SKEPTICISM . SCIENCE . SOCIETY

Vol. 36, No 1. March 2016

History Facts Dark Ages & The Pharaohs

+Mediums, Maths & Gum

Australian Skeptics . www.skeptics.com.au The Skeptic March 16

Skeptical Groups in

Australian Skeptics Inc – Eran Segev Canberra Skeptics – Lauren Kelly www.skeptics.com.au PO Box 555, Civic Square ACT 2608 PO Box 20, Beecroft, NSW 2119 http://www.canberraskeptics.org.au Tel: 0410 382 306 Tel: 02 8094 1894; Mob: 0432 713 195; Fax: (02) 8088 4735 [email protected] (general inquiries), [email protected] [email protected] (Canberra Skeptics in the Pub). Sydney Skeptics in the Pub – 6pm first Thursday of each A free monthly talk, open to the public, usually takes place month at the Crown Hotel, cnr Goulburn and Elizabeth Streets in on the 1st Saturday of each month at the Lecture Theatre, the city (meeting upstairs) CSIRO Discovery Centre, Clunies Ross Rd (check website for details of the current month’s talk). Skeptics in the Pub gather Dinner meetings are held on a regular basis. at 1pm on the third Sunday of each month at King O’Malleys Pub in Civic. For up-to-date details : www.meetup.com/ SocialSkepticsCanberra/ Hunter Skeptics – John Turner Tel: (02) 4959 6286 [email protected] Meetings are held at the Club Macquarie, Lake Road, Argenton Skeptics SA – Laurie Eddie on the second Thursday of each month, excepting January, 52B Miller St Unley, SA 5061 commencing 7.00pm, with a guest speaker or open discussion Tel: (08) 8272 5881 [email protected] on a given topic. Visitors welcome. Further information from the Thinking and Drinking - Skeptics in the Pub, on the third Friday secretary at: [email protected] of every month. Contact [email protected] www.meetup.com/Thinking-and-Drinking-Skeptics-in-the-Pub/ Australian Skeptics (Vic) Inc – Chris Guest calendar/10205558 or http://tinyurl.com/loqdrt GPO Box 5166, Melbourne VIC 3001 Tel: 1 800 666 996 [email protected] WA Skeptics – Dr Geoffrey Dean Skeptics’ Café – Third Monday of every month, with guest speaker. PO Box 466, Subiaco, WA 6904 La Notte, 140 Lygon St. Meal from 6pm, speaker at 8pm sharp. Tel: 08 9341 4538 [email protected] More details on our web site www.skeptics.com.au/vic All meetings start at 7:30 pm at Grace Vaughan House, 227 Stubbs Terrace, Shenton Park Further details of all our meetings and speakers are on our Borderline Skeptics Inc – Laurie Smith website at www.undeceivingourselves.org RSB 11 Callaghhan’s Creek Boxes, via Tallangatta VIC 3701 Tel: (02) 6072 3415 Hobart Skeptics – Leyon Parker Meetings are held quarterly on second Tuesday at Albury/ PO Box 84, Battery Point TAS 7004 Wodonga on pre-announced dates and venues. Tel: 03 6225 3988 BH, 0418 128713 [email protected] Skeptics in the Pub - 2nd Monday each month, Queensland Skeptics Association Inc – Bob Bruce 6.30pm, Ball & Chain restaurant, Salamanca Place PO Box 3480, Norman Park QLD 4170; www.qskeptics.org.au Mob: 0419 778 308 [email protected] Darwin Skeptics – Michelle Franklin Meetings with a guest speaker on the last Monday of the month PO Box2027 Humpty Doo NT 0836 from February to November at the Redbrick Hotel, 81 Annerley Tel: 0408 783 145; www.facebook.com/group/darwinskeptics/ Road, South Brisbane. Dinner from 6pm, speaker at 7.30pm. [email protected] Qskeptics eGroup - www.egroups.com/list/qskeptics Meeting to be announced - see Facebook page for details Gold Coast Skeptics – Lilian Derrick PO Box 8348, GCMC Bundall, QLD 9726 Tel: (07) 5593 1882; Fax: (07) 5593 2776 [email protected] Contact Lilian to find out news of more events.

Volume 36 • No 1 March 16 Contents

REPORTS ABC Catalyst and Wi-Fried 9 9 Tim Mendham

UOW and anti-vax PhD 11 Tim Mendham 11 20 FEATURES 14 The Dark Ages 14 Tim Harding Pharaoh’s mountain 20 Barry Williams

ARTICLES 32 Planet 9 28 Steve Roberts

The Medium on TV 32 Richard Saunders & Krissy Wilson

Black salve 40 Jo Alabaster

Maths and conspiracies 42 Steve Roberts 42 Chewing gum 44 Mike Morgan & Eric Reynolds 28 Diplomacy - chiros v GPs 46 Tim Mendham 46 44

REGULARS 54 Editorial 4 Around the Traps 5 Them! 12 48 The logical place 18 Puzzles page 31 Book reviews 48 What goes around 54 Forum 56 Letters 62 54 EDITORIAL

No authority n the past the Therapeutics Good debate to the preservation of a free and IAdministration (TGA) has been democratic society.” criticised as a toothless tiger – slow No mention of accuracy. Falsehoods response and insignificant ability to and inaccuracies can therefore be implement decisions regarding the published, as long as the unnamed ISSN 0726-9897 promotion of medical and alt med adjudicators sign off on it. Quarterly Journal of products. Where a supplier has been Senior academics at the University Australian Skeptics Inc shown to be in breach of regulations (and not just in science areas) issued a (ABN 90 613 095 379) due, say, to unsupported claims, statement supporting immunisation, Editor product suppliers can change the and while they limited their statement Tim Mendham name of a product and yet leave the to that area, the timing and topic were formulation unchanged, to pass muster obviously inspired by the controversy. Editorial Board – “Different but same, wink wink”. They felt the need to support Steve Roberts In the September 2015 issue of immunisation and, by implication, the Eran Segev The Skeptic, we asked various ‘serial University’s academic standards. Martin Hadley complainers’ what they thought of the Prof Alison Jones, Executive Dean Barry Williams regulators they regularly dealt with. of UOW’s Faculty of Science Medicine Design Services The general view was that these bodies & Health and the lead signatory of the Nova Consulting P/L were hampered by lack of financial and statement, told Australian Skeptics that people resources, and the need for a “We are trying to redress the balance – All correspondence to: proactive and reactive culture. not specifically in response to the thesis. Australian Skeptics Inc But these bodies are not alone. We’re not trying to give it oxygen or PO Box 20 Recently, the University of create controversy. ... From what I’ve Beecroft NSW 2119 Wollongong has been embroiled in seen of the thesis, it doesn’t represent Australia a controversy over a PhD awarded the views of a science evidence-based Contact details to Judy Wilyman, a known anti- approach.” Tel: +61 (0)2 8094 1894 vaccination campaigner, whose thesis Poor responses from authorities are Mob: +61 (0)432 713 195 contained scientific errors and claims of found elsewhere. Fax: +61 (0)2 8088 4735 conspiracies that had been oft-repeated The Australian Health Practitioner by the anti-vax lobby in the past. The Regulation Agency (AHPRA) has been [email protected] University was alerted to this in no criticised for its poor control of the www.skeptics.com.au uncertain terms by many members of professional bodies it oversees, in this the public, the scientific community case the Board of Australia The Skeptic is published four times and the media, but the response was (CBA). The CBA itself has been per year by Australian Skeptics Inc. a classic “wash our hands … we’re ineffective in controlling outrageous Views and opinions expressed in articles powerless to do anything” statement: claims made by chiropractors, and and letters in The Skeptic are those of “As a leading research-intensive AHPRA has been ineffective in ensuring the authors, and are not necessarily university, the University of that the CBA acts to ensure professional those of Australian Skeptics Inc. Wollongong values intellectual standards. Slaps on the wrist is the Articles may be reprinted with openness, freedom of opinion, diversity general extent of ‘punishment’, which permission and with due acknowledge- of ideas, equity, and mutual respect. many offenders manage to circumvent ment to The Skeptic. ... UOW does not restrict the subjects if not ignore. All effort is made to ensure correct into which research may be undertaken There are still other authorities that acknowledgement of all contributions. just because they involve public are inactive in the face of individuals We are happy to update credit when so controversy or because individuals snubbing their noses at regulations and informed. or groups oppose the topic or the standards. Some are under investigation findings. UOW does not endorse the by skeptics generally and Australian Editorial submission deadline individual views of its academics or Skeptics in particular. Watch this for the next issue: students. It recognises the importance space.. April 30, 2016 of open and respectful public policy - Tim Mendham, editor 4 NEWS The Skeptic March 16

Around the traps ... time, the Board’s sole approach to this problem has been educative. They have published communiques and newsletters, conducted seminars, “Ineffective” Chiro Board written letters to practitioners subject to complaint, and produced a fact should be sacked sheet on evidence-based practice and a non-specific position statement AUSTRALIA: Lack of effective on paediatric care. They have also action by the Chiropractic Board of noted that the use of certain words Australia and the Australian Health in advertising, such as ‘cure’, ‘safe’ Practitioner Regulation Agency to and ‘effective’, can increase the risk of on-going complaints of misleading misleading or deceiving the public. advertising has elicited the strongest “However, the Board has never response from health professionals, published any determinations about academics, Skeptics groups, public the hundreds of complaints received. health advocates, and consumer groups Unlike similar bodies, the Board such as Choice. has never named offenders After a lengthy investigation, Dr Ken and has never required the Harvey, Adjunct Associate Professor Australian Skeptics’ Bent correction of serious misleading in the Department of Epidemiology Spoon award for their information by ordering a and Preventive Medicine at Monash ineffectiveness in dealing with retraction. University and a long time campaigner unacceptable conduct by some of its “Despite chiropractors having against shonky medical products, and members ... even members who were the highest rate of advertising Mal Vickers, who is a research associate on the Board of the CAA itself! complaints of all practitioners (38 of Dr Harvey as well as a member of Harvey and Vickers also took aim per 1000 chiropractors in 2013–14), the committee of Victorian Skeptics, at AHPRA, which is responsible for no penalties or disciplinary action wrote in an article in the Medical the implementation of the National appear to have been applied for Journal of Australia (http://tinyurl.com/ Registration and Accreditation Scheme advertising offences.” hrbgv69), that the Board “has largely across Australia. failed to correct the websites which we “AHPRA notified us that [our] have complained about”. complaints had been received, but “It has failed to deter other subsequently we heard no more.” SPECIAL OFFER practitioners from continuing to The complaints involved 38 make claims that have been the chiropractors and 69 advertising claims for Subscribers subject of numerous complaints. It that were selected from more than 200 Australian Skeptics is offering has made submitting complaints a chiropractic websites that appeared subscribers to the hard copy totally unrewarding procedure. While to be in breach of s.133 of the Health edition of The Skeptic an a complainant is usually notified that Practitioner Regulation National Law their complaint has been received, Act 2009 and also the CBA’s Guidelines additional digital copy for free. subsequently they usually hear no more. for advertising regulated health services. Many of our subscribers have “In short, despite hundreds of These provisions prohibit advertising already taken up this offer. If complaints about unethical advertising that is false, misleading or deceptive, you are not doing so but would over many years and calls to act on creates an unreasonable expectation of like to get the free digital copy, practitioners who promote anti- beneficial treatment, or can encourage then email the editor on vaccination beliefs, the Chiropractic the indiscriminate or unnecessary use [email protected] Board has consistently failed to protect of health services. the public from misleading and “[We] argued that the time for and we’ll adjust your deceptive conduct by practitioners. ‘education’ had passed and chiro- subscription accordingly. “Given that track record, it’s not practors must now be held to account Note, this offer is only open surprising that there are now calls for for breaches of the National Law. to subscribers to the hard copy the CBA to be sacked.” “Five years have passed since the (paper) edition and is limited In 2013, the Chiropractic Board CBA first asked practitioners to to one free digital copy per and the Chiropractors’ Association ensure that their websites met legal subscriber. of Australia were joint winners of the advertising requirements. Over this 5 23 NEWS

