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December 1987 "BASIS", newsletter of the Bay Area Skeptics
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         Bay Area Skeptics Information Sheet
                   Vol. 6, No. 12
                Editor:  Kent Harker



HOMO IGNORAMUS
Lynn Hammond

It is acceptable for the average college graduate to leave the
hallowed halls of higher learning without even the most basic
understanding of a molecule. It is unthinkable that the same
student be ignorant of Shakespeare. He or she would be considered
unlettered if not illiterate. While there is no desire to give the
humanities short shrift, one might wonder if some of the emphasis
ought to be slightly broadened.

We live in a highly technological era -- the age of the scientific
method. Indeed, the age of science. The world and the way things
work have never been understood to such a high degree; this
knowledge turns about an appreciation for the simplicity and beauty
of the fundamental laws of the universe. The value of a good
science education for the masses is inestimable, but our
educational system has largely failed. The results are measurable
and disastrous. Many commonly-held beliefs date back hundreds of
years to pre-scientific, magical thinking.

Jon D. Miller, director of the Public Opinion Laboratory at
Northwestern U., did a comprehensive survey of public beliefs, the
results of which appeared in "American Demographics" journal; those
that apply to science are summarized here.

Only one-third of us understand what a molecule is, yet the term
is used daily in advertising (the majority think that a molecule
produced naturally is better than one produced synthetically). Less
than that admit to a clear understanding of radiation, which
accounts for much of the hysteria over nuclear energy. When
advertising states that a product is "proven in scientific circles"
only a third have an inclination what that means.

There is a strong correlation between higher education and general
knowledge of basic science, but the gap is still dismally wide.
Sixty percent of college graduates said they understood what a
molecule is compared to 25% of high school graduates. One third of
college grads compared to only 4% of high school grads understood
DNA. The nature of a scientific study is 5 times more likely to be
understood by collegians than by their high school counterparts.

The study suggests that while the average adult will expand his/her
knowledge in general, if we don't learn our science in a formal
setting, we most likely never will. The report is most unsettling
in that there is not much application of the little scientific
knowledge the average student does acquires. It seems we learn some
of the terminology and principles of science, but there is
negligible carry-over into daily function.

Most Americans can't distinguish between science and pseudoscience.
Almost 70% of all adults read astrology reports and fully 39% (66
million) say they believe in astrology and think it is scientific.
Twelve million Americans say they sometimes change their plans
after reading their horoscope. Astrology goes heavily along gender
lines because of the difference in educational opportunities, it
has been suggested. Still, 1/3 of college graduates consult
astrological forecasts.

One of the most powerful and comprehensive scientific theories, the
theory of evolution, is doubted by a majority of the public. The
majority of men and college graduates accept evolution, but women,
high school graduates and high school dropouts are more likely to
reject it.

We are about evenly split on the question of extraterrestrial
visitors. Most believers think alien visitors are benign or
friendly, and of all the beliefs studied in the survey, the
extraterrestrial hypothesis did not fall along gender or
educational lines.

For the some 25 million Americans who do not have a high school
diploma, the world is a frightening, hostile, incomprehensible
place in which they have little control over their lives. This
group heavily believes in fate, signs, omens and luck, while fewer
than 10% of college graduates would agree. To the statement "It is
not wise to plan ahead since many things turn out to be a matter
of good or bad luck anyway." almost half of the dropouts agreed.
Less than 10% of the collegians agreed.

The quality of being open minded requires that one have many
options available. One who does not remotely understand even the
rudiments of physics is hardly in a position to allege open-
mindedness about alternative physical explanations. If A, B, C, and
D contribute understanding to a concept it will not do to postulate
X in the name of open-mindedness when one has no knowledge of A,
B, C, and D.

If the average American obtains very little science in his or her
formal education and then only applies it poorly, the knowledge gap
after leaving school is being filled by the marketplace. Sadly,
that marketplace makes no distinction between science fiction and
science fact: what sells is all that counts. The pulp rags at the
check-out stand outsell the combined effort to present any
semblance of the other side.

