http://www.dbskeptic.com Skepticism. Critical thinking. Podcast. Community. Sun, 11 Sep 2011 01:30:05 +0000 en-us hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.4 Digital Bits Skeptic brings skepticism and critical thinking to a world of new age, religion and credulous pop culture. Andy Kaiser clean Andy Kaiser skeptic@dbskeptic.com skeptic@dbskeptic.com (Andy Kaiser) 2009 Skepticism and critical thinking in a world of new age, religion and credulous pop culture skeptic, skepticism, critical thinking, new age, religion, pop culture, skeptical articles, critical thinking articles, philosophy http://www.dbskeptic.com/images/dbskeptic-logo-144.jpg http://www.dbskeptic.com/category/fortune-telling/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/07/19/ice-cubes-cornflakes-inflation-and-what-caused-the-sub-prime-lending-crisis-why-theories-are-so-hard-to-get-right/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/07/19/ice-cubes-cornflakes-inflation-and-what-caused-the-sub-prime-lending-crisis-why-theories-are-so-hard-to-get-right/#comments Sun, 19 Jul 2009 19:51:30 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=1380 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/07/19/ice-cubes-cornflakes-inflation-and-what-caused-the-sub-prime-lending-crisis-why-theories-are-so-hard-to-get-right/feed/ 3 Navin Kumar By Navin Kumar Article ID: 1331 - The Phillips Curve is possibly the biggest blow-up in economics that ever happened. Economists - and just about every class of social scientists - are frequently (and rightly) accused of being so infatuated with a th... By Navin Kumar Article ID: 1331 The Phillips Curve is possibly the biggest blow-up in economics that ever happened. Economists - and just about every class of social scientists - are frequently (and rightly) accused of being so infatuated with a theory, that they ignore data if it doesn't fit in with their model. The Phillips Curve is a wonderful example of rigorous empiricism. In 1958, A.W. Phillips discovered a striking relationship between inflation and unemployment: periods of high inflation coincided with periods of low employment. Subsequent studies found this result held true across countries and time periods. This led to the belief that there was a "trade-off" between employment and inflation which could be exploited by policy makers: a government could reduce unemployment if it was willing to increase inflation and vice-versa. The theory behind the data was fairly simple: if unemployment was low, businessses found it hard to hire workers and to increase wages. Higher wages causes goods to be more expensive to produce, so firms increase prices, and this causes inflation. Conversely, if the government caused inflation, there would be a gap in which wages are low in comparison with the price of goods. This is because the workers have not yet negotiated higher wages to compensate for higher prices. During this period, businesses take advantage of low wages by hiring more workers and stepping up production, reducing unemployment. Higher inflation means increased production and lower unemployment. The empirical evidence and theory were flawless. Policies based on the Phillips Curve enjoyed some initial success. So why is it that in the 1970s the Phillips Curve collapsed, and the world saw "stagflation": a bizarre situation which combined reduced production with inflation? An answer came from American economist Milton Friedman: low unemployment, he explained, is the result of unanticipated inflation. If the government started intentionally causing inflation, inflation becomes regular and predictable. If it is predictable, employees started negotiating contracts in which wages increased in tune with inflation and there is no point at which wages are "cheap". This is an incredibly subtle difference. Note that the explanation hasn't changed: the relationship is still the result of wages not keeping up with prices. The only difference is that the second uses a more sophisticated system than the first. To illustrate what happened, consider the following example (used by Landsburg in his excellent book The Armchair Economist): "Imagine an economist noticed that people purchased two boxes of cereal per week. Excited, he publishes a paper on the subject and it comes to the governments' attention. The government - for whatever reason - decides that people should eat four boxes of cereal per week. People already buy two boxes, so if the government sends them [an additional] two boxes every week - yay! - they will eat four boxes a week!" But that's not how it plays in real life. After getting the two boxes, this won't suddenly change consumer habits to four boxes - they'll instead stick with two. Since the government just gave them two, they'll buy no boxes at all! These are the perils of not including  people's behavior when formulating an idea. But it's even worse when we get a theory wrong. Imagine two economists bumped into the "two boxes a week" fact. One says, "People will always buy two boxes of cereal per week," while the other says, "People will always eat two boxes of cereal per week." How can you tell which one of them is right? From the data, you can't.  