earth has lots of electrons.  That's because it's big.  Big things have lots of atoms, and atoms have electrons.  Ergo, the Earth has a great many electrons.  Most of those electrons aren't moving around much because they're participating in chemical bonds, but some of them can.

2)  When electrons move around, it's called "electric current."  If enough of them flow through your body, it's called "being electrocuted."

3)  The Earth's electrons do sometimes get stuck on objects, causing the objects to build up a static charge.  If you experience small amounts of static charge buildup, the result is a carpet shock.  Large amounts of static charge cause lightning.  Neither one is comfortable.

4)  Your biological clock has nothing to do with being barefoot.  It does have something to do with light/dark cycles and the internal production of hormones and neurotransmitters; getting the two to line up is called "entrainment."  Some of us are naturally bad at this.  We're called "insomniacs."  I walk around barefoot all the time, and note that I am still up at 3:30 AM writing this post instead of doing what the rest of the household is doing, namely, sleeping.

5)  The "magnetic resonance" thing is nonsense.  Sorry for being blunt, but really.  The brain "matching a harmonic of frequencies of the other organs?"  What the hell does that even mean?  Your organs aren't magnetic, or else walking through the silverware department of an Ikea would be a dangerous proposition, and would result in stainless steel cutlery flying toward you and embedding itself in your body.  Your water molecules (and any other molecules in you that are free to rotate) do respond to a strong magnetic field, which is the principle behind an MRI.  But the idea that each of your organs has a specific "magnetic frequency" and you'll feel better if they all get synchronized with each other is unscientific horse waste.

The disheartening thing is that so many people lack the scientific knowledge and critical thinking skills to recognize this sales pitch for what it is.  If you look at the Kickstarter page for Earth Runners, you'll see that they've already raised over $5,700.  The optimistic side of my personality wants me to believe that the donors are just interested in getting a cool-looking, comfortable, well-made pair of sandals, and they aren't buying them so as to keep their bodies well-stocked with happy electrons.  But the cynical side -- never very deeply buried -- remembers all of the other stuff people buy, the magnetic bracelets and crystal pendants and water vibration machines and so forth, sold using just such pseudoscientific foolishness.  And it becomes all too easy to believe that the sponsors of Earth Runners are being taken in, and believe that if they just wear their copper-studded sandals, they'll get in touch with Mother Earth.

So, anyway, there you are.  That's all I have to say about that.  Partly because if that wasn't enough of a debunking to convince you, going on for longer probably won't have any effect.  It's also because it's time for me to get going to my day job, where I will be wearing my nasty, rubber-soled, insulating shoes, depriving me of the natural flow of electrons from the floor of my classroom.  Maybe that's why I'm so tired at the end of the day.