In what can only be described as a Great Leap Backward for rationality, the Roman Catholic Church in Poland has announced that it is publishing the world's only monthly magazine focused exclusively on exorcisms. (Source)
The journal, called Egzorcysta, will feature stories about Satanic possession, how to recognize it in others, and how to avoid it for yourself. Its first issue, released on Monday, has articles entitled "Satan is Real" and "New Age: The Spiritual Vacuum Cleaner."
The magazine was apparently conceived as a response to an increasing demand for the services of exorcists in Poland. Father Aleksander Posacki, a professor of philosophy and theology and "a leading demonologist and exorcist," stated to reporters that the number of exorcisms has risen dramatically, and links the increase to the fall of communism.
"The rise in the number or exorcists from four to more than 120 over
the course of 15 years in Poland is telling," he said. "It's indirectly due to changes in the
system: capitalism creates more opportunities to do business in the area
of occultism. Fortune telling has even been categorised as employment
for taxation. If people can make money out of it, naturally it grows and its spiritual harm grows too."
His colleague, Father Andrzej Grefkowicz, has stated that there is a "three-year waiting list for exorcists in Warsaw."
To which I can only respond: you have to wait three years to get an exorcism? You'd think that if they really believed that Satan was possessing someone, and working through them to commit evil, they'd get someone right on it. "Let's see... is your daughter making things float around? Yes... Has she puked up any pea soup lately?... I see... Is she able to turn her head a full 360 degrees? Mmmm-hmmmm... I understand... Well, we'll send someone down. Can you pencil us in for November 12, 2015?"
Of course, the main problem I see with all of this is that I have never heard of credible evidence that any of it -- Satan, possession, exorcism, and the rest -- has the least basis in reality. What's always been puzzling to me, and that I've never heard any True Believers adequately explain, is why (if Satan is out there looking for souls to inhabit), he doesn't pick likelier targets. Odd how the people who get possessed, and who end up in the hands of an exorcist, are virtually always Catholics themselves. You would think that a scoffing atheist like myself would be a perfect victim, given the apparent weakness of my own Eternal Spirit. But I've never heard of a single case of a rationalist nonbeliever being possessed.
Which in my mind places demonic possession squarely in the realm of either (1) mental illness, or (2) hysteria brought on by fear. In the first case, treating the problem using exorcism borders on criminal neglect -- to take some poor schizophrenic, and to try to cure his illness by mumbling some prayers and pouring holy water on his head, is in the same category as the Christian Scientists who waste time praying over someone with appendicitis. In the second case, I have no doubt that exorcisms sometimes "work" -- in the sense that if your "demonic possession" was caused by your panicked fear that there was an evil entity trying to control you, then an authority figure performing a ritual and telling you that the entity had departed would undoubtedly help you to feel better. It's a little like the nocebo effect -- the scientifically documented phenomenon in which people who believe that voodoo curses are real become ill if a practitioner tells them that they have been cursed.
The whole thing is profoundly bothersome. I find it amazing that we sit here in the 21st century, with our incredible access to science, technology, and rational thought, and are still hearing stories about demons and Satan and witches (take a look at this BBC story about people in Ghana who are permanently exiled to "witch camps," away from their families, if they're accused of sorcery). I know that things have improved -- far more people are rationalists, and have a good understanding of science, now than did even thirty years ago. But when I read this sort of thing, I realize that we still have a very long way to go.
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
Unexplainable malarkey
A regular reader and frequent contributor to Skeptophilia sent me a link yesterday, with the message, "Oooh, look! Another company has discovered that it can sell bogus woo-woo stuff using your favorite words - frequency, field, energy, and vibration!"
Many of you probably recall how pissed off I get when people use scientific words and can't even be bothered to look up the actual definitions. It's even worse when they use said misused scientific words to rip people off, although clearly some of the responsibility lies with the consumers, because after all, they could also bother to look up the actual definitions if they wanted to -- caveat emptor, and all of that sort of thing.
So, anyway, when I clicked the link, and it brought me to a site called "Unexplainable Frequencies," I knew this one was gonna be good for a few faceplants. Here's the banner headline on the homepage:
Many of you probably recall how pissed off I get when people use scientific words and can't even be bothered to look up the actual definitions. It's even worse when they use said misused scientific words to rip people off, although clearly some of the responsibility lies with the consumers, because after all, they could also bother to look up the actual definitions if they wanted to -- caveat emptor, and all of that sort of thing.
So, anyway, when I clicked the link, and it brought me to a site called "Unexplainable Frequencies," I knew this one was gonna be good for a few faceplants. Here's the banner headline on the homepage:
- Manifestation
- Wealth
- Visualization
- Astral Projection
- Lucid Dreams
- Spirit Guide
- Chakra Work
- Remote Viewing
- Psychic/ESP
- Christ Consciousness
- IQ Increaser
Monday, September 10, 2012
Curiosity finds a shoe, a finger, and various aliens
It was only a matter of time.
Ever since NASA's roving Mars explorer Curiosity sent its first photographs back to Earth, I've been waiting for some wingnut to use one of them to "prove" something -- that aliens live there, that a superintelligent race had visited there before, or possibly that the US has had a working base there for thirty years, and President Obama visited there when he was a teenager.