Vic Govt cracks down on ‘dodgy’ health practitioners

AUSTRALIA: Victoria’s unregistered ‘dodgy’ shame providers in the media in order health complaints watchdog dentists, and ban them to protect the public. will be given greater powers from providing these The laws will also prevent dodgy to name and shame dodgy unethical and dangerous healthcare practitioners who are health service providers and treatments”. not regulated under national health practitioners, and protect Other examples practitioner regulation law and are the public by banning them include a formerly banned in other states from moving to from practising. registered dentist who Victoria and offering their healthcare The State Government claimed ‘’ services there. has introduced the Health could cure cancer, or For example, under the new Complaints Bill 2016 into people purporting to legislation, a midwife who is prohibited Parliament, to establish a tough new be able to ‘convert’ gay people through from practising in South Australia complaints system to crack down medical or therapeutic means. would automatically be banned on dangerous unregistered health Individuals who breach the from practising in Victoria, whereas practitioners. Commissioner’s ruling would face up to previously a complaint would need Under the proposed new laws, the two years in prison. If the community to be lodged about the midwife’s existing Health Services Commissioner is at risk, the Commissioner will be able care before the Health Services will be replaced by a new watchdog, to issue public warnings and name and Commissioner could take action. the Health Complaints Commissioner, creating “a more comprehensive health complaints system that better protects the public and providers of health WA research on anti-vax motivation services”. The new Commissioner will receive beefed up powers to take action AUSTRALIA: Researchers at Edith Early results from the study indicate against dangerous and unethical health Cowan University in Western Australia that the prime reason for not vaccinating providers who are not registered under have launched a pilot study to investigate was mistrust of government as national health practitioner regulation the motivations of anti-vaccinators, manipulators of opinion. Other reasons law. and why they might keep their decision included the belief that a healthy diet In a major change, the Bill will allow secret from friends and family. alone could protect their children in anyone to make a complaint, rather Lead researcher Dr Bronwyn addition to herd immunity. than just the person who received the Harman, senior lecturer at the School “These parents believe they are being health service. The Commissioner will of Psychology and Social Science, told lied to and believe they have done also have the power to instigate an media outlets that it was important to enough of their own research to believe investigation even when no complaint is understand the reasons parents were not vaccinating is risky,” Harman said, “even lodged, for example, if the media have vaccinating their children. though much of their research comes uncovered an unscrupulous unregistered University researchers interviewed from unreliable sources on the internet.” provider making fake or harmful claims. a group of parents from an anti- University of Sydney paediatrics expert This is similar to legislation that vaccination cluster area about their Professor Nicholas Wood told the ABC was passed in NSW some time ago, reasons for not immunising their that promoting shame among parents allowing the Health Care Complaints children. All the parents said they hadn’t who did not vaccinate was not an effective Commission to institute its own told their extended family and friends tactic to improve vaccination rates. investigations rather than rely on that their children weren’t vaccinated. “The anti-vaxxers are likely to believe it dissatisfied patients. “They don’t want the confrontation; is just more of an attack on their choice. Under the proposed laws, a statement they’re tired of people questioning their “What we need to do is to tackle the from the Victorian Premier’s office choices, and they don’t want to justify wide range of reasons that the ‘not very says that “the new Commissioner their decision, so they just don’t tell many’ are not vaccinated in an open and would have the powers to investigate people,” Harman said. individualised way, remove shame and and crack down on high profile cases “It really does frighten me [when] a lessen confusion.” such as the blogger who faked cancer lot of people coming into contact with He said it was important to not ‘lump’ to profit from her wellness app, the [pregnant] women and children aren’t people who wanted to get their children fake gynaecologist performing ‘fertility disclosing their status out of fear of being vaccinated but could not for genuine treatments’ on women for a decade, or perceived as bad parents,” she said. reasons with those who were anti-vax. 6 The Skeptic March 16

Alien promoter dies Money for nothing The creators of the campaign did not clearly state who they are, but one supposedly behind the campaign was UK: A proposal to manufacture hats discovered to be Marek Schweigert, that are claimed to shield your head a creative marketing specialist. Their from electromagnetic fields has become company website offers no information a successfully funded project on about who they are or where they are Kickstarter. Called Shield Headwear, located. the product is described as an The campaign seems to be by a UK “impressive new concept that combines company, however, a commentator not only impeccably stylish design but in the Kickstarter community, also astonishing modern technology Skeptic Factfinder, claims that the to protect the wearer from harmful company behind the campaign is out radiation emitted by cell-phones, Wi-Fi of Slovakia, with the UK company, signals and other electronic devices”. possibly a shell, registered in late USA: Edgar Mitchell, the sixth man The Shield Headwear – beanies and October, just a few weeks before the on the moon and a proponent of the caps – are made with “special silver launch of the Kickstarter campaign, paranormal, conspiracies, and aliens, shielding fabric inside” with “shielding and listed with a private residence has died at age 85 on the eve of the effectiveness 55dB-65dB from 10 MHz address in the UK. 45th anniversary of his lunar landing. to 4 GHz”. The Kickstarter campaign raised He was the last surviving participant of The Shield £13,834 the Apollo 14 mission. Apparel from 313 During his post-astronaut life, he company backers. had claimed aliens “wanted to know admits “it can`t Kickstarter about our military capabilities” and completely does not said that “My own experience talking protect your guarantee to people has made it clear the ETs had head against projects or been attempting to keep us from going signals because investigate to war and help create peace on Earth.” it should be a creator’s Mitchell was the founder of the covered from ability to Institute of Noetic Sciences (1973) the top to complete when he turned to mystical and psychic the bottom” their project. interpretations of the universe. The but it reassures by saying that “the In this instance, the supplier of the Doubtful News site reports that “his shielding fabric is tested and it blocks product is already apologising for status provided clout to claims of alien High Frequency & Low Frequency late delivery to those who have pre- involvement with earthly matters”. electromagnetic radiation”. purchased their hats.

New cryptozoology Matt Bille, science writer and by the defunct International Society of society author of a number of cryptozoological Cryptozoology (ISC). books, said the ICS is intended to be Coleman told Bille that the ICS USA: The formation of a new the long-hoped for resurrection of the would be strictly scientific and said that International Cryptozoology Society principles of scientific study followed “true believers and debunkers” were (ICS) was announced at the inaugural not welcome, though the definitions of International Cryptozoology Museum. those terms and who they applied to The new Society will be headed were not clear. by Canadian cryptozoologist Dr Paul Winner of the conference’s Golden LeBlond as president and run by Yeti award for Cryptozoologist of Loren Coleman (right, with friend), the Year was Jeremy Efroymson, a founder of the Museum, and one other film-maker, attorney, writer, and museum director. It promises an online philanthropist whose family foundation peer-reviewed journal and regular has awarded grants and funds to conferences, the first of which will be various cryptozoological ventures, held next year at the Museum. including the Museum. 7 23 NEWS

Natural selection not selected

USA: Roughly six-in-ten US adults in the US, evangelical (62%) say humans have evolved over Protestants are among time, according to data from Pew the most likely to reject Research Center’s recently released evolution. According Religious Landscape Study. But only a to the study, a solid little more than half of them (33% of majority (57%) of all Americans) express the belief that evangelicals say humans and other living things evolved humans and other living things have But the US is not alone in these solely due to natural processes. A quarter always existed in their present form. anti-evolution beliefs. According to of US adults (25%) say evolution was (About half of Mormons and roughly the study, even larger percentages guided by a supreme being. three-quarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses of people in many other countries The same survey found that 34% also reject evolution.) These views reject evolution. For example, in of Americans reject evolution entirely, are largely mirrored by the official Latin America, roughly four-in-ten or saying humans and other living things positions of large evangelical churches, more residents of several countries – have existed in their present form since as well as, in many cases, by the including Ecuador, Nicaragua and the the beginning of time. majority of their members. Dominican Republic – say humans and Among young people, 73% of For instance, majorities of those other living things have always existed American adults younger than 30 who affiliate with the Southern Baptist in their present form. They believe expressed some sort of belief in Convention (58%) and the Seventh- this to be true even though the official evolution, a jump from 61% in 2009, day Adventist church (67%) reject teachings of Catholicism, which is the the first year in which the question was the idea that human beings evolved majority religion in the region, do not asked. The number who believed in over time. By contrast, much smaller reject evolution. Meanwhile, Muslims purely secular evolution (that is, not minorities of mainline Protestants in many nations are divided on the directed by any divine power) jumped (30%), Catholics (29%), Jews (16%) topic, although majorities of Muslims from 40% to a bare majority of 51%. and the religiously unaffiliated (15%) in countries such as Afghanistan, Of all the major religious groups share this view. Indonesia and Iraq reject evolution.

Nothing happened in Canberra the thunderstorm itself. He admitted to thinking it was not right, that it AUSTRALIA: A UFO sighting over had possibly been faked, but noted it Canberra that received global media was “probably not Photoshop either”. coverage has been revealed to be a hoax In fact, it was a program called Adobe (No! Really?). appeared during a storm. After Effects that generated the Depicting what was described as a Australian National University ‘phenomenon’ using real scenes. UFO portal or ‘wormhole’, the 2015 astronomer Dr Brad Tucker was The video poster, Johnson sighting was posted on YouTube, quoted at the time as saying the red Thompson, eventually apologised, promoted on Reddit, and run as a news and green light which glowed faintly in admitting he was not even trying to story in the Canberra Times, Tech the background was “characteristic of depict ball lightning because he’d Times, News Corp, the Daily Mail and an aurora”. never heard of it before this. He many other outlets. “An aurora is when from posted a second video explaining how The video (http://tinyurl.com/ the sun hits the earth’s atmosphere, he’d “accidentally created” the hoax zg6zg38) showed a spherical the energy rubs the earth’s atmosphere with Adobe After Effects. shape lighting up the sky during with friction and charges the gas,” he “I didn’t intend for it to be taken a thunderstorm. While no-one said. “But the problem is there was no seriously, but I made an error in else seemed to have spotted the activity from the sun, it was cloudy, we judgement and titled the video as if it phenomenon, explanations included can’t see the aurora, so it doesn’t really was real.” a UFO portal into hyperspace, a fit.” The original video received wormhole, but ball lightning was the Tucker said in this case, the energy 345,000 views; the hoax reveal had clear front runner because it apparently to create an aurora probably came from only 3500. . 8 REPORT Wifi The Skeptic March 16 ABC Catalyst does it again Tim Mendham looks at the ABC on Wi-Fi radiation

BC-TV’s science program and that it is an issue of public Catalyst and one of its chief concern. That’s why the Catalyst scienceA reporters Dr Maryanne program spoke to those who consider Demasi have been nominated for the increased risk to be significant and current state of knowledge. the Australian Skeptics’ Bent Spoon concerning, and to others who do not “Indeed there is currently no award. consider it to be significant, including scientific evidence that exposure to low A report by Dr Marianne Demasi, extensive quotes from a spokesman level radiofrequency, such as emitted by titled “Wi-Fried” and broadcast on for ARPANSA and the industry body mobile phones and wi-fi, has an impact February 16, looked at the supposed AMTA. The program also included on health. health dangers of wi-fi connections for the views of prominent brain surgeon “By not providing a balanced view smart phones, laptops, tablets, etc. Charlie Teo and prominent cancer of the science, Catalyst has left viewers The program and Dr Demasi have expert Professor Bruce Armstrong with misleading messages related to the been criticised before for promoting (IARC 2011 committee). use of such devices, which may serve to unsubstantiated scientific ‘evidence’ “It is also important to note that at perpetuate fear related to a health risk of ‘dangerous’ products. In 2014, Dr least two of the current critics of the that currently does not exist.” Demasi and Catalyst presented a case program - Drs Bernard Stewart and Dr Devra Davis, an American against statins in cholesterol control. Simon Chapman (see below) - were epidemiologist and writer, in The program was criticised for using invited to participate in the program countering the lack of scientific ‘experts’ with vested interests in but declined. Had they agreed to be evidence for brain damage from wi-fi promoting to put interviewed, their views would have radiation, said that it was too early to the anti-statin case, and pitching the been included as well.” see any rise in brain cancer caused by proponents of established evidence- (Dr Teo has been criticised in the mobile phones or wi-fi, and argued that based medicine into a minor role. past as “alarmist” and “a little out brain cancers after the Japanese atomic This time the same process had been there” - http://tinyurl.com/hwvkpny.) bombs did not appear for 40 years. used to alert people to the dangers of Perhaps because of the claim that “This is simply incorrect,” said Dr sticking smart phones to their ears - it “the science is not settled”, the Catalyst Simon Chapman, Emeritus Professor used six ‘experts’ (at least one without story allowed many unsubstantiated in Public Health at the University of any attribution) to put the case for statements that ignored scientific Sydney. the supposed dangers, and only one evidence to be made, and some of He cited a study published by the scientist who pointed out the lack of those statements were wrong. American Cancer Society (http:// any scientific evidence that supports Dr Sarah Loughlin of the University tinyurl.com/ztr4jd7) that reported the danger claims. of Wollongong, a researcher at the on central nervous system cancers Even that scientist was encouraged NHRMC’s Centre for Research (including brain cancers) in those to state that science was never 100 per Excellence in Electromagnetic exposed to atomic bomb radiation in cent sure of something, which in the Energy, as well as a member of Japan, which found that more than program’s point of view equated to the WHO Environmental Health 58 per cent of those studied were “you can’t say it’s 100 per cent safe and Criterion Evaluation Committee diagnosed in the first 40 years, and therefore it must be dangerous”. on Radiofrequency Fields, said that some much earlier. In response to criticism, Catalyst “Many claims were made without “There is no evidence of any increase responded on its Facebook page providing any substantiated science to in the rate per 100,000 population that “The program and its producers support what was essentially individual of brain cancer in any age group in recognise there’s a debate, understand and selective opinions that were used Australia from 1982 to the present, that the science is not settled to paint an incorrect picture of the other than for the very oldest age group 9 REPORT Wifi

