Do coincidences mean anything?
This was the subject of one of my favorite movies -- "I 'Heart' Huckabee's." If there is a coincidence -- maybe even what seems to be a wildly improbable, weird, eye-opening one -- does it have any meaning, in the Cosmic Sense? Or is it, to quote one of my favorite songs -- Laurie Anderson's "The Monkey's Paw" -- "a twist of fate, a shot in the dark, a roll of the die, the big wheel, the big ride?"
One of my students has been paying more attention to the little coincidences lately, and his claim is that they happen way more than is attributable to chance. The whole thing came up yesterday because in my AP Biology class we were talking about the low caloric content of celery -- giving rise to the claim that you use more calories chewing celery than you get from eating it. He then told me that only two periods earlier, the same topic came up in a different class... and then went on to tell me, excitedly, how "that sort of thing is always happening to me!"
Of course, if he thought that I was going to be willing to attribute coincidences to some sort of Larger Purpose At Work, he was barking up the wrong tree. My opinion is such things are simply the dart-thrower's bias -- we tend to notice the hits (in this case, the times when the same topic comes up twice) and ignore misses (all of the millions of things that don't get mentioned twice). As a result, we tend to overestimate wildly how common such coincidences are.
That's not to say that there aren't some peculiar ones; I have had the experience myself of thinking about a song, turning on the radio, and the song is playing. Take that minor mystery, and turn up the gain, and you get people whose dreams have come true, who have had premonitions of disaster and not taken the plane (or train or boat or whatever), and whose lives have been saved. Is this true ESP, or the hand of god, or something more prosaic?
I'd opt for the latter, and I suspect that you knew I'd say that. In my opinion, for there really to be something "going on" here, there'd have to be some cause for it, some discernible mechanism at work. I'm willing to entertain the idea -- momentarily, anyway -- that some supreme being who honestly cares about us might wish to intervene on our part, and save us from calamity via a vision, premonition, or dream. But that opens up the troubling question about why said deity didn't bother to let the 235 other people who died in the plane crash know, so that they, too, could escape death. That a deity exists who selectively warns some folks about impending doom while allowing others to perish is a pretty scary idea, and such a deity would have to be capricious to the point of evil.
How about the more benign explanation, that some of us are simply more "in touch" with the sixth sense than others, and therefore all those folks who died simply weren't wired to be aware of the coming catastrophe? Again, there's that pesky lack of a mechanism. Not one experiment designed to detect ESP of various sorts has succeeded, which is (to say the least) a bit troublesome to those who believe in such things. Some of those true believers respond that lab conditions, run (presumably) by skeptical scientists, are not conducive to the psychic energy field, and it's the lack of belief by the researchers that is interfering with the outcome. I respond; that's mighty convenient. Sounds like special pleading to me.
So, we're left with the conclusion that coincidences happen just because -- they happen. Carl Sagan, in The Demon-Haunted World (which should be required reading in every public school science program in America), deals with such things -- he states that given that we dream every night, and daydream every day, and listen to radios and read newspapers and such pretty much constantly, coincidences are bound to happen, just by the statistics of large numbers. It doesn't make them feel any less weird when they do occur; but sooner or later, you're going to dream something, and a few days or weeks later, it will more or less "come true." There are only so many things we dream about, and only so many kinds of things that happen in our lives, and given a large enough time axis, eventually those two will coincide.
I hope -- honestly, I do -- that I haven't just taken the magic out of your perception of the world's weirdness. My own view is that I'd much rather know the truth than to believe a pretty falsehood; and really, the idea of a god who selectively dabbles in the affairs of humans isn't even that pretty, when you think about it. So if I've made the world seem a little more prosaic and dull, I sincerely apologize. And if I get into my car in a half-hour or so, and turn on the radio, and hear Laurie Anderson's "The Monkey's Paw," it will serve me right.
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Friday, September 9, 2011
We have met the aliens, and they are us
In all of the time I've thought about, read about, talked about, and written about the possibility of aliens having come to Earth, I have always looked at it from the prosaic standpoint of a technologically superior race visiting us, usually in some sort of spacecraft. Controversy about this possibility usually revolves around the feasibility of anyone (however advanced) crossing the distances required, and that sticky little point called "hard evidence."
Little did I know that I might be asking the wrong question. Maybe the aliens are already here. Maybe they're...
... us.
This is the contention of those who believe in the bizarre idea of exogenesis. Humans, they say -- and some of them believe that all living things -- are actually descended from alien life that colonized the Earth ages ago. Exogenesis is kind of an elaboration of astronomer Fred Hoyle's idea of panspermia - that the earliest life, single-celled bacteria-like organisms, were brought to Earth in cosmic dust. Exogenesis takes it one step further. The colonization was done deliberately, by a superintelligent alien race, and we are the descendants of those alien-created life-forms.
*cue music from Star Trek: The Next Generation*
Yes, those of you who, like myself, are TNG geeks will recall that one of the best episodes ever ("The Chase") revolved around the idea of a highly advanced race seeding a multitude of planets with gene sequences that would then somehow guide the course of evolution to create species that resembled the original parent race. It was a neat, if questionably scientific, way to explain why humans, Klingons, Romulans, Vulcans, and the rest all were basically bipedal, bilaterally symmetric primates, without having to admit that it was because having all the aliens shaped like humans made makeup and costumes way cheaper.
The problem, of course, is that Star Trek is fiction, while the people who believe in exogenesis are dead serious. Check out this website. Once you get past the fact that the layout looks like someone ate a Marvel comic book and then threw up on the screen, you will find that the author, one Andre Heath, claims that "scientific studies have proven that 97% of the human genome is extraterrestrial in origin."
Heath quotes a "prominent geneticist," Sam Chang, as saying that "... junk human DNA was created by an extraterrestrial 'programmer.'"
Chang goes on to say a great many other things, which I will leave you to read on your own, because when I got to the part about our DNA containing a "big code" and a "basic code" and that the "big code" was done in a "rush to create human life on Earth," and that this rush meant the job got done in a half-assed way and that's why we get cancer, my brain cells were crying for mercy.