Enter the British YouTube aficionado who goes by the handle StephenHannardADGUK. (I'm assuming his actual name is Stephen Hannard, which seems likely, so I'll refer to him by that name for the remainder of my post, and my apologies if this is incorrect.) Hannard has analyzed the Curiosity photographs, examining them down to the last detail, and even applying various filters to them to see if anything is hiding, up there on the dusty Martian surface. And lo, seek and ye shall find! Hannard discovered:
An alien poking his head out of a burrow!
UFOs!
A fossilized human finger!
A shoe!
What is NASA saying about these photographs? Predictably, they deny that anything weird is going on. The "UFOs" are dead pixels in the camera's imager, which have lost function and therefore create a white dot on the image that was accentuated by Hannard's use of filters. As for the grinning alien, the fossilized finger, and the shoe, those are... rocks. Just plain old Martian rocks.
Hannard and others, however, beg to differ. After telling us what we're looking at, Hannard concludes with, "What are these objects?... as always, you decide." In other words, you're free to disagree, as long as you don't mind being a Credulous Fool Who Believes Everything NASA Says. Of course that's what NASA spokespeople would say. They're paid to cover stuff up, especially the top-secret covert stuff that's been going on out there on Mars.
Um, yeah. That's why they've (1) sent a roving robot up there to take photographs of everything it can, (2) had it beam those photographs back to Earth, and (3) made those photographs public. So if NASA is acting as a covert-operations unit, it might want to rewrite its protocol manual, because right at the moment its methods of maintaining secrecy kind of suck.
Also, if these really are evidence of the presence of aliens (or humans, for that matter) on Mars, I'd really appreciate it if they'd do a better job of cleaning up after themselves and not leave shoes and severed fingers all over the place. The Earth has gotten mucked up enough with litter and pollution, let's not start doing the same to Mars, okay?
Anyhow, that's the news from the world of Ridiculous Outer Space Alien Conspiracies. As usual, I'm pretty certain that my missive from the world of rationality won't convince anyone who isn't already convinced, but I feel compelled to post it anyway. Just call me a Missionary of Skepticism, proclaiming my message to anyone who will listen, lo, even unto the Grinning Alien Groundhogs of Mars.
Ever since NASA's roving Mars explorer Curiosity sent its first photographs back to Earth, I've been waiting for some wingnut to use one of them to "prove" something -- that aliens live there, that a superintelligent race had visited there before, or possibly that the US has had a working base there for thirty years, and President Obama visited there when he was a teenager.
Enter the British YouTube aficionado who goes by the handle StephenHannardADGUK. (I'm assuming his actual name is Stephen Hannard, which seems likely, so I'll refer to him by that name for the remainder of my post, and my apologies if this is incorrect.) Hannard has analyzed the Curiosity photographs, examining them down to the last detail, and even applying various filters to them to see if anything is hiding, up there on the dusty Martian surface. And lo, seek and ye shall find! Hannard discovered:
An alien poking his head out of a burrow!
UFOs!
A fossilized human finger!
A shoe!
What is NASA saying about these photographs? Predictably, they deny that anything weird is going on. The "UFOs" are dead pixels in the camera's imager, which have lost function and therefore create a white dot on the image that was accentuated by Hannard's use of filters. As for the grinning alien, the fossilized finger, and the shoe, those are... rocks. Just plain old Martian rocks.
Hannard and others, however, beg to differ. After telling us what we're looking at, Hannard concludes with, "What are these objects?... as always, you decide." In other words, you're free to disagree, as long as you don't mind being a Credulous Fool Who Believes Everything NASA Says. Of course that's what NASA spokespeople would say. They're paid to cover stuff up, especially the top-secret covert stuff that's been going on out there on Mars.
Um, yeah. That's why they've (1) sent a roving robot up there to take photographs of everything it can, (2) had it beam those photographs back to Earth, and (3) made those photographs public. So if NASA is acting as a covert-operations unit, it might want to rewrite its protocol manual, because right at the moment its methods of maintaining secrecy kind of suck.
Also, if these really are evidence of the presence of aliens (or humans, for that matter) on Mars, I'd really appreciate it if they'd do a better job of cleaning up after themselves and not leave shoes and severed fingers all over the place. The Earth has gotten mucked up enough with litter and pollution, let's not start doing the same to Mars, okay?
Anyhow, that's the news from the world of Ridiculous Outer Space Alien Conspiracies. As usual, I'm pretty certain that my missive from the world of rationality won't convince anyone who isn't already convinced, but I feel compelled to post it anyway. Just call me a Missionary of Skepticism, proclaiming my message to anyone who will listen, lo, even unto the Grinning Alien Groundhogs of Mars.
Saturday, September 8, 2012
The American political parties get a Tarot reading
I know that many of you are concerned about the upcoming presidential election in the United States. Even many of my readers from other countries are likely to be keeping their eyes on what happens in Washington, DC, because (like it or not) the US is a major power broker in the world. Campaigning is getting hot and heavy, and right now the race is in a statistical dead heat -- raising the tension on both sides.
Well, it will come as a great relief to all of you to know that we now have more data from which to make an educated choice. Some professional Tarot card readers have weighed in on the topic, and have done readings for both parties so that we can find out not only what party spokespeople have to say about the issues -- we can also find out what a bunch of randomly-dealt pieces of card stock with colorful images might indicate.