ABC Catalyst topic, in this case non- Continued... ionising radiation and the use of where the increase started well before wi-fi media. mobile phones were introduced in The program Australia and so cannot be explained had six scare- by mobile phones. All cancer in mongering Australia is notifiable, and over 85 per ‘experts’ cent of brain cancer is histologically ranged against verified: it is not just a doctor’s one scientist opinion.” saying that Dr Darren Saunders is a cancer there wasn’t biologist at the University of NSW any scientific and visiting fellow at the Kinghorn evidence that Cancer Centre, Garvan Institute. harm was being caused. It confused the one, the regulator, was there to tell us He said there were key flaws in the proper and normal scientific restraint that the evidence is they’re safe, even argument made in the program that of saying we can’t be absolutely sure though the scientific consensus weighs stood out scientifically. One was the of something; with admitting the heavily in the opposite direction. lack of any demonstrable increase in something is dangerous. Poor science, “And there was similar imbalance brain cancer incidence over time. “We bad journalism, overly alarmist, and in the time each side was given, with have been exposed to the same kind of even the title of the story, ‘Wi-Fried’, 14 minutes to the prosecutors and just non-ionising electromagnetic radiation was sensationalised. Move over Daily over two for the defence. long before mobile phones and wi-fi Mail, here comes Catalyst.” “What’s more, the program took became commonplace.” its lead from a controversial American He added that a second flaw was MEDIA WATCH campaigner, scientist Dr Devra Davis.” the absence of a plausible biological ABC-TV’s Media Watch then covered Media Watch then used the clip mechanism for how this kind of the Catalyst program, referring to it as a from the program in which Demasi radiation can cause cancer. “There “so-called investigation”. and Davis view the photos of supposed were very poor analogies made with Catalyst sent a lengthy response brain damage referred to above: microwave ovens and smoking, to Media Watch’s queries regarding Demasi: Wow, so that, that penetrates which are purely emotive and not allegations of bias, lack of balance etc. almost to the other side of the ear. based on actual science. Comparing a One of the points made in the Catalyst Davis: Correct. microwave to a mobile phone is like response was: “From the review of the Demasi: That’s incredible. comparing a Saturn V rocket to your scientific literature, no-one across the Davis: Yeah, it is. lawnmower.” scientific literature credibly argues there Demasi: Now, do we know that this For a supposed scientific program, is no evidence mobile phones pose a translates into health effects for the one sequence in particular was health risk. They say no established child? indicative of poor scientific support evidence that wireless technology Davis: No, we don’t. for the radiation claims. Dr Davis used causes health effects which is distinct Demasi: So should we, should we be illustrations to explain the supposed from say that there is no evidence at concerned? extent of radiation damage to the all.” “It seemed pretty clear Dr Demasi brain, but these were obviously photo The distinction between “no was ready to believe,” Media Watch library shots of a man and a little girl established evidence” and “no host Paul Barry said. . with colours superimposed on them. evidence” is a fine one, reflecting her The program said this showed thermal inference in the program that not being imagery of radiation seeping into the able to say something is absolutely safe brain, but this imagery could have is the same as saying it is dangerous. easily been applied to any object – it Like many commentators, including was not generated by those particular Australian Skeptics, Media Watch found subjects. Nonetheless, Dr Demasi that “Demasi’s program was shockingly seemed impressed by the colours. one-sided”. The Bent Spoon nomination says: “Six witnesses were lined up to tell “For (again) presenting a biased us that mobile phones and Wi-Fi may sensationalist story on a scientific be dangerous to our health and only 10 REPORT Research The Skeptic March 16 Controversy over anti-vax PhD Tim Mendham reports on the University of Woo-longong’s potential Bent Spoon

ustralian Skeptics is of thought and expression. receiving many Bent “UOW does not restrict the SpoonA nominations for the subjects into which research for may be undertaken just because its approval of a PhD thesis they involve public controversy by notorious anti-vaccination or because individuals or groups campaigner Judy Wilyman. oppose the topic or the findings. Called “A critical analysis “UOW does not endorse of the Australian government’s the individual views of its rationale for its vaccination academics or students. It policy”, Wilyman’s thesis recognises the importance describes what she calls of open and respectful “the political framework in public policy debate to the which policy is affected by preservation of a free and biased science or undone democratic society. [underfunded] science” and claims Conspiracy theories are supplemented “All UOW PhD theses are assessed by “the existence of institutional barriers with numerous claims about the efficacy at least two examiners who are external to to carrying out independent research, and safety of vaccination and vaccines UOW, have unchallengeable knowledge including on topics unwelcome to that have been covered and debunked in the field of study, have no conflicts groups with vested interests”. many times before. of interest that would impede their She includes collusion between The reference to Martin above examination and there can be no more industry and health authorities, is to Professor Brian Martin, her than one examiner in any one country.” particularly that the World Health primary supervisor at the University of There is no mention that claims made Organisation “is perceived to be out Wollongong, whom she thanks “for his in PhD theses need to be accurate and of touch with global communities unwavering support and encouragement. supported by evidence. and it is controlled by the interests of His weekly phone calls kept me focused Professor Peter McIntyre, director of corporations and the World Bank”. and there were many robust discussions the National Centre for Immunisation This level of conspiracy is continued: that helped me to overcome the Research & Surveillance and an advisor “Powerful pro-vaccination lobby groups significant opposition to this project. to the WHO, told The Australian that such as the Australian Skeptics and Stop I thank him for his patience and he had offered to advise Wilyman but the Australian Vaccination Network dedication to my research.” withdrew his offer as she was “not (SAVN) influence politicians and the Martin himself has been a supporter willing to entertain” evidence which media. They also use social blogs to of the Australian anti-Vaccination contradicted her beliefs. ridicule and abuse individuals, including Network’s right to “freedom of speech”, Wilyman was previously working academics and professionals, who are if not the AVN itself, publishing a paper on her PhD at questioning the safety and efficacy in 2015 titled “On the Suppression of in Western Australia. In the past, of vaccines (Martin 2015). There is Vaccination Dissent”. she has made numerous disparaging evidence that lobby groups in many In a statement on its website, the comments about vaccination that have countries are being funded by industry University of Wollongong has defended no foundation in science, such as the to promote industry interests. These the approval of the PhD: “UOW ensures long discredited claims of a link between groups discredit people’s reputations research is undertaken according to vaccination and autism. and promote disinformation to suppress strict ethical and quality standards and The winner of the Bent Spoon will be scientific debate.” supports researchers’ academic freedom announced later this year. . 11 THEM Readers’ indigestible Tim Mendham looks at those ‘other’ publications, where skepticism is a dirty word ... sometimes.

his issue, we look at one example of the wonderful world of New TAge publications, a long-lasting title that has been through a major repositioning. We also review those magazines that we have covered in past isues. The partial theme here is digitisation, and that will become the major concern in future columns.

Nova NOVA magazine is the grandfather metropolitan area, Fremantle, the – or more likely the fairy godmother Hills, Mandurah, Bunbury, Busselton, – of New Age publications in Margaret River and Albany”. Australia. So, back to its WA roots. Calling itself “Australia’s Holistic It does now appear online (www. average health and fitness publication Journal”, it was launched in Western novaholisticjournal.com) “to carry our is that all of these articles are written Australia in March 1994 and has empowering message of holistic health by Peter Dingle PhD. You remember now been going for 23 years as a free and lifestyle to readers throughout Peter Dingle. He’s the one whose wife monthly journal on “holistic health Australia as well as overseas, including Penelope died an agonising death and lifestyle combined with our the United States, the UK, New from rectal cancer having foregone trademark artistic covers and layout” Zealand, Canada, China, India, potentially life-saving medical It regular covers “, Brazil, the Netherlands, France and treatment, instead using nutrition, natural medicine, , Germany. And as with our hardcopy and spiritualism. The coroner in that , yoga, Traditional Chinese edition, each monthly online edition case said that, while the decision medicine, spirituality, astrology, is accessible for free.” to use alternative treatments was personal growth, mindfulness and Why those countries specifically Penelope’s, “Dr Dingle, her partner, community with articles contributed is hard to figure; surely an online insofar as he supported and assisted by a wide range of practitioners who publication can be read anywhere. with [the homeopath’s] treatments are respected in their fields”. But it’s probably a good guess that and kept the deceased away from But there does seem to have been those are the only countries where the outside influences, contributed to that a change. It was previously available publishers have heard from its readers; loss of a chance of survival”. at most health food stores, alternative either that or they are good sleuths at It was a very sad case all round. medicine facilities and any other finding out online identities. Peter Dingle’s contribution to outlets under the New Age aegis Anyway, the contents, assuming Nova is extensive – the vast majority around Australia. It seemed to be what’s online is the same as what’s of the “top stories” are written by doing very well, as it always had a in the print version, are pretty much him. And while his brief is nutrition healthy proportion of advertising. what you’d expect of Australia’s and healthy lifestyle, he still exhibits Now, though, that distribution appears holistic journal. In fact, they’re pretty the mistrust of ‘traditional’ medicine to have been cut. The magazine’s much what you’d find in any health that encouraged him to keep site says that it is available “in print and fitness publication. The top Penelope Dingle away from “outside format from health food stores, natural stories cover the benefits of walking, influences”. therapy clinics, practitioners’ rooms, the need to get physical, finding In an article titled “Medicine fresh food markets, independent work-life balance, improving your or Dogma”, he takes large supermarkets and cinemas, cafes, cardiovascular system with vitamins, swipes at Western medicine and mind body spirit retailers and many and the problems of overeating. pharmaceuticals, suggesting that other outlets throughout the Perth The one difference with your “drug money” has overwhelmed the

12 The Skeptic March 16

Them at Last The review of Nova magazine this the bizarre and convoluted world issue brings our study of paranormal of Quantum Physics, and that magazine publishing to a close. There magick might even be real? Is there are some other titles, but all of the 18 really proof that we survive physical magazines listed below were readily death? Can we really and effectively available at one time or another from communicate with the ‘other side’? our local newsagents. Over the last Is this idea more than mere wishful three years we have looked at: thinking, and more importantly, • Atlantis Rising can the departed really answer us?” • Colors Now, compare the number of • Conscious Living titles above (including Nova, that’s evidence against particular medical • Creation 19) and think about how many hypotheses. • Fortean Times science-based publications are He then makes the stunning • Hard Evidence available on our newsagent shelves. statement that “The simple fact • Mind Body Spirit There’sNew Scientist, Cosmos, is that countries that are less • Mysteries of the Unknown Australasian Science, Australian developed and spend the least • Natural Medicine Geographic, Double Helix, Popular amount on pharmaceuticals have • New Dawn Science, Discovery, a few astronomy the longest lives, and highest health • Nexus titles … and you start to run out. and quality of life with less chronic • Open Minds Only some of these are regularly illness without drugs and processed • Psychic News available. There are more magazines lifestyles. This should ring warning • Psychics Directory devoted to hobby railways or bells everywhere. The countries that • Soul & Spirit tattoos (even women’s tattoos) spend the most money on health • UFOlogist than there are science publications. have the sickest populations.” • Uncensored Go to the magazine subscription This is absolute garbage. • Your Stars service, iSubscribe, and you soon According to the United Nations Missing in action is Paranormal, get into the paranormal titles listed World Population Prospects 2015 a UK mag that was one of our above, and these under the heading Revision, the average lifespan is favourites. Who could resist such “science and nature”. 71.0 years (68.5 years for males articles as “Are you the victim of a Formal skepticism is a minority and 73.5 years for females) over the psychic vampire” or “Trouble bruin pursuit, despite increasing numbers period 2010–2013. Those countries – spectral bears”? But, like Nova, among the young and women (a with the lowest life expectancy this disappeared into the digital couple of minorities themselves are all third-world undeveloped realm (www.paranormalmagazine. in the past). Informally, of course, nations, and most of those in Africa, co.uk). It is now hard to tell if there are a lot more skeptics. Most, and that less lifespan is not in most it still exists. It has certainly had however, would not use that title, cases because of wars. a chequered ownership history, or even appreciate that they apply Dingle then goes on to state, with four owners over the last ten the critical thinking approach; it’s with the most tragic but hopefully years, and looking at the website just that it generally happens to be unintended irony, that “The false for this summary there is a lot of applied in mundane areas (which hopes promised by pharmaceutical old editorial and 404 pages. Maybe fridge do I buy? how should I get to companies often result in patients its problem was a slight turn to work today?). not taking any other steps that the skeptical, as indicated by its That’s the challenge facing could actually save their lives.” welcome page, which includes the Skeptics. Keep the word out there, Frankly, most of the stuff in New statements: “Is magick considerably as discouraging as that might be at Age publications can be fun if a bit more than just the stuff of legends? times. But at the same time keep in silly. Statements such as those by And could it be compared to a form mind that paranormal claims and Dingle are neither of those, which of technology? Is there apparent claimants do come and go, just like does not reflect well on Nova. . proof of the reality of phenomena in paranormal publications. .