[Mr. Hammond is a "BASIS" subscriber and concerned skeptic from
Idaho.]



PRESIDENTIAL HEALER

Much information about ex-Rev. Pat Robertson has been in the mail
to "BASIS" of late, notably from BAS advisor BILL BENNETTA. The
concern about keeping this publication out of the political arena
makes us reluctant to touch on Robertson, but the amount of
correspondence and clippings shows that there is more than just
candidate Robertson.

Quite apart from his political ambitions, his foibles, examined
under the public microscope, have touched on his faith-healing
claims. Since alleged healings from any paranormal source fall
under the purview of BAS, and since we have had striking successes
in our investigations in this area, it was deemed important to
focus some attention on Robertson's methods and claims. What
follows, then, is something of a summary of the material sent to
BASIS.

Probably one of the best analyses was done by Martin Gardner in
"The New York Review of Books", Aug. 13.

"Like Brother Bakker and Richard Roberts, Pat practices the shotgun
technique of healing -- much simpler than the laying on of hands.
God gives him a `Word  of Knowledge' about the afflictions of
unnamed people. With millions of  viewers, he is sure to score many
lucky hits. Those who are hit report their  miracle cures and make
generous donations. If an interviewer likes the way  the healees
talk, they may be invited to appear on the show to give stirring
testimony.

"Pat's sin of pride, the pride of willful ignorance, has grown with
CBN. His powers now rival St. Peter's. In China he once preached
in English and his listeners, he says, all heard him in their
native dialects, just like on the day of Pentecost. A woman in
California listened to Pat say that someone had broken an ankle and
God was healing it. Her ankle was instantly okay. The awkward fact
is she had been watching a rerun -- Pat actually spoke his lines
before the woman broke her ankle. Healing future accidents, Pat
writes, happens often in his ministry.

"On at least three occasions the prayers of Pat and his associates
have saved CBN headquarters from damage by a killer hurricane. In
"Beyond Reason" he tells how they diverted hurricane Betsy from
Virginia Beach.

"Here is yet another story Pat himself relates in "Beyond Belief":
One Sunday, after services when he was an assistant pastor of a
church in Mount Vernon, New York, a twelve-year old girl ran out
of the entrance into the street and was killed by a car. Next day,
Pat and his congregation prayed that the child would rise from the
dead. The girl's body, lying in an open casket, had been embalmed.
Pat saw nothing unusual or funny about this incident. `She did not
rise,' he concluded solemnly, `and we buried her on Tuesday.' "

Dick Dabney reported in "Harper's", August 1980, a chilling sample
of Pat's healing technique.

"There is a woman in Kansas City who has sinus. The Lord is drying
that up right now. Thank you Jesus. There is a man with a financial
need -- I think a hundred thousand dollars. That need is being met
right now, and within three days, the money will be supplied
through the miraculous power of the Holy Spirit. Thank you Jesus!
There is a woman in Cincinnati with cancer of the lymph nodes. I
don't know whether it's been diagnosed yet, but you haven't been
feeling well, and the Lord is dissolving that cancer right NOW!
There is a lady in Saskatchewan in a wheelchair -- curvature of the
spine. The Lord is straightening that out right now, and you can
stand up and walk! Just claim it and it's yours. Stand up and walk.
Thank you Jesus! Amen and amen!"

The "San Jose Mercury" reported that neo-Pentecostal Robertson "is
being confronted by powerful video images broadcast on a Los
Angeles NBC affiliate showing him leading a 1981 revivalist faith-
healing in which he proclaimed that members of the audience were
cured on the spot of cancer, hemorrhoids, goiter, bad teeth and a
long list of other ailments.

"As he has in other well-publicized appearances, Robertson told of
having personal discussions with God. He said he was driving in his
car and the Lord told him to ask for something, anything. `I said,
well, I don't know what to ask for but I probably would like to
have $1,000. And the Heavenly Father said all right.'