Psychic ReeNee Cummins has started a group called UPredict, whose stated goal is to do psychic readings not only for people, but for political groups and for "mysterious things going on around the planet." So Cummins and her team decided to do readings for the Republican and Democratic Parties, asking five questions of the magic cards:
Or, just maybe -- the interpretation of the cards was reflecting the hopes, desires, political leanings, and (in some cases) prior knowledge of the "readers."
This is my problem with the majority of self-proclaimed psychics -- their readings don't have any sort of scientifically-admissible controls, and yet they rail against the skeptics as being "closed-minded" and "unwilling to consider that there might be more to the universe than what the scientists tell us." Is that so? Are we really as blind as all that? Is there something more affecting outcomes than the known physical components of the universe?
Well, if you want anyone to take you seriously, you have to play by the rules. Show me that a computer, programmed with the meanings of the Tarot cards, could do a card throw for the Democrats and Republicans, and come to the same conclusions as your "Reading Room" team did. Or even go so far as to have your "readers" do a second throw for each party, and show that it gives you substantially the same results. Do something that will convince me that Tarot card readings aren't just clever people imposing their own slant on something that is essentially a random arrangement of pieces of card stock.
I'm guessing they'd probably refuse, however, and simply accuse me of having "a sad lack of understand" and "a major toxic ego."
Well, it will come as a great relief to all of you to know that we now have more data from which to make an educated choice. Some professional Tarot card readers have weighed in on the topic, and have done readings for both parties so that we can find out not only what party spokespeople have to say about the issues -- we can also find out what a bunch of randomly-dealt pieces of card stock with colorful images might indicate.
Psychic ReeNee Cummins has started a group called UPredict, whose stated goal is to do psychic readings not only for people, but for political groups and for "mysterious things going on around the planet." So Cummins and her team decided to do readings for the Republican and Democratic Parties, asking five questions of the magic cards:
- How does this party’s platform affect America?
- Is this convention’s philosophy in touch with a majority of Americans?
- Division is a problem in America – How is this convention going to affect this?
- Will there be problems in the areas around the convention?
- What will be the net effect of the convention on the American Culture?
The first thing that is apparent about the reading done for the Republicans is the lack of Major Arcana cards in the entire reading. There were only 13 Majors for a reading that involved over 120 cards. When there are few majors in a reading, the reader will usually ask the client if they truly understand what is going on in their lives. There is usually a sad lack of understand [sic] or a major toxic ego involved when there are this small a percentage of Majors in a reading. The readers in the room talked about how there seemed to be a nostalgic element in the Republican Party that wanted to take America back to a simpler time.Really? The cards told you that last bit? Or did you just look up the word "conservative" in the dictionary?
Second, the most populous card was the knights of all suites. Knights are a young, dynamic energy; but it is an uneven energy and can be taken to extremes. Again, why the "my way or the highway attitude"? Why are these people so angry? The economy was crashed in 2008 because of bad banking decisions. However the energy of the knight say that these extremes are the energy levels being exhibited towards the current situation with no reflection on what history actually is or what part they (the Republicans may have played in it). The Reading Room talked about the war on women and that this junior high like energy would explain why the participants refused to understand that they were hurting more than helping. Again, it also explained a hypocracy [sic] towards attending shows in strip clubs in Tampa where tents had been put up to protect the identity of customers.Okay, so it's becoming pretty clear that most of the "Reading Room" psychics are not card-carrying GOP members. So let's turn to what they said about the Democrats:
First, the Major Arcana cards reappeared with the Democratic reading. In fact, the Major's were heavy in this reading. Heavy Major Arcana cards mean that what is going on is very important on a spiritual level. It does not predict that this side will win, it says that they will accept the will of the people, and then fight on for the best conclusion. The Project TAROT Moment Cards were mainly Major Arcana. The first, and most prominent was The Devil. I know, for conservatives that is enought [sic] to make them weep tears of joy; but that would only be for the ill-informed. The Devil deals with a hell of the client's own making. A mental construct that has no physical component in reality. Now who is making a living hell for this administration? Could it be the Republican's decision to make this administration a one term administration? Could their "junior high" attitude about society explain the bullying that has gone on in the media and between people? Could they have turned this President into their own Devil - only to have people discover that their reality is not the one shared by most of the country.Myself, I find it a little ironic that these people are talking about "reality" while blathering on about a bunch of playing cards that can magically tell you what's going on behind the scenes in the US political arena.
The adults came back into the room - we had a lot of queens and kings of all suites. The idea of introspection to do the right thing and then lead the people in the manner came out strong. But the inner work of the queens was just as important as the leadership of the king. The fact that there was both kings AND queens shows that while men and women are different, there is a need for both genders and the wisdom they bring to the table. The final Project TAROT moments happened with The Justice card and The Fool. The Justice card was a welcome sight. Yes, Justice will be served, and things will be straightened out. However, the Justice card has it's [sic] sword in the air. It can cut the crap and move us forward, or it can slice and dice people who are on the wrong side of history. The last card - The Fool - back to a card of hope and change. Is that what America wants?Oh, clearly. You can't argue with the cards. All-knowing, connected to the mystical energies of the universe, all that sort of thing.