13 FEATURE History

In the Dark

Tim Harding shines a light on the Dark Ages

ike other skeptics, I often Ldespair at the apparent decline in the public understanding of science. Anti-science, , , conspiracy theories and the general distrust of experts seem to be on the rise. I sometimes even wonder whether we are in danger of regressing into a new Dark Age. So what do we mean by a ‘Dark Age’? Was there really a Dark Age in post-Roman Europe? If so, what were approximately 1000 CE. The Early what happened when your mob was its most likely causes? These questions Middle Ages followed the decline in charge!” So, like good skeptics, let’s are difficult to answer, and not just of the Western Roman Empire and examine the historical evidence. because of disagreements among preceded the Central Middle Ages historians. The difficulty is in some (c1001–1300 CE) and the Late Middle THE GREEK DARK AGE ways circular – we call the post-Roman Ages (1300-1500 CE). The period saw The first European Dark Age occurred period a ‘Dark Age’ because we don’t a continuation of downward trends in ancient Greece from around 1100 to know enough about it (relative to the begun during late classical antiquity, 800 BCE. The archaeological evidence periods before and after); and we don’t including population decline, especially shows a collapse of the Mycenaean know enough about it because not in urban centres, a decline of trade, and Greek civilization at the outset of this much was written down at the time. increased translocation period, as their great My own observation is that western of peoples. There is palaces and cities civilisation has already suffered two a relative paucity of “Western civilisa- were destroyed or Dark Ages about 1300 years apart. scientific, literary, artistic tion has suffered abandoned and vital (There was an earlier Dark Age in and cultural output from trade links were lost. Ancient Greece from around 1100 to this time, especially in two Dark Ages 1300 Unfortunately, their 800 BCE). If this ‘trend’ is repeated Western Europe. years apart. Linear B script also we should be due for another one in a Historians suggest that ” disappeared, leaving couple of hundred years’ time. there were several causes us with no written The term ‘Dark Ages’ commonly of this decline, including the rise of accounts of what really happened or refers to the Early Middle Ages, which Christianity. The other causes are often why. was the period of European history overlooked, especially by antitheists Legend has it that Greece was lasting from the 5th century to trying to score points such as “Look invaded by the mysterious Dorians 14 The Skeptic March 16

from the north and/or the Sea Peoples Left: Linear B tablet of uncertain origin but possibly from discovered in Pylos the Black Sea area. The archeological Below: Lino’s Gate evidence is of little help to us other at Mycenae, with than showing a simpler geometrical amateur archaeologist style of pottery art than that of the Heinrich Schliemann Mycenaeans, hinting at occupation by seated (?) in front. a different culture. There is archeological evidence of a revival of Greek trade at the beginning Augustus, in 476 CE has traditionally was largely abandoned. of the 8th century BCE, coupled with marked the end of the Western Roman In the 8th century, the volume of the appearance of a new Greek alphabet Empire. The Eastern Roman Empire, trade reached its lowest level, partially system adapted from the Phoenicians often referred to as the Byzantine indicated by the very small number which is still in use today. This led to Empire after the fall of its western of shipwrecks found in the western the creation of western civilisation’s counterpart, had little ability to assert Mediterranean Sea. oldest extant literary works, such as control over the lost western territories. One of the main consequences of Homer’s The Odyssey and The Iliad. Although the movements of peoples the fall of Rome was a breakdown From succeeding centuries we have during this period are usually described of the strict Roman law and order, been bequeathed major texts of ancient as ‘invasions’, they were not just resulting among other things in the Greek drama, history, philosophy and military expeditions but migrations of escape of slaves who had performed science. entire peoples into the empire. These most of the labour. Less food and were mainly rural Germanic peoples fibre was produced on farms, resulting THE DECLINE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE who knew little of cities, writing or in people leaving the cities to less The Roman Empire reached its greatest money. Administrative, educational efficiently grow their own. Lower territorial extent during the 2nd and military infrastructure quickly agricultural activity resulted in natural century CE, reaching from Babylonia vanished, leading to the collapse of the reforestation, and travel and trade by in the East to Spain in the West, schools and to a rise of illiteracy even land became less safe, exacerbating the Britain and the Netherlands in the among the leadership. economic decline. North, to Egypt and North Africa in For the formerly Roman area, the South. The following two centuries there was another 20 per cent THE CHRISTIAN EMPIRE witnessed the slow decline of Roman decline in population between 400 The Catholic Church was the only control over its outlying territories. and 600CE, or a The Emperor Diocletian split the one-third decline empire into separately administered between 150-600 eastern and western halves in 286 CE which had CE. In 330 CE, after a period of significant economic civil war, Constantine the Great consequences. refounded the city of Byzantium as To make matters the newly renamed eastern capital, worse, the Plague of Constantinople. Justinian (541–542 During the period from 150 to 400 CE), which has CE, the population of the Roman since been found to Empire is estimated to have fallen from have been bubonic 65 million to 50 million, a decline plague, recurred of more than 20 percent. Some have periodically for 150 connected this to the Dark Ages Cold years - killing as Period (300–700 CE), when there was many as 50 million a decrease in global temperatures which people in Europe. impaired agricultural yields. The population of In 400 CE, the Visigoths invaded the city of Rome the Western Roman Empire and, itself declined from although briefly forced back from about 450,000 in Italy, in 410 CE they sacked the city 100 CE to only of Rome. The Vandals again sacked 20,000 during the Rome in 455 CE. The deposition of Early Middle Ages. the last emperor of the west, Romulus The city of London 0315 FEATURE History

In the Dark Continued...

centralised institution to survive the fall of the Western Roman Empire intact. It was the sole unifying cultural influence in Western Europe, preserving Latin learning, maintaining the art of writing, and preserving a centralised administration through its network of bishops ordained in succession. The Early Middle Ages are characterised by the control of urban areas by bishops and wider territorial control exercised by dukes and counts. The later rise of urban communes marked the beginning of the Central Middle Ages. During the Early Middle Ages, the for the East-West Schism in the 11th for powerful centralised Christian divide between eastern and western century. In the West, the power of the control during the Dark Ages is Christianity widened, paving the way Bishop of Rome expanded. In 607 CE, lacking. Boniface III became the first Bishop of Rome to use the title Pope. Pope THE WESTERN EUROPEAN DARK AGE Gregory the Great used his office as The concept of a Western European a temporal power, expanded Rome’s Dark Age originated with the Italian missionary efforts to the British Isles, scholar Petrarch in the 1330s CE. and laid the foundations for the Petrarch regarded the post-Roman expansion of monastic orders. centuries as ‘dark’ compared to The institutional structure of the light of classical antiquity. The Christianity in the west during this Protestant reformers of the 16th period is different from what it would century had an interest in disparaging become later in the Central Middle the ‘Dark Ages’ as an era of Catholic Ages. control, when they (the Protestants) As opposed to the later church, thought that Christianity had ‘gone the church of the Early Middle Ages off the rails’. Later historians expanded consisted primarily of the monasteries. the term to refer to the transitional In addition, the papacy was relatively period between Roman times and the weak, and its power was mostly Central Middle Ages (c11th–13th confined to central Italy. Religious century), although in the 20th century orders wouldn’t proliferate until the the Dark Ages were contracted back Central Middle Ages. to the Early Middle Ages (500-1000 For the typical Christian at this CE) again. I shall refer to this period time, religious participation was in Western Europe as ‘the Dark Ages’ largely confined to occasionally from here on. receiving mass from wandering monks. Evidence for the Dark Ages include Few would be lucky enough to receive the lack of output of manuscripts this as often as once a month. By (both originals and copies – see the end of the Dark Ages, individual the Table on page 18), a lack of practice of religion was becoming contemporary written history, more common, as monasteries general population decline, a paucity started to transform into something of inventions, a lack of sea trade, approximating modern churches, restricted building activity and limited where some monks might even give material cultural achievements in occasional sermons. Thus the evidence general. 16 The Skeptic March 16

Bottom left: The Sack of Rome by Barbarians in 410 CE, by Jospeh-Noel Sylvestre (1890) . Left: The Great Mosque of Cordoba (finished 987 CE) - aerial view and hypostyle hall Below: Statue of Petrarch from a niche in the exterior wall of the Uffizi Palace, Florence (early 19th century by Andrea Leoni)

CE on, decrees began to circulate recommending the restoration of old schools and the founding of new ones across the empire. Institutionally, these new schools were either under the responsibility of a monastery (monastic schools), a cathedral, or a noble court. The teaching of dialectic (a discipline that corresponds to today’s informal logic) was responsible

The Romans were remarkable larger cathedrals and faster ships. innovators. Their inventions of The invention of the three-field materials included kiln-fired bricks, system towards the end of the cement, concrete, wood veneer, Dark Ages, coupled with higher cast iron, glassware and surgical temperatures and the heavy plough, instruments. In construction, they enabled higher agricultural yields, invented paved roads, bridges, tunnels, which kick-started economic recovery aqueducts, arches, domes, dams, water and the resumption of trade. Among supply, drainage, sewerage and even other things, the three-field system underfloor heating. Their production created a surplus of oats that could technology included be used to feed the wheeled more horses. It plough, the two- Hardly any technolo- also required a re- field crop system, “ organisation of land harvesting machines, gy was invented, though tenure that led to paddlewheel mills, science flourished in the manorialism and the screw press, the Islamic world. feudalism. force pump, steam ” In the ancient power, gearing, world, Greek was pulleys and cranes. The Romans the primary language of science. were also admired for their mining Advanced scientific research and technology. teaching was mainly carried on in the In contrast, hardly any new Hellenistic side of the Roman Empire, technology was invented during and in Greek. Late Roman attempts to the Dark Ages. Nor were there any translate Greek writings into Latin had scientific discoveries of note, although limited success. As the knowledge of science and mathematics continued Greek declined, the Latin West found to flourish in the Islamic world, itself cut off from some of its Greek as discussed below. Yet later in the philosophical and scientific roots. Central Middle Ages, technological In the late 8th century, there inventions included windmills, was renewed interest in Classical mechanical clocks, transparent Antiquity as part of the short- glass, distillation, the heavy plough, lived Carolingian Renaissance horseshoes, harnesses, stirrups and of the early 9th century CE. more powerful crossbows. Architectural Charlemagne carried out a innovations enabled the building of reform in education. From 787 17 FEATURE History

EUROPEAN OUTPUT OF MANUSCRIPTS

the Logical Place In the Dark 500-1500 without SE Europe (byzantine realm) & Russia Continued... Denialism 5 000 000 enialism is a person’s choice to D deny certain particular facts. 4 000 000 It is an essentially irrational belief for the increase in the interest in where the person substitutes his or speculative inquiry; from this interest 3 000 000 her personal opinion for established would follow the rise of the Scholastic knowledge. Indeed, one of the tradition of Christian philosophy. In 2 000 000 hallmarks of denialism is a failure to the 12th and 13th centuries, many Number of Copies recognise the distinction between of those schools that were founded 1 000 000 facts and opinions. under the auspices of Charlemagne, Denialism should not be confused especially cathedral schools, would with modern scientific skepticism, become universities. 0 6th 7th 8th 9th 10th 11th 12th 13th 14th 15th which as we know is the challenging of THE EXPANSION OF ISLAM beliefs that are unscientific, irrational or CENTURY based on insufficient evidence. Instead After the death of the prophet Mohammed in 632 CE, Islamic forces of denying facts, modern skeptics CONCLUSIONS test claims by analysing whether they conquered much of the former Eastern Roman Empire and Persia, starting The former Roman Empire was are supported by adequate empirical with the Middle East and Arabian replaced by three civilisations – evidence. Peninsula in the early 7th century, Western Europe, the Byzantine Empire The philosophical skepticism of the North Africa in the later 7th century, and the Islamic Caliphate. The Dark Sophists in ancient Greece (which was and much of the Iberian Peninsula Ages really only refer to one of these quite different to modern skepticism) (Spain and Portugal) in 711 CE. This civilisations, Western Europe, where consisted of doubting whether there Islamic Empire was known as the there is significant historical evidence can be any knowledge or facts at all, Umayyad Caliphate. Its capital was of a marked decline in scientific, rather than denying particular facts. the Spanish city of Cordoba, which by technological, agricultural, economic, Science denialism is the rejection the 10th century CE had become the educational and literary activities of basic facts and concepts that are world’s largest city, with an estimated during this period. There was also a well-supported parts of the scientific population of around 500,000. considerable decline in the population consensus on a subject, in favour of The Islamic conquests reached of Western Europe, notwithstanding radical and controversial opinions of an their peak in the mid-8th century. migrations of Germanic peoples from unscientific nature. For example, the The defeat of Muslim forces at the northern Europe. Christianity is likely term evolution denialist or ‘creationist’ Battle of Poitiers in 732 CE led to the to have been only one of several causes is applied to people who argue against re-conquest of southern France by the of the Dark Ages. . the fact that life on Earth has evolved Franks, but the main reason for the from earlier forms, instead of having halt of Islamic growth in Europe was REFERENCES been created by a supernatural being in the overthrow of the Umayyad dynasty Bennett, Judith M. (2011) Medieval History its current form. and its replacement by the Abbasid – A Short History, McGraw- Hill, New York. Other instances include Holocaust dynasty based in Babylon. Gibbon, Edward (1788). The History of the denialism, AIDS denialism and The works of Euclid and Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. vaccination denialism. The various Archimedes, lost in the West, were 6, Ch. XXXVII. forms of denialism present a common translated from Arabic to Latin in Other references for this article may be underlying feature of the person Spain. The modern Hindu-Arabic found on Tim Harding’s blog at http:// rejecting overwhelming evidence, often numerals, including a notation for yandoo.wordpress.com/ with attempts to deny the existence of zero, were developed by Hindu a scientific consensus or alternatively mathematicians in the 5th and 6th to allege a to conceal centuries. Muslim mathematicians About the author: or fake the evidence. Denialism is learned of it in the 7th century and Tim Harding BSc works commonly one of the foundations of added a notation for decimal fractions as a regulatory consultant quackery and other varieties of what we in the 9th and 10th centuries. In the to various governments. skeptics call ‘woo’. course of the 11th century, Islam’s He is also studying scientific knowledge began to reach medieval history at Monash - by Tim Harding Western Europe, via Islamic Spain. University. 18 The 32ndAustralian Skeptics National Convention Melbourne November 25-27

Carillo Gantner Theatre, Sidney Myer Asia Centre University of Melbourne

Tickets on Sale June 2016

Special Guest Speakers LAWRENCE KRAUSS Author of international bestsellers The Physics of Star Trek and A Universe From Nothing. Director of the ASU Origins Project at Arizona State University, Foundation Professor in the School of Earth and Space Exploration and the Department of Physics, and described by Scientific American as a unique scientific ‘public intellectual’.

EDZARD ERNST A leading spokesperson for sense in medicine and co- author of the book Trick or Treatment. Academic physician and researcher specialising in the study of complementary and alternative medicine. He was formerly Professor of Complementary Medicine at the University of Exeter, the first such academic position in the world.