"So the Lord gave it to him, Robertson said. And then a week later
he was glad he asked because he said his daughter required dental
care that cost $1,000. `He (the Lord) knew I had the need before
I called on Him.' "

James Randi predicts that Robertson will ultimately withdraw from
the race. The heat is going to be turned up, and it remains to be
seen if America will be run by a bona-fide fundamentalist.

[Again, special thanks to BILL BENNETTA (spelled with two n's --
sorry about that misspelling in the last issue, Bill) for the
materials and comments. - Ed.]



HANDWRITING ANALYSIS
David Schreiber

Have you ever wondered what standards teachers use when they make
personal judgments and form attitudes toward their students?

Recently a high school teacher from the Ottawa area in Canada named
Luigi Zardo revealed his criteria in an article in "Forum", a
publication of the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation.

Zardo teaches business, and states that he judges his students on
the basis of graphology: "the science of discerning personality
traits from the appearance of someone's handwriting."

He is not diffident in his judgments. He believes that there is
negligible business sense in a student whose handwriting
concentrates in the "upper zone" of the writing line. Similarly,
he sees little motivation to make money in a student whose script
focuses in the "middle zone." Of someone whose writing slopes
sharply to the right, Zardo says, "I don't expect cool reason."

He presents a small "Encyclopaedia Graphologica". A line of writing
that droops reveals a writer who is "indecisive, weak-willed and
discouraged." Compressed loops indicate fearfulness and emotional
tension. Upward-reaching loops are the mark of people who live in
a fantasy world.

One wonders if a stray blob of ink points to some truth more
profound than a leaky pen.

Zardo makes no apologies that he uses these signs to judge his
students. He wrote the "Forum" article to encourage his fellow
teachers to do likewise. Which means more to him when marking a
critical essay, the logic of a student's argumentation or the slope
of the script? What happens when the student with droopy
handwriting approaches him for a recommendation to a leadership
camp? Will writing in the wrong zone put students on some secret
blacklist?

Graphology has been around since 1622, when a doctor in Bologna (no
pun intended) named Camillo Baldi published the first book on the
subject. The hypothesis on which it is based seems believable.
Starting from the simple, obvious fact that personality must be
exhibited in behavior, it is argued that there might exist a
precise, detail-for-detail correspondence between the personality
of a writer and the individual marks he or she makes in the act of
writing. Thus the character trait of boldness might be revealed in
large letters, optimism in an upward slant of the writing line, and
sensuality in large loops plunging below the writing line.

This idea seems interesting enough; well worth putting to the test.
Unfortunately graphology has never proven itself in sound,
scientific tests. It has never gone past the stage of hypothesis.
Despite this deficiency, but in a way that is all too familiar in
the pseudosciences, it has grown large and pretentious.

One of the earliest and most important critical studies of
graphology, by Ludwig Klages in Germany in the Nineteenth century,
concluded that the interpretation of isolated signs was simply not
valid. Most other studies have produced negative results.

A little support for graphology was given in a study by noted
French psychologist Alfred Binet in the late 1800s. It tested seven
graphologists by asking them to analyze 74 handwriting samples and
to attempt to distinguish the 37 writers who were of superior
ability (by the standards of the testers, presumably) from the 37
of average ability. The graphologists scored better than chance,
with one analyst matching 92%. Of course, a thorough study must
have each subject submit the same handwritten text. The reference
is not clear on this point. If samples were taken from written
material already extant, then one wonders how many clues to a
writer's ability were available just in the words of the
handwriting samples. In any event, later studies did not yield
further support.

Nevertheless, graphology flourished and is flourishing today,
sometimes popping up under a guise of respectability. Although it
is not generally taken seriously in North American academic
circles, graphology has been taught at the New School for Social
Research in New York City as a serious diagnostic aid. Corporations
hire graphologists to screen job applicants. It is not unusual to
find sources such as the "Merit Student's Encyclopedia" blithely
stating the "the main fields in which graphology can be helpful
include personnel selection, vocational guidance, and historical
research." Europe has been even more lax, as several universities
there teach courses in graphology, and one can even earn an
official license to practice the subject.

