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December 1988 "BASIS", newsletter of the Bay Area Skeptics
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         Bay Area Skeptics Information Sheet
                   Vol. 7, No. 12
                Editor:  Kent Harker



SOILED LINEN
by William Bennetta

The Shroud of Turin is a 14-foot-long piece of linen that bears
two full-length images -- one a front view, the other a rear view
-- of a man who seems to have been flogged and crucified. The two
images lie head to head, separated by some six inches of bare
cloth. There are no side-view images.

The shroud belongs to the House of Savoy but is kept (at Turin,
Italy) by functionaries of the Roman Catholic Church. The Church
has explicitly encouraged the veneration of the shroud and has
palpably, if informally, promoted various beliefs about it. These
include the idea that it is the cloth in which the corpse of
Jesus was wrapped for burial, as well as the correlative idea
that the images and the ostensible bloodstains on the shroud are
direct impressions of that corpse. According to one vigorous
advocate of those beliefs, the most recent public exposition of
the shroud, held at Turin during the summer of 1978, drew some
3.5 million people.

On 14 October 1988 the "New York Times" reported that the shroud
had been discredited by radiocarbon dating: Tests had indicated
that the linen was no more than 750 years old. The "Times" also
recounted the tortuous statements by which the archbishop of
Turin, in announcing the results of the tests, had tried to
obfuscate the Church's promotion of the shroud and had given
assurance that the shroud, even if bogus, had "produced
miracles."(1)

I was in Port Chester, New York, at the time, visiting members of
my family. When I showed the "Times" to my brother, Bob, he said
that the Corpus Christi church -- one of several Catholic churches
in Port Chester -- had a shrine entirely devoted to the shroud. I
suggested that we go over to the church to see how the shroud was
being promoted to the faithful.

As Joe Nickell relates in "Inquest on the Shroud of Turin", the
shroud was condemned, very early in its strange history, as a
fake. In 1389 the bishop of Troyes, in France, sent a report
about the shroud to Pope Clement VII. It began:(2)

"The case, Holy Father, stands thus. Some time since in this
diocese of Troyes, the Dean of a certain collegiate church . . .
falsely and deceitfully, and not from any motive of devotion but
only of gain, procured for his church a certain cloth cunningly
painted, upon which by a clever sleight of hand was depicted the
twofold image of one man, . . . he falsely declaring and
pretending that this was the actual shroud in which our Savior
Jesus Christ was enfolded in the tomb."

Pope Clement declined to suppress the shroud entirely, but in
1390 he imposed restrictions on any future exhibitions of it.
There would be no ceremonies or candles or incense or guard of
honor, he decreed, and each exposition would have to include the
announcement that "it is not the true Shroud of Our Lord but a
painting or picture made in the semblance or representation of
the shroud."

The Pope's prudent judgment, however, was soon eclipsed. The
Savoys acquired the shroud in 1453, and they immediately began to
exhibit it as Jesus's burial cloth and to attribute miraculous
powers to it. Their enterprise succeeded, and the shroud became
widely accepted, among Catholics, as an authentic relic. It
enjoyed that status for the next 500 years or so, even though the
Church's central administration remained conspicuously ambiguous.
They repeatedly provided de facto endorsement of the folklore
and superstitions that adhered to the shroud, but they never said
definitively that the shroud was the thing that believers
believed it to be.

The most engaging episode in the shroud's history has come in our
own century, as it has been subjected to scientific and
pseudoscientific examinations. The proceedings have been odd,
sometimes Byzantine, and often absurd, because they have included
the repeated conflation of a real question with a purely
theatrical one. The real question, arising from some puzzling
visual and physical properties of the images, has been: How were
the images formed? The theatrical one, promoted by some Church
officials and other believers, has been: Is the shroud authentic?
In the context of this latter question, some people -- committed
to finding that the shroud is genuine -- have misrepresented their
tests or their results and have tried to explain contrary results
by inventing supernatural forces.