More Announce ments Soon convention.skeptics.com.au FEATURE Classic Catches - History

Building Pharaoh’s Mountains

In this Classic Catch article from 1995, Barry Williams gets to the pointy end of pyramids, and looks at who built them and how … and it doesn’t involve aliens.

n 1988, I wrote “Pyramids, Pyramyths HISTORY the king’s palace ie the Great House Iand Pyramidiots” [Vol 8, No 3, republ- To begin with, we need to know just (note the interesting parallels with ished as a Classic Catch in Vol 32, No 4] a little of the history, geography and modern usage eg “the White House in which I looked at the many strange religion of Egypt, a nation which lasted said”, “a spokesman for No 10 claimed”, ideas which had grown up about the as a continuous culture, and was a “the Kremlin reports” [but fortunately pyramid, both as a solid construction powerful player in its world, for almost not as yet “the Lodge demands”]). and as a geometrical shape. Since then, 3000 years, beginning with unification These kings are conventionally although the pyramid appears to have in c3150 BCE and ending with the grouped into 30 Dynasties, following declined in importance as a cutting-edge death of the last native born Pharaoh in the genealogy in the Egyptian History New Age cure-all, its shape still exerts 332 BCE. of Manetho, a Greek-Egyptian priest a peculiar influence over the minds of To put this into context, many of who lived in the 3rd century BCE. those who have a desperate desire to the other major political entities of During the following Persian and Greek believe. the ancient world lasted for less than a (Ptolemaic) periods, the rulers of Egypt In particular, the Egyptian Pyramids couple of centuries, the Roman Empire assumed the titles and forms of the and more specifically the Great Pyramid for around 800 years, and in modern Pharaohs and these are sometimes added of Khufu, located on the plateau of times, the European empires usually less to the original 30 dynasties. Giza on the outskirts of Cairo, seem than 200. For convenience, Egyptian dynastic to fascinate those who wish to believe Even the British Empire, by far the history is broken down into various that the world is a more mysterious and largest of all, was only a major power periods: magical place than it actually is. In this in the world for around 300 years. Or, • Early Dynastic Dyn I-II 3150-2686 BCE article I will look in more detail at just to make the point about the time scale • Old Kingdom Dyn III-VI 2686-2181 how these remarkable structures came of Ancient Egypt even more starkly, the • First Intermediate Dyn VII-X 2181-2040 to be built and show that, far from Egyptians from the reign of Ahmose • Middle Kingdom Dyn XI-XII 2040- representing evidence for lost civilisations II (26th Dynasty) onwards are closer 1782 or star travelling extraterrestrials, they are in time to us than they are to their • Second Intermed Dyn XIII-XVII 1782- entirely consistent with, and stand as a ancestors of the First Dynasty. 1570 tribute to, the abilities of the very human Historically, Egypt was ruled by god/ • New Kingdom Dyn XVIII-XX 1567-1070 people of their time - people who were no kings, known to us as Pharaohs, the • Third Intermed Dyn XXI-XXV 1070-525 different, in any material respect, from us. name in Egyptian originally meaning • Late Period Dyn XXVII-XXXI 525-332 20 The Skeptic March 16

area. Some traces of late palaeolithic sites and early farming settlements have been found, but it must be remembered that more civilised societies have been building over these sites for 5000 years, so it is unsurprising that not a great deal is known about the pre-Dynastic Egyptians. One of the facts that has emerged from this time concerns the burial customs of the earlier settlers; bodies in an excellent state of preservation have been found in simple graves in the sand. They are almost always found lying on one side, with the knees drawn up to the chest, wrapped in a mat and with some personal items beside the body. There is no evidence of any special methods having been used to ensure preservation; it appears to stem fortuitously from the rapid desiccation of the corpse by the extremely dry and hot sand. Later burials are in brick-lined graves which probably had sand heaped over them and there is some decoration evident. It is reasonable to suppose that the GEOGRAPHY RELIGION mummification and funeral rituals The kingdom of Egypt consisted of the The Egyptian religion was very complex, of later Egyptians derived from very fertile Nile Delta (Lower - northern with many gods originally associated this accidental preservation of their - Egypt) and a narrow strip of arable with local settlements. Re, the sun predecessors. Unfortunately, some of land on either side of the Nile Valley god was the primary deity and the these rituals appear to have done more (Upper – southern - Egypt), which was personal god of the Pharaoh, who was harm than good, as dynastic mummies kept fertile by the deposition of silt also considered to are often in a far during the regular annual flood. be the son of Re. worse state of Throughout most of Egyptian history, Royal succession The pyramids fascinate preservation than it stretched from the Mediterranean followed the “ the earlier bodies. in the north to the First Cataract (at female line with, those who wish to There is, however, Aswan) in the south, a country 1000km ideally, the king believe the world is more no doubt that a long and on average 30km wide, giving being the son of mysterious than it is major part of the an estimated usable land area of around the preceding king ” Egyptian religion 34,000 sq km (about half the area of and his Great Wife concerned survival Tasmania). Although at various times of (the heiress to the line). In some cases, into the afterlife and that this very much imperial expansion, Egyptian conquests when another individual assumed the depended on the survival of the mortal extended its territory as far north as kingly role, he assured his legitimacy by remains of the individual. Syria and far to the south into what is marrying the heiress (often his sister and now Sudan, the core of Egypt remained occasionally his mother). BEFORE THE DYNASTIES the land between the First Cataract and Not a great deal is known about the the Delta. BURIAL CUSTOMS civilisations which grew up along the The Nile was the most important There is evidence of nomad hunters Nile prior to the establishment of Egypt fact of Ancient Egypt, guaranteeing its moving into the Nile region as long as a single entity, but there is plenty agricultural wealth (an estimated 10 as 15,000 years ago and, over time, of circumstantial evidence that two metres of silt has been deposited in the some of these appeared to have settled kingdoms must have existed in the latter Nile Valley during historical times) and down and taken up agriculture, which part of the third millennium BCE, one acting as the main transport corridor for was invented in the Middle East and based in the Delta and one in the Valley. this long, narrow land. probably brought to Egypt from that Then, sometime between 3150 and 0321 FEATURE Classic Catches - History

Pharaoh’s one of which presumably contained King of Lower Egypt, the First after the the body and the remainder containing King of Upper Egypt, Administrator of Mountains the possessions of the deceased to give the Great Palace, Hereditary Lord, the him comfort in the afterlife. Above the High Priest of Heliopolis, Imhotep the Continued... burial pit was built a large, rectangular, builder, the sculptor, the maker of stone decorated brick superstructure which vases ...”. contained compartments for the storage Certainly a man of many 3050 BCE, a king whose name appears of food, wine and other useful items. accomplishments and arguably the best to have been Narmer (later Greek This type of brick tomb we call a known Egyptian who was not a king. historians referred to him as Menes) is mastaba, after the He was revered seen on two carved pieces wearing both Arabic word for the Even in early Egyptian by later Egyptians the White Crown of Upper Egypt and step found outside “ as a scribe, doctor, the Red Crown of Lower Egypt. He modern Egyptian history there was the fear astronomer and is generally credited as the king who houses, which they of the descration of the all round good unified the two kingdoms and all future resemble in shape. bloke and he was kings had among their titles “King of As time went king’s tomb and remains. subsequently deified the two lands”. on through the ” during the Late The next king of whom there is first two dynasties, Period, more than good evidence is one Hor-Aha. He the burial chambers of the kings were 2000 years later. The king to whom was probably the son of Narmer and is made deeper and more complex, while Imhotep was such an invaluable servant credited with being the founder of the the superstructure became larger and is known to us as Djoser or Zoser - also First Dynasty in about 3050, setting up more highly decorated. Presumably this known to the later Greeks as Tosorthos his capital at Memphis (near the present was partly because even this early in and described on his monuments as day Cairo). This was to remain a major Egyptian history there was the fear of Netjerikhet - the second king of the city, though not always the capital, the desecration of the king’s tomb and Third Dynasty, who reigned c2668- throughout Egyptian history. remains. 2649. During the First Dynasty the kings Imhotep selected a site for his king’s began to build large tombs as a prelude PYRAMIDS tomb at Saqqara to the northwest of to the afterlife and to preserve their Then, in the Third Dynasty (2686 BCE Memphis. On this site he constructed remains from the depredations of and considered to be the beginning of the first really large stone structure the elements and from grave robbers, the Old Kingdom) someone had the ever built. He began by constructing although none of them has been bright idea that stone would be a better a stone mastaba in a uniquely square positively identified with a particular and more permanent building material shape, approximately 207 feet on each king. This is not germane to our story, than sun-dried mud bricks. side and 26ft high (I will use imperial but the method of tomb construction Evidence suggests, and it is generally measurements in the descriptions of the is. The oldest of these tombs consisted accepted, that this individual was one pyramids as these are the measurements of a burial pit, roofed over with planks, Imhotep, described in a contemporary given in my reference, The Pyramids walled into separate compartments, inscription as “The Treasurer of the of Egypt by IES Edwards.) It was built of local stone and faced with fine limestone, with the four faces roughly oriented to the four cardinal points. When it was completed, it was extended by 14ft on each side and again faced with dressed limestone, although the height of these extensions was two feet lower than the central box. Then another enlargement of 28ft was added to the east side, making it a stepped, and now rectangular, mastaba. A further three steps were added on top of this but, before this was completed, further

Top right: The Giza complex - (l to r) Menkaure, Khafre and Great Pyramid of Khufu, with the Queens Pyramids in front. Left: Djoser’s Step Pyramid, Egypt’s oldest. 22 The Skeptic March 16

extensions were added to the north and a highly intelligent people learning a resemble a rectangular tower standing in west sides and the whole structure was brand new skill (working with stone), a huge hill of rubble. completed as a six step pyramid. The of a highly organised society able to About 40km north of this, at Dashur, final dimensions were 411ft east to west, undertake major works, and of a driving we find the next pyramid, belonging 358ft north to south and 204ft high. force aiming for something special. to Snefru, the first king of the Fourth This extraordinary structure formed It has been conjectured that the Step Dynasty. This again is different from only the centrepiece of a huge complex, Pyramid was seen as a staircase to enable what we think of as a true pyramid. 1800ft long and 900ft wide, totally the dead king to join his father Re in It begins with a slope on the sides of enclosed with decorated stone walls heaven, but this is only conjecture – 54o and, at 160ft above the ground, and including buildings and courtyards we just don’t have enough evidence to the slope decreases to 43o. This is used in the funeral ceremonies. These determine what motivated Imhotep and known (for obvious reasons) as the buildings, though full sized, were only his royal master. Bent Pyramid. Some have suggested replicas and their interiors were filled I have no intention of describing in that this change was made when the with stone. detail the pyramids built by Djoser’s Meidum pyramid collapsed and the The burial chambers under the immediate successors; enough to say slope was reduced to prevent another pyramid are considerably more complex that they did build pyramids of a collapse. Though plausible, this idea is than in any of the later pyramids, much lower standard and smaller than not supported by concrete evidence. consisting of shafts, tunnels and the Step Pyramid. Perhaps the cost of To the north of this pyramid, we find chambers which also show that many construction of Djoser’s masterpiece had the first true pyramid, also belonging changes in design were undertaken impoverished the kingdom. to Snefru. Called the Northern Stone, during construction. It really was a Then, at the beginning of the Fourth or the Red Pyramid, this was built at most remarkable feat of design and Dynasty, (c 2613) someone decided the conservative angle of 43o. All of engineering. Nevertheless, there are to convert the step form into a true this shows that the Egyptians were still many signs that the builders were not pyramid. learning as they went along. entirely comfortable with the new At Meidum, about 50km south of techniques and materials; just what Memphis, a building was commenced THE GREAT PYRAMID we would expect in any entirely new as a step pyramid and again several Now we move north again to Giza, on enterprise. changes of design during construction the outskirts of modern Cairo. Khufu In the construction of the Step are evident. The interesting thing about (Cheops in Greek), the son of Snefru, Pyramid there is no indication of this pyramid is that, at some time ruled c2589-2566, and began work any external influences by advanced during its history (perhaps even during on the greatest piece of construction civilisations from either Atlantis or the construction), it collapsed, for reasons ever attempted in the ancient world. It stars. There is plenty of evidence of we cannot tell for certain. Its remains represents the culmination of everything 23 FEATURE Classic Catches - History

Pharaoh’s was cut through the already on from, the Ascending Corridor, completed levels, meeting a we come to a remarkable piece of Mountains short horizontal corridor architecture. The Grand Gallery is which ends in another 153ft long, 6ft 9in wide and 28ft Continued... chamber which is generally high to the peak of its corbelled (and incorrectly) known as roof. At the end of the Grand the Queen’s Chamber. This Gallery, a horizontal passage the Egyptians had learned about room is a short distance leads to the King’s Chamber, pyramid construction and, although above ground level and built of granite and many subsequent pyramids were directly beneath the apex of measuring 34ft 4in east to constructed, none of them could match the pyramid. west, 17ft 2in north to south the sheer scale of the Great Pyramid of Two small passages, and 19ft 1in high, which is Khufu. about 8in square, lead offset to the south from the Probably no building in the history of upwards at an angle of vertical centreline. From the the world has excited so much interest, about 38o from the north wall, a small shaft nor so many peculiar hypotheses, as north and south walls penetrates to the Khufu’s great monument. And there of this chamber. Until outer surface is little wonder that this should be so, relatively recently, these of the pyramid because it is indeed a very remarkable were believed to end within at an angle of piece of work. the masonry and were regarded 31o and from Khufu’s pyramid differs in some other as evidence that the chamber had the south wall, a respects from its predecessors. Until been abandoned unfinished. In 1994, similar shaft ascends this stage, the kings’ burial chambers however, a small robot camera was sent to the outside at 45o. had been hewn out of the rock beneath up one of these passages and discovered The purpose of these is unknown, the pyramid or built at ground level, a metal door at its end. To this date, but hypotheses have been advanced that with the pyramid superimposed above we have no idea what lies behind the they pointed to important stars in the them. A subterranean chamber was door, but I will go out on a limb here Egyptian cosmology. apparently the original intention of and bet that it will not be evidence These hypotheses may be correct, but, Khufu, as a corridor descends into the of extraterrestrial visitors. [Editor’s as with so much about the Egyptians, rock of the Giza plateau, terminating in note: In fact, in 2002, an expedition we just don’t know. The King’s Chamber an unfinished chamber. Then, at some by the Egyptian Supreme Council of has a flat ceiling, consisting of nine stage during the construction it was Antiquities and National Geographic granite slabs averaging 50 tons each in decided that the burial chamber should drilled a small hole in this door and sent weight. Above this are four other flat lie within the superstructure of the a camera to look inside. They found … roofed spaces and one pointed roof, pyramid. another door!]. presumably designed to relieve the stress A narrow ascending corridor (known, But the changes in the pyramid did of the remaining masonry on the ceiling surprisingly, as the Ascending Corridor) not end here. Above, and continuing of the King’s Chamber. On one of the walls of one of these relieving chambers is found the only known mention of the name Khufu in the entire pyramid. Curiously, the only known representation of this very important king is a 7.6 cm high ivory statue, found somewhere else. All of the construction methods used in the Grand Gallery and the King’s Chamber shows that the Egyptians had no concept of the arch but they

