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CSI’s Balles Prize Go es to New Yorker Staff Writer an d Au th o r Mich ael Sp ecter

The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry ference, available online at www.ted.com/ (CSI) has awarded its Robert P. Balles talks/michael_specter_the_danger_of_ Annual Prize in Critical Thinking for science_denial.html. 2009 to Michael Specter for his book The Robert P. Balles Annual Prize in Denialism: How Irrational Thinking Hin - Critical Thinking is a $1,300 award given ders Scien tific Progress, Harms the Planet, to the author of the published work that and Threat ens Our Lives, published in best exemplifies healthy skepticism, logi- Octo ber 2009 by The Penguin Press. cal analysis, or empirical science. Each Michael Specter has been a staff year, CSI selects the paper, article, book, writer at The New Yorker since 1998, or other publication that has the greatest where he covers science, technology, and potential to create positive reader aware- public health issues. His bio shows his ness of important scientific issues. bona fides as both a foreign correspon- CSI established the criteria for the dent and a medical/science writer. prize, including use of the most parsi- Specter came to The New Yorker from The New York Times, where he had been monious theory to fit data or to explain a roving foreign correspondent based in apparently preternatural phenomena. Rome. From 1995 to 1998, Specter ser- Michael Specter This prize has been established through ved as the Times Moscow bureau chief. genetically engineered foods, synthetic the generosity of Robert P. Balles, an asso- He came to the Times from The Wash - biology, , and health care. ciate member of CSI, and the Robert ington Post, where, from 1985 to 1991, Specter argues that this fear has real P. Balles Endowed Memorial Fund, a he covered local news before becoming consequences and will lead to future dis- per manent endowment fund for the the Post’s national science reporter and, asters when scientific progress declines benefit of CSI. later, the newspaper’s New York bureau and the world is not capable of feeding This is the fifth year the Robert P. chief. In 1996 he won the Overseas its growing population, diseases that Balles prize has been presented. Previous Press Club’s Citation for Excel lence for could be eradicated infect millions of winners of this award are: his reporting from Chechnya. He has people, and global warming threatens our very survival as a species. 2008: Leonard Mlodinow for his twice received the Global Health Coun- book The Drunkard’s Walk: How Ran - In a paragraph sure to sound familiar cil’s annual Excellence in Media Award, domness Rules our Lives, published in first for his 2001 article about AIDS, to skeptics, Specter offers some thoughts 2008 by Pantheon “India’s Plague,” and second for his on how to combat the rising tide of denialism. He writes: 2007: Natalie Angier, New York Times 2004 article “The Devastation,” about science writer and author of the book the ethics of testing HIV vaccines in To accomplish any of this we will The Canon: A Whirligig Tour of the Africa. He also received the 2002 AAAS have to recognize denialism when we Beautiful Basics of Science Science Journalism Award for his article see it. As a society and as individuals, that means asking tough, skeptical 2006: Ben Goldacre for his weekly “Rethinking the Brain,” about the scien- questions, then de manding answers column “Bad Science,” published in tific basis of how we learn. supported by compelling evidence. The Guardian newspaper (U.K.) In Denialism, Specter discusses the When the government, a company, or 2005: Shared by Andrew Skolnick, any other group makes a claim, we contradictory beliefs held by large seg- Ray Hyman, and Joe Nickell for their need to scrutinize the claim with care ments of the population concerning sci- series of articles in the SKEPTICAL but without passion. Most impor- ence. For while there is no question as to tantly, we must learn to accept data INQUIRER on “Testing ‘The Girl with the benefits science has brought to the that has been properly judged and X-Ray Eyes’” verified—no matter what it says, or world in terms of health, life expectancy, Nominations are now being accepted food production, wealth, and standards how much we might have wished that it pointed in another direction. for 2010. Please send submissions to: of living, there is a fear of science and scientific progress. Specter points to this The SKEPTICAL INQUIRER highly rec- Barry Karr, Executive Director, CSI fear and efforts to impede science exem- ommends a presentation Michael Spec ter PO Box 703 plified in such areas as vaccinations, gave at the February 2010 TED Con - Amherst, NY 14226-0703