As you would expect, while I was reading this stuff, I kept gesturing toward the photographs of Sam Chang and Andre Heath and screaming, "Where is your evidence?" This accomplished nothing except for waking up my border collie and inducing her to slink around, looking extremely guilty. Because of course, they don't have any evidence - we're simply supposed to believe them because Chang is "a prominent geneticist."
Well, I'm not buying it. Our DNA is made of the same stuff, read the same way, as the DNA of every other life form on Earth, and the changes we see in it - including the so-called "junk DNA" - show a smooth continuum of evolutionary change, just as you would expect if we, and all the other species around us, evolved from common ancestry. There is no evidence that we were any kind of "special creation," rush job or not.
So, as appealing as it would be to have a universe in which something like "The Chase" could happen, I'm afraid that it'll have to remain in the realm of fiction. And I'm calling bullshit on Chang and Heath.
And Andre, as one blogger to another, you really need to do something about your blog layout. That would include getting rid of that drawing of what appears to be a radioactive President Obama. Thanks.
Little did I know that I might be asking the wrong question. Maybe the aliens are already here. Maybe they're...
... us.
This is the contention of those who believe in the bizarre idea of exogenesis. Humans, they say -- and some of them believe that all living things -- are actually descended from alien life that colonized the Earth ages ago. Exogenesis is kind of an elaboration of astronomer Fred Hoyle's idea of panspermia - that the earliest life, single-celled bacteria-like organisms, were brought to Earth in cosmic dust. Exogenesis takes it one step further. The colonization was done deliberately, by a superintelligent alien race, and we are the descendants of those alien-created life-forms.
*cue music from Star Trek: The Next Generation*
Yes, those of you who, like myself, are TNG geeks will recall that one of the best episodes ever ("The Chase") revolved around the idea of a highly advanced race seeding a multitude of planets with gene sequences that would then somehow guide the course of evolution to create species that resembled the original parent race. It was a neat, if questionably scientific, way to explain why humans, Klingons, Romulans, Vulcans, and the rest all were basically bipedal, bilaterally symmetric primates, without having to admit that it was because having all the aliens shaped like humans made makeup and costumes way cheaper.
The problem, of course, is that Star Trek is fiction, while the people who believe in exogenesis are dead serious. Check out this website. Once you get past the fact that the layout looks like someone ate a Marvel comic book and then threw up on the screen, you will find that the author, one Andre Heath, claims that "scientific studies have proven that 97% of the human genome is extraterrestrial in origin."
Heath quotes a "prominent geneticist," Sam Chang, as saying that "... junk human DNA was created by an extraterrestrial 'programmer.'"
Chang goes on to say a great many other things, which I will leave you to read on your own, because when I got to the part about our DNA containing a "big code" and a "basic code" and that the "big code" was done in a "rush to create human life on Earth," and that this rush meant the job got done in a half-assed way and that's why we get cancer, my brain cells were crying for mercy.
As you would expect, while I was reading this stuff, I kept gesturing toward the photographs of Sam Chang and Andre Heath and screaming, "Where is your evidence?" This accomplished nothing except for waking up my border collie and inducing her to slink around, looking extremely guilty. Because of course, they don't have any evidence - we're simply supposed to believe them because Chang is "a prominent geneticist."
Well, I'm not buying it. Our DNA is made of the same stuff, read the same way, as the DNA of every other life form on Earth, and the changes we see in it - including the so-called "junk DNA" - show a smooth continuum of evolutionary change, just as you would expect if we, and all the other species around us, evolved from common ancestry. There is no evidence that we were any kind of "special creation," rush job or not.
So, as appealing as it would be to have a universe in which something like "The Chase" could happen, I'm afraid that it'll have to remain in the realm of fiction. And I'm calling bullshit on Chang and Heath.
And Andre, as one blogger to another, you really need to do something about your blog layout. That would include getting rid of that drawing of what appears to be a radioactive President Obama. Thanks.
Thursday, September 8, 2011
The news in brief
Here at Worldwide Wacko Watch, we're alternately working hard finding breaking news stories about the activity of the world's wingnuts and bringing them to your doorstep, and looking nervously out of the window, because it's still raining. Yesterday alone we got over five inches of rain. All of this precipitation is thanks to the remnants of Tropical Storm Lee. Lee seems to have looked down at the Finger Lakes, and thought, "Wow. This would be a nice place to retire." If it doesn't stop soon, I'm going to begin to think that the people in Kentucky who are building a scale model of Noah's Ark may have been right after all. And I hope you appreciate what it took out of me to write that sentence.
Be that as it may, we do have a few interesting bits of news to share with you, so we'll take a break from barricading our offices with sandbags to tell you about them.
First, we have a story from Wales, where an Anglican vicar has declared Wales to be "the most haunted place in the world." Reverend Lionel Fanthorpe, who is not only a clergyman but is a black belt in judo and rides a motorcycle, moved to Wales some years ago and began to investigate its alleged hauntings. He found lots, according to a recent interview in WalesOnline (here).
“I would say Wales has a disproportionate amount of incidents,” Rev. Fanthorpe said. “Welsh friends and Welsh mediums seem to have this highly-developed spiritual sense, a high intelligence and sensitivity – it’s a perceptiveness and degree of awareness that you don’t find in other parts of the UK. It may well be something inherent, something in the genes of Welsh people that carries this extra power and extra awareness with so many spiritual phenomena.”
He stopped just short of saying that there were genes in Irish people that allowed them to see leprechauns and genes in French people that made them obnoxious to tourists.
In any case, Rev. Fanthorpe has visited a variety of sites, including Roch Castle (supposedly haunted by King Charles II's mistress), Pembroke (where a Nessie-like creature has been seen offshore), and Skirrid Mountain (haunted by notorious Nazi Rudolf Hess).
Rev. Fanthorpe is not just doing all of this traveling about for his own entertainment; he's doing it for yours. Yes, he will be featured in a television show, the latest in the fine old tradition of Ghost Hunters, in which they make a lot of stir, strike dramatic poses, and then find nothing, week after week. This one, however, will be unique in that the principal investigator will be a man of the cloth. They did not mention the title for the proposed show, but I suggest "Holy Spirits."
Next, we have a report from Russia that one of their scientists has built a working time machine.