The question of the authenticity of the shroud and its images is
a nonsense because the shroud itself declares unequivocally that
it is a work of art. The evidence can be plainly seen and does
not require the intercession of microscopes, spectroscopes or any
of the other devices that have been enlisted. Let me explain.

The shroud's devotees imagine that the people who buried Jesus
placed His body on a part of the shroud and then drew the rest of
the up and over, so that it enfolded the head and entirely
covered the body's front and sides. The part of the cloth that
was under the body, they say, acquired the rear-view image; the
part that was laid atop acquired the front-view image.

This is consistent with the head-to-head orientation of the two
images, but it is irreconcilable with the geometry of the images
themselves. That geometry is so right that it is wrong: When the
shroud is laid flat, the images are realistic and well
proportioned; they are not the distorted images that you would
see if you wrapped a three-dimensional corpse in a cloth, then
somehow transferred an impression of the corpse's surface to the
cloth, and then laid the cloth out in two dimensions.

In other words, the images do not conform, even crudely, to the
explanation by which believers purport to account for them. Nor
do they conform to any other explanation but this: The images
were devised by an artist who did what artists -- graphic artists,
at least -- always have done. He represented his three-dimensional
subject by making planar projections, and he omitted features
that had no projections on the two planes that he had chosen.
This explains two stark properties of the shroud for which, as
far as I know, the believers have no explanation at all. It tells
why there are no images of the corpse's sides, and it tells why
the space between the two images -- which, according to a
believers' scenario, should have acquired an impression of the
top of the corpse's head -- is bare. For me, the naive geometry of
the images has always been conclusive. Readers who want to learn
about other impeachments of the shroud's authenticity will find
an abundant supply in Joe Nickell's book. I cannot even begin to
summarize them here, but I must mention the business of the
"bloodstains."

The shroud shows many red marks that represent blood from the
wounds that Jesus incurred, during a period of many hours, as He
was flogged, crowned with thorns, nailed to a cross, and stabbed
with a lance. And like the images of the corpse, these
"bloodstains" are much too good to be true. Nickell says:

"The `blood' stains on the shroud are suspiciously still red,
whereas aged blood turns black. In addition they are
`picturelike'. . . .  Other questions arise: How could some of
the `clots' or `flows' which had DRIED (for example, those on
the arms) have transferred to the cloth at all? As to blood
flowing onto the cloth after the body was supposedly wrapped. . .,
how could such WET blood have dried without causing the cloth
to adhere to the body? And if such blood had not dried, how could
it fail to smear when the body was removed?"

Among those "picturelike" stains, the ones that represent flows
from wounds induced by the crown of thorns are especially
notable. They depict blood arranged in rivulets, outside of
Jesus's hair, but real blood from scalp wounds does not flow in
that way; it spreads into the hair, sticking to it and matting
it. Various examinations of the shroud's "blood stains" have
failed to disclose corpuscles, hemoglobin or any other materials
that are specific to blood, but they have given evidence of
several substances that were used by medieval artists as
pigments.

The reason why the Corpus Christi church has a shrine devoted to
the shroud is that Father Peter M. Rinaldi was the church's
pastor from 1950 to 1977. Rinaldi was a believer if there ever
was one, and he wrote several books about the shroud.

Copies of his "I Saw the Holy Shroud" were displayed for sale in
the church's vestibule when Bob and I got there, and I bought
one.(3) The text -- credulous, sophistic and highly distortive --
includes a brief, sterilized version of the shroud's history and
some commensurately bogus invocations of science. As a whole, it
is comparable to a creationist pamphlet.

As Bob and I walked from the vestibule into the shrine, we met a
full-sized, fully colored statue of Jesus on His cross. It was
meant to be both clinical and horrific; the nearby placard said
the statue had been made by a devotee of the shroud and that it
reflected what the shroud told about Jesus's awful death.