Top: Imhotep, architect of the Step Pyramid (bronze from c.332-30 BCE, in the Louvre). Left: Pyramidical shapes - (l to r) Great Pyramid, Bent Pyramid of Dashur, Step Pyramid. Right: Great Pyramid chambers and passages. 24 The Skeptic March 16

do represent the best methods of the sun god, so a certain hyperbole in near his valley temple. construction using contemporary description is to be expected. The third, and much smaller pyramid techniques and materials. And the pyramid was not the only (356ft square) at Giza belongs to They are not the sort of thing one construction associated with this Menkaure, son of Khafre. The Giza would expect from advanced external monument. Each of the pyramid complex also contains a number of very civilisations. That most of them have complexes included a Valley Temple, small pyramids, assumed to belong to subsequently cracked, but none has on the Nile bank, a covered causeway wives of the kings. collapsed is evidence that it was not leading up to a number of large Later kings of the Old Kingdom a bad technique at that. The King’s constructions beside the pyramid, all of continued to build pyramids, though Chamber contains a granite lidless which have disappeared. much smaller (typically 250ft square) sarcophagus, which is about 1 inch too In 1925, a vertical pit was discovered, than those of Giza, and largely of rubble wide to have been brought in through at the bottom of which was found or mud bricks, cased with limestone. At the Ascending Corridor, so it must have the funeral accoutrements of Queen the end of the Sixth Dynasty, centralised been installed during construction. Hetepheres, Khufu’s mother. Her body government seems to have broken down Various devices were included in the was not found in this tomb and may only to be restored after about 150 years. pyramid to block these passages with have been buried elsewhere, but this find Twelfth Dynasty kings c1900 BCE blocks of stone and none of them gives us some idea of the artefacts in use reinstated the construction of pyramids, succeeded in keeping out tomb robbers. at that time and is one of the greatest but these consisted largely of mud brick No item belonging to the king’s burial ancient treasures ever found. Then, in and were far inferior to those of the Old has been found and the pyramid was 1954, another pit was discovered to Kingdom. almost certainly breached in antiquity. contain a dismantled cedar boat. About To recapitulate, the construction of Another, roughly built, tunnel leads 141ft long, this boat has subsequently stone pyramids began in the reign of from behind where these blocks were been reconstructed, and is in a specially Djoser (2668-2649) and reached its placed to enable the masons to escape designed museum at Giza. peak in the reign of Khufu (2589-2566), after their work was done. Khufu was succeeded by his son little more than 100 years. The completed pyramid was faced Djedefre, who only reigned for eight Compare this with our achievement with dressed white limestone (almost all years and left a now-ruined pyramid at a of powered flight in 1903 and putting a of which has now been removed) and different location, and then by another man on the moon in 1969 and I don’t must have been a truly remarkable sight son Khafre who was responsible for think the Egyptians suffer at all from the to contemporary and later Egyptians. the second pyramid at Giza (the one comparison. The pyramid had the name “Khufu is that actually looks taller than the Great one belonging to the horizon” (each of Pyramid because it is built on higher THE NUMBERS the pyramids had a name extolling the ground). This pyramid is roughly 50ft Let us now consider a few facts about virtues of its owner) which no doubt shorter in each of its base dimensions, the Great Pyramid. derived from some religious purpose. 8ft lower in height, and not as well- Length of the four faces at ground It is useful always to remember built as its predecessor, though more level: that the Pharaohs were in fact of its associated buildings remain. • North 755.43 ft gods to their people and in Khafre is also credited with the • South 756.08 ft death were believed to have construction of the Great • East 755.88 ft joined their father, Re, Sphinx, which is located • West 755.77 ft Thus the difference between the longest and shortest sides is only 7.9 inches. Angles at the corners: • North-east 90 3’ 2” • North-west 89 59’ 58” • South-east 89 56‘ 27” • South-west 90 0’ 33” Height (originally)481.4 ft (of which the top 31 ft are now missing) Slope angle: 51 52’ Base area: 13.1 acres Alignment errors to the cardinal points: • North side 2’ 28” south of west • South side 1’ 57” south of west • East side 5’ 30” west of north • West side 2’ 30” west of north 25 FEATURE Classic Catches - History

Pharaoh’s remains near the Second Pyramid. It work would have been carried out by has been estimated that the base of the skilled artisans, who no doubt were Mountains Great Pyramid is level to within half employed year round. The heavy an inch between the north-west corner lifting work was probably done by Continued... and the south-east corner. There is even ordinary workers (mainly farmers in a suggestion that the prevailing winds a primarily agricultural society) who may have accounted for this minor would otherwise have been unemployed All of which appears to be near enough imperfection by ‘piling up’ the water in during the height of the annual flood. for government work. this corner. They were not slaves, except insofar as (Although Khufu’s pyramid is the Where did the stone come from? the god/king could be considered to most exactly aligned to the cardinal Most of the internal stones were own everything, and records exist to points, most of the others of this time quarried on site on the Giza Plateau. show they were paid for their labour are true to within less than 15’.) The limestone casing stones came from (chiefly in bread and onions, which It is estimated that the structure Tura, on the opposite (eastern) bank of must have made for some interesting contained approximately 2.3 million the Nile. Rocks were odours in internal separate blocks of average weight 2.5 quarried by cutting construction tons. It is impossible to be more accurate grooves along three “The technology known sites). The picture as in the centre of the base there is a core sides with copper to be available to the we have of of the natural rock of the Giza plateau, chisels and using cruel overseers the size of which cannot be determined. wooden wedges to pyramid builders was whipping the At 5.75 million tons, it is the heaviest split the rock away sufficient to do the job. reluctant workers building ever constructed and, until the from its base. Partially ” is an invention 19th century CE, it was the tallest. cut blocks from later of Hollywood periods are still in place in quarries and or cartoonists and no contemporary CONSTRUCTION METHODS show how this was done, and samples illustrations show whips being wielded We now know what was built, but we of copper chisels and saws are still in in this way. In general, and except for need to ask, how was it built. The simple existence. captives taken during imperial expansion answer is that we do not know for How were the rocks moved? On flat phases, the Egyptians were not slave certain. ground on sledges, pulled by men. A owners. And another myth for which Little in the way of written records 2.5 ton block could be moved by as few there is no evidence is that members of have been found from this early period as four to six men and later illustrations the king’s family and household were of Egyptian history, but we can make show teams of 150 or more pulling killed and buried with him. This may some fairly confident deductions from giant statues weighing 60 tons using have occurred during pre-dynastic times what evidence remains. this method. Getting the stones up an and during very early dynasties, but did How was the base levelled (13.1 acres, increasing pyramid would have posed not occur at this time. remember)? In the case of the Great more problems. It is known that the How did they get the sides to so Pyramid, and presumably for others, the Egyptians used levers in their work and accurately align with the cardinal points? whole base area was not levelled. In this we assume that they built ramps up the Sometimes this question is posed with case, a large outcrop of the native rock sides of the growing structures. Remains the addendum “as they did not have the was left in place in the centre. But the of ramps have been found near some compass”. If they had used a compass, perimeter of the Pyramid stands on a pyramids, but a modern attempt to the alignment would not have been level base, which is important to ensure build a small scale pyramid shows that nearly so accurate, as this would have that the construction goes up straight. by using levers and billets of wood, a lined up with the magnetic poles, not We can be quite confident that a mud stone can be lifted to a higher course true north or south. But a better method wall was built around the perimeter of efficiently and that may have been the exists and this is one that was certainly the base, the space inside being filled method used, but we do not know used later in Egyptian history. with water. Then a network of trenches for certain. It remains a fact that the All that is needed is an observation was cut in the bedrock, so that the technology known to be available to the of the rising and setting points of a bottom of each trench was the same pyramid builders was sufficient to do particular star, bisect the angle and distance below the surface of the water the job. Remember that in a pyramid, Presto, you have North. You then use (which would have to be constantly 70 per cent of the mass lies in the lower a set square to make the corners 90o topped up to account for evaporation). third and 80 per cent lies in the lower and away you go. Because the horizon The water was then drained off and the half of the structure, so the job, though is not level you can build an enclosure remaining rock chipped down to the difficult, is not quite as difficult as might around your surveyor, so he cannot see level of the bottom of the trenches. be at first imagined. the horizon and he marks the points An example of this trench grid Who did the work? The technical where the star rises and sets with 26 The Skeptic March 16

great accuracy. They probably did the of the Great Pyramid that, suitably been built with lasers and anti-gravity calculations several times to be sure they massaged, would give any result from devices, they should have been a lot were right but that is again a plausible Planck’s Constant to the GDP of New better. method using extant technology. Zealand for 1957. This idea continues Why did they do it? Well, in both And while we are on measurements, to bob up from time to time and makes cases the simple answer might be “To it is a fact that the circumference bears a even less sense now than it did 150 years the Greater Glory of God”, but that relationship to its height that is a pretty ago. Wishful thinking. does not tell the whole story. In our own fair approximation of 2π. And then there is one idea that century, we might look at the desire The Egyptians did not have that level stays within the bounds of plausibility: to enter space in the same context. of sophistication in mathematics, so pyramid construction was devised Our species seems to have this internal how could this have come about? Again, as a method of welding together a drive to push out the boundaries we do not know, but we do not have community, a nation, from the disparate and it sometimes manifests itself in to propose any extraterrestrial forces. elements so recently independent remarkable works. However, we should It could be just by chance that this entities. A reasonable hypothesis, not overuse analogy to try to understand came about or it could be that a rolling possibly correct, but it suffers, like so the motivation of earlier members of drum or wheel was used to measure much about Ancient Egypt, from lack of our species and it remains a matter for long distances, in which case π would evidence. speculation, not for certainty. have been included in measurements Finally, we can make logical fortuitously. We just don’t know. CONCLUSION assumptions about how the Egyptians We do not know for certain just how went about constructing these SOME CRANK THEORIES the pyramids of Egypt were constructed; magnificent works, because we know Apart from the external influences, some after all, they were constructed over 4500 something about the technologies they of the other weird suggestions made for years ago and very few written records had, but we make assumptions about how and why the Egyptians made their remain from that early time. Many their motivation and thoughts at our pyramids are: mysteries remain as to actual techniques peril. The Ancient Egyptians were homo Energy transmitters/concentrators - and certainly as to motivation, and many sapiens sapiens, just as we are; they were there is absolutely no evidence that the of those mysteries may never be solved every bit as intelligent and as capable pyramids represent any form of energy with any certainty. Nevertheless we can as we are, but they stand at the very that would not be contained in the rocks be confident that the job was not beyond threshold of our species’ long journey that comprise them (apart from the the people who did it. into civilisation and we stand at the potential energy they contain by virtue The technology of the time, which end of a 5000 year long corridor. On of their height above the ground). Nor we might consider primitive, was the way, we have learned a lot and have is there any evidence to suggest that appropriate for the job to be done. To taken on a lot of cultural baggage. In the pyramid was used to preserve the suggest that the Egyptians needed the many ways, the Ancient Egyptians are bodies of the pharaohs, although, as no assistance of Atlanteans or Pleiadeans is just as alien to us as any hypothesised pharaonic bodies have ever been found an insult to our species. civilisation from the stars could in any of the pyramids, we cannot be Let me put that in a different context. conceivably be. . absolutely certain (only bloody sure). During the 12th and 13th centuries Granaries - an old idea was that they CE, a wave of cathedral building REFERENCES were built by Noah as granaries against swept through Europe. The work Edwards, IES, The Pyramids of Egypt, Revised times of famine. As the empty spaces that was done was truly monumental ed, Penguin, 1991. within or beneath the pyramids are such and represented the cutting edge Clayton, Peter A, Chronicle of the Pharaohs, a minor percentage of their entire bulk, of contemporary techniques and Thames & Hudson, 1994 this seems to be a case of ‘conspicuous inventiveness, but that was all it Baines, John & Malek, J, Atlas of Ancient construction’. Clearly wrong. represented. Just as no-one seriously Egypt, Phaidon, 1984. A calendar of all the earth’s history, suggests that Catholic missionaries Mendelssohn, Kurt, The Riddle of the past and future – a hoary old chestnut from Orion came to earth to instruct Pyramids, Norton,1986.]t perpetrated last century by some rabid these mediaeval artisans and architects fundamentalists, chief among whom in how to do their jobs, so we do not About the author: was the Astronomer Royal for Scotland, need to postulate external agencies to Barry Williams is former Charles Piazzi Smyth. Details of his account for the pyramids. In each case, president and executive mania are contained in my previous it was just some homo sapiens showing officer of Australian Skeptics article “Pyramids, Pyramyths and how good they can be if they have the Inc, and editor of this journal. Pyramidiots”. Suffice it to say that there incentive. If nothing else, remarkable He was there when the are any number of measurements one works as the pyramids and Mediaeval pyramids were built, so he could make on any structure the size cathedrals may be (and are), had they knows of what he talks. 27 ARTICLE Astronomy Planet from Outer Space Steve Roberts looks into the latest astronomical ‘discovery’ and how astrologers are struggling to keep up.