Pravda reports that Vadim Alexandrovitch Chernobrov, of the research institution Kosmopoisk, released a statement last week that he had successfully built a time machine using a "capsule surrounded by intense magnetic fields." The magnetic fields, Chernobrov said, "warped time," and two synchronized chronometers, one inside the capsule and one at some distance from the experimental site, went out of sync during the duration of the experiment.
Chernobrov stated that animals put inside the capsule "experienced serious to deadly effects," but this didn't stop him from conducting experiments on humans, who had no detrimental results other than "seeing colored circles, and experiencing some moderate arrhythmia."
Chernobrov is still exploring his results, and their potential applications. Physicists in other countries, however, are skeptical, and are currently trying to replicate the phenomenon, thus far unsuccessfully.
Chernobrov stated that he is willing to act in an advisory capacity to his colleagues in other labs. "If you can somehow harness the lightning," he said, "and channel it into the flux capacitor, it might just work!"
Next, we have an announcement that will be of great interest to Skeptophiliacs in Oklahoma: McGee Creek State Park, in Atoka, will be the host of the Great Oklahoma Cryptid Fest this Saturday. It will start at 1 PM and go until either they find Bigfoot or all get discouraged and go home, whichever happens first.
Featured guests will be Nick Redfern, of UFO conspiracy theory fame, and a host of "professionals" from the cast of the ThisIsNotHistory Channel's MonsterQuest. A good time is certain to be had by all, and please take note that I am in no way suggesting that it might be a great idea for someone to hide somewhere in McGee Creek State Park on Saturday, wearing a gorilla suit. This would in fact be a really bad idea and if anyone does it, then shame on them and they certainly didn't hear me coming up with such a plan.
Lastly, we have the disappointing news that Comet Elenin appears to be breaking up as it approaches the sun.
Elenin, you may recall, is the comet that was discovered late last year, and then became the subject of a whole host of hysterical predictions - most of them centered around the destruction of humanity. Websites arose like weeds, connecting Elenin to the Planet Nibiru, Mayan prophecies, and the Book of Revelation. Woo-woos began to weep, wail, and gnash their teeth over the imminent cataclysm, which most agreed would occur at the moment of Elenin's closest approach to Earth, on October 21, 2011.
"But wait," the scientists said, "Elenin's tiny! And it will be 22 million miles away at closest approach! It won't have any effect on us at all!" But their voices were drowned out by howls of derision, because of course no one would listen to a bunch of dimwitted scientists when you have nonexistent Mayan prophecies to guide your understanding of the universe.
Unfortunately for the woo-woos, however, NASA announced last week that Elenin's "coma" (the glowing mantle of gas around the comet itself) appears to be dimming and elongating, an observation that frequently precedes a comet's disintegration.
That noise you just heard was the collective sighing of a bunch of disappointed woo-woos, who now are finding that they will actually have to plan on going to their day jobs on October 22.
So, that's the news for today from Worldwide Wacko Watch. I'll now return to my previous occupation, which is watching the rain. I just received a call from our school superintendent to announce that the rain is bad enough that they're delaying the opening of school for two hours, and may actually cancel school if it gets any worse -- a "rain closure," something that has never happened in my twenty-five year career as a teacher. Myself, I suspect that she's just wanting to make sure she has enough time to complete her Ark.
Be that as it may, we do have a few interesting bits of news to share with you, so we'll take a break from barricading our offices with sandbags to tell you about them.
First, we have a story from Wales, where an Anglican vicar has declared Wales to be "the most haunted place in the world." Reverend Lionel Fanthorpe, who is not only a clergyman but is a black belt in judo and rides a motorcycle, moved to Wales some years ago and began to investigate its alleged hauntings. He found lots, according to a recent interview in WalesOnline (here).
“I would say Wales has a disproportionate amount of incidents,” Rev. Fanthorpe said. “Welsh friends and Welsh mediums seem to have this highly-developed spiritual sense, a high intelligence and sensitivity – it’s a perceptiveness and degree of awareness that you don’t find in other parts of the UK. It may well be something inherent, something in the genes of Welsh people that carries this extra power and extra awareness with so many spiritual phenomena.”
He stopped just short of saying that there were genes in Irish people that allowed them to see leprechauns and genes in French people that made them obnoxious to tourists.
In any case, Rev. Fanthorpe has visited a variety of sites, including Roch Castle (supposedly haunted by King Charles II's mistress), Pembroke (where a Nessie-like creature has been seen offshore), and Skirrid Mountain (haunted by notorious Nazi Rudolf Hess).
Rev. Fanthorpe is not just doing all of this traveling about for his own entertainment; he's doing it for yours. Yes, he will be featured in a television show, the latest in the fine old tradition of Ghost Hunters, in which they make a lot of stir, strike dramatic poses, and then find nothing, week after week. This one, however, will be unique in that the principal investigator will be a man of the cloth. They did not mention the title for the proposed show, but I suggest "Holy Spirits."
Next, we have a report from Russia that one of their scientists has built a working time machine.
Pravda reports that Vadim Alexandrovitch Chernobrov, of the research institution Kosmopoisk, released a statement last week that he had successfully built a time machine using a "capsule surrounded by intense magnetic fields." The magnetic fields, Chernobrov said, "warped time," and two synchronized chronometers, one inside the capsule and one at some distance from the experimental site, went out of sync during the duration of the experiment.
Chernobrov stated that animals put inside the capsule "experienced serious to deadly effects," but this didn't stop him from conducting experiments on humans, who had no detrimental results other than "seeing colored circles, and experiencing some moderate arrhythmia."
Chernobrov is still exploring his results, and their potential applications. Physicists in other countries, however, are skeptical, and are currently trying to replicate the phenomenon, thus far unsuccessfully.
Chernobrov stated that he is willing to act in an advisory capacity to his colleagues in other labs. "If you can somehow harness the lightning," he said, "and channel it into the flux capacitor, it might just work!"
Next, we have an announcement that will be of great interest to Skeptophiliacs in Oklahoma: McGee Creek State Park, in Atoka, will be the host of the Great Oklahoma Cryptid Fest this Saturday. It will start at 1 PM and go until either they find Bigfoot or all get discouraged and go home, whichever happens first.
Featured guests will be Nick Redfern, of UFO conspiracy theory fame, and a host of "professionals" from the cast of the ThisIsNotHistory Channel's MonsterQuest. A good time is certain to be had by all, and please take note that I am in no way suggesting that it might be a great idea for someone to hide somewhere in McGee Creek State Park on Saturday, wearing a gorilla suit. This would in fact be a really bad idea and if anyone does it, then shame on them and they certainly didn't hear me coming up with such a plan.
Lastly, we have the disappointing news that Comet Elenin appears to be breaking up as it approaches the sun.
Elenin, you may recall, is the comet that was discovered late last year, and then became the subject of a whole host of hysterical predictions - most of them centered around the destruction of humanity. Websites arose like weeds, connecting Elenin to the Planet Nibiru, Mayan prophecies, and the Book of Revelation. Woo-woos began to weep, wail, and gnash their teeth over the imminent cataclysm, which most agreed would occur at the moment of Elenin's closest approach to Earth, on October 21, 2011.
"But wait," the scientists said, "Elenin's tiny! And it will be 22 million miles away at closest approach! It won't have any effect on us at all!" But their voices were drowned out by howls of derision, because of course no one would listen to a bunch of dimwitted scientists when you have nonexistent Mayan prophecies to guide your understanding of the universe.
Unfortunately for the woo-woos, however, NASA announced last week that Elenin's "coma" (the glowing mantle of gas around the comet itself) appears to be dimming and elongating, an observation that frequently precedes a comet's disintegration.
That noise you just heard was the collective sighing of a bunch of disappointed woo-woos, who now are finding that they will actually have to plan on going to their day jobs on October 22.
So, that's the news for today from Worldwide Wacko Watch. I'll now return to my previous occupation, which is watching the rain. I just received a call from our school superintendent to announce that the rain is bad enough that they're delaying the opening of school for two hours, and may actually cancel school if it gets any worse -- a "rain closure," something that has never happened in my twenty-five year career as a teacher. Myself, I suspect that she's just wanting to make sure she has enough time to complete her Ark.
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Nostradamus and the missing urn
I have written daily on this blog for years now, and have steadfastly resisted mentioning the name "Nostradamus," noted 16th century wingnut and erstwhile prophet, who achieved fame for writing literally thousands of quatrains of bizarre predictions.
One of my reasons for so doing was that it was one of several things that seemed to attract the attention of Dennis Markuze, the Montreal resident better known as "Mabus." Mabus gained notoriety by harassing prominent skeptics and atheists, and was known to target people like P. Z. Myers, Rebecca Watson, Jennifer Ouellette, and Tim Farley, bombarding them with hundreds of emails a day, the content of which ranged from obnoxious to downright threatening.
Markuze is rabid not only in his anti-skeptic stance, he is also deeply into the whole Nostradamus thing, and peppered his screeds with quotes from the "prophecies." But Markuze was arrested recently after an online petition demanding action garnered more than ten thousand signatures, and the Montreal police had no choice but to act.
So, anyway, I've had this skeptical blog for four years, and thus far had avoided getting "Mabused." I figured that mentioning Nostradamus was probably pushing my luck in that regard, so I decided that discretion was the better part of valor and found other things to write about. But now that Markuze is out of commission...
Just this morning, I ran into an article which claimed that Hurricane Irene and the recent earthquake that hit Virginia and surrounding states were predicted by Nostradamus. Curious, I took a look at the passage. Here is the prophecy:
This is the problem with all of the "prophecies" that Nostradamus wrote - they're vague, and weird, and make obscure historical and mythical allusions. In that respect, they're a little like an extended version of the Sabian Symbols about which I wrote a couple of weeks ago, and like them, you can read into them anything you want. Here's one I picked at random (Century X, Quatrain 71):
What I find amazing is that there are literally thousands of websites, books, and films out there that claim to give the correct interpretation of Nostradamus' wacky poetry. Some of them take a religious bent, and try to tie them into scripture, especially the Book of Revelation; some try to link them to historical events, an especially popular one being World War II; others, even further off the deep end, try to use them to predict future catastrophes. These last at least put the writers on safer ground, because you can't accuse someone being wrong if they're using arcane poetry to make guesses about things that haven't happened yet.
In any case, I'm doubtful that Nostradamus knew anything about Hurricane Irene or the eastern earthquake, any more than he predicted World War II, the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, the assassination of JFK, or any of the hundreds of other things he's alleged to have forecast. All we have here is once again, people taking vague language and jamming it into the mold of their own preconceived notions of what it means. About Nostradamus himself, I'm reminded of the words of the Roman writer Cicero, who said, "I don't know how two augurs can look each other in the face while passing in the street without laughing out loud."
One of my reasons for so doing was that it was one of several things that seemed to attract the attention of Dennis Markuze, the Montreal resident better known as "Mabus." Mabus gained notoriety by harassing prominent skeptics and atheists, and was known to target people like P. Z. Myers, Rebecca Watson, Jennifer Ouellette, and Tim Farley, bombarding them with hundreds of emails a day, the content of which ranged from obnoxious to downright threatening.
Markuze is rabid not only in his anti-skeptic stance, he is also deeply into the whole Nostradamus thing, and peppered his screeds with quotes from the "prophecies." But Markuze was arrested recently after an online petition demanding action garnered more than ten thousand signatures, and the Montreal police had no choice but to act.
So, anyway, I've had this skeptical blog for four years, and thus far had avoided getting "Mabused." I figured that mentioning Nostradamus was probably pushing my luck in that regard, so I decided that discretion was the better part of valor and found other things to write about. But now that Markuze is out of commission...
Just this morning, I ran into an article which claimed that Hurricane Irene and the recent earthquake that hit Virginia and surrounding states were predicted by Nostradamus. Curious, I took a look at the passage. Here is the prophecy:
Century 8, Quatrain 29:
At the fourth pillar which they dedicate to SaturnWell. My first thought was, "What?" But the serious, and very earnest, author of the article (which you can read in its entirety here) went on to explain how this was clearly referring to the recent hurricane and earthquake:
Split by earthquake and by flood;
Under Saturn’s building an urn is found
Gold carried off by Caepio and then restored.
The first line describes a fourth pillar dedicated to Saturn. In astrology Saturn ruled over matters of law, government and civilization. The monument’s cornerstone was laid with a ceremony sponsored by the Freemasons on the 4th of July. The Washington Monument could be this pillar dedicated to Saturn (law and governance).
The second line is “split by earthquake and by flood”. The Washington Monument was split, cracked by the August 23rd earthquake. It had to be closed indefinitely until repairs could be made. This line also mentions a flood. A few days later hurricane Irene arrived, flooding the area with rainwater.
The next two lines are an enigma. They have yet to happen but seem to follow the events of the first two lines. “Under Saturn’s building an urn is found.” This is not the pillar of the first line, but I suggest a government (Saturn’s) building. What is this urn, and what is its significance?
The last line speaks of Caepio, a general and statesman during the Roman Empire. Historically, Caepio was said to have plundered a fortune in gold and silver from ancient temples, so I assume this line refers to him. The stolen silver was sent to the Roman Empire, but the gold vanished (supposedly stolen by Caepio). Caepio had a disastrous military campaign and suffered greatly for his folly, being punished by the Empire. What does this mean in the modern day? As a metaphor it could represent many things, from monetary policy to the fate of politicians.So, they take the part that kind of fits, and twist it until it fits better; and decide that the part that doesn't fit simply "hasn't happened yet." Mighty convenient, don't you think? Me, I'm thinking that if they were really all that convinced that he was right, they'd be hard at work looking for the missing urn, which sounds like it could contain a significant amount of gold.
This is the problem with all of the "prophecies" that Nostradamus wrote - they're vague, and weird, and make obscure historical and mythical allusions. In that respect, they're a little like an extended version of the Sabian Symbols about which I wrote a couple of weeks ago, and like them, you can read into them anything you want. Here's one I picked at random (Century X, Quatrain 71):
The earth and air will freeze a very great sea,What does that mean? Beats the hell out of me. I'm guessing that you could apply it to a variety of situations, as long as you were willing to interpret it loosely and let the images stand for whatever you want them to. Me, I think it has something to do with 2012. Oh, and that global warming is a lie, because the sea is going to freeze. I'm sure that the Planet Nibiru and global conspiracies are somehow involved, too.
When they will come to venerate Thursday:
That which will be, never was it so fair,
From the four parts they will come to honor it.
What I find amazing is that there are literally thousands of websites, books, and films out there that claim to give the correct interpretation of Nostradamus' wacky poetry. Some of them take a religious bent, and try to tie them into scripture, especially the Book of Revelation; some try to link them to historical events, an especially popular one being World War II; others, even further off the deep end, try to use them to predict future catastrophes. These last at least put the writers on safer ground, because you can't accuse someone being wrong if they're using arcane poetry to make guesses about things that haven't happened yet.
In any case, I'm doubtful that Nostradamus knew anything about Hurricane Irene or the eastern earthquake, any more than he predicted World War II, the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, the assassination of JFK, or any of the hundreds of other things he's alleged to have forecast. All we have here is once again, people taking vague language and jamming it into the mold of their own preconceived notions of what it means. About Nostradamus himself, I'm reminded of the words of the Roman writer Cicero, who said, "I don't know how two augurs can look each other in the face while passing in the street without laughing out loud."
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
School spirit
So, today's the first day of school here in upstate New York, and I'm sure there are thousands of nervous boys and girls who are on the verge of being awakened by parents, siblings, or alarm clocks, and getting themselves ready for the start of another school year. And lots of little ghostly children are stretching and yawning (well, I assume that ghosts stretch and yawn, but I have no empirical data on that) and preparing for another nine months of haunting, before the school is again empty and the ghosts have to find other occupations than scaring the living.
Every school I've worked in has, according to the students, been haunted. My current school supposedly had a haunted gym, and for years I was periodically regaled by students with accounts of being alone in the locker room and "hearing noises" and "seeing shadowy shapes." This usually resulted in my initiating a discussion of the phrase "tangible evidence," making suggestions for other possible explanations for noises and shadows, and describing the principle of Ockham's Razor. The stories have kind of tapered off, however, since a renovation project a few years ago turned what was the gym into the cafeteria, and a new, larger gym was built on what was bare ground. Since that time I haven't heard any more about ghosts. Maybe even ghostly kids are repelled by cafeteria food, I dunno.
We're apparently not the only ones who have enrollment from the ranks of the spirit world, however. A Frankfort, Kentucky school for the disabled is supposedly haunted by the spirit of a kid who was killed in a bus accident. A worker in the school, identified only as "Belinda," relates that custodians heard the sound of footsteps in empty halls at night, and students heard noises from inside lockers, and heard their names called when no one was there. "Belinda" herself was discussing the haunting in the cafeteria with another staff member, and a pot on an overhead rack "came up off the spoke and flew clear across the room!" However, as we have only "Belinda's" word for this, I'm thinking this one carries about as much weight as my former students' "shadows and noises."
Apparently, you can have all kinds of ghosts at schools. "Deb" from a town in the hill country of Australia describes barbequing hamburgers for some eight-year-old students of hers who were staying at the school for a sleepover, when "a little dog - a Jack Russell terrier - popped out of the wall!" The ghostly dog "ran around barking" and ran "through a wall into the Tech Studies room." Deb, whose nerves we should all admire, went into the Tech Studies room, and lo, there was the dog, standing on his hind legs, barking at a "glowing green orb." Finally, both dog and orb "floated away into the sky."
I bet by then the hamburgers were reduced to disc-shaped charcoal briquets, but who can blame her?
Lastly, we have a photograph taken by one Margaret Cowart, when she visited the oldest wooden schoolhouse in the United States, situated in St. Augustine, Florida, that seems to show the face of a rather severe looking schoolteacher (see inset on upper right):
I'm hoping that no one expects me to continue going to school after I'm dead. My feeling is, I spend enough time in my classroom as it is - once I'm dead, I'd like to visit a few more interesting places. I could totally get into haunting, say, a beach in Costa Rica. Why a schoolteacher would stick around in a musty old building not only after retirement but after death, especially one that isn't even a working school any more, just to glare menacingly out of windows at passersby, is beyond me.
In any case, if any of my readers are students, allow me to wish you a pleasant and productive school year, free of ghostly footsteps, flying cookware, floating dogs, glowing orbs, and glowering teachers (dead or alive).
An equal wish of goodwill goes out to all you teachers and school staff members out there. May all of your problems this year be no worse than mildly unruly, but still living, students, and no Jack Russell terriers of either sort, dead or alive. We have to maintain some classroom decorum, here.
Every school I've worked in has, according to the students, been haunted. My current school supposedly had a haunted gym, and for years I was periodically regaled by students with accounts of being alone in the locker room and "hearing noises" and "seeing shadowy shapes." This usually resulted in my initiating a discussion of the phrase "tangible evidence," making suggestions for other possible explanations for noises and shadows, and describing the principle of Ockham's Razor. The stories have kind of tapered off, however, since a renovation project a few years ago turned what was the gym into the cafeteria, and a new, larger gym was built on what was bare ground. Since that time I haven't heard any more about ghosts. Maybe even ghostly kids are repelled by cafeteria food, I dunno.
We're apparently not the only ones who have enrollment from the ranks of the spirit world, however. A Frankfort, Kentucky school for the disabled is supposedly haunted by the spirit of a kid who was killed in a bus accident. A worker in the school, identified only as "Belinda," relates that custodians heard the sound of footsteps in empty halls at night, and students heard noises from inside lockers, and heard their names called when no one was there. "Belinda" herself was discussing the haunting in the cafeteria with another staff member, and a pot on an overhead rack "came up off the spoke and flew clear across the room!" However, as we have only "Belinda's" word for this, I'm thinking this one carries about as much weight as my former students' "shadows and noises."
Apparently, you can have all kinds of ghosts at schools. "Deb" from a town in the hill country of Australia describes barbequing hamburgers for some eight-year-old students of hers who were staying at the school for a sleepover, when "a little dog - a Jack Russell terrier - popped out of the wall!" The ghostly dog "ran around barking" and ran "through a wall into the Tech Studies room." Deb, whose nerves we should all admire, went into the Tech Studies room, and lo, there was the dog, standing on his hind legs, barking at a "glowing green orb." Finally, both dog and orb "floated away into the sky."
I bet by then the hamburgers were reduced to disc-shaped charcoal briquets, but who can blame her?
Lastly, we have a photograph taken by one Margaret Cowart, when she visited the oldest wooden schoolhouse in the United States, situated in St. Augustine, Florida, that seems to show the face of a rather severe looking schoolteacher (see inset on upper right):
I'm hoping that no one expects me to continue going to school after I'm dead. My feeling is, I spend enough time in my classroom as it is - once I'm dead, I'd like to visit a few more interesting places. I could totally get into haunting, say, a beach in Costa Rica. Why a schoolteacher would stick around in a musty old building not only after retirement but after death, especially one that isn't even a working school any more, just to glare menacingly out of windows at passersby, is beyond me.
In any case, if any of my readers are students, allow me to wish you a pleasant and productive school year, free of ghostly footsteps, flying cookware, floating dogs, glowing orbs, and glowering teachers (dead or alive).
An equal wish of goodwill goes out to all you teachers and school staff members out there. May all of your problems this year be no worse than mildly unruly, but still living, students, and no Jack Russell terriers of either sort, dead or alive. We have to maintain some classroom decorum, here.
Monday, September 5, 2011
Paying psychics what they're worth
It's not often that I'll run across a story from the World of Woo-Woo that actually makes me mad. My general opinion is that if it makes you happy to believe in ghosts, the Loch Ness Monster, or whatever, and you don't mind my laughing in your general direction, then I'm cool with that.
This morning, however, I bumped into an article on the site A State of Mind called "What Can You Learn about Attracting Abundance by Paying for Psychic Services?" (The article can be read in its entirety here.) This opinion piece, written by someone who simply calls himself "Nathaniel," has as its central argument that you should pay psychic practitioners because that's a way to share the abundance of the universe and attract more good stuff into your own life.
Okay, I have some serious problems with this.
Let's take the simple stuff first. Suppose you decide to go into a bakery this morning and get a cup of coffee and a croissant. The guy at the counter asks you for five bucks. Why do you give it to him?
Well, because it costs money to grow, process, and ship the coffee beans, wheat, and other stuff that it takes to make your breakfast, and people put time and effort into brewing the coffee, making the croissant, and so on. So you're paying for a set of things, and you're paying for a set of services.
What about entertainment? Why do we pay for movies? Well, here we're paying people for their skills; a talented movie-maker worked long and hard to learn how to craft a good movie, as did the actors, costumers, and all of the hundreds of other people it takes to put together this summer's blockbuster.
You pay the people who tune your car up because they have abilities you don't. You pay doctors because they have knowledge that can help you directly. You pay the government, in the form of taxes, to maintain resources for the common good -- police, teachers, firefighters, roads, public lands.
Why, then, should we pay psychics?
Beats the hell out of me. Let's see how "Nathaniel" weighs in on the topic:
What psychic practitioners are doing is hoodwinking the public. They are leading the gullible into thinking that they have abilities that they in fact do not have, and that they can provide a service that they in fact cannot provide. As such, it is not only questionable as to whether they should be paid, it is questionable as to whether they should be allowed to practice their "arts" at all.
Now, I understand that many people approach this stuff as a form of entertainment, and I have no issue whatsoever with that. I actually had a Tarot reading done myself once, just for fun, although I must add in my own defense that I had had more than one pint of beer in the hours preceding the event. As a form of entertainment, there is nothing wrong with people shelling out cash to get a crystal ball reading if that's what floats their boat.
I do, however, have serious issues with the amount of money people spend on psychic services not as entertainment, but because they think that they are really receiving something valuable for their money. Despite the fact that the claims of such charlatans as James Hydrick, Uri Geller, Peter Popoff, James van Praagh, and Sylvia Browne have been debunked again and again, people continue to make them and others like them filthy rich. Desperate individuals have blown their entire life's savings paying for the services of "psychics." And that is immoral, unethical, and should be illegal.
Nevertheless, "Nathaniel" concludes his article with:
This morning, however, I bumped into an article on the site A State of Mind called "What Can You Learn about Attracting Abundance by Paying for Psychic Services?" (The article can be read in its entirety here.) This opinion piece, written by someone who simply calls himself "Nathaniel," has as its central argument that you should pay psychic practitioners because that's a way to share the abundance of the universe and attract more good stuff into your own life.
Okay, I have some serious problems with this.
Let's take the simple stuff first. Suppose you decide to go into a bakery this morning and get a cup of coffee and a croissant. The guy at the counter asks you for five bucks. Why do you give it to him?
Well, because it costs money to grow, process, and ship the coffee beans, wheat, and other stuff that it takes to make your breakfast, and people put time and effort into brewing the coffee, making the croissant, and so on. So you're paying for a set of things, and you're paying for a set of services.
What about entertainment? Why do we pay for movies? Well, here we're paying people for their skills; a talented movie-maker worked long and hard to learn how to craft a good movie, as did the actors, costumers, and all of the hundreds of other people it takes to put together this summer's blockbuster.
You pay the people who tune your car up because they have abilities you don't. You pay doctors because they have knowledge that can help you directly. You pay the government, in the form of taxes, to maintain resources for the common good -- police, teachers, firefighters, roads, public lands.
Why, then, should we pay psychics?
Beats the hell out of me. Let's see how "Nathaniel" weighs in on the topic:
You’re not paying just for service – let’s take my e-books for example. You’re not paying just for the e-book as a piece of electronic document. You’re paying for knowledge inside, for the knowledge I had to collect and understood in the past years. You’re paying for all my experience, mistakes and successes I had, so you won’t make the same mistakes I did. You’re also paying for the coffee I used to drink when I was writing e-books, you’re paying for electricity, for my food, for my bills, for hours of practice. Or let’s take Chakra reading, for example, what are you paying for in this case? First, you pay for my time, and, of course, you pay for my knowledge and experience. You’re also paying for my life energy I’m spending to use that “active sonar” on you :). Then you’re paying for the food, jogging and Tai Chi Chuan that I will use to recharge my psychic batteries. And all of this is just the tip of an iceberg.So, "Nathaniel," you really are putting "chakra reading" in the same category as, for example, a doctor's use of his/her knowledge and training to help cure you of a disease? I'm sorry, but I have to call "bullshit" at this point. There is no evidence - not one scrap - that "chakras," and all of the associated nonsense about energy meridians, auras, and blockages, actually exist. To steal a line from Richard Dawkins, the training people receive in this area is a little like a person studying for a degree in fairyology.
What psychic practitioners are doing is hoodwinking the public. They are leading the gullible into thinking that they have abilities that they in fact do not have, and that they can provide a service that they in fact cannot provide. As such, it is not only questionable as to whether they should be paid, it is questionable as to whether they should be allowed to practice their "arts" at all.
Now, I understand that many people approach this stuff as a form of entertainment, and I have no issue whatsoever with that. I actually had a Tarot reading done myself once, just for fun, although I must add in my own defense that I had had more than one pint of beer in the hours preceding the event. As a form of entertainment, there is nothing wrong with people shelling out cash to get a crystal ball reading if that's what floats their boat.
I do, however, have serious issues with the amount of money people spend on psychic services not as entertainment, but because they think that they are really receiving something valuable for their money. Despite the fact that the claims of such charlatans as James Hydrick, Uri Geller, Peter Popoff, James van Praagh, and Sylvia Browne have been debunked again and again, people continue to make them and others like them filthy rich. Desperate individuals have blown their entire life's savings paying for the services of "psychics." And that is immoral, unethical, and should be illegal.
Nevertheless, "Nathaniel" concludes his article with:
Everything you do is a way of giving or receiving energy. When you receive a psychic or spiritual service, and you give money in exchange, then such exchange is complete. But you don’t need to give money to complete the exchange. It can be food, a place to say, or a bit of advertising for someone who was kind enough to help you for free. Some people prefer money, as this is a form of universal energy exchange in the modern world. Others accept other things, as well. But some form of exchange is needed.
It’s that simple.
If you do not give, how do you want to receive? If you do not provide a service, how do you want to receive gratitude? If you do not produce a product, how do you want to receive money? If you do not give, how do you want to receive? This rule applies to our entire life.Myself, I believe the "give to receive" rule only makes sense if what you're receiving actually has any value. If "Nathaniel" and others like him want to get rich off our desire to understand the present, know the future, and do even more outlandish things - contact the dead, cast spells to attain our wishes, heal our illnesses without the use of traditional medicine - then it is incumbent upon them to show that they can actually do what they claim. As the evidence for such abilities currently stands at "zero," my opinion is that they shouldn't receive a single cent of compensation for their "services."
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Breaking news: The alchemists were right
Frequently, when I'm asked why I'm opposed to science teachers being required to teach "alternate explanations" along with teaching evolution, I respond, "It's interesting that no one is asking teachers to present 'alternate explanations' in other areas of science. No one, for example, expects chemistry teachers to advocate alchemy as an 'alternate explanation.'"
By now, you'd think I'd know better than to use the phrase "no one" in a statement about belief in some crackpot idea.
Meet Jay Weidner, film director responsible for such masterpieces as Timewave 2013, Infinity: The Ultimate Trip, and (most significantly, for our purposes) The Secrets of Alchemy: The Great Cross and the End of Time. Weidner, in his website (here's the link) outlines his three laws of the universe, which are poised to oust Newton's Laws as fundamental rules governing nature:
How about that? I'm in such a high echelon in a top-secret conspiracy that the fact was secret even from me. Now that's what I call a secret conspiracy.
In any case, Weidner is a big believer in alchemy, especially as it pertains to the production of the Philosopher's Stone, a substance that can give eternal life. I thought that Dumbledore had destroyed the Philosopher's Stone way back in Book One, but Weidner disagrees; he said he has discovered a book that shows you how to produce it, using "materials costing less than a thousand dollars," and he illustrates this on his website using a picture of Aquarius, symbolized by a guy with a Fabio hairstyle, huge pecs and biceps, a six-pack, and almost no clothes, pouring water out of a jar, wearing an expression that seems to say, "Hey, baby, you wanna partake of my Elixir of Life?"
Now there's a symbol that's worth a thousand pictures.
Anyway, the book that describes the process for making the Philosopher's Stone is available for free here. Weidner cautions us all to download the book before the Evil Conspirators find out that it's available and "hit the internet kill switch." Because we all know how much the people who run the internet care about the presence of wacky, absurd ideas out there online. We can't have that.
Curious, I took a look at the book (the Book of Aquarius), since it's free. When you go to the "Read Online" page, you get a set of chapter headings, and not wanting to slog through the pages of quasi-metaphysical bullshit, I decided to cut to the chase, and skipped to Chapter 14: What Is It Made Of? And I found out that, to my great shock, the Philosopher's Stone is only made from one ingredient. And that ingredient is...
... wait for it...
Urine.
Yes, you read that right. I know, because I had to read it several times before I was convinced that I was reading it correctly myself. And I thought, "Well, at least Weidner was right when he said that you can get the ingredients for less than a thousand dollars." Here's the relevant passage from the book:
Anyhow, I encourage you to peruse Weidner's site (I especially recommend the stuff about Stanley Kubrick faking the moon landing) and the Book of Aquarius. But if you succeed in making the Philosopher's Stone, please don't tell me about it. I don't want to know. For one thing, it will mean that you'll have been playing around with your own urine, or, god forbid, someone else's, and that's just nasty. For another, at that point you'll have discovered the Secret of Eternal Life, and being that I'm one of the Conspirators, I'd be duty-bound to kill you. That'd just be unfortunate for a variety of reasons, the most important one of which is that I need all the readers I can get, and if I went around killing them it might discourage people from following my blog.
By now, you'd think I'd know better than to use the phrase "no one" in a statement about belief in some crackpot idea.
Meet Jay Weidner, film director responsible for such masterpieces as Timewave 2013, Infinity: The Ultimate Trip, and (most significantly, for our purposes) The Secrets of Alchemy: The Great Cross and the End of Time. Weidner, in his website (here's the link) outlines his three laws of the universe, which are poised to oust Newton's Laws as fundamental rules governing nature:
Weidner's First Law: "Whatever ideas are the most suppressed are the most likely to be the closest to the truth."The First Law would seem to suggest that we should go back the Four Humors Theory of Medicine (all illnesses are caused by an imbalance between the Four Bodily Humors -- blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile), as that was suppressed back when they noticed that patients treated according to the recommendations of this theory usually died. The Second Law means -- never mind, I don't know what the hell the Second Law means. But the Third Law would seem to indicate that I'm a conspirator. I guess that given that I not only call most conspiracies "theories," but I ridicule them frequently in my blog, I'm not only a conspirator, but I'm really high up in the hierarchy of the conspiracy because I'm so determined to convince everyone that it isn't real.
Weidner's Second Law: "If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a symbol is worth a thousand pictures."
Weidner's Third Law: "The only people who call conspiracies 'theories' are the conspirators."
How about that? I'm in such a high echelon in a top-secret conspiracy that the fact was secret even from me. Now that's what I call a secret conspiracy.
In any case, Weidner is a big believer in alchemy, especially as it pertains to the production of the Philosopher's Stone, a substance that can give eternal life. I thought that Dumbledore had destroyed the Philosopher's Stone way back in Book One, but Weidner disagrees; he said he has discovered a book that shows you how to produce it, using "materials costing less than a thousand dollars," and he illustrates this on his website using a picture of Aquarius, symbolized by a guy with a Fabio hairstyle, huge pecs and biceps, a six-pack, and almost no clothes, pouring water out of a jar, wearing an expression that seems to say, "Hey, baby, you wanna partake of my Elixir of Life?"
Now there's a symbol that's worth a thousand pictures.
Anyway, the book that describes the process for making the Philosopher's Stone is available for free here. Weidner cautions us all to download the book before the Evil Conspirators find out that it's available and "hit the internet kill switch." Because we all know how much the people who run the internet care about the presence of wacky, absurd ideas out there online. We can't have that.
Curious, I took a look at the book (the Book of Aquarius), since it's free. When you go to the "Read Online" page, you get a set of chapter headings, and not wanting to slog through the pages of quasi-metaphysical bullshit, I decided to cut to the chase, and skipped to Chapter 14: What Is It Made Of? And I found out that, to my great shock, the Philosopher's Stone is only made from one ingredient. And that ingredient is...
... wait for it...
Urine.
Yes, you read that right. I know, because I had to read it several times before I was convinced that I was reading it correctly myself. And I thought, "Well, at least Weidner was right when he said that you can get the ingredients for less than a thousand dollars." Here's the relevant passage from the book:
I must explain that the Stone could in theory be made from anything, since everything contains the life-energy to some degree, which is the active ingredient of the Stone. Urine contains this life-energy in high concentration, due to the fact that it has just come out of you, and you, as a living animal, are full of life-energy... From the urine we will need to extract a distillate (water) and a salt. The life-energy is in the water, and since the life-energy is so volatile it will remain with the water even when the water is distilled (evaporated and condensed). Our bodies do not want to reject the life-energy in the urine, but have no choice since the life-energy is attached to the water. Secondly, urine is the perfect ingredient because it is as of yet undetermined. That is, it has been well filtered, broken down and purified. It contains all kinds of different minerals, but in minute particles not yet assigned to any purpose.At this point, I had to stop reading, mostly because it's hard to read the computer screen when your forehead is on your desk.
Anyhow, I encourage you to peruse Weidner's site (I especially recommend the stuff about Stanley Kubrick faking the moon landing) and the Book of Aquarius. But if you succeed in making the Philosopher's Stone, please don't tell me about it. I don't want to know. For one thing, it will mean that you'll have been playing around with your own urine, or, god forbid, someone else's, and that's just nasty. For another, at that point you'll have discovered the Secret of Eternal Life, and being that I'm one of the Conspirators, I'd be duty-bound to kill you. That'd just be unfortunate for a variety of reasons, the most important one of which is that I need all the readers I can get, and if I went around killing them it might discourage people from following my blog.
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