The statue captivated me for several minutes -- not only because
it was wonderfully garish but also because it did indeed resonate
with the shroud. Jesus's body bore many spots and stripes of red
paint, representing blood from the lacerations inflicted when He
was flogged; and even though the flogging had been administered
well before the crucifixion, this blood was no different in color
from the fresh blood that was flowing from newer wounds. Nor had
the spots and stripes been smeared or smudged; nor had they been
blurred by the sweat that Jesus had shed during His considerable
exertions on the way to His execution. The artist who had painted
the statue had made errors like some of the ones that had been
made, 600 years earlier, by the artist who had painted the
shroud.

The shrine itself was rather dark and physically unimpressive.
Its principal resources comprised a reduced-scale photograph of
the shroud, some other pictures, and a number of explanatory
placards. The placards said outright that the shroud was the
true, miraculous shroud of Jesus, asked rhetorically what else it
could be, and told that scientists had affirmed that its
authenticity had resisted all scientific challenges.

The results of the radiocarbon dating of the shroud, along with
the announcement of those results by the archbishop of Turin,
have been reported widely and prominently by the popular media,
including the daily newspaper that serves Port Chester. And I am
sure that the current pastor of Corpus Christi -- even if he has
had no particular interest in the Shroud of Turin -- knows, even
now, that his shrine needs an overhauling. Just for fun, I intend
to visit the church again to see if any changes have been made.
I'll let you know what I find out.

REFERENCES:
1. R. Suro. 14 October 1988. "Church says shroud of Turin isn't
authentic" -- "New York Times".
2. J. Nickell. 1983. "Inquest on the Shroud of Turin". Prometheus
Books.
3. P.M. Rinaldi. 1983. "I Saw the Holy Shroud: A Study of the
Shroud of Christ". Don Bosco Publications, New Rochelle, NY.



"PSYCHIC" SYLVIA

Oh don't you love it! The "Psychic" in this headline is as it
appeared, complete with quotes, on the front page of the October
25th "San Jose Mercury News". The paper reports that the best-
known Bay Area psychic, Sylvia Brown, is accused of defrauding
lenders on loans in excess of $200,000. On top of that, or
perhaps because of it, she has filed for protection under the
bankruptcy laws.

Brown has hated BAS since it's inception. Mention Bay Area
Skeptics in general or Bob Steiner in particular, and you will
see one hot woman go off to New York. Now, despite this overt
hostility -- even though it may be tempting -- we don't crow about
Brown's misfortunes, or the possibility that she may be involved
in fraudulent activities, but we do crow that this newspaper
doesn't put any credence in her "psychic" profession, as
evidenced by the quotes.

In the article, with a very unflattering picture of her looking
every day of her 52 years, Brown allegedly is involved with her
Los Gatos real estate broker in falsifying loan documents. All
this is just part of the daily grind of airing the dirty laundry
of the celebrities. What makes this particular celebrity
noteworthy as far as we are concerned is her claim of psychic
powers.

Sylvia charges an average of $360 for a 40-minute psychic
consultation. She has founded a "church" ("Novus Spiritus") of
which she is the minister. Reverend Brown has done quite well for
herself with her psychic religion business. Much of her
consultation relates to business advice; word has it that her
mercantile counsel goes at considerably more than the regular fee
for the lovelorn and the lost. She became involved with her
broker in several ventures, and, if we can believe her side of
the story, he took her for a ride.

So why, of all people to get taken down the pike -- presuming her
story to be correct -- would it be super-psychic Sylvia Brown?
Shouldn't her spectacular precognitive and clairvoyant powers
have served her when she needed them most? What reassurance does
she have for her many disciples that her powers haven't taken
leave of her in wholesale fashion, which could very likely leave
them where she is? She despaired that she gave all her financial
dealings over to the broker, and SHE HAS NO IDEA WHAT HE DID
WITH ALL THE MONEY! She trusted him "like a brother."