Everybody wants to form accurate opinions of other people, and we
would all be extremely grateful for new, quick-and-easy methods of
achieving insight into character. Graphology lacks the firm
experimental foundation that it would need to make it any more than
an excuse for discrimination.

The great English thinker Francis Bacon invented a name for
illusions like graphology: Idols of the Theatre -- so called
because they consist of little worlds of belief existing apart from
reality, like stage plays. His comments on them, although made 400
years ago, are still accurate. "The human under-standing" he said,
"when it has once adopted an opinion, either as being the received
opinion or as being agreeable to itself, draws all things else to
support and agree with it. And though there be a greater number and
weight of instances to be found on the other side, yet these it
either neglects and despises, or else by some distinction sets
aside and rejects."

Mr. Zardo and others will not cease to believe in graphology just
because no evidence for it exists. But the intensity of their
belief might decrease if skeptics keep reminding them of the dearth
of facts.

[David Schreiber is a teacher who lives in Toronto. His article
first appeared in "The Ontario Skeptic".]



MANTRA MUDDLING
Michael Sorens

Newsflash! Except that this information is from January 1984; but
it is of perennial interest for those who are seeking
transcendental truth.

A person who completes a course in Transcendental Meditation is
given a secret "mantra": a "personalized set of syllables" that
should be repeated to oneself during meditation, according to
"Omni" magazine, and this mantra should not be disclosed to anyone.
And soon we will find out why it shouldn't.

The "Omni" article points out the interesting fact that if you
study under a second TM teacher, you will be given the same mantra.
This clearly indicates the transcendent nature of your personality,
which is obvious to those who can read it.

The head of the TM discipline, Maharishi Mahesh Yogi has this to
say about mantras:

"We know that each man is a different individual. Similarly, each
man has his own type of energy impulses that constitute his
personality. Therefore, if the qualities of the energy impulses of
the sound of the mantra rightly correspond to the energy impulses
of the man, only then will it be of real value. Any wrong choice
of the mantra is sure to create unbalance in the harmony of the
man's life."

Imagine, if you will, the horrors of being given the wrong mantra
by some teacher who had dozed off in TM school during the section
on your particular kind of energy. This could ruin your whole day.

Never fear. According to "Omni's" article, it was revealed by some
disaffected TM trainers that there are just 16 mantras -- not the
thousands claimed by Yogi -- which are assigned according to age
rather than energy. They are:

ENG 0 - 11    SHIRIN 26 - 29
EM 12 - 13    SHIRIM 30 - 34
ENGA 14 - 15  HIRING 35 - 39
EMA 16 - 17   HIRIM 40 - 44
AENG 18 - 19  KIRING 45 - 49
AEM 20 - 21   KIRIM 50 - 54
AENGA 22 - 23 SHAM 55 - 59
AEMA 24 - 25  SHAMA 60 - up

[The 55 - 59 group has the right mantra, it looks to me. MICHAEL
SORENS is a frequent contributor of layout and format ideas, for
which we are very grateful. -- Ed.]



RAMPARTS

[Ramparts is a regular feature of "BASIS", and your participation
is urged. Clip, snip, and tear bits of irrationality from your
local scene and send them to the EDITOR. If you want to add some
comments with the submission, please do so.]

There seems never to be an end to the stream of baloney that is
grist for the skeptic's mill. It has been discovered that animals,
insects (specifically, cockroaches), and even eggs have psychic
powers. Parapsychology laboratories have conducted research in
which a random generator turned a heat lamp on and off over a batch
of fertilized chicken eggs. The eggs were found to influence the
randomness to keep the heat "on" significantly more than average.
Of course, our plants also possess psychic powers, too.
Parapsychologists have measured galvanic response in plants as they
(the plants) reacted to their environment. Don't tell secrets
around your philodendron.

Psychic Penelope Smith has a new twist with her sensitivities. She
uses her powers to communicate with animals. And then she tells the
pet owner what it is that Fido has been wanting all these years.