Or, just maybe -- the interpretation of the cards was reflecting the hopes, desires, political leanings, and (in some cases) prior knowledge of the "readers."
This is my problem with the majority of self-proclaimed psychics -- their readings don't have any sort of scientifically-admissible controls, and yet they rail against the skeptics as being "closed-minded" and "unwilling to consider that there might be more to the universe than what the scientists tell us." Is that so? Are we really as blind as all that? Is there something more affecting outcomes than the known physical components of the universe?
Well, if you want anyone to take you seriously, you have to play by the rules. Show me that a computer, programmed with the meanings of the Tarot cards, could do a card throw for the Democrats and Republicans, and come to the same conclusions as your "Reading Room" team did. Or even go so far as to have your "readers" do a second throw for each party, and show that it gives you substantially the same results. Do something that will convince me that Tarot card readings aren't just clever people imposing their own slant on something that is essentially a random arrangement of pieces of card stock.
I'm guessing they'd probably refuse, however, and simply accuse me of having "a sad lack of understand" and "a major toxic ego."
Friday, September 7, 2012
The Motive Fallacy and the reincarnation of Steve Jobs
The "Motive Fallacy" is the assumption that because someone has a motive to say something, that has a bearing on the truth value of what they've said. The canonical example of the Motive Fallacy is the child who shows his mother a drawing he's made, and asks Mom what she thinks.
"It's beautiful, honey," she says.
"No, it's not," the little boy responds. "You're just saying that because you're my mother."
The little boy assumes that because the mom has a motive to spare his feelings, she must be lying -- when in fact, the drawing could be either brilliant or terrible, and the mom's motive for saying it's good has no effect on that one way or the other. She could be lying; she could be telling the truth. It's impossible to tell. And assuming that her motive gives you more information is a fallacy.
I ran into a great example of the Motive Fallacy, not to mention a rather bizarre example of woo-woo, a couple of days ago. The Wall Street Journal ran an article (here) describing how a group of Thai Buddhists have decided that Apple founder Steve Jobs has been reincarnated.
The whole thing apparently hit the news when Apple software engineer Tony Tseung contacted Phra Chaibul Dhammajayo, the abbot of the Dhammakaya Temple near Bangkok, to find out what happened to Jobs following his death. So the abbot put his mind to it, and finally Tseung got his response last month. To everyone's immense relief, it was good news.
"After Steve Jobs passed away, he was reincarnated as a divine being with a special knowledge and appreciation for science and the arts," Phra Chaibul said, in the first of a series of lectures that have been made available by the Dhammakaya Temple. "Everything is high-tech, beautiful, and simple, exactly the way he likes it, and he is filled with great excitement and amazement." He then went on to say that Jobs now has a full head of hair, sleeps on a floating hover-bed, and if he wants to eat, one of twenty servants immediately brings him what he would like, and if he thinks about his favorite song, it starts playing.
Well, that sounds happy enough. I mean, my only question would be: how do you know all of this? But so far, no one seems to be asking this. All we have is the pronouncement, all too typical with religious leaders, that Phra Chaibul has direct and specific knowledge of something that is unavailable to the rest of us slobs.
What makes this situation more interesting is the response of Phra Payom Kallayano, a Thai religious authority. He said that Phra Chaibul was only saying all of this as a publicity stunt, because he wanted to attract more followers to the Dhammakaya Temple, and thus more money. Phra Chaibul, in other words, is only claiming that Steve Jobs was reincarnated because he has a motive to make that claim.
Really? That's the only problem you see here? Of course Phra Chaibul has a motive; the Dhammakaya Temple is one of the wealthiest in Thailand, and caters to well-educated, modern Buddhists, virtually all of whom use computers on a daily basis. Integrating modern technology into religious beliefs is never a simple matter, and Phra Chaibul's statement that Steve Jobs has been reincarnated as a "powerful warrior-philosopher" must give some comfort to Buddhists who worry that today's electronic world bears little resemblance to Nirvana.
But stating that Phra Chaibul has a motive to make the claim is a pretty weak objection, and overlooks a much bigger difficulty, which is that there's not a shred of evidence that it's true. Isn't it curious that no one in the temple seems to be saying, "Can you show me any proof that Steve Jobs is living in a floating glass house with twenty servants?" Which would have been the first thing I'd have thought of. It's what I always think when people make strange claims, even when those claims are part of a well-respected, organized religion.
Maybe the reason for this is that the Motive Fallacy points fingers at specific people, whereas the demand for evidence knocks the pins out from underneath the entire belief system. If Phra Chaibul is making up the Steve Jobs story so that his temple will get donations, that says something about Phra Chaibul himself, but allows you to leave alone the belief in reincarnation and everything else it implies. Once you say, "Show me your evidence that this has happened," you've changed the ground rules -- and placed a demand that can be applied to any other statement that the religion has made. In fact, don't just show me hard evidence that Steve Jobs is living in bliss as a reincarnated warrior-philosopher; show me evidence that reincarnation happens at all. We know you religious leaders have motives for saying what you do; however, that statement is irrelevant. Give me some solid reason to believe that god, heaven, hell, and all the rest exist, other than pointing at a passage in a book and saying, "It says so right here." I'm going to hold your claims to the same gold standard of evidence that I do every other claim about how the world works.