But once you change the rules of the game - by sending them boxes - you can. The first theory implies they will continue buying two boxes per week while the second predicts they will buy none at all. The second will be proven right. Similarly, in 1958, if you had two theories which stated, "Inflation reduces unemployment, Andy Kaiser clean 11:04 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/04/26/problems-with-prophecy-from-the-bible-and-koran/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/04/26/problems-with-prophecy-from-the-bible-and-koran/#comments Mon, 27 Apr 2009 04:16:25 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=973 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/04/26/problems-with-prophecy-from-the-bible-and-koran/feed/ 8 Nicholas Covington By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1318 - Most world religions, especially the Abrahamic faiths, promote the idea that God has spoken to man in the past and present. If they are right, we should find strong evidence that future knowledge was handed do... By Nicholas Covington Article ID: 1318 Most world religions, especially the Abrahamic faiths, promote the idea that God has spoken to man in the past and present. If they are right, we should find strong evidence that future knowledge was handed down to man in the form of prophecy. God may also have spoken scientific facts to a prophet which the prophet could not possibly have known at the time. As you might guess, Christians, Jews, and Muslims all believe that their holy books contain such knowledge. However, a careful examination reveals that not only is there no strong evidence of prophecy, but also that the Qu'ran and Torah both contain falsehoods concerning history and science! Before we can consider a prophecy as genuine, there are four standards that must be met. 1. The prophecy must be specific. This criterion rules out the vast majority of prophecies. Take those in the Biblical Book of Revelation, which is so vague that it has plenty of different interpretations. For example, the number "666" is said to refer to the Roman Emperor Nero by the Roman Catholics, while Seventh-Day Adventists maintain that this number refers to the Pope! Also, in order to be precise, the prophecy should give or imply a date by which it is to be fulfilled. Otherwise, any group can make a prophecy such as "City X will be destroyed" and claim victory for their prophecy if City X is destroyed hundreds or thousands of years later. Alternately, a group could always claim that the prophecy will be fulfilled sometime in the future, and so such a claim would risk nothing. An example of this is in the Bible's Book of Ezekiel (chapter 26). It says that Tyre will be completely destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar. This is a false prophecy, since Tyre was still standing centuries later when Alexander the Great came through and conquered it. 2. The prophecy must be made before the prophesied event This is another criterion which rules out a very high percentage of alleged prophecies. To be certain that a prophecy was made before the predicted event, we must have documentation. And this documentation must be datable - by carbon-dating or some other trusted method - to a time well before the event happened. 3. The prophecy must be fulfilled and must not appear in the same book as a text containing false prophecies. We must be able to verify that the prophecy came true. We also would not expect a God-given prophecy to predict anything other than what actually happened. 4. The prophecy must not be something which could plausibly be attributed to a guess. Years before the Soviet Union collapsed, many people predicted the collapse itself. This makes sense, since the Soviet Union had been terribly unstable for years. While there is nothing miraculous about these predictions, any alleged prophecy must likewise be this specific. Prophecy: The Bible predicts the birth of the nation of Israel Throughout my reading and research, I have come across only a handful of prophecies which were claimed to fulfill all of these criteria. A Christian website claimed that the book of Ezekiel predicted the exact year when Israel would again become a nation[1]. Here's the relevant passage: "Then lie on your left side and put the sin of the house of Israel upon yourself. You are to bear their sin for the number of days you lie on your side.  