A story in the "Mercury News" about what this astounding woman does
with animals considers a case in point. In a $25-per-half-hour chat
with "Max", a German shepherd, he told her that what he wanted most
was a bird. A parakeet. Max was serious, because he "wasn't
noticeably grinning".

That might have explained why Max was watching Penelope's bird so
attentively. Maybe Max wants a whole bunch of birds. Preferably,
plucked.

"Smith said her success stories include a dog with a broken leg
that wouldn't keep his cast on, and a racehorse that wouldn't run."
She explained to the dog the soundness of the medical procedure and
he quit his foolishness right then and there. Dogs have to
understand like anyone. She says. The horse "was not racking up
many wins", and it turns out that the filly had been traumatized
by several injuries and just didn't have enough self-confidence.
Penelope fixed it all.

This Dr. Doolittle left some instructions for us mere mortals to
use to make contact with our own fuzzies and furries.

"Find a quiet place and sit calmly with your pet. Clear your mind
and focus on your pet. Call his name or rub his back to let him
know you want to talk. Visualize something, and send it outward in
front of your body. Practice sending a mental picture from where
you are to a few feet away. Then practice sending the mental
picture to your pet. Start by saying hello telepathically. Imagine
your pet saying hello back. Move on to `How are you doing?' Listen
carefully for the answer, keeping your mind open only to your pet.
Try asking, `Is there anything you want to tell me?' Take a deep
breath if you don't like the answer. And practice, practice."

After the session, let your pet talk to Ms. Smith about the bill.


Charles Berlitz (of "The Bermuda Triangle" fame) is at it again,
according to the "Toronto Sunday Star". Charles wrote two other
books -- listed in the non-fiction section of your bookstore --
about the unusual. His latest effort in vintage Berlitz style is
"The Lost Ship of Noah", a rambling work about the last 100 years
of countless expeditions and sightings of the famed vessel in the
Ararat environs.

As to his own opinions, Berlitz says, when asked about the
existence of the ark, "I won't say for certain this is Noah's Ark,
but it could be." Creationist arkeology at its best.

Anything that looks remotely boat-like has been photographed time
and time again. Samples of petrified whatever are taken to be the
building materials from the liner.

(Since the Ark presupposes the Deluge, one might wonder why Charles
didn't discuss the plausibility of a world-wide flood that covered
the entire surface to 18 cubits above Everest. Of course the Ark,
at 5.5 miles above sea level for almost a year, may have been
heated to maintain proper temperature.


Attorney DAVID PRESSMAN (David did an article on health fraud for
"BASIS") sent us a blurb from "The Vegetarian Times" in which
super-psychic Uri Geller attributes a great upsurge in his
"utensil-twisting abilities when he gave up meat 10 years ago.
Geller said that when he ate meat, it took five minutes to bend a
spoon, but since becoming a vegetarian, he can do it in one minute
or less."

What would happen if he gave up caviar?


From the pages of "Health" magazine, a full-page advertisement for
a "perceptron" was forwarded to us. The copy warns us that the
"Russians struck first with psychic weapons." NASA, we learn, has
spent millions in a frantic attempt to catch up with the latest
psychic discoveries so that our fighter pilots could out-psyche the
commies in dogfights. NASA developed a top-secret doodad to train
our Top Guns how to increase their psychic abilities to the point
that they could "know" the next move of their opponents before they
made it.

Of course, someone let the secret out, and now you can buy this
gizmo for 40 bucks and train yourself. If you don't fly A-16s, you
can use your new-gained insight to see what your business
competitor is going to do to you before he does it. There's a
"complete instruction booklet that discusses psychic ability and
intuition."

Let's hope Joe Montana gets one of those things before Super
Sunday.

You are really going to be steamed about this one if you lost money
on Black Monday or live in Los Angeles -- or worse, if you are a
victim of both. The "Mercury" reports that Jose Arguelles,
concocter of Harmonic Convergence, now says that "the energy from
the Harmonic Convergence is responsible for the stock-market dive
and the L.A. earthquakes."

We don't care what or who is responsible for it, we just want you
to tell us a little more SPECIFICALLY in advance. "There will be
troubles in the next few months" is not very helpful, Jose.