"That's something that hurt me really bad," Brown said of her
dealings with him. "I'm not psychic about myself -- that's the
tragedy."

The real tragedy is the belief she has fostered in the public
that she is psychic about ANYTHING.



SUITLESS PSYCHIC

Skeptics' groups nationwide have had a rather nervous eye turned
to Hawaii this past year in a case involving parapsychologist
Gharith Pendragon, a part-time instructor of non-credit courses
at UH. Several skeptics have mailed in newspaper clippings about
the verdict, but these accounts mostly announce the CSICOP
victory without much background. The details of the case were
summarized by CSICOP Executive Director and Australian barrister
Mark Plummer in CSICOP's "Skeptical Briefs", official newsletter
of the national group. Parts of the following article are
something of a summary of Plummer's summary.

The whole flap began in 1986 when attention was brought to some
Hawaiian skeptics about course offerings by Pendragon at Windward
Community College, an adjunct of the University of Hawaii. The
classes were part of WCC's non-credit, extension division
program. The titles of the four courses were (1) Introduction to
Psychic Phenomena, (2) Mastering Clairvoyance, (3) Developing
Telepathy, and (4) Psychic Development. The course description of
#3 is particularly interesting: "Telepathy, mind to mind
communication, is a psychic trait that has been documented around
the world. It is also a talent and a skill that can be
deliberately enhanced by individuals. This course explores the
theories of why and how telepathy works, as well as various
meditations and techniques to increase telepathy."

Without doubt, all of us would like to see the world-wide
documentation unless it is, as we might expect, world-wide
anecdotes. The most impressive thing about Pendragon's telepathy
course would be that he explores the how's and why's of theories
for which we have looked in vain all these years to throw at the
wall. A theory can be dissected and tested; the statistics
parapsychology has given us cannot. Pendragon must be hiding
these theories even from his associate parapsychologists.

In July of 1986, a Hawaiian newspaper quoted Pendragon saying he
held a master's degree in psychology from USC and that he was a
"licensed clairvoyant and psychic." A search produced evidence
that Pendragon had no master's degree and that the only license
he had was an excise tax license; he later wrote a letter to the
paper admitting this.

The results of this inquiry, and the questionable academic nature
of his course offerings generated some letters from some
concerned U of H faculty and Hawaiian skeptics to the university
administration. Pendragon's annual contract was not renewed, so
he filed suit in Superior Court against CSICOP, Paul Kurtz, James
Randi, U of H, Hawaii Skeptics, and various individuals
associated with HS. He alleged that the activities of the
defendants resulted in the cancellation of his courses and he
sought redress for: 1. defamation, 2. interference with
contractual relations, 3. civil conspiracy to deprive him of his
civil rights, and 4. violations of his rights under the first and
fourteenth amendments of the Constitution. The plaintiff sought
injunctive relief against the University to be reinstated,
asserted that there was a conspiracy against him, claimed his
constitutional rights had been abrogated, and charged that the
defamation had financially harmed him.

In answer to the conspiracy allegations, the evidence showed that
the defendant's statements were public, that many of Pendragon's
own exhibits did not refer to him directly or indirectly, and
that CSICOP knew nothing about the whole affair until late
October 1986. Regarding Pendragon's rights, Judge Harold Fong
accepted as persuasive defendants' arguments that there is no
such thing as a constitutional right to teach a non-credit
course, and that the first amendment does not compel a university
to hire someone to teach parapsychology.

The defamation aspect turned on the legal definition. Was
Pendragon a "public figure"? The judge ruled that, for the
purposes of this case, Pendragon WAS a public figure insofar as
parapsychology was concerned; this by his own papers, as his
resume included radio and TV appearances, letters to newspapers
and the like. Law requires that defamation charges against a
public figure be backed by solid evidence that the defendants
"acted with actual malice, making statements knowing them to be
false or with reckless disregard of whether they are false or
not." Judge Fong found no evidence to this effect.