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Investigations Exonerate Climate Research Unit from Britain, the U.S., and Switzerland. of Scientific Misconduct The panel examined the unit’s published peer-reviewed research from the past Is this the beginning of the end—or at November 2009 after more than a thou- twenty years and interviewed key staff. least the end of the beginning—of the sand e-mails and 3,000 other documents Here is the international panel’s “Climategate” phase of the great Cli- hacked from the university’s server were number one conclusion: “We saw no mate Wars? We’ll see, but climate con- disclosed by climate-science critics, with evidence of any deliberate scientific mal- trarians’ widely publicized accusations subsequent accusations of scientific mis- practice in any of the work of the about a noted British climate research conduct. CRU maintains one of the three Climatic Research Unit, and had it been unit’s alleged misconduct have now main international climate datasets. (The there we believe that it is likely that we been examined and, largely, rebuked. other two are at the National Oceanic and would have detected it. Rather we found Two independent investigations in Atmospheric Administration’s National a small group of dedicated if slightly dis- Britain into critics’ charges that climate Climatic Data Center in North Carolina organised researchers who were ill-pre- scientists at East Anglia University’s Cli - and NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space pared for being the focus of public matic Research Unit (CRU) mishandled Studies in New York.) attention. As with many small research climate data and engaged in scientific On April 12, 2010, an eight-page groups their internal procedures were misconduct have been completed. They report of the international panel set up rather informal.” found that while the unit’s record-keeping by the university in consultation with The panel mildly criticized the CRU practices could have been better, the most the Royal Society to examine the integ- for not involving more professional sta- serious accusations against CRU and cli- rity of CRU’s research was issued. The tisticians in its work and for not collab- matologist Phil Jones, its director, are seven-member panel was chaired by the orating more with a much wider scien- unfounded. eminent British geology professor and tific group. The unit was at the center of the con- Royal Society fellow Ron Oxburgh It also said CRU “accepts with hind- troversy that first broke out in late (Lord Oxburgh) and included scientists sight” that they should have devoted

Penn State Panel Finds mal charges, the panel assembled from The fourth allegation, that Mann devi- ‘No Credible Evidence’ for the morass of accusatory messages four ated from accepted research practices, was synthesized allegations to examine. referred to a committee of faculty scien- Three Allegations against That panel issued its report Febru ary tists, with a report due June 3. See Chris Michael Mann 3, 2010. It cleared Mann of three of the Mooney’s Point of Inquiry podcast inter- four allegations. view with Michael Mann at www.pointof The same November day in 2009 that “After careful consideration of the evi- inquiry.org/Michael_mann_unprecedente hacked e-mails about climate science dence and relevant materials,” the inquiry d_attacks_on_climate_research/ from East Anglia University were dis- committee reported it found that: closed, Pennsylvania State Uni versity NOAA Says March Was began getting a barrage of e-mails and There exists no credible evidence that Dr. Mann had or has ever engaged in, Warmest on Record phone calls (and later letters) about or participated in, directly or indi- Meteorology Depart ment professor and rectly, any actions with an intent to The National Oceanic and Atmos pheric climate expert Michael E. Mann. The suppress or to falsify data. ... Administration reported on April 15 that messages accused Mann of manipulating There exists no credible evidence the world’s combined global land and data, destroying records, and colluding that Dr. Mann had ever en gaged in, or participated in, di rectly or indirectly, any ocean surface temperature “made last to hamper scientific discourse about actions with intent to delete, conceal, or month the warmest March on record.” global warming. Many of the complaint otherwise destroy emails, information, This is from the monthly NOAA messages were very similar in content, and/or data. ... National Climatic Center Analysis, based and most were from outside the univer- There exists no credible evidence on new global data and records going back sity, but the university decided the mat- that Dr. Mann had ever en gaged in, or to 1880. “Taken separately, average ocean participated in, di rectly or indirectly, ter should be officially examined. It con- any misuse of privileged or confiden- temperatures were the warmest for any vened an investigative panel of top uni- tial information available to him in his March, and the global land surface was the versity officials. Since there were no for- capacity as an academic scholar. fourth warmest for any March on record.