I have assigned you the same number of days as the years of their sin. So for 390 days you will bear the sin of the house of Israel. After you have finished this, lie down again, this time on your right side, and bear the sin of the house of Judah. I have assigned you 40 days, a day for each year." (Ezekiel 4:4-6, NIV) Some say this passage predicts there will be 430 years of judgment against the nation of Israel.  We have claims that the Babylonian Captivity began in 606 BCE, and lasted for exactly seventy years. This would leave us with 360 years of remaining punishment. Andy Kaiser clean 10:07 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/03/29/how-to-be-a-psychic/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/03/29/how-to-be-a-psychic/#comments Mon, 30 Mar 2009 03:13:06 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=903 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2009/03/29/how-to-be-a-psychic/feed/ 2 M Parrott By M Parrott Article ID: 1314 It is my belief that self-proclaimed psychic Uri Gellar has been deluding people for several decades by bending spoons, stopping watches, changing the movement of compasses and making predictions as to what is on a piece... By M Parrott Article ID: 1314 It is my belief that self-proclaimed psychic Uri Gellar has been deluding people for several decades by bending spoons, stopping watches, changing the movement of compasses and making predictions as to what is on a piece of paper. I am a magician and I can replicate each one of these. Contained in this article are various videos of Geller failing or unintentionally revealing his secrets. I will also - to a degree - tell you how he does these tricks. Please understand I can't tell you everything, as magic must have its secrets. Let's start with the easiest: how to magically stop a running watch. How to stop and start a running watch Do this trick with two warnings: you may damage a watch with this technique, requiring a trip to a watchmaker for repair. Also make sure your target watch is not a Rolex, as they often will not restart. Get an analogue watch and a magnet. Whack the magnet on the back of the watch and it'll stop.  Easy, right? Nothing too hard, apart from palming the magnet. And you can even get around that requirement, since magicians like to make things as easy as possible. There are magnetic rings. Geller also supposedly starts "broken" watches. Here is one technique: grab a watch that hasn't worked for years. Warm it in your hands. By that warming process, a few broken watches will start to work. Admittedly not all, but some of them. How to magically move a compass This one is easy. And I even have a video for this one. One way is to use a magnetic ring like before. Another is to use a magnetic fake thumb. You know how a compass works, and you know how a magnet would change it. I have a video for you: Well... That seems a bit weird. For legal reasons I can't say he cheated as Geller tends to sue people. However if you look you can see him putting something on his thumb, or it appears that he does. Also the final (successful) attempt is the only one where you cannot see his thumb, so he may be trying to hide something. Notice the word "may". I can't say anything for sure. There is also another technique that Mr. Geller could use. In his earlier clips of this trick you will note that you can see his thumb all the time. However, you could easily repeat this effect by placing strong magnets under your shirt. Spoon bending The magic community has plenty of material on these effects. Far more impressive cutlery bends too, like forks! It's easy, though not all metal will bend. Some are easier than others. But the general idea behind any metal bend is the same, be it spoons, forks, coins, keys, it all comes down to the same thing, and that is misdirection. If you have no knowledge of basic magic principles then you have no idea what I am on about. So let me explain. Misdirection is the art of, surprisingly, misdirecting people. A simple but very effective way of doing this is by talking and asking questions. If you ask someone a random question, that person - for a split second - will stop concentrating on you, and that's your opportunity to do anything. Corinda (writer of the mentalist bible "13 Steps to Mentalism") alludes that - using misdirection - you should be able to bring in a chocolate-covered elephant being ridden by trumpet-playing pigmies without anyone noticing. Actually, Corinda didn't say exactly that. I'm exaggerating to make my point. But the principle still remains. Go up to someone, show them a normal spoon. Take it back, ask them a question, while they're thinking about your question, bend the spoon. Watch in amazement as they later see that the spoon is bent. Well... It's not that simple. There is also the use of "ratcheting". This is the technique of making something look like it's bending, when it's been bent already. Cover the bend, then place two fingers on the spoon and start rubbing. With a bit of practise you can make it look like it is bending in your fingers. Spoon bending example and explanation: Andy Kaiser clean 11:04 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/06/the-future-of-skepticism/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/06/the-future-of-skepticism/#comments Sat, 06 Sep 2008 18:16:21 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=155 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/09/06/the-future-of-skepticism/feed/ 6 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1247 - Things are getting worse. - Across the world, we've got so-called complementary and alternative medicine infiltrating legitimate healthcare and medical treatments. The United States government seems more interested ... By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1247 Things are getting worse. Across the world, we've got so-called complementary and alternative medicine infiltrating legitimate healthcare and medical treatments. The United States government seems more interested in supporting Christianity than supporting religious choice. There are attacks on preventative sciences, like Jenny McCarthy and others insisting their understanding of vaccination technology trumps that of any medical doctor. While I could argue that skepticism is making progress in places, like against the fringe beliefs of cryptozoology, astrology and Intelligent Design, it's even easier to argue that we're losing the battle. Logic and common sense are failing and falling, supported by the beliefs of a credulous society. We are losing. What's a skeptic to do? I fully expect that things will get worse. Yet, despite this gloomy outlook, I'm not worried. Let's do a little scrying of our own, a little fortune-telling and future-prediction. The difference between this and reading tea-leaves is that mine is an educated guess based on probabilities and human nature. Think about a possible future for healthcare. Let's assume the worst for the skeptical community. Let's assume we live in a world where people believe vaccinations cause autism and don't actually protect against disease. What will happen? As fewer people become immunized, herd immunity will break down. Entire communities will again become susceptible. We will see outbreaks and epidemics of preventable diseases like measles, mumps and rubella. We'll see previously-eradicated diseases like polio and leprosy resurface and spread through populations. Many people will get sick. Many people will die. The human response will be to analyze and respond. Doctors and biologists and groups like the Center for Disease Control will again stress the importance of immunizations. This goes far beyond the current polite and low-publicity efforts. We'll get massive ad campaigns, increased TV coverage and a flood of data supporting and explaining the science behind immunizations. The information has always been out there for those interested in finding it, but in this Sick New World, immunization science will be shoved down our throats. People will immunize because they actually understand the process, the risks, and the benefits. This scenario specifically addresses the anti-vaccination problem. But the long-term results are applicable across the board, from alternative-medicine to Scientology. If left unchecked, eventually enough people will get abused, hurt and killed. There will be an inevitable backlash as people come to their senses. As skeptics and critical thinkers, our job is to make sure this imagined world, if it does come to pass, passes quickly. If we can prevent it from happening, even better. If we can't prevent it, nature will do the job for us, though the results will be horrifying and deadly. Our job as skeptics will be to ensure this happens sooner rather than later. Our first obligation is to take care of our family, friends and those closest to us. Then work to educate the wider community and the world at large. The above example addresses healthcare. But a lack of critical thinking causes plenty of other problems in our society. Scammers will always be around unless we increase people's exposure to critical thinking. There will always be people trying to take advantage of others, and there will always be people ready to believe lies. We can lessen the damage with education and activism. Religion is another issue. At its best, it's a good cause that exists for the wrong reasons. At its worst, we get intolerance, persecution and death. Contributing to religion's existence are blind belief in tradition, reliance on unjustified moral laws, and the very human trait of being scared of the dark. Critical thinking and a desire for knowledge can help define what religion really is, Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/07/08/a-field-trip-to-edgar-cayces-association-for-research-and-enlightenment/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/07/08/a-field-trip-to-edgar-cayces-association-for-research-and-enlightenment/#comments Tue, 08 Jul 2008 05:19:12 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=98 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/07/08/a-field-trip-to-edgar-cayces-association-for-research-and-enlightenment/feed/ 10 Tammy Buchli By Tammy Buchli, Science & Reason in Hampton Roads Article ID: 1238 - When my local skeptic's organization (Science & Reason in Hampton Roads) announced a field trip to Edgar Cayce's Association for Research and Enlightenment in Virginia Beach, By Tammy Buchli, Science & Reason in Hampton Roads Article ID: 1238 When my local skeptic's organization (Science & Reason in Hampton Roads) announced a field trip to Edgar Cayce's Association for Research and Enlightenment in Virginia Beach, I was... Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/29/psychic-stagecraft-how-to-change-from-magician-to-miracle-worker/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/29/psychic-stagecraft-how-to-change-from-magician-to-miracle-worker/#comments Mon, 30 Jun 2008 04:23:40 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/?p=95 http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/06/29/psychic-stagecraft-how-to-change-from-magician-to-miracle-worker/feed/ 3 Peter Booth By Peter Booth Article ID: 1235 - Mentalism is a form of performance magic that simulates the paranormal, most commonly mind-reading, predicting the future and psychokinesis.  Magicians get involved in skepticism because much of the time the so-calle... By Peter Booth Article ID: 1235 Mentalism is a form of performance magic that simulates the paranormal, most commonly mind-reading, predicting the future and psychokinesis.  Magicians get involved in skepticism because much of the time the so-calle... Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/31/punk-skepticism-a-perfect-mix-of-skeptic-and-rebel/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/31/punk-skepticism-a-perfect-mix-of-skeptic-and-rebel/#comments Tue, 01 Apr 2008 01:16:06 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/31/punk-skepticism-a-perfect-mix-of-skeptic-and-rebel/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/31/punk-skepticism-a-perfect-mix-of-skeptic-and-rebel/feed/ 2 Anonymous by Anonymous Article ID: 1215 - Skepticism is a philosophical commitment to doubt. However, to doubt without end is of no use. - Committed skeptics include Harry Houdini, Penn and Teller, Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, James Randi, Christopher Hitchens, by Anonymous Article ID: 1215 Skepticism is a philosophical commitment to doubt. However, to doubt without end is of no use. Committed skeptics include Harry Houdini, Penn and Teller, Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, James Randi, Christopher Hitchens, and many other intellectual giants. My doubts began not with the profound words of astronomers, nor by studying stage magic. My doubts began with rage. Holy rage which drives teenagers to truancy and smoking. In my case, it drew me to countless mohawks and hair colors. It drew me to body piercing and tattoos, it drew me to loud defiant music like the Dead Kennedys, Slayer, Marilyn Manson, Black Flag, The Misfits, Danzig, and later to industrial music. I doubted society and its presumptions. I saw through the lies school told me. I saw that teachers who were teaching me didn't give a damn about what they taught. I saw through the pretend benevolence of authority figures, especially the police and school administration. I saw through the ridiculous exaggerations of Reagan's "Just Say No!" campaign. I saw through the lies of commercialism, and was painfully aware that if I was spending money, someone had engineered my purchase through advertising. I saw through conventional religion. Even my attempts to be a Christian later in life were rife with heresies and ideas that conflicted with the status quo. But I still fell for a lot of crap. I fell for alternative medicine, the new age movement, ridiculous theories about JFK's assassination, and finally Christianity. Why was I so gullible when I was so committed to rebellion? Indeed, there is no greater rebel than the skeptic. So why are youth movements like punk, goth, industrial, hip-hop, and metal so devoid of skeptics? I guess that we felt so judged by the world, we wanted to be open minded. We heard nonsense not from our enemies in uniforms and ties, but from our friends. It was our friends forecasting horoscopes, it was our friends doing the tarot reading, it was our friends with the hip young bible study. So we bought it. At least I did. I think that a time of a new era in punk must arise. Perhaps a few co-conspirators could engineer it. The era of the skeptical punk, the dangerous angry youth who is as perceptive in seeing a fraud as she is in seeing the world as a conformist facade. That she - this heroic uber-mensch, punk skeptic - will demand scientific evidence for all claims that are not readily self-evident! When she is born, then revolution could be the next step. The passion of punk with the mind of the skeptic would be an unstoppable revolt against the easy victimhood that the public falls into due to its own inertia. If I had something to pray for, I would pray for this. But since prayer is little more than talking to oneself I can instead act. The punk skeptic is here in me. Am I alone? Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/16/this-is-the-dawning-of-the-age-of-asparagus-fortune-telling-goes-green/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/16/this-is-the-dawning-of-the-age-of-asparagus-fortune-telling-goes-green/#comments Sun, 16 Mar 2008 05:57:52 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/16/this-is-the-dawning-of-the-age-of-asparagus-fortune-telling-goes-green/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2008/03/16/this-is-the-dawning-of-the-age-of-asparagus-fortune-telling-goes-green/feed/ 1 Andy Kaiser By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1212 - Jemima Packington is an "asparamancer". This is a vegetable-in-cheek way to describe fortune-telling using greenery. In Packington's case, the greenery is asparagus: she can throw asparagus spears on the floor, By Andy Kaiser Article ID: 1212 Jemima Packington is an "asparamancer". This is a vegetable-in-cheek way to describe fortune-telling using greenery. In Packington's case, the greenery is asparagus: she can throw asparagus spears on the floor, or have you throw them yourself. By the resulting positioning, as well as her chlorophyllic intuition, she will tell your future. How does this process work? How does Packington know her "asparamancy" works? According to Jemima Packington's interview as reported by the BBC, she said she started her fortune telling "quite by chance" some years ago after some stalks fell on her floor and she made a prediction that came true. Now, the source material says she helps "promote Worcestershire and its asparagus-growing tradition." It doesn't qualify if this is just a goofy publicity stunt to promote asparagus (we all know asparagus needs it, what with the vicious broccoli competition), or if Jemima Packington truly believes in her skill. Regardless of her motivation, there is a serious point between this and similar future telling techniques. From entrail-reading to tarot cards, these fortune-telling techniques "work" because of the diviner's intuition and interpretive skill. Two points can be made about these types of readings: 1) The Weekend at Bernie's Effect This is nothing more than a very old concept becoming re-popularized. Take the example of Hollywood "writers": creatively stagnate and devoid of original ideas, they now love to remake movies. They think a previously-used movie storyline will be successful today because the original was lost to the mists of obscurity (often referred to as "the 1980s"). This "ancient knowledge" is considered special for no other reason than its age. If "the ancients" created it, that alone justifies the popular acceptance. Unfortunately for this essay, entrail-reading and tarot cards fall into the same category as "Weekend at Bernie's": they're old, sometimes funny, but ultimately a waste of your time and money. A movie about a dead guy with no rigor mortis is as odd as telling your future by throwing asparagus on the floor. 2) What's my name? Who's my daddy? (Apologies to The Zombies, because "Time of the Season" is an excellent song, and doesn't deserve to be referenced in a conversation about asparagostic fortune-telling.) Take the two questions above - your name and your lineage, both important and a critical part of your being - and submit them to a fortune-teller. Given zero background information about you, shouldn't a true psychic be able to provide these answers? Even if fortune-telling is inexact (and all "proof" seems to claim this), one still should be able to visit several fortune tellers and notice a significant trend towards divining the correct information. If they can't, then you're better off saving your pennies: flip them yourself to determine your fortune, rather than give them to a fortune-teller. It's argued that fortune-telling and divination is a search for the truth, and is nothing more than a meager human attempt to understand the mystery of life. It can also be argued that better results can be achieved from research and experimentation, not from spilling your asparagus. If you really want to involve vegetables in fortune-telling, try predicting when Hollywood will remake "Weekend at Bernie's". Andy Kaiser clean http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/#comments Tue, 16 Oct 2007 13:53:21 +0000 Andy Kaiser http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/ http://www.dbskeptic.com/2007/10/16/whats-the-harm-in-believing-reasons-for-skeptical-thought-and-critical-thinking/feed/ 2