The question of defamation turned out to be the most significant
portion of the trial as far as Pendragon's case is concerned, and
for the wider issue of parapsychology in general. IF PENDRAGON
INDEED POSSESSED PSYCHIC POWERS, IT REMAINED TO HIM TO PROVE IT
BEFORE HE COULD ARGUE CONVINCINGLY THAT HE WAS DEFAMED BY SOMEONE
WHO ASSERTS HE HAS NO SUCH THING. Here would be his chance to
not only embarrass these nasty skeptics, but to have a courtroom
platform on which to do it while establishing the validity of
psychic phenomena. Imagine the humiliation Randi would have to
suffer by anteing-up his $10,000 prize from a courtroom
demonstration of psi in addition to the court judgments! The
defendants submitted a motion that Pendragon present such
evidence to the court to substantiate his public claims. The
court agreed, and a "discovery request" was served. Pendragon
refused to respond even on order of the court, and now the case
was turning black for him.

Fong found Pendragon's objections to the requests were without
merit and that the defendant's motions for sanctions against him
and his counsel were valid. Pendragon's pleading turned from bad
to non-existent to ludicrous when his wife-attorney argued that
the defendant's motions "sought to deprive him of his sixth
amendment right to confrontation and discover." Judge Fong
responded that "a reasonably competent attorney would know that
this sixth amendment right is limited to criminal cases."

The court ruled that the plaintiffs pay court costs and attorney
fees of the defendants, finding the lawsuit without merit and
frivolous.

While we are obviously pleased with the outcome, we must remember
that BAS is not an affiliate of CSICOP, and that no individual
has any express or implied authorization to speak for CSICOP or
BAS. There is of course a responsibility to address bizarre
claims carefully, but the chilling specter of litigation has
threatened to silence critics of the nonsense that rains upon us
daily. It is reassuring to know that sanity prevails in our court
system in light of some of the horror stories we hear to the
contrary. The victory is sweet, but we must be nonetheless
careful about libel issues.

We would very much like to ask Mr. Pendragon why he couldn't have
foreseen the outcome clairvoyantly so as to save his own time and
the money he now must pay for the legal expenses of those he
sued.



CORRECTION PLEASE

"BASIS" wishes to make several corrections relating to the article
we ran on the meeting review of Loyd Auerbach's presentation. That's
Loyd, with one "l." If we can't get the name right, is there any hope?
Also, Loyd heartily thanked us for the promotion we accorded him --
we like to take good care of our speakers -- but with commendable
honesty, he declined the Ph.D. we conferred upon him.

He says his publicist would like to know about the other book he
wrote; Loyd only knows of one himself. Maybe the other one we
credited him with was written out of body. We confused the subtitle
of his only book as being a separate book. That's what you get for
having such a lengthy title, Loyd. Auerbach also shrugged the status
of "professional magician" with which we graced him. We should have
said "professional-quality magician."

For more substantive matters of the article itself, (see the October
issue of "BASIS") Auerbach notes that "The panel of magicians at the
Parapsychological Association Convention in Boston in 1985 did NOT
conclude that magicians need to be present at all experiments. To the
contrary, it was noted at that and the previous panel (in 1983) that
in most of the experimental methodologies of today, computerized as
they are, a magician might be helpful during the design stage of the
experiment, but that there'd be little or nothing for him/her to look
for during the running of the experiment. In addition, it's almost
impossible for a scientist to determine that the magician he/she
consults is knowledgeable enough to really be of any help. Even a
magician can be fooled. [emphasis added].

Thanks, Dr. Hourback, for these corrections.  -- Ed.



EDITOR'S CORNER
by Kent Harker

The unflappable Dr. Duane Gish, fundamentalist and foremost
anti-evolution debater, was in San Jose for a three-day
conference on "Bible Science." His schedule was for the church:
no outside invitations and no planned debates.