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more attention in the past to archiving ticular agenda. Their sole aim was to mate Data from the Climatic Research data and algorithms and recording exactly establish as robust a record of temper- Unit at the University of East Anglia.” what they did. atures in recent centuries as possible. The report notes that critics had All of the published work was accom- Said the panel: “We are satisfied that panied by detailed descriptions of asserted on Web sites and in submissions the CRU tree-ring work has been carried uncertainties and accompanied by to the committee that the e-mails showed out with integrity, and that allegations of appropriate caveats. The same was true a deliberate and systematic attempt by deliberate misrepresentation and unjusti- in face to face discussions. ... leading climate scientists to manipulate fied selection of data are not valid.” We believe that CRU did a public climate data, arbitrarily adjusting and It reviewed the external criticisms in service of great value by carrying out much time-consuming meticulous “cherry-picking” data that supported detail: “It seems that some of these crit- work on temperature records at a time their global warming claims and deleting icisms show a rather selective and un - when it was unfashionable and adverse data that questioned them. charitable approach to information attracted the interest of a rather small The Parliament science committee made available by CRU. ... Although section of the scientific community. investigation focused on key issues sur- we deplore the tone of much of the crit- The university issued a statement rounding these claims, including the icism, we believe that this questioning of April 15 saying it “welcomed the report accuracy and availability of CRU’s cli- the methods and data used in den- by the Lord Oxburgh’s Independent mate data, datasets, and computer pro- drochronological records will ultimately Panel, both in respect of the Climate gramming, and the question of access or have a beneficial effect and improve Research Unit being cleared of any sci- withholding of access. working practices.” entific impropriety and dishonesty, and Here are excerpts from the Parlia- The panel even had some praise for the suggestions made for improvement ment committee’s report: CRU’s work: in some other areas.” In detailed discussion with the re - Earlier, on March 31, the House of We believe that the focus on CRU and searchers, we found them to be objec- Professor Phil Jones, Director of tive and dispassionate in their view of Com mons Science and Technology com- CRU, in particular, has largely been the data and their results, and there mittee published its fifty-eight-page misplaced. Whilst we are concerned was no hint of tailoring results to a par- investigation, “The Disclosure of Cli - that the disclosed e-mails suggest a

Additionally, the planet has seen the An editorial in the same issue also and the Inter governmental Panel on fourth warmest January–March period on warned that the debate over global warm- Cli mate Change (IPCC, 2007) that record.” ing has become dangerously divided. glo bal climate has warmed and that human activities (mainly greenhouse- “The debate has become polarized,” gas emissions) ac count for most of the 255 NAS Members Decry warned the editorial, and as a result “the warming since the middle 1900s. If ‘Political Assaults’ on scientific enterprise and the whole of current trends continue, the projected society are in danger of losing their cru- increase in global temperature by the Climate Science cial rational relationship.” end of the twenty-first century will result in large impacts on humans and A strongly worded letter from 255 mem- other species. Ad dressing the challenges bers of the National Academy of Sciences Geologists’ Climate posed by climate change will require a condemning “political assaults” on cli- Change Statement combination of adaptation to the mate researchers was published in the changes that are likely to occur and May 7 Science. In other news related to the climate con- global reductions of CO2 emissions “We are deeply disturbed by the re cent troversy, the 22,000-member Geological from anthropogenic sources. escalation of political assaults on scientists Society of America issued a revised position The three-page single-spaced state- in general and on climate scientists in par- statement on climate change in April 2010. ment, a revision of a 2006 statement, ticular,” they said in their letter. “We call Here is its opening paragraph: goes on to summarize the “strengthened for an end to McCarthy-like threats of Decades of scientific research have basis for the conclusion that humans are criminal prosecution against our col- shown that climate can change from a major factor” and the “large effects” on leagues based on innuendo and guilt by both natural and anthropogenic causes. humans and ecosystems if greenhouse association, the harassment of scientists by The Geo logical Society of America gases reach projected levels. It also offers politicians seeking distractions to avoid (GSA) concurs with assessments by the information for policy decisions for taking action, and the outright lies being National Academies of Science (2005), guiding mitigation and adaptation (see spread about them.” the National Re search Council (2006), www.geosociety.org).