"When a man's knowledge is not in order, the more of it he has, the
greater will be his confusion." -- H. Spencer



EDITOR'S CORNER
by Kent Harker
Editor of "BASIS"

I recently did a presentation on the paranormal for a fraternal
order and it was at least as interesting to me because I was able
to see how the public reacts to paranormal explanations.

I wanted to show that since parapsychologists have no theory of psi
they resort to statistical analyses for support. I wanted to
demonstrate that probabilities cannot stand in lieu of theory.

After an introduction about 100 years of parapsychological research
that has not produced one replicable experiment, I proposed an
"inquiry." The audience of about 35 was seated with the closest row
approximately 10 feet away. I held up a quarter, and told them that
the test was to determine if the quarter was fair, i.e., unbiased.
I stood behind a table with a table-top podium, and flipped the
coin twice and reported it to be heads both times.

"Are there any who think the coin is weighted?" I asked.

No takers. I flipped three more times, reporting heads each time.
Again my query, and a couple of hands came up. They said it looked
suspicious. Then I told them they all had an imaginary $100 to bet
on the bias of the coin based upon the five successive heads.

The two pulled their hands down. I tossed the quarter three more
times, reporting all heads.

They began to talk to each other. To my same question, about five
hands were raised. They were willing to bet that 8 successive heads
was sufficient reason to venture their $100 for even money.

Then I announced that the $100 had suddenly become $5,000 as a test
of their confidence. All hands went down -- the bets were off. The
discussion in the audience grew as they questioned one another.
Eight successive heads was not enough to risk $5,000.

"After all," they reasoned, "it COULD happen just by chance."

Now they were beginning to think a little -- to question what was
happening. I flipped the coin two more times announcing the same
result (heads), and had two takers at $5,000.

Suddenly, someone blurted, "Hey, how do we know you are telling us
the truth about the outcome of the toss?"

"Finally!" I said to myself. Some of those people were ready to
place their money (imaginary though it was) solely on my word.
After a little applause for his observation, we settled down again.
I assured them I had been honest but they wanted someone up there
to see for themselves nonetheless.

A representative was chosen and came forward. Then I flipped the
coin, turned it on the back of my hand, slightly lifted my fingers
off the coin and announced the result. The monitor said he wanted
to see, so I removed my hand entirely, exposing the head.

"Now we have eleven trials, all of them heads," I proclaimed. Two
more tosses in the same fashion gave me a string of 13. A dozen
hands said they were now ready to put their money down. (They had
forgotten their brother's counsel for the first ten trials.)

The monitor then protested that I had looked at the coin first, and
suggested that I might have been manipulating the coin. The betters
immediately withdrew and demanded closer supervision. They said
that THEY should flip the coin.

How dare they! I feigned indignation and they relented. But they
advised the monitor to watch more carefully.

I patted him on the back and gave a not-too-surreptitious wink. Two
more flips and two more heads brought half the audience to a
willingness to bet their $5,000.

I told them I was not convinced of their sincerity and the level
of their belief since the money was not real, so I told them it is
now $100,000 --  their life savings.

Almost all wagers were off, because, after all, it "just could be
chance" even though it is very unlikely. Two people, however, stuck
to their guns. They just didn't think anything that unlikely could
occur by chance. Their comments to this effect were interrupted by
a gentleman who said he knew that it is possible to flip a coin in
a certain way to make it turn up a predetermined face. This made
sense to most, so the pair immediately sucked in their stake.

A number of people were beginning to get hostile. They INSISTED
that someone else flip the coin. I assured them I had no reason to
lie (false) and that I was not using any trickery in conducting the
trials (false). A little more ranting on my part, and they were
ready to continue.

I noticed that about a third of them had their arms tightly folded
across their chests and their eyes riveted on me. It was getting
hard for me to keep a straight face.

Three more heads, for a total of 18 straight.

Some of the believers wanted to bet, but were reluctant, if only
because of the skeptics. I appealed to them to persuade their
cohorts, and the discussion became livelier.