I attended an informal Saturday morning breakfast fellowship
organized to enlighten Christians on how to debate evolutionists.

It was an interesting atmosphere: breaking the fast with early-
morning evangelists who had come to learn the fundamentals of
fundamentalist crusading against Darwinian devils. Little groups
collected here and there while the victuals were prepared. I
shuffled around and listened in on several of them; I am very
interested to see how they talked to themselves. Heads shook in
disgust and disbelief as they made comments about the absurdity
of evolutionary theory. Disbelief sometimes turned to a hearty
guffaw when someone tossed out some favorite creationist straw
man.

We enjoyed a respectable meal as discussion continued over the
table. I sat across from a young family and talked casually to
the woman. She related her trials in the public schools, assuring
me that she had been an excellent student until she got to
biology. "The teacher was totally closed-minded," she said. He,
according to her, would become very angry when she asked certain
questions -- questions that "he couldn't answer." I asked her what
some of them were, but she couldn't remember. She related how she
finally got herself out of that den of humanist snakes and
enrolled in a good Christian school where they taught the truth.

"I just couldn't buy all that junk about the dinosaurs being a
million years old," she said. "Why, I would not even let my son
play with dinosaur models until I found out the truth: that they
were all drowned by the Flood!"

I wondered if I tipped my hand when I told her the dratted
evolutionists say they are some 65 million years old. When she
didn't flinch, I guess there isn't much difference between one
million and sixty-five million if one believes the universe is
only 6,000 years old.

After the small talk and some plate clearing, the Pastor
introduced "the man called by God to do the most important work
in our age, Dr. Duane Gish, of the Institute for Creation
Research." Gish's physical stature and appearance do not measure
up to his renown.

"Should we defend Christianity through material evidence?" he
began. "Some Christians object to mixing science and theology,
faith and reason. Our mission at the ICR is to turn people to the
Bible and the Lord," he pronounced.

What? The ICR tells the PUBLIC that its purpose is academic
freedom -- equal time for alternative viewpoints. The
fundamentalists have assured us all along that they are only
concerned about science - that religion has nothing to do with
it. This testimony went all the way to the Supreme Court as their
position. Maybe Exodus 20:15 doesn't cut much when it comes to
presenting the "Lord's side."

"The debate format is one of the most effective tools of
evangelism we have," he continued. "People come from all over.
Every time we stage a debate, the rooms are filled to the walls,
and there are many testimonies of those who have gone on to
accept Christ. The only disadvantage is that we have to share the
podium with the evolutionists!"

This is the unvarnished reality. Debates give a platform to the
creationists on two false premises: 1) the format is to discuss
creation vs. evolution, and 2) that science is the only concern.
The format is laid out and orchestrated entirely by the promoters
of the debates, the creationists. THEY organize the debates,
set the agenda, invite the people, etc. It is in their control
and according to their plan. The topic will be evolution, period.
There will be no talk of creationism. Part two is a joke. Science
is complex. A real discussion of evolution would require that one
have a sound working knowledge of physics, chemistry, biology,
geology, paleontology and taxonomy. How does this fit the average
person? The debate is a stage on which creationists can perform.

The legitimate scientist walking into this forensic booby trap is
grist for the mill. There is no time to even scratch the surface
of important research and developments. The tactic of the
creationists is very effective: Put the hapless opponent on the
defensive and he or she will waste the whole time trying to dig
him or herself out of the hole prepared by the organizers. And
lose we do. Most of the early debates have been badly lost to
creationists, which gives them trophys to place on their shelves.
Gish proclaimed that "the truth always wins, and the people can
see that!" Anyone who has ever been on a debate team can attest
to the reality: truth has precious little to do with the debate
and everything to do with tactics and forensic skill.

