COMMENT:In effect a document of the failings of rationalist critiques of occult religion as much as of the New Age itself. The many good contributions, such as that of <a href="/bibq/melton">J.G. Melton</a> or <a href="/bibq/schultz">Ted Schultz</a> get lost among the personality bashing perpetrated by <a href="/bibq/gardner">Martin Gardner</a> and <a href="/bibq/klass">Philip Klass</a>, and outright rants like that by C. Raschke. The book fails to present any coherent picture of the New Age as a movement, however slippery in definition, resulting in a scattershot approach. Even in the criticism of specific claims, its strong point, the result is haphazard. <a href="/bibq/blackmore">Susan Blackmore</a>, in her contribution, discusses skeptical nonexplanations in the psychology of extraordinary experience, calling for approaches that do justice to the phenomena; with respect to the New Age as a social phenomenon, this book suffers from a similar dismissive attitude. It gives the impression that New Agers are a random collection of kooks and fools. Skeptics need more adequate resources (with indexes!); the general public also deserves better than standard issue skeptic material preaching to the converted.