Fortunately, there were no probabilists or conjurers in the crowd.
I would have been sunk, so clumsy were my antics.

A challenge came from another corner that perhaps the monitor was
in league with me, and that he was not to be trusted either. After
all, they couldn't be sure I had not arranged something with him.
My protests to the contrary seemed to lay all concerns to rest,
especially since they had chosen him, and everybody got right back
into things.
I put on my most sincere demeanor and flipped heads twice more.

A portly chap near the center said he had heard that a roulette
wheel had been unceremoniously removed from Monte Carlo after a run
of nine drops on red. "The coin is weighted -- there was little
doubt. The experiment had demonstrated this beyond reasonable
doubt," he declared. He would place a million  on it.

"Would you really," I asked, "really if it would your own money?"

He waffled a little when he was reminded that it COULD happen by
chance even though it was so unlikely.

Now members of the audience insisted that someone else flip the
coin. They would not go any further without independent
verification. I realized that I could not continue my ruse, so I
asked them some questions.

"If you don't match my results, will it prove that the coin is
fair?" I asked.

Discussion. Several other said that the test would have to be run
numerous times under different conditions to be able to state
something conclusively. There began to be a consensus that the
factors necessary to control a simple thing like a coin toss
experiment could be very complex, indeed. I introduced the idea
that the number of trials would have to be predetermined or else
someone might quit when a number of "successes" had been achieved.
This was a springboard for a discussion of the "decline," the
"sheep and goats," and the "experimenter" effects, all alleged to
influence the outcome of a parapsychological experiment.

It was now clear that many were thinking about what was, in fact,
the point of the demonstration: At what juncture is one able to say
there is something other than chance operating? The difficulty of
eliminating extraneous data and experimental design flaws was very
evident.

One person said, quite solemnly, and quite truly, "You can never
know if the experiment is clean."

No matter how hard one tries, there may be some element that has
been overlooked. If statistical considerations are all one has to
go on, and since statistics only has meaning on the premise of
randomness, randomness must be assured before conclusions may be
inferred. Such a premise is in fact incredibly complex at least -
- if not empirically impossible.

Now I increased the complexity of the problem by telling them that
I wanted them to consider psychokinesis -- that the turn of the
coin could be influenced by my volition or even the unwitting
volition of others in the room. There were some in the audience who
said they were "lucky" because they felt they could influence
things by their concentration. This was bandied about a little, and
someone offered, "How would you eliminate that as an influence?"
Chaos reigned supreme now.

I asked for some order after listening to a few summaries of the
difficulties and how each might be handled, but the question, "At
what point does one place confidence that a long sequence of heads
could not occur by chance?" was still dangling. This is of course
what I wanted to come to. Nearly all agreed that there would be no
objective way of concluding that the coin was weighted from coin-
tossing experiments.

"What is the goal of this experiment?" I asked them.

"To determine if the coin is weighted," they remembered well. They
agreed that, no, we couldn't determine it statistically.

"Is there a better way to find out if the coin is biased?"

The suggestions came in a torrent.

"Weigh it."

"Measure it."

"Look at it under high magnification."

There were many others, but it suddenly brought everything down to
earth. The problem was so simple now. It could be determined
objectively and with finality.

To a few groans and a lot of laughter I told them I had lied about
the face of the coin and cheated with their spokesperson. All
agreed that it wouldn't ultimately have changed the problem very
much anyway -- just shifted the difficulty from one area to
another.

There was a sense of relief among the participants in this little
scenario as several wondered why they hadn't thought of other ways
to test the coin before.

Now I asked them to look at "psi" phenomena.

"How can we devise a test of something for which we have no theory
of how and why it works let alone its existence in the first
place?" I asked.

With the coin we know it exists and we know the kinds of things
that would make it biased, and can directly and empirically test
those sources of bias one-by-one. These tests could then be
replicated independently. After empirical testing, we could use the
results of the tests to predict the average outcome of a sequence
of tosses. This has the reasoning going in the right direction:
from existence, to theory, to statistics. Since there is no theory
of psi to test, we cannot devise an experiment to falsify it. Psi
is non-falsifiable. If it is non-falsifiable, it is non-scientific
and parapsychology is a pseudoscience.