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blunt refusal to share scientific data criticised for making informal com- ble thirty-year fight over climate sci- and methodologies with others, we ments on academic papers. ence up through the summer of 2009, can sympathise with Professor Jones, shortly before the hacked e-mails epi- who must have found it frustrating to The Parliament committee did fault handle requests for data that he “the culture at CRU of resisting disclo- sode began. Schneider told SI: What the over-hyped so-called ‘Cli - knew—or perceived—were moti- sure of information to climate skeptics.” mate Gate’ e-mails revealed is that vated by a desire simply to un der - It said the “failure of UEA to grasp fully mine his work. some scientists are also human— In the context of the sharing of the potential range of damage to CRU especially if under constant attack data and methodologies, we consider and UEA by the non-disclosure of Free - from those they did not believe to be that Professor Jones’s actions were in dom of Information requests was regret- seriously interested in complex sound line with common practice in the cli- table.” It urged the unit and the scientific science. They get testy, try to keep mate science community. It is not community to take steps “to ensure who they think are not serious away standard practice in climate science to from them, and say some stuff—in publish the raw data and the com- greater transparency.” private—they (like nearly all of us do puter code in academic papers. How - “Within our limited inquiry and the with friends in private) would never ever, climate science is a matter of evidence we took, the scientific reputa- say in public nor would we act on it great importance and the quality of tion of Professor Jones and CRU the science should be irreproachable. from our private frustrated rantings. If We therefore consider that climate remains intact. We have found no reason those who attacked these half dozen scientists should take steps to make in this unfortunate episode to challenge mainstream scientists were truly not available all the data that support the scientific consensus as ex pressed by mega-hypocrites, they’d voluntarily re- their work (including raw data) and Professor [John] Bedding ton [Govern - lease all their past ten years of back and full methodological workings ment Chief Science Advisor] that ‘global forth e-mails. I virtually promise you (including the computer codes). warming is happening [and] that it is it would be mega more conspiratorial Had both been available, many of among the critics of UEA than any- the problems at UEA could have induced by human activity.’” thing between Mann and Jones et al. been avoided. . . . Still another independent investiga- In addition, insofar as we have tion was carried out by Associated Press Both the independent panel report been able to consider accusations of (AP) reporters Seth Borenstein, Raphael and the House of Commons science dishonesty—for example, Professor Satter, and Malcolm Ritter. They and com mittee report are available in full on Jones’s alleged attempt to “hide the two other reporters examined 1,073 of the Web. decline”—we consider that there is no case to answer. . . . the e-mails stolen from climate scientists Together with the earlier exoneration and posted online. AP distributed the of Pennsylvania State University clima- Critics of CRU have suggested tologist Michael E. Mann of similar that Professor Jones’s use of the results of their “exhaustive” investigation words “hide the decline” is evidence last December 12. They found pettiness, complaints against him (see sidebar, p. that he was part of a conspiracy to especially in the climate scientists’ dis- 6), the so-called Climategate hacked e- hide evidence that did not fit his dainful attitudes toward critics, but no mail episode now seems to have been re- view that recent global warming is fraud. “The messages don’t support solved—overwhelmingly in favor of the predominantly caused by human climate scientists. The contrarians’ most activity. That he has published claims that the science of global warm- papers—including a paper in ing was faked,” the AP re ported. “The serious accusations have been subjected Nature—dealing with this aspect of exchanges don’t undercut the vast body to four investigations and found invalid the science clearly refutes this allega- of evidence showing the world is warm- in each case. tion. In our view, it was shorthand ing because of man-made greenhouse for the practice of discarding data —Kendrick Frazier known to be erroneous. . . . gas emissions.” “The reason that these UEA scientists Kendrick Frazier is editor of the Critics of CRU have suggested were ‘exonerated’ by four independent SKEPTICAL INQUIRER. He first began cov- that Professor Jones’s use of the word ering climate research in the 1970s as “trick” is evidence that he was part of investigations so far of scientific misdo- a conspiracy to hide evidence. . . . ings is they didn’t actually do any of it— earth sciences editor, and then editor, of The balance of evidence patently threatened sometimes, but never did it,” Science News. fails to support this view. It appears noted Stanford climatologist Stephen H. to be a colloquialism for a “neat” method of handling data. . . . Schneider told the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER. Schneider is a veteran of the climate The evidence that we have seen See Climate Wars wars. His new book Science as a Contact does not suggest that Professor Jones Follow-Up, p. 50 was trying to subvert the peer review Sport (National Geographic Society, process. Academics should not be 2009) chronicles the rough-and-tum-

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£20, 000. But he is the undisputed hero Simon Singh Wins Suit of two groups of people: the campaign- as British Chiropractors Cave In ers for free speech who will use this vic- tory as a stepping stone toward their I recently reported on the libel action Singh’s words, the judges had ruled in goal of changing English libel law and brought by the British Chiropractic favor of Singh. Thus, the BCA had the the skeptics who will use this case as a Asso ciation (BCA) against writer Simon choice of either giving up or publicly dis- spark to ignite a much larger fire to Singh for disclosing that some of their cussing their nonsensical, some would threaten the bogus claims of quacks therapeutic claims were “bogus” (Com- argue dangerous, claims. They have cho- around the world. mentary, “Keep Libel Out of Science,” sen the former, presumably to prevent SI, May/June 2010). On April 15, further damage to the already badly —Edzard Ernst 2010, the BCA announced that they tarnished image of chiropractic worldwide. Edzard Ernst, MD, PhD, is at Peninsula would abandon their legal action. Even though he has won this case, Medical School, Universities of Exeter and In the appeal about the meaning of Singh is still likely to lose around Plymouth, U.K.

ET (Commission), Go Home The RMPRS has monitored Peck- man’s projects for years. Members Bryan The U.S. government has once again group recreated the film in five hours Bonner and Matthew Baxter recently been accused of suppressing proof of with a camera and an alien prop. formed the Mission for Inhi biting the existence of UFOs and aliens, but Romanek and Peckman report that Bureauc racy (MIB), now a registered this time one city is taking the conspir- they have received messages from aliens political committee against Peckman’s acy theorists too seriously. and have captured additional photo - A proposal to create an Extrater- graphs and footage of aliens and UFOs. commission. As official op ponents, the restrial Affairs Commission in , Furthermore, they claim that there are MIB command equal media time to chal- Colorado, will go before voters at an fifty-seven species of extraterrestrials lenge Peckman’s claims with critical election in August this year. Instigated and that there have been 4,000 land- thinking. The group has already exposed by Jeff Peckman, the “Welcome to ings on Earth. some damning facts. Billy Meier, one of Earth” campaign aims to establish a This is not the first time Peckman Peckman’s cohorts, claims that he time- committee to investigate alleged gov- has attempted to foist frivolous ballots traveled with alien guides and took pho- ernment cover-ups of alien abductions on the city. In 2003, for example, he tographs of what he saw. The MIB’s and encounters and to explore extrater- attempted to instigate the “Safety thorough research revealed that this “evi- restrial energy sources and cancer-cur- Through Peace” ballot initiative. This dence” comes from a picture book, not ing technology. failed initiative aimed to reduce crime another planet. Additional images of This seems like a spoof of the Search by reducing stress in Denver, forcing “alien women” really did go back in time for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). residents to “have a nice day” by way of However, SETI aims to “explore, under- music piped through public ... to a 1960s performance on the TV stand and explain the origin, nature and transportation and and program The Dean Martin Variety Show. prevalence of life in the universe,” while classes for residents. The sobering news is that as a non- Peckman’s scheme plans to “prove” the This latest proposal received the partisan measure on the ballot, Peck - existence of spaceships and little green 4,000 signatures required to appear on man’s proposal will cost the city men and to take them to our leader. the ballot, but an additional 6,000 were $100,000. If successful, The Denver The impetus for the proposal was an invalidated. There are claims that these Extraterrestrial Affairs Commission alien “Peeping Tom” captured on film by signatures were falsified, and one won- will cost tens of thousands of dollars a man named Stan Romanek in Ne - ders if any signatories were of the same every year—not to mention the cost to braska in 2003. He claims he filmed an mindset as those who jokingly listed Denver’s reputation. alien visitor, but he didn’t release this “Jedi” as their religion on census forms. incredible footage until 2008. Romanek Peckman labels his initiative a “pub- —Karen Stollznow maintains that NASA cannot explain his lic safety ordinance,” and while ludi- film, but the Rocky Mountain Paranor - crous, the petition may appeal to con- Karen Stollznow has a PhD in linguistics mal Research Society (RMPRS) can. spiracy theorists or pass by default if and is a host of the Center for Inquiry’s Suspecting a hoax, this local skeptical skeptical voters are apathetic. Point of Inquiry podcast.