Prominent evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould famously said that science and religion were "non-overlapping magisteria" -- separate ways of understanding the world, whose methods (and thus standards for establishing truth) were different. Science is primarily external, and verifiable; religion internal, and unverifiable. While Gould was a great writer and a brilliant man, I've never thought this made the least bit of sense. Science's stance -- that our understanding of how the universe behaves is discoverable, and can only be based upon hard evidence -- is really the only reliable protocol we have. Saying that religious statements don't have to meet the same standard of evidence as scientific ones means that religious leaders can make any damnfool claims they want, and they can't be challenged to prove what they're saying. But the weak, Motive Fallacy response that Phra Chaibul got after his bizarre public statement is an indication of how few people really want to go there.
"It's beautiful, honey," she says.
"No, it's not," the little boy responds. "You're just saying that because you're my mother."
The little boy assumes that because the mom has a motive to spare his feelings, she must be lying -- when in fact, the drawing could be either brilliant or terrible, and the mom's motive for saying it's good has no effect on that one way or the other. She could be lying; she could be telling the truth. It's impossible to tell. And assuming that her motive gives you more information is a fallacy.
I ran into a great example of the Motive Fallacy, not to mention a rather bizarre example of woo-woo, a couple of days ago. The Wall Street Journal ran an article (here) describing how a group of Thai Buddhists have decided that Apple founder Steve Jobs has been reincarnated.
The whole thing apparently hit the news when Apple software engineer Tony Tseung contacted Phra Chaibul Dhammajayo, the abbot of the Dhammakaya Temple near Bangkok, to find out what happened to Jobs following his death. So the abbot put his mind to it, and finally Tseung got his response last month. To everyone's immense relief, it was good news.
"After Steve Jobs passed away, he was reincarnated as a divine being with a special knowledge and appreciation for science and the arts," Phra Chaibul said, in the first of a series of lectures that have been made available by the Dhammakaya Temple. "Everything is high-tech, beautiful, and simple, exactly the way he likes it, and he is filled with great excitement and amazement." He then went on to say that Jobs now has a full head of hair, sleeps on a floating hover-bed, and if he wants to eat, one of twenty servants immediately brings him what he would like, and if he thinks about his favorite song, it starts playing.
Well, that sounds happy enough. I mean, my only question would be: how do you know all of this? But so far, no one seems to be asking this. All we have is the pronouncement, all too typical with religious leaders, that Phra Chaibul has direct and specific knowledge of something that is unavailable to the rest of us slobs.
What makes this situation more interesting is the response of Phra Payom Kallayano, a Thai religious authority. He said that Phra Chaibul was only saying all of this as a publicity stunt, because he wanted to attract more followers to the Dhammakaya Temple, and thus more money. Phra Chaibul, in other words, is only claiming that Steve Jobs was reincarnated because he has a motive to make that claim.
Really? That's the only problem you see here? Of course Phra Chaibul has a motive; the Dhammakaya Temple is one of the wealthiest in Thailand, and caters to well-educated, modern Buddhists, virtually all of whom use computers on a daily basis. Integrating modern technology into religious beliefs is never a simple matter, and Phra Chaibul's statement that Steve Jobs has been reincarnated as a "powerful warrior-philosopher" must give some comfort to Buddhists who worry that today's electronic world bears little resemblance to Nirvana.
But stating that Phra Chaibul has a motive to make the claim is a pretty weak objection, and overlooks a much bigger difficulty, which is that there's not a shred of evidence that it's true. Isn't it curious that no one in the temple seems to be saying, "Can you show me any proof that Steve Jobs is living in a floating glass house with twenty servants?" Which would have been the first thing I'd have thought of. It's what I always think when people make strange claims, even when those claims are part of a well-respected, organized religion.
Maybe the reason for this is that the Motive Fallacy points fingers at specific people, whereas the demand for evidence knocks the pins out from underneath the entire belief system. If Phra Chaibul is making up the Steve Jobs story so that his temple will get donations, that says something about Phra Chaibul himself, but allows you to leave alone the belief in reincarnation and everything else it implies. Once you say, "Show me your evidence that this has happened," you've changed the ground rules -- and placed a demand that can be applied to any other statement that the religion has made. In fact, don't just show me hard evidence that Steve Jobs is living in bliss as a reincarnated warrior-philosopher; show me evidence that reincarnation happens at all. We know you religious leaders have motives for saying what you do; however, that statement is irrelevant. Give me some solid reason to believe that god, heaven, hell, and all the rest exist, other than pointing at a passage in a book and saying, "It says so right here." I'm going to hold your claims to the same gold standard of evidence that I do every other claim about how the world works.
Prominent evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould famously said that science and religion were "non-overlapping magisteria" -- separate ways of understanding the world, whose methods (and thus standards for establishing truth) were different. Science is primarily external, and verifiable; religion internal, and unverifiable. While Gould was a great writer and a brilliant man, I've never thought this made the least bit of sense. Science's stance -- that our understanding of how the universe behaves is discoverable, and can only be based upon hard evidence -- is really the only reliable protocol we have. Saying that religious statements don't have to meet the same standard of evidence as scientific ones means that religious leaders can make any damnfool claims they want, and they can't be challenged to prove what they're saying. But the weak, Motive Fallacy response that Phra Chaibul got after his bizarre public statement is an indication of how few people really want to go there.
Thursday, September 6, 2012
The Great Hantavirus Pandemic Conspiracy
Since we were talking about conspiracies yesterday, I thought I'd continue in the same vein by taking a look at the recent hantavirus outbreak in Yosemite National Park.
Here are the facts -- not that those tend to matter to conspiracy theorists.
Hantavirus is an RNA virus that is carried by deer mice, and is present in their urine, droppings, and saliva. When deer mice come into contact with human -- e.g. in cabins -- the mouse droppings dry out, and the resultant dust can be inhaled, carrying the virus into the human respiratory system. Once a human is infected, the disease progresses rapidly, beginning with flulike symptoms, and eventually causing pneumonia and acute respiratory distress. There is no treatment, and even with medical care, about half of infected patients die. (Source)
The recent outbreak in Yosemite National Park, in the "Signature Tent Cabins," led to 10,000 people being exposed. Note that this is simply the number who occupied the cabins this summer; it is unknown how many of them actually came in contact with the virus. As of right now, six people have been confirmed to have contracted the disease, and two of the infected have died. (Source) The cabins were closed on August 24, and as hantavirus has an incubation period of two to four weeks, it is likely that there will be few other cases amongst the people who visited the park.
So, anyway, that's the situation. Scary for those exposed, sad for those who have actually contracted the disease, and otherwise, it's pretty much over. Hantavirus has never been shown to be transmissible from human to human, so that's it for the epidemic (if I can call an outbreak that sickened six people that).
But try telling your average conspiracy theorist that.
Here are a few direct quotes from conspiracy sites. I am including only a few, because after reading these, I felt my cerebral cortex turning to cream of wheat, and I had to stop. (Spelling and punctuation has been left intact, because that improves the overall effect.)
Hey, it could happen.
What blows my mind about all of this is how fact-resistant these people are. Show them press releases from the National Institute of Health, explaining that hantavirus doesn't seem to be communicable from one human to another, and stating that only six people have so far been sickened? It's all part of the government's disinformation plan. Tell them that the sulfur spill in April was just an accident, and was cleaned up quickly, and had nothing to do with the outbreak? Riiiight. Sure it was an accident. *wink, wink* Explain that hantavirus was already present in deer mouse populations, and there would be no need for anyone to "spray the park with the virus," even if someone wanted to do so, which no one does? Ha. So you say. You poor, deluded fool, you.
You get the feeling these people love it when bad things happen, so they can have more things to blame the government for. They don't seem to have any sense that being that we live in the natural world, bad stuff sometimes just happens. Storms, earthquakes, volcanoes, floods... and disease outbreaks. No human agency is necessary for any of this stuff, much as they would like that to be the case.
And finally, don't these conspiracy theorists give you the impression that they think that the government is a lot more powerful, and efficient, than it actually is? My own sense is that our elected officials look more like the Keystone Kops than they do like the Men in Black. If they even knew how to create a catastrophe, I doubt they could successfully pull it off, much less keep it quiet.
But maybe that's the point. The people who believe in conspiracy theories find it weirdly comforting that someone is in charge, even if that someone has evil intentions. The idea that hantavirus has shown up in Yosemite because the Evil Government put it there is easier to live with, somehow, than the idea that bad stuff just happens sometimes, because life is a risky chaotic jumble, and there is no pattern, no Grand Reason That Things Happen.
Or maybe they're just batshit crazy.
Here are the facts -- not that those tend to matter to conspiracy theorists.
Hantavirus is an RNA virus that is carried by deer mice, and is present in their urine, droppings, and saliva. When deer mice come into contact with human -- e.g. in cabins -- the mouse droppings dry out, and the resultant dust can be inhaled, carrying the virus into the human respiratory system. Once a human is infected, the disease progresses rapidly, beginning with flulike symptoms, and eventually causing pneumonia and acute respiratory distress. There is no treatment, and even with medical care, about half of infected patients die. (Source)
The recent outbreak in Yosemite National Park, in the "Signature Tent Cabins," led to 10,000 people being exposed. Note that this is simply the number who occupied the cabins this summer; it is unknown how many of them actually came in contact with the virus. As of right now, six people have been confirmed to have contracted the disease, and two of the infected have died. (Source) The cabins were closed on August 24, and as hantavirus has an incubation period of two to four weeks, it is likely that there will be few other cases amongst the people who visited the park.
So, anyway, that's the situation. Scary for those exposed, sad for those who have actually contracted the disease, and otherwise, it's pretty much over. Hantavirus has never been shown to be transmissible from human to human, so that's it for the epidemic (if I can call an outbreak that sickened six people that).
But try telling your average conspiracy theorist that.
Here are a few direct quotes from conspiracy sites. I am including only a few, because after reading these, I felt my cerebral cortex turning to cream of wheat, and I had to stop. (Spelling and punctuation has been left intact, because that improves the overall effect.)
- This could be the new Pandemic, the worldwide killer that wipes out mankind ,in the 14th century the Black Death wiped out 25 million people and this was before planes and easy travel throughout the world, if that many people died in the 14th century imagine the destruction and devestation in the modern world where you can jump on a plane tomorrow and end up in Timbuktoo ,25 million would be like chicken feed ,make no mistake this has no cure and if it goes airborne and can be transmitted through handshakes ,coughs and sneezes ,the world will have no need to be worried about any asteroid hitting or Yellowstone erupting in 2012.
- Remember the big rig that spilled 600 25# bags of sulfur near the entrance to Yosemite in April? Anyone wondering if that stuff was really sulfur? It closed the roads nearby. Was this just an excuse to close everything up so they could spray the park with deadly hantavirus? Just in time for summer vacations...
- Its another false flag operation to draw attention away from what's going on at the Democratic National Convention. Like we can't see through what their doing.
- Obama and his cronies are hiding their role in this. Start a deadly pandemic in an election year, so that it gives you something to claim you're fighting against. And while millions are dying, they get into office permanently. Watch for it, sheeple. You'll be living in a fascist dictatorship before you know it... if you're one of the survivors.
- There are now 12000 people sick with this right now and that's the ones we know about, how many more, are we being told the total truth about this, in less than a week thousands more infected, imagine a month, a year, 5 yrs from now planet earth could be the corpse planet, maybe this is why their looking at other planets that could support life.
Hey, it could happen.
What blows my mind about all of this is how fact-resistant these people are. Show them press releases from the National Institute of Health, explaining that hantavirus doesn't seem to be communicable from one human to another, and stating that only six people have so far been sickened? It's all part of the government's disinformation plan. Tell them that the sulfur spill in April was just an accident, and was cleaned up quickly, and had nothing to do with the outbreak? Riiiight. Sure it was an accident. *wink, wink* Explain that hantavirus was already present in deer mouse populations, and there would be no need for anyone to "spray the park with the virus," even if someone wanted to do so, which no one does? Ha. So you say. You poor, deluded fool, you.
You get the feeling these people love it when bad things happen, so they can have more things to blame the government for. They don't seem to have any sense that being that we live in the natural world, bad stuff sometimes just happens. Storms, earthquakes, volcanoes, floods... and disease outbreaks. No human agency is necessary for any of this stuff, much as they would like that to be the case.
And finally, don't these conspiracy theorists give you the impression that they think that the government is a lot more powerful, and efficient, than it actually is? My own sense is that our elected officials look more like the Keystone Kops than they do like the Men in Black. If they even knew how to create a catastrophe, I doubt they could successfully pull it off, much less keep it quiet.
But maybe that's the point. The people who believe in conspiracy theories find it weirdly comforting that someone is in charge, even if that someone has evil intentions. The idea that hantavirus has shown up in Yosemite because the Evil Government put it there is easier to live with, somehow, than the idea that bad stuff just happens sometimes, because life is a risky chaotic jumble, and there is no pattern, no Grand Reason That Things Happen.
Or maybe they're just batshit crazy.
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Storms, consipiracies, and divine retribution
Last night the remnants of Hurricane Isaac swept through upstate New York, bringing electrical storms and some much-needed rain to our area, and doing little damage except for scaring the absolute hell out of my neurotic border collie, Doolin, who seems to think that thunder is the Footsteps Of Monsters Who Eat Dogs. So other than straightening up the things she knocked over in trying to get Somewhere Safe, we actually were rather fortunate.
Sadly, the residents of southern Mississippi and southeastern Louisiana (especially Plaquemines Parish) weren't so lucky, and there are thousands that are still flooded out, and tens of thousands without electricity. The prediction that it would make landfall as "only a Category 1" storm turned out to be correct, but a Category 1 storm turns out to be capable of a lot of damage, especially if it moves slowly, as Isaac did.
The science of predicting hurricane tracks has improved vastly, but it's still a highly complex business, dependent on a great many variables that can be hard to measure. Still, we're better off than we were in 1900, when a hurricane slammed into Galveston, Texas with very little warning, claiming an estimated 8,000 lives.
Of course, that hasn't stopped the crazies from claiming that hurricanes are not controlled by such prosaic variables as air moisture, sea surface temperature, shear, and steering currents. Big storms being due to purely natural causes? No, that would be way too simple.
First, we have noted meteorologist Rush Limbaugh, who claimed that the folks over at NOAA were predicting the storm's path based upon their desire to disrupt the Republican National Convention:
Of course, Limbaugh is bush-league crazy compared to Joe Kovacs over at WorldNetDaily, who claims that god sent Hurricane Isaac toward New Orleans deliberately to screw up Southern Decadence, an annual gay pride festival:
Even this doesn't end the litany of wackos who have weighed in on the cause of hurricanes. Over at Chemtrail Planet, we hear that the path of the storm was determined by Evil Government Officials putting chemicals in jet fuel, so that the exhaust contrails could change the weather:
And last, our parade of wingnuts would not be complete without a salvo from Alex Jones, who as you might expect posted a YouTube video claiming that Hurricane Isaac was created by the US government using their magical superpowers, better known as HAARP. "We would be weird to not say it could be government-created as some type of disaster for the election," Jones said. "That’s not outside the realm of possibility."
Which is true only in the sense that earthquakes being caused by the leaping about of Giant Subterranean Bunnies is also, technically, not outside the realm of possibility.