Even if one were to grant the existence of psi, it is impossible
to determine if the results of an experiment are due to
clairvoyance, pre-cognition, psychokinesis, or telepathy.

Over one hundred years have failed to produce a single experiment
that can be replicated in any laboratory at any time. Over one
hundred years have failed to produce a plausible theory of psi.

If parapsychologists claim to be scientific and to use the
scientific method, is there any other domain of science that has
so doggedly continued with such a paucity of evidence for so long?



SOUTH AFRICAN SKEPTIC VISITS BAY AREA
by Yves Barbero

David Liknaitzky, M.D., a founding member of the Association for
the Rational Investigation of the Paranormal (ARIP) of South
Africa, visited San Francisco in late October with his wife.

Dr. Liknaitzky, a pathologist in Johannesburg, was contacting
skeptics from local groups as he and his wife toured the United
States. He said his group of fifteen is just getting off the ground
and he is interested in some of the means local societies have used
to increase interest in skepticism.

Despite the enormous social problems in his country, the usual
cache of day-to-day claims from psychics, health frauds, and the
like abound just as anywhere else. Groups within the medical
community are already involved in fighting health fraud, he pointed
out, but he and others within ARIP felt that the challenge of
paranormal claims needed to be met by an organization of its own.

The group now consists mainly of men and women from the sciences.
"All Caucasian", he added with some disappointment; and the women
are primarily wives of members. He hopes, as the group grows, to
involve members from the community at large and to have members
without regard to race or ethnic origin.

Since the Chair, Larry Loebig, could not be present, I acted in his
behalf and outlined with Dr. Liknaitzky the various tactics BAS is
using to grow and bring public attention to the problems of psychic
claims.

The doctor has a commitment of support from BAS and permission to
use articles from "BASIS" for the newsletter they plan to start.
He assured me that he'll keep us informed about his group's growth.

As we drove around San Francisco taking in the sights, our
conversation also dealt with some of the social problems of the
modern world.

If more people had the doctor's ideals, I think, there would be
more equality and less friction.

You may write him at:

David Liknaitzky,
31 Gambia Road
Emmarentia, Johannesburg, South Africa 2195


The inimitable ROBERT STEINER, erstwhile Chair and co-founder of
BAS, lecturer, performer extraordinaire, President-elect of the
Society of American Magicians (SAM), etc., etc. is finally going
to do for us what he does for groups in an ever-expanding region
in the country, except he isn't going to charge us! Bob's
reputation has rapidly spread during the last two or three years
to the point that he is speaking and lecturing professionally. His
performances before concerned citizens' groups have won him high
praise from law enforcement officials.

Bob's keen interest has always been in the best of the Houdini
tradition of exposing sleight-of-hand passing for psychic
phenomena. He has worked for years in the SAM's subcommittee on
magic fraud.

Join BAS on Tuesday, December 15 for this fascinating evening with
Bob; we guarantee you will be dazzled and amazed with his
performance. You may come away believing in the paranormal if you
compare the smoothness of Bob's demonstration compared with, say,
Uri Geller. You'll only be sorry if you don't come.

See the Calendar for details and directions.

                             -----

Opinions expressed in "BASIS" are those of the authors and do not
necessarily reflect those of BAS, its board or its advisors.

The above are selected articles from the December, 1987 issue of
"BASIS", the monthly publication of Bay Area Skeptics. You can
obtain a free sample copy by sending your name and address to BAY
AREA SKEPTICS, 4030 Moraga, San Francisco, CA 94122-3928 or by
leaving a message on "The Skeptic's Board" BBS (415-648-8944) or
on the 415-LA-TRUTH (voice) hotline.

Copyright (C) 1987 BAY AREA SKEPTICS.  Reprints must credit "BASIS,
newsletter of the Bay Area Skeptics, 4030 Moraga, San Francisco,
CA 94122-3928."

                             -END-