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Texting While Dead In the second case, soon after his Viking being buried with his sword). As wife’s death, a man received calls on his the text messages were received over a In view of the massive evidence suppos- cell phone that were listed as coming edly compiled over three decades ago for period of five years, Cooper notes that the from his home phone when no one was phone calls and radio messages from the battery on the wife’s cell phone would dead, it is perplexing (indeed astounding) there. Then his daughter (who had have died well before many of the text that there has been little in the way of moved away) received text messages that messages were sent (but, one hopes, not claimed e-mails or faxes from the dead. used words and phrases frequently used before her pacemaker gave out, assuming by her mother, which both father and Now that silence has been broken. In she revived in her coffin). Unfortunately, daughter interpreted as messages from the January 2010 issue of Paranormal Cooper does not provide us with the con- the dead woman. These text messages Review (53: 10–12), Robert Callum E. tent of these received messages. One can Cooper presents a review of recently did not display an originating number, only presume that they were something received text messages from the dead. which is unusual, and based on Cooper’s along the lines of “WTF?” In the first case he presents, a family interview with a mobile phone represen- was besieged by text messages from a pre- tative, the cell phone would be almost —Douglas M. Stokes sumed poltergeist. The calls were listed as impossible to hack without access to the coming from the cell phones of family phone system’s major programs. Douglas M. Stokes is author of The members, even when the phones in ques- Interestingly, the deceased wife had Conscious Mind and the Material World tion were dismantled and the batteries and been buried with her cell phone (appar- and is a frequent contributor to the para- SIM cards removed. ently the modern day equivalent of a psychological literature.

House of Commons Reports Homeopathy a Placebo, Urges No Further Funding

The House of Commons Science and “Even if water could retain a memory of Research Technology Committee has published a previously dissolved substances, we know The committee considered the frequently landmark Evidence Check report exam- of no explanation for why the sugar-based voiced notion that more re search into ining the United Kingdom govern- homeopathic pills routinely dispensed homeopathy is required in order to ment’s policy on homeopathy (www.pu would retain such memory.” resolve open questions. The MPs strongly blications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/ opposed this view: “There is enough test- cmselect/cmsctech/45/45.pdf). The re - Clinical Efficacy ing of homeopathy and plenty of evi- port, published Febru ary 22, 2010, was The committee considered clinical trials dence showing that it is not efficacious based on sixty submissions of written evi- and systematic reviews and meta-analy- ... we cannot see how further research on dence and several oral hearings. Here I will ses of clinical trials to evaluate the effi- the efficacy of homeopathy is justi- focus on what the report says about the cacy of homeopathic remedies. It con- evidence base of homeopathic products. cluded that “the systematic reviews and fied. ... It is also unethical to enter meta-analyses conclusively demonstrate patients into trials to answer questions Plausibility that homeopathic products perform no that have been settled already.” The committee expressed considerable better than placebos.” Patient Choice doubt about the validity of the “like cures This conclusion was in sharp contrast like” principle, one of the fundamental to those of some of the submissions the The committee also addressed questions assumptions of homeopathy: “the princi- committee received. But the MPs issued of placebo response, patient satisfaction, ple of like-cures-like . . . fails to provide a the following statement about these and patient choice vis-à-vis evidence credible physiological mode of action for experts: “We regret that advocates of demonstrating that homeopathy can be homeopathic products.” The second homeopathy, including in their submis- associated with large placebo effects, assumption of homeopathy, that diluting sions to our inquiry, choose to rely on, which in turn can lead to patient satisfac- remedies renders them not weaker but and promulgate, selective approaches to tion and patients wanting homeopathic stronger, was considered “scientifically the treatment of the evidence base as this treatment. The MPs stated: “For patient implausible” by the committee. The risks confusing or misleading the public, choice to be real choice, patients must be Mem bers of Parliament (MPs) added: the media and policy makers.” adequately informed. ... This would cer-