What always puzzles me about this sort of thing is the fact that people listen to, or read, this stuff, and at least someone must find it plausible. In fact, in the case of Limbaugh and Jones, the evidence is that a lot of people find what they say plausible, despite the fact that much of it is blatant horse waste. Why, I wonder, don't people look folks like this in the eye when they make their ridiculous pronouncements, and say, "May I please see your Ph.D. in meteorology or climate science? Or, in fact, any kind of science at all? Oh, you don't have one? Then SHUT THE HELL UP."
But people never do, for some reason.
Sadly, the residents of southern Mississippi and southeastern Louisiana (especially Plaquemines Parish) weren't so lucky, and there are thousands that are still flooded out, and tens of thousands without electricity. The prediction that it would make landfall as "only a Category 1" storm turned out to be correct, but a Category 1 storm turns out to be capable of a lot of damage, especially if it moves slowly, as Isaac did.
The science of predicting hurricane tracks has improved vastly, but it's still a highly complex business, dependent on a great many variables that can be hard to measure. Still, we're better off than we were in 1900, when a hurricane slammed into Galveston, Texas with very little warning, claiming an estimated 8,000 lives.
Of course, that hasn't stopped the crazies from claiming that hurricanes are not controlled by such prosaic variables as air moisture, sea surface temperature, shear, and steering currents. Big storms being due to purely natural causes? No, that would be way too simple.
First, we have noted meteorologist Rush Limbaugh, who claimed that the folks over at NOAA were predicting the storm's path based upon their desire to disrupt the Republican National Convention:
So this whole thing has been politicized, as the Democrats politicize everything, and that's why we are talking about it. Now, I want to remind you: All last week... And, no, at no time here am I alleging a conspiracy. At no time. With none of this am I alleging conspiracy. All last week what was the target? Tampa. What was going on in Tampa this week?
The Republican National Convention. A pretty important one, too. Introducing the nominee, Mitt Romney. It's only after the convention that Romney can actually start spending all of this money that he's raised, so this convention is very important. It's a chance to introduce Romney to a lot of people who don't know him yet. And I noticed that the hurricane center's track is -- and I'm not alleging conspiracies here. The hurricane center is the regime; the hurricane center is the Commerce Department.
It's the government.
It's Obama.Oh, right! Okay! That's perfectly believable, as long as you have a single kernel of Kettle Corn where most of us have a brain. The hurricane is Obama! Barreling toward the Republican National Convention! With the destructive Winds of Liberalism! I'm certain that the storm itself cared deeply about who wins the presidential election, because, you know, that's how weather works.
Of course, Limbaugh is bush-league crazy compared to Joe Kovacs over at WorldNetDaily, who claims that god sent Hurricane Isaac toward New Orleans deliberately to screw up Southern Decadence, an annual gay pride festival:
New Orleans is still hosting Southern Decadence with open homosexuality manifesting in the streets of the city. It could be that God is putting an end to this city and its wickedness. The timing of Hurricane Isaac with Southern Decadence is a sign that God’s patience with America’s sin is coming to an end. … Let’s all watch this very closely, because if New Orleans is destroyed, it is a sure sign that the final judgment for the national sin of America has arrived.And as additional proof, we have a quote from Alabama Senator Hank Erwin, showing that government officials are only as intelligent as the people who elected them:
America has been moving away from God. The Lord is sending appeals to us. As harsh as it may sound, those hurricanes do say that God is real, and we have to realize sin has consequences.No, Senator, what those hurricanes say is that low pressure centers form over the eastern Atlantic during the summer, increase in strength during conditions of warm surface waters and low shear, and get pushed toward the Caribbean and the southern United States by the prevailing winds. Homosexuality really has very little to do with it.
Even this doesn't end the litany of wackos who have weighed in on the cause of hurricanes. Over at Chemtrail Planet, we hear that the path of the storm was determined by Evil Government Officials putting chemicals in jet fuel, so that the exhaust contrails could change the weather:
High on the list of suspects for deployment of “chembombs” is the fleet of Evergreen Air B-747 tankers equipped with Evergreen’s own patented aerosol deployment system capable of spraying a wide variety of aerosols depending on the mission.This is accompanied by a highly informative YouTube video that made me weep softly while banging my head against my computer keyboard.
The huge 20,000 gallon system was originally promoted as a new technology for fighting wildfires even though the patent claims equal capability at releasing aerosols for the purpose of "weather modofication" [sic].
Suspicions are growing that Evergreen’s fire-fighting promotion was a decoy to hide their primary mission of covert climate modification.
And last, our parade of wingnuts would not be complete without a salvo from Alex Jones, who as you might expect posted a YouTube video claiming that Hurricane Isaac was created by the US government using their magical superpowers, better known as HAARP. "We would be weird to not say it could be government-created as some type of disaster for the election," Jones said. "That’s not outside the realm of possibility."
Which is true only in the sense that earthquakes being caused by the leaping about of Giant Subterranean Bunnies is also, technically, not outside the realm of possibility.
What always puzzles me about this sort of thing is the fact that people listen to, or read, this stuff, and at least someone must find it plausible. In fact, in the case of Limbaugh and Jones, the evidence is that a lot of people find what they say plausible, despite the fact that much of it is blatant horse waste. Why, I wonder, don't people look folks like this in the eye when they make their ridiculous pronouncements, and say, "May I please see your Ph.D. in meteorology or climate science? Or, in fact, any kind of science at all? Oh, you don't have one? Then SHUT THE HELL UP."
But people never do, for some reason.
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