here was jubilation in 1783 when Ta British astronomer accidentally spotted a new planet, and tried to call it ‘George’ in honour of the King. The French and the newly constituted Americans were appalled, and argued about its name for the next 70 years, during which time astronomers were eagerly observing the new planet and measuring its position. The orbit of a planet can be pretty well determined from only three positions in front of the stars, and Uranus (as it was eventually in 2018. But in 2013 it made two Mike Brown, Professor of Planetary called, delighting punsters to this day) incursions into Cetus, the Whale, Astronomy at Caltech - “it’s about here”. is about 20 AU from the Sun, and its a constellation that isn’t even in the orbit takes 84 years. The Earth’s orbit at Zodiac. Anyone born between 9/3/13 it was possible to calculate roughly 93 million miles is defined as 1 AU. and 3/4/13 or 12/11/13 and 13/1/14 where this planet should be, and its Astrologers then had to add this should have a whale of an inventive mass. Sir George Airy, the British new planet to the six already known spirit. Astronomer Royal from 1835-1881, since ancient times, and decide what with typical arrogance pooh-poohed its significance might be - and they FINDING PLANETS this idea, delaying observations of that decided on ingenuity, inventions and Meanwhile, astronomers at their area of the sky, so it was a Frenchman, revolutionary spirit. They also had the telescopes - or more accurately, their Urbain Le Verrier, who discovered the challenge that Uranus sits in front of legions of computers (adult female extra planet. Well, actually Galileo the same zodiacal constellation for human beings) at their desks - were had seen it in 1612 and drawn it as half a dozen years at a time before finding that Uranus was not following a star in his notebook. And to make wearily shuffling across to sit in the orbit that had been precisely matters worse, a British astronomer front of the next one - a moment determined for it. Smirking astrologers had (of course) seen it a month before that can be precisely determined would ascribe this to its revolutionary Le Verrier, but having only inferior sky because a committee has defined spirit, but tedious and boring scientific maps he also mistook it for a star. We the constellations as having exact work showed that there must be await Russian and North Korean claims boundaries. Uranus is currently another planet even further out there, for prior observation. As its discoverer, ‘in’ Pisces and will move into Aries pulling on Uranus by gravitation. And Le Verrier wondered what to call the 28 The Skeptic March 16

new planet, especially as the French with Neptune’s orbit. Other bodies, quite right for just Neptune doing the had cut the head off their King some including Pluto itself, have orbits in work. Because Pluto was no longer years before; so he modestly named it resonance with Neptune’s; timings in counted as a planet after 2006, the after himself. But the Russians thought proportions of 2:3 (Pluto), 3:4, 3:5, 4:7 new planet would be the 9th planet that Neptune would be a better name. and 2:5 have been noted and Wikipedia and is thus called Planet IX - to the Neptune is 30 AU from the Sun and lists a dozen of these “plutinos”. Way delight of movie fans who know that its orbit takes about 165 years, thus out beyond this mess, probably the worst on 11/7/2011 it was back at where there may lie the Hills movie ever made is it was first discovered on 23/9/1846. Cloud at 2-5,000 AU “ Photographing called Plan 9 from But - guess what - Neptune does not and the Oort Cloud at Neptune is like Outer Space, and to follow its orbit properly either. It was 20-50,000 AU, with photographing a sci-fi fans who note thus proposed that yet another planet vast numbers of rocky that the Dune series must be out there, pulling on Neptune, bodies, but this is still black cat in a cellar at of books by Frank but this time it was too complex to only a conjecture; night. Herbert already calculate exactly where it would be. An there is not enough ” has a planet called exhaustive search of the Zodiac was sunlight out there to Ix. There had also therefore undertaken, and that is how see anything. (For scale, the nearest star, been wild speculation before 2006 of Pluto was discovered, in 1930. But as Alpha Centauri, is at 300,000 AU or what would have been a 10th planet, the euphoria and self-congratulation 4.37 light-years.) It is postulated that conspiratorially called Planet X and wore away, it was noticed that Pluto bodies get dislodged from these two this became linked to the cosmic doom is nowhere near heavy enough nor in clouds by the gravity of passing stars, predictions of 2012. But we’re still the right place to be the offending new letting them fall into the Solar System here. planet; so yes, there must be another where some of them become long- Returning to astronomical reality, new planet out there. period comets. Planet IX is calculated to have a mass With better telescopes, this time the about 10 times that of Earth (ie about wildest dreams of astronomers came … AND FINDING NEW ONES half that of Neptune) and to be very far true and a whole swag of new bodies Why am I telling you all this? Well, out, about 700 AU from the Sun, and was discovered; this is the Kuiper partly because I thought you might its orbit would be about 10-20,000 Belt, at 30-55 AU from the Sun. The like to know it. But mostly because years. It would be a planet rather than a gravity of Neptune, orbiting at 30 astronomers have now postulated the dwarf planet - both have enough mass AU, limits the near edge of the Kuiper existence of another large planet, based to become spherical under their own Belt, perturbs the bodies in it, and has on the observations that the movements gravity, but a planet clears its orbit too. cleared several large holes in resonance of some Kuiper Belt objects are not Planet IX must have a very strongly

29 ARTICLE Astronomy

Planet 9 from gushes “Astrologers believe this planet addition to Ceres and Pluto (demoted bodes well for an improvement in in 2006) three more dwarf planets are Outer Space many love lives and heralds the advent known: Haumea, Makemake and Eris, of a more caring, trusting society. each much bigger than Ceres. And Continued... They also say it promises radically there are probably 100 more, waiting to to alter our finances, and our whole be discovered, either by astrologers or relationship with money.” How he astronomers. My money is on the latter. elliptical orbit, its distance from the knows that they believe and say this is Cainer’s prognostications are curious, Sun varying between 300 and 1200 beyond me - perhaps he conducted a even by astrological standards. By what AU, and the orbit may not lie in the survey - but at least it is cheerful news, mechanism can the new planet affect ecliptic (a flat disk of space in which at a time when everyone is thinking of earthly finance, and get people to care all the planets orbit and all other Solar doom and gloom (and why that is, also more? (Compassion being already System material is found, these an attribute of Neptune, see having condensed from an above.) “An improvement” in original spinning disk of rocky these things would always be fragments; except that the welcome, but the planet has orbit of Pluto is elongated and always physically existed, so how inclined at 17o to the ecliptic, can its discovery by humanity showing that Pluto must have change anything? Cainer tries been wandering in interstellar to link the discovery of Uranus space and captured into the (1783) with hot-air ballooning, Solar System by gravity). and - skipping over Ceres Now, we don’t know where (1801) - of Neptune (1846) the new planet might be along with photography, and of Pluto its orbital path, and when you (1930) with, um, er, ... and he look for things that far from points to the current financial the Sun - well, it gets dark out mess and refugee crisis as being there. Photographing Neptune ripe for change, ignoring the far, itself has been compared to far worse financial and refugee photographing a black cat crises of the last hundred years in a coal cellar at night, and where astrologers and Planet IX this new planet could be 50 were no use at all. . times further away. Pluto was discovered by patiently photographing the entire night sky along the ecliptic, but if we have to look outside the ecliptic REFERENCES that is much more sky. So we Konstantin Batygin and Michael won’t be seeing this new planet E. Brown 2016, The Astronomical anytime soon. Journal 151 22 (accessed at What do the astrologers http://iopscience.iop.org/ make of all this? Still article/10.3847/0004-6256/151/2/22) floundering from having http://www.dailymail.co.uk/ to invent and add the influences of baffles me; I reckon life is pretty good sciencetech/article-3414985/Why-newly- Uranus (revolutionary spirit) and now). planet-STELLAR-news-lovelife-Discovery- Neptune (compassion, illusion) and Cainer also tries, incredibly (or Planet-9-dramatic-repercussions-world- Pluto (transformation, renewal) and, maybe not, for an astrologer) to get astrology.html while they were at it, the dwarf planet some credit for actually discovering Ceres (the environment, pregnancy) the planet: “Astrologers, by the way, About the author: they should have extreme difficulty have long had such faith [that a new Steve Roberts is assigning influences to the new planet, planet would be found]. We knew it a mathematician, especially as its orbit is so very slow would be only a matter of time before cryptographer and has spent that it must sit ‘in’ the same star sign a new planet was discovered and have many fruitless hours trying for thousands of years at a time. been cautiously expecting it to surface to find UFOs. He holds high Nevertheless Jonathan Cainer, in any decade now.” Well, here’s some hopes for Planet 9. the UK’s Daily Mail, has had a go: he news from those dull old scientists - in 30 PUZZLES The Skeptic March 16

ACROSS Brain testers 1. An island crop is given latitude. (9) CRYPTIC CROSSWORD no 29 6. A property right is strange to me. (5) 8. A cry of pain that is some sort of creature. (5) 1 2 3 4 5 N 76 9. A delicately built person broke a chrome pot. (9) P 11. French is too much, I see, for a hot place. (6) 8 9 10 12. The last rogatory dweller in the underground. (4) 13. A bird from the east of an imaginary land. (3) 15. The outer part of fruitful enthusiasm. (4) 11 12 12 13 M 16. Move hips. (4) 14 17. Turn it wistfully inside. (5) 15 17 16 17 19. There should be no start for nothing. (5) P 21. 18 20 Ritual – OK? Wrong. (4) S R 22. The man and the advertisement go to the top. (4) 19 20 21 22 23 R S 25. Debt to poetry. (3) 24 26. I live well but crazy. (4) 25 26 P 27 27. Topsy chopsy cops a nutsy. (6) 28 29. He’s just a kid gone rusty. (9) 30. There’s great depth in a baby’s story. (5) 29 30 C 31. Cat on fire? I get right confused. (5) I 32. Tellurium, the French ways see in the dark. (9) 31 35R 32

Tim Mendham + Steve Roberts DOWN DR BOB’S QUIZ 1. The grave has no study of animals, even strange animals. (13) 1. In the late 1700s a scholar visited Alcala, Spain to consult 2. Native American meetings go off with a bang, the original parchments of Biblical text, from which the followed by cheers. (7) Complutensian Polyglot had been printed in 1517. But he was told that they had all been sold off in 1749, to a man named 3. A Russian secret service chief moved to Spain. (6) Toryo. What was Señor Toryo’s occupation? 4. No blokes? A sign of things to come. (4) 2. The Empire State Building is now often spotlighted in colours, 5. Quack healer treats a turn - no way! (10) including in green for Eid-Ul-Fitr in October 2007. Before this, 6. Capone was strong, but was he god? (8) why was it lit in green in early 2004? 7. Countryman says Geller is not real, for one. (7) 3. Who was first to goof the floof? 10. Visited places that a hound uses the wrong way. (7,6) 4. What would you measure, using the Mull of Kintyre for 14. The instrument of the radium is where the majority is. reference? (10) 5. Americans have begun to sell milk in square containers that 18. The street keeper is not known to me. (8) also serve as jugs – the shipping and packaging costs are lower. 20. Gosh, put a cork in Paterson’s polo club. (7) What problem is being encountered with the square jugs? 23. To codify the short measure of a vault. (7) 6. Exactly when did Sweden change to driving on the right? 24. Note a needle. (1-5) 28. As spoken by creationist Roberts. (4)

Answers on page 62

0331 ARTICLE Psychics The Medium . . . Rare neitherWell Donenor Richard Saunders and Dr Krissy Wilson tune in to the ‘psychic’ techniques of Lisa Williams, currently touring Australia.