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tainly require an explanation that home- Comment be reimbursed with public funds. opathy is a placebo. When this is not This report considered relevant evidence I know of no other official report that is of similar rigor, clarity, and rationality. done, choice is meaningless. When it is from both opponents and proponents of One can only hope that decision makers done, the effectiveness of the placebo— homeopathy. It is a careful and thought- in other countries will study it carefully that is, homeopathy—may be diminished. ful consideration of all the arguments and and produce equally well-reasoned re- We argue that the provision of homeopa- counterarguments. In the end, the MPs ports that eventually translate into evi- thy on the NHS, in effect, diminishes, not concluded that homeopathic remedies dence-based policy. increases, informed patient choice.” are placebos and that placebos should not —Edzard Ernst

Fraud Watch: David Morton is simply a fraud—and a tions arise: Why are people so gullible Psychic Investing really, really bad psychic.” that they believe such claims? Why did In the article, headlined “For Psychic, people believe his claims that he learned It is hard to avoid reading about people Suit Came as Surprise,” de la Merced to use “a fusion of Eastern harmed by , apparently reported that the fake psychic swindled and Western psychic techniques” in even in the business section of the news- over $6 million by promising investors Nepal? And why was he allowed to make paper. On March 5, 2010, The New York “‘piles of money,’ along with spiritual such absurd claims to the public for so Times’s Michael J. de la Merced began an happiness.” Morton apparently claimed many years? to have predicted all the high and low article this way: “He calls himself —Jay M. Pasachoff ‘America’s Prophet,’ a psychic, trained by points of the stock market, “giving exact Nepalese monks in the art of time travel, dates for rises and crashes over the last Jay M. Pasachoff is a professor of astronomy who can foretell the future of the stock fourteen years.” at Williams College, where he teaches a markets. But to the authorities, Sean The case is still pending, but ques- course on “Science and Pseudoscience.”

The Death of Our became a founding fellow of CSICOP, Beloved Colleague now the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, and an original member of SI’s Martin Gardner Editorial Board. He followed Fads and Fallacies with Science: Good, Bad, and With this issue already in final page lay- Bogus and many subsequent compila- out, we received the unwelcome news tions of essays and reviews. that our longtime friend and colleague He published scores of memorable Martin Gardner had died May 22. He books in mathematics, philosophy, science, was ninety-five. literary criticism, and critiques of fringe sci- Gardner, a brilliant polymath, was ence. He was probably most famous for his (and always will be) a hero to skeptics long-running “Mathe matical Games” col- and science-minded people worldwide. umn in Scientific American, where his curi- “Martin would not have wanted to ous, whimsical, original mind delighted know how devastated I am at the news,” readers everywhere. said James Randi, in a perhaps typical After he retired his SA column, we expression of grief. “I can’t quite picture invited him to do a regular column for Martin Gardner my world without him. That man was one the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, and he did so died. His cover letter gave no indication of my giants, a very longtime friend of from 1983 to 2002 (“Notes of a Psi- of failing health. I answered immedi- some 50 years or more. He was a delight.” Watcher,” later titled “Notes of a Fringe- ately to tell him how much I enjoyed it. Fads and Fal - Gardner’s 1950 book Watcher”). He also published a series of We will publish it in our September /Oct- lacies in the Name of Science is still the books based in part on it. He recently ober issue, along with tributes from his classic examination of pseudoscience resumed his SI column on an irregular colleagues. ! and pseudoscientists. It remains in basis. Martin mailed his last column to print, still relevant today. In 1976 he me May 12, only ten days before he —Kendrick Frazier, Editor

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