Gish unrolled the basic plan to his breakfast audience. First, it
must be simple. (Here he demonstrates his debating skill. Some of
his hapless opponents have hamstrung themselves with the
complexities of micro and molecular biology, physics,
paleontology, etc.) Second, (of course he did not DIRECTLY say
what I am about to say, but it is nevertheless an essential
ingredient of creationist success): construct some giant straw
men and then pull out the matches. Here is Gish's formula for a
creationist debate success, straight from the horses mouth: "We
must attack from four points: 1) Probability, 2) The fossil
record, 3) Thermodynamics, and 4) Metamorphosis of the
butterfly."

Number one is a wonderful straw man. It relies on the false
premise that all the appropriate modifiers of chance, viz.
"pure," "blind," "nothing but," etc. depict an accurate mechanism
for evolutionary function. Of course life is unthinkable if
chance is the ONLY feature, and herein lies the popular appeal.
But no evolutionary theory offers chance as the ONLY mechanism.
Some of the newest research (in the latest issue of "Nature", a
Harvard team reports that certain one-celled bacteria begin
mutating very rapidly when subjected to lethal environments)
suggests that mutation, for example, may be built into the
genetic structure; i.e., randomness may not even be the only way
for mutation to occur.

Number two is a powerful approach. The public is, for all
practical purposes, totally ignorant of the fossil record and the
geologic column. There are, to be sure, "gaps" in the historic
record. When one thinks about it for a minute, it is a remarkable
event when anything fossilizes. Because it is an extreme rarity,
there are gaps all over the place; also, what is considered a gap
is very subjective. The overall picture is a simple-to-complex
one, with eras that are presently silent. But to argue that
current silence is proof of nonexistence is specious in the
extreme, especially since creationists conveniently side step the
lines in which there are tightly linked "intermediaries," of
which the genus Homo is an example.

Number three is a creationist mainstay because it has such strong
emotional appeal, and a good debater knows that emotion is the
way to win a debate. Swing low and the audience will swing with
you. Throw in an absurd metaphor or analogy, and they'll be
eating out of your hand, metaphors like a wind sweeping through a
junk yard to produce a 747. A moron knows this can't happen no
matter how much time is allowed, and of course even the simplest
life is much more complex than a 747.

The second law of thermodynamics says, in an overly-simplistic
way, that things cannot normally proceed from simple to complex.
This argument is closely related to number one, because it
assumes that chance is the ONLY factor involved.

Creationist would have their listeners believe that scientists
world wide have suffered the same, fundamental mental lapse: they
all forgot one of the basic laws (the 2nd law of thermodynamics)
of physics.

Item number four is a new trick. Again, the appeal is the
simplicity of the approach. This tactic says, "if your theory is
correct, it must explain every single thing right now. If I am
able to find a single, unexplained datum, your theory does not
cover it now and will not ever be able to cover it, and it cannot
be modified in any way by newer information to explain this
datum. This caricature of science is standard fare with
creationists. Since they are ruled by absolutes themselves, they
think science must work in a pool of absolutes. At the base of
number four is a false dichotomy: if you cannot explain this it
was a miracle. Creationists are masters of the false dichotomy --
it is their staff of debate life.

All of this is tactics, the stuff of debate. What to do? there is
a sort of damned-if-you-do and damned-if-you-don't dilemma here.
If the evolutionary side refuses to debate because we know it is
not a format to produce enlightenment, the creationists win by
default, so there is no alternative: debate we must. But those
who accept debate must come to the podium with a firm grasp of
the reality: it is a forensic spectacle, not an exercise in
elucidation. All the stuff of modern science -- theories,
evidence, scientific methodology, etc. -- is not at all the issue.
Since creationists set the agenda -- they require their opponents
sign statements about the format -- the event is in their control.
Control must be wrested from them on the stage by requiring them
to answer the most basic questions about the absurdity of their
position: a 6,000-year-old universe, a world-wide flood that is
the cause of the geologic column, and the fact that they are in
disagreement not only with evolutionary biology, but in direct
conflict with physics, astronomy, chemistry, anthropology,
taxonomy, paleontology, and just about every other branch of the
physical, social and life sciences. Another essential is
preparation: the evolutionary side must know the creationist
position inside out. (In some early debates, the evolutionists
knew little to nothing about creationist positions, again showing
the naivete of some responding to the challenge.)