he question as to the continuance USA and across Europe demonstrating the public who took these Tof consciousness after death has their ‘psychic’ communication with demonstrations seriously. A selection been a topic of fascination for centuries disembodied spirits. (Their older of notable members of the scientific and the notion that certain individuals sister Leah was one of the first to be community were convinced that can talk to the dead has been in convinced by the two, and took charge these manifestations were evidence of existence since antiquity. Indeed, every of them and managed their careers for paranormal activity. Michael Faraday, culture throughout history has had some time.) Arthur Conan Doyle, and William its share of supernatural beliefs and In 1888, Margaret, the elder of the Wallace, co-founder of the Theory traditions. However, it was not until two sisters, admitted that the whole of Evolution, were all vocal in their the middle of the nineteenth century thing had simply been a practical joke support of Spiritualism. among western cultures that alleged to amuse their mother, but by this Modern day psychics are a sad breed psychic mediumship with the spirits time it was too late. in comparison to of the dead became a popular public The world had seen Gone is the melo- their nineteenth spectacle. We can, in fact, chart the the birth of a new “ century development of such popular belief in religion, Spiritualism. drama. Modern psychics counterparts. Gone public displays of psychic mediumship As interest in this are a far less impressive, is the melodrama, with the birth of Spiritualism. new phenomenon the ectoplasmic The irony is that the whole thing grew, a new breed fun and imginative lot.” manifestations started with a childish joke. It was, in of psychic showmen and ghostly fact, two teenage sisters who were the emerged who would apparitions. instigators of this modern phenomenon. put on wildly theatrical displays of Modern psychics are a far less Margaret and Kate Fox claimed in alleged psychic communication with the impressive, fun and imaginative lot. 1848 in a small town called Hydesville spirits of the dead. Objects would fly Today, psychic communication is in New York State that they could around the room, faces would appear in typically verbal whereby a psychic communicate with the spirit of a mirrors, all manner of strange knocking, will pass on messages of love and dead pedlar. A series of rapping noises tapping and moaning noises could be encouragement to grieving family could be heard wherever the sisters heard, and ectoplasm, a gooey, slimy members, often in the controlled went – noises, they claimed, that were substance, would ooze from a range of environment of a TV studio in front of from the other side. The girls were a orifices both organic and otherwise. an invited audience. sensation and travelled throughout the Surprisingly, it was not only TV psychics have risen enormously 32 The Skeptic March 16

in popularity over the last 25 years lines of light entertainment and social It seems Williams has been studying with many of them earning celebrity commentary. Like other morning at the Edward’s school of psychic status with vast earnings from TV shows over the years, Studio 10 from communication as she uses a similar shows, book deals and tours. Notable time to time will have on as a guest technique, even using phrases from his examples include James van Praagh and a so-called ‘psychic’ or, to be blunt, patter. Her performance on Channel John Edward from the USA and Colin someone who claims they talk with the 10 is described below. What follows Fry from the UK. Each one has had a dead. is an exact transcript of her alleged Medium . . . very popular TV series with a suitable In August 2014, the visiting English psychic communication and a brief title, eg Crossing Over, The Sixth ‘psychic’ Lisa Williams was a guest commentary from the authors on The Sense, and they will have their own on the show. To quote the promo for her technique. We will leave it to the particular patter. Edward, for example, Ms Williams’ pending appearance, reader to determine if this is genuine is especially known for his twenty “International psychic medium Lisa evidence for life after death, or if this Rare questions approach, firing questions at Williams joins Studio 10 for a ‘special is yet another example of the egregious the audience member, whereas the UK TV event’, 8.30 tomorrow morning. way Williams and her ilk make a living. neither nor psychic Colin Fry takes a more gentle Lisa has chosen Studio 10 as the (For those interested, you can and touchy-feely approach, gently only Australian TV show to do a live see the video at http://tinyurl.com/ offering tender messages; “I’m leaving z9smyjk.) Well Done his love with you, my darling”. To a The following transcript begins credulous public these performances starting at the point when Williams can appear very convincing but skeptics claims to start receiving messages from would suggest that they are all using the dead for members of the invited cold reading techniques which can studio audience. This is interspersed easily be replicated by non-paranormal with comments from the authors in means (Randi, 2000; Shermer, 1998). italics. Cold reading is a powerful technique whereby anyone can convince perfect TRANSCRIPT strangers that you know all about them Sarah Harris (Host: SH): A lot of (Hyman, 1977). people have come in today into the Consider the following: “I’m getting studio audience to perhaps see if you a male figure – he’s either a son, can zone in on them. father or grandfather. He is wearing a uniform of some kind and brown Lisa Williams (LW): Yup, sure. boots. Does that mean anything to anyone?” SH: ... have you had anything, are you This effectively describes 50 per feeling anything just yet? cent of the world’s population. Above: Margaret and Kate Fox, giving birth to Every male is someone’s son, father spiritualism as a joke. LW: Well here, it’s … well obviously or grandfather and many males I’ve just walked in and I’m really draw wear a uniform to work – postmen, reading on our studio audience. You to this section whether it’s because I’m the military, Bunnings employees. will not see this anywhere else folks. actually right opposite. But I do have a However, if you are a grieving child, Make sure you don’t miss it. 8.30 father figure and a mother figure that parent or grandparent, desperate for tomorrow morning, on Studio 10.” are standing right in the centre by this the possibility of reassurance from the With a build up like that it was lady and the gentleman in the striped other side, then you will find a way hoped that, at the very least, Ms shirt, so it’s in this section here. Um, so to make sense of vague and general Williams would go some way to I’m not sure um, the lady… statements as being specific to you proving that contact from beyond the - what Hyman calls “the fallacy of grave is possible. It is also worth noting [Comment]Lisa Williams starts off personal validation” (Hyman, 1977). that there are dozens of people in with the classic cold reading opening Late in 2013, the TEN TV network Australia who also claim they can talk gambit; ie she is looking for a “father/ in Australia launched a new mid- with the dead for a live TV audience, mother figure”. A “father figure” morning chat/infomercial show to for example Network 7’s The One - could be one’s father, grandfather, replace The Circle, a Melbourne-based The Search for Australia’s Most Gifted older brother, uncle, great uncle, show along similar lines. The new Psychic 2008 and 2011, so we wonder family friend, mentor and so on. A show Studio 10 features a live studio why such a fuss is made over a visiting “mother figure” could be one’s mother, audience and an interesting line-up foreigner. It seems that beings from grandmother, aunt, great aunt, older of hosts. It covers many issues, some abroad somehow offers the appeal of sister, family friend, mentor and so on. very serious but more are along the the ‘exotic’. She has essentially described most of 33 ARTICLE Psychics

The Medium Continued...

the world’s population so all bases are covered. Surely something will bite? In effect she is asking if anyone in this audience knows anyone who has died who is either male or female. This is hardly earth-shatteringly specific.

[Comment]If at this stage someone from the audience had spoken up and said, “My father / grandfather / uncle / brother / mother / grandmother / aunt / sister died recently” or “I feel my ... has been trying to contact me.” or “I had a reading and my ... was coming through” Lisa would have been able a grandmother as well for you.” This to acknowledge a hit although she has rather neatly gives her two options. If [Comment]Here we have two simply asked a question and given no Amanda (the woman in the audience) questions at once, which leaves open specific information. Furthermore, the indicates her grandmother is dead the chance that Amanda will pick up use of the word “and” (a father figure then the conversation can go down the on a mother figure. Also it would be “and” a mother figure) gives the extra path of it being the grandmother who surprising indeed if a daughter was not possibility that someone might relate is sending messages from beyond the like her mother in at least one respect to both parents or sets of grandparents grave. If however, Amanda indicates … that may be dead. her grandmother If a member of the Most important thing is still alive, then A: Umm, yeah, yeah. audience indicates “ the conversation a female figure, the for this spirit is criticism can go down the [Comment] … although in this male figure may well of her granddaughter’s path of there being case Amanda seems reluctant to just disappear from a message for acknowledge this. LW tries again: the dialogue and baking prowess.” her grandmother vice-versa. As we’ll or about her LW: On your mother’s side. see in this case, the grandmother father figure goes no further. from the other side. How galling [Comment]But in fact this has already that the dead can be so vague! This been established. SH: Let’s get a microphone onto him. is all symptomatic of the techniques The man in the beard? employed with cold reading. A: Yeah

LW: I’m almost kind of thinking it’s Amanda: (A): (Holding mic) Do I LW: And she keeps showing me like the woman at the front actually umm? speak in here? baking. I don’t know whether she used May I ask my love, is there a mother to bake a lot of pastries or something… figure in spirit for you please? [No LW: Yeah. Hi. immediate reaction from the woman.] [Comment]A grandmother who bakes Sorry I’ve just been told there’s a Joe Hildebrand (Host: JH): Hi. What’s “pastries or something” - something grandmother as well for you. your name? means anything. Not especially surprising. [Comment]This is simply asking A: Amanda. if the woman’s mother or “mother A: Yeah figure” was dead and since there was LW: Hi Amanda. Would I be right in no reaction, Lisa Williams then tries saying that there’s a mother figure or LW: ...because she keeps putting a for a grandmother. However, notice that your grandmother was like your crust on a pie, actually. the last part of the sentence: “... there’s mother in many respects? 34 The Skeptic March 16

LW: Alright now also ... she’s actually A: There has been some family health coming through and telling me there’s concerns. some form of celebration. You weren’t expecting this. I’m sorry my love. [The [Comment]Straight out miss. Her video makes it clear that Lisa Williams mother seems be in in good health, meant that Amanda wasn’t expecting but Amanda is trying to make the to be zoned in on.] Um, but she’s question somehow fit regardless. acknowledging a celebration that’s Health concerns with other members either happening in the family, and of the family is not what Lisa Williams Left: Lisa Williams, third from the left, on your mother would still be with us, isn’t was alluding to, but it’s a good example Studio 10 , with Sarah Harris (far right) and Joe she. of how hard people will work to help Hildebrand (beside Harris). the psychic: the fallacy of personal Above Amanda, trying hard to make it fit. [Comment]Somewhere, someone, validation – making vague general sometime in every family is likely statements that could be true of to be having or about to have a anyone, specific to oneself. [Comment]LW is asking another birthday, anniversary, celebration question this time to see if Amanda has or commemoration of a date such LW: Okay there’s been some family memories of her grandmother cooking as a death in the family or similar health concerns, ‘cause I’m being told which of course has a high probability significant event. This is much like the that everything’s going to be okay and of being right. birthday routine that goes “Who is it that you need to just share that with the that is having a birthday? Last month family, okay? And that’s the reason why A: (inaudible) or this month or maybe next month?” she’s coming through. In this case we just have the word LW: No, I don’t think you are actually “celebration” which opens a multitude [Comment]Lisa Williams is feeding because she’s saying “No, no, no you of possibilities from birthdays to back what Amanda just told her but don’t cook!” So do you not actually, do anniversaries to a new job or to any making it seem like it’s coming from you not like cooking? happy occasion involving anyone in the the dead grandmother. family. [Comment]Merely another question LW: She’s also talking about someone and no direct or specific information. A: She is, yes. needs to get their hair dyed.

A: Um … oh slightly. It’s not my [Comment]Williams could well have A: Ah, me. favourite thing to do. gleaned that Amanda’s mother was still alive earlier on when there was no (Laughter in the audience) [Comment]It has to be said that reaction to her question. throughout all of this exchange [Comment] “Someone” could be Amanda seems pretty unconvinced yet LW: Okay because she’s acknowledging Amanda or anyone Amanda knows Lisa Williams is making it clear that your mother here and like there’s a from family to friends, presumably these messages are definitive. celebration around your mum. But can a female but could potentially be a you tell your mum that she’s going to male, needs to get their hair coloured. LW: It’s not your favourite thing is be okay, so there may have been some Many women over a certain age dye it? No. Because she’s just showing me, health concerns around your mum their hair or are thinking about it. “no”. recently is that right? Young people too will get highlights or toners, males and females. Any positive [Comment]Another technique here of [Comment]Again Lisa is simply asking answer from Amanda about anyone simply repeating back the information questions and not giving information. she knows would make it look like a that the audience member has already “Health concerns” is vague at best hit. (A common cold-reading tactic in given her, making it appear that the and health related issues with older this situation if there was no positive message is specific. It does seem a people is hardly surprising and yet, reaction would be for a psychic to say shame that the most important thing once again Amanda’s response is rather something like, “Well, she’s telling me for this particular ‘spirit’ is to pass on noncommittal: there is someone and I think you’ll find criticism of her granddaughter’s baking out who that is. Maybe they don’t want prowess. You would think that the dead A: Umm? anyone to know!”). Is this really the might have something a little more best that this dead spirit can come up significant to pass on, but apparently LW: Or she’s been…. Has she had with? Someone somewhere needs to get not. something… their roots done? 35 ARTICLE Psychics

this out actually because I wasn’t sure Williams and other psychics need to The Medium but I’ve got a feeling that someone can ask so many questions? If she is getting relate to a younger adult that’s in the messages from the dead, why don’t Continued... audience like a younger daughter or they just make themselves clear? The someone who lost their daughter or son. normal response to this criticism is that Um, can anyone relate to what I’m psychics can only relay what they are LW: Alright, well there you go. talking about please and it happened told or shown and that can be unclear. Alright, she’s laughing and saying, she’s very quickly as an accident. It may This passing the buck and more or less saying “Just get it done, get it done, not have been your child but it may be putting the blame on “them”, or the get it done.” Because either it’s been someone you can relate to. Now this is spirits, is routine. bothering you or you been keep talking the time, please don’t be shy. about it. But she loves you very much. Man: My brother. Anyway I’ve got another gentleman [Comment]Asking if anyone in the that’s coming through anyway but we’ll audience knows of a younger person LW: And a passing of a sudden wait. who has died in an accident. She accident. You understand that? looks about audience and at hosts. No [Comment]It is normal for people to reaction to her questions. [Comment]A sudden accident is pretty be told in their readings that the dead simple to understand. It’s a possible love them. For some reason the dead LW: Okay. Alright I just kept feeling as lead and Lisa Williams is chasing it. grandmother has no trouble verbalising though someone passed in an accident, the words “Just get it done.” Rarely can either of you two relate to it? Man: No, he died when I was umm … do the dead pass on any bad news or Someone passed in an accident, a very actually born. negative comments. In a way it would sudden passing and I’ve got the feeling be refreshing if the dead did at least that they crossed, um, quite quickly. It [Comment]Miss. once send a message of anger but this is was a very sudden… no? not what people want to hear. LW: Mmmm. I don’t want to make [Comment]No response but she is not it fit. It just feels someone passed SH: We’ll take a very quick break but giving up. in a sudden accident. It was like a we’ll have more of Lisa Williams right head injury, a trauma to the head. after this. Don’t go anywhere. Man: (Unclear) Can anyone relate to this? It’s like a friendship. (Commercial Break) LW: Can you understand this? [Comment]The answer is too far SH: Welcome back to Studio 10 where Man: Mmm ... our studio audience is currently being Right: ‘Man’, a victim of fine flattery. read by psychic medium Lisa Williams. LW: