Skepticblog

Daniel Loxton (left) and Donald Prothero (right) at The Amazing Meeting 2013. Photo by David Patton

Hi, guys! A quick post today to update you about the release of Abominable Science, my big Columbia University Press cryptozoology book with Don Prothero.

The book is hitting stores right now. It’s officially “in stock” at Skeptic.com; at Amazon.com, available in both hardcover and Kindle; at the iTunes bookstore; and, also on Kobo! (As of this writing, Amazon.ca still has it listed for pre-order—not too surprising, as it’s officially an August 6 release.)

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Junior Skeptic #47 cover illustration by Chris Wisnia with Daniel Loxton

One of the great pleasures of writing Junior Skeptic is getting to answer the questions that bother me at the back of my mind—the questions I daydream on the bus, that fill me with excited curiosity when I should be settling into sleep. Another great pleasure is the discovery that scholars and scientists are extraordinarily generous with their time.

When I sat down to write the current Junior Skeptic, “Alien Invaders!” I was reminded of something that had long bugged me: is anyone concerned that our spacecraft might carry microbes that could contaminate other worlds? After all, bacteria are tough little buggers. And—consider The War of the Worlds as a cautionary tale. What if returning spacecraft carried dangerous microbes back to Earth? Could alien bacteria devastate our own planetary ecosystem, as H. G. Wells imagined terrestrial bacteria annihilating his Martians?

Turns out that there are people whose job it is to worry about those hypothetical contamination dangers—and to work to prevent them. With some pointers from Bad Astronomy’s Phil Plait and the Planetary Society’s Emily Lakdawalla, I soon learned that this is an entire field that dates back to the first tentative human steps beyond the Earth.

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Abominable Science — due out August 6, but exclusively available to TAM-goers July 11-14

I’m thrilled to announce this morning, with my co-author Don Prothero, that our big new book Abominable Science (in stores August 6) will be available as a special pre-release exclusive at the James Randi Educational Foundation’s upcoming The Amazing Meeting 2013 conference in Las Vegas this weekend. Thanks to Columbia University Press and the Skeptics Society, TAM-goers will have the opportunity to get their hands on the book weeks before anyone else!

This has been in the works for months, but the schedule was so tight that we dared not share the good news until the books were safely shipped and on site. They came straight off the presses and straight into boxes to the South Point resort for TAM. Touch and go! Happily, they were delivered yesterday.

Don and I will both be at TAM to chat about monsters and things that go bump in the night. Find us at the Skeptics Society table, or anywhere on the convention floor. Looking forward to seeing you all!

And with that, I’m off to prepare psychologically to sit in a chair in the sky…

The Skeptics Society is pleased to present the second in a series of videos that promote science and critical thinking through the use of humor, wit, and satire. In this video, B.Y.T.H. Busters: The Secret Law of Attraction, Adam Average and Jamie Imtheman put the “Law of Attraction” to the test. If you missed our first video, The Con Academy,watch it now! Both videos feature Brian Dalton (of Mr. Deity fame) and Skeptic magazine publisher Michael Shermer.

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It’s almost that time of year again! Things are buzzing at the Skeptics Society with excitement for the James Randi Educational Foundation’s upcoming “The Amazing Meeting” conference in Las Vegas—skepticism’s big show! There’s really nothing else like TAM. I’ll never forget what it felt like to attend for the first time, back in 2004. I walked into TAM2 as the newly-minted editor of Junior Skeptic, and as a long-time enthusiast for the literature of scientific skepticism—the only such enthusiast I knew, apart from my brother Jason. But there in that room were almost 300 skeptics! I’d never experienced anything like it.

Today, TAM attendance hovers between one and two thousand curious, upbeat minds. The energy is incredible. The whole place hums, vibrates. I come out of every single TAM vibrating myself—buzzing with ideas, new connections, new energy for the year ahead.

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Skeptics are Not Everythingologists

Accepting that any and all “testable claims” are in principle within the scope of scientific skepticism—and that untestable claims are, for reasons of principle (though also practicality) outside that scope—does it follow that skeptics should take the initiative to wade into mainstream scientific or academic controversies? Certainly we have often explored controversial areas beyond the paranormal, provided that those areas made testable claims. “The Skeptics also believe that science and rational skepticism can and should be applied to certain claims in the social sciences,” affirmed Michael Shermer in 1992, “including testable statements made in such fields as psychology, sociology, economics, and political science.”¹

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Jamy Ian Swiss explains and defends the work of scientific skepticism. View the speech on YouTube.

Today I thought I might share a short excerpt from my two-chapter “Why Is There a Skeptical Movement?” on the topic of scientific skepticism’s long-standing focus on testable claims (particularly those related to the paranormal or fringe science). It’s an issue that is in the air at the moment following a fantastic speech delivered by magician Jamy Ian Swiss at the Orange County Freethought Alliance conference last weekend. You can view the entirety of Jamy’s speech on YouTube. (For more on the conference, see Donald Prothero’s post here at Skepticblog.)”Why Is There a Skeptical Movement?” was almost two years in the making. As the Skeptics Society has shared it for free, the historical research alone may be worth your price of admission. I do hope you’ll consider delving further into the story of scientific skepticism’s long and proud public service tradition—the work of decades, even centuries, of activism and investigation. But this particular “testable claims” point is so critical to the understanding of skepticism, and so frequently not understood, that I feel that sharing this section from the piece here may be useful. With yet another ghastly news story again raising the question of predatory paranormal fraud, this may be a good time to say once again that the need for this work—the need for clarity, focus, and sustained, dedicated effort—is as urgent as it has ever been. I hope you will support skeptics in doing that work, even if your own primary cause is not the same.

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This week I’d like to share something a little different: an out-of-copyright detective story published way back in 1916. “The Rough Fist of Reason”—one of the “Strange Cases of Magnum, Scientific Consultant” by Max Rittenberg (1880–1965)—tells the tale of a fictional on-site skeptical investigation into the operation of a slick Spiritualist medium and a perplexing photograph of an astral manifestation. It is charmingly dated and over the top, and yet it is also astonishingly familiar. It echoes not only much of the language and arguments of the modern skeptical movement, but also some of the clichés and ongoing debates of our field. Like some modern portrayals of skeptics in fiction (I’m reminded here of Hugh Laurie’s Dr. House or Benedict Cumberbatch’s Sherlock Holmes) Magnum is a hard, overconfident debunker with little empathy for the purveyors or consumers of paranormal ideas: “He was an inveterate opponent of superstition or nebulous fancy presented to the world in the garments of science, and wherever possible, liked to smash a fist into it.” In his merciless materialism, he is both brilliant and callous; admirable, and yet conceivably dangerous to the wellbeing of those he encounters.

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Token Skeptic podcast host Kylie Sturgess.

I was pleased recently to speak with Kylie Sturgess for her Token Skeptic podcast (audio available here) about my research into the history of skepticism—in particular, my recent two-chapter piece “Why Is There a Skeptical Movement?” (PDF) and Junior Skeptic issues 45 and 46.

I found it a very useful conversation about the many skeptics who have lived, worked, and left the stage before us; their legacy; and the foundational principles of the movement they inspired. For that reason, I’m delighted that Sturgess has now provided a transcript, posted at her Patheos blog Token Skeptic. Here’s an excerpt:

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