Until we begin to meet creationists at their own level, we will
continue to lose debates and we will continue to help them
further their fundamentalist religious evangelism.



THERE'S PROGRESS

The "San Jose Mercury", a nationally recognized newspaper, is one
of only seven major papers that publishes a disclaimer with its
syndicated astrology column. Under the aegis of CSICOP, some 24
Nobel laureates signed a statement about three years ago to the
effect that there is no scientific basis for the ancient craft.
This declaration was then circulated to the big publishers with a
request that they append a disclaimer to their horoscope columns.

The "Mercury" took the declaration even more seriously than
CSICOP had hoped and moved Omar's daily spiel next to the comic
page, adding the CSICOP disclaimer. On October 8 of this year the
editors did themselves one better: they moved the blasted thing
right ONTO the comics page. Larson's popular "The Far Side"
replaced the horoscope with this note under the cartoon: "The
Horoscope has moved to the comics page."

One mustn't look for punishment when there is victory, but the
only negative might be that the horoscope is now right next to
the crossword puzzle, a situation that might stoke up the
wordsmith aficionados to snip off the intruding drivel so as
not to be distracted from the serious business of what is a
morning ritual pleasure for them.

We ought all to write to the editors to salute this brave move
because they are likely to be set back some with subscription
cancellations from the many astrology junkies.

But hold on to your horses. Just when we are patting ourselves on
the back for the part we had in this minuscule victory, "BASIS"
received a call from skeptic Richard Cleverly who sent us a copy
of the "Psychic Reader", a Berkeley publication that we (and many
serious parapsychologists) would consider the "Enquirer" of
parapsychology. Richard notes, to our grand dismay, that the
"Reader" boasts over 65,000 subscribers. "BASIS" has one of the
larger subscription bases of local groups and we are under 400.
Ugh.

This demoralizing information was darkened further by a recent
CBS poll about the state of science education in America. Fully
one fourth of those surveyed did not know the earth orbited the
sun. Ten percent of those vaguely aware of the heliocentric
reality believed that earth's orbit is completed in a 24-hour
period.

Is it any wonder the public is fair game for anything that drops
into the vacuum? Progress is going to be slow, but we may take
some minor comfort that, as far as astrology goes, there are
seven less newspapers pandering astrobabble than before.



BAS IS ONLINE

Bay Area Skeptics has fully entered the electronic age. Most of
the publication of "BASIS" is done by computer as is the
submission of most material. In our efforts to expand the
communication and offer rapid exchange, BAS Secretary Rick Moen
has, with the help of Director Yves Barbero (and some money from
BAS chairman Larry Loebig and others), put together a Bulletin
Board System (BBS). Rick is the computer expert, and Yves is the
scrounging expert. For very little out-of-pocket expense and a
great deal of time and effort, they have assembled a crackerjack
system running at 300/1200 baud (N81) for all you computer nuts
out there. Moen is the systems operator - SysOp in the parlance.

With the cost of communication hardware so low - inexpensive
modems are well under $100 and the software to run them is in the
public domain (free) - you should expand the utility of your own
system by adding a modem. The information available at the
keyboard with the modem is phenomenal and a source of real
enjoyment.

To contact the BAS BBS, have your computer phone [phone].
You can leave private messages or air your latest challenge to
all the callers. If you have articles you would like have
considered for publication, upload them with reference to the
editor. We welcome criticism and suggestions. Ring us up and keep
up with the very latest.

                             -----

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, 1988 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) 1988 BAY AREA SKEPTICS.  Reprints must credit "BASIS,
newsletter of the Bay Area Skeptics, 4030 Moraga, San Francisco,
CA 94122-3928."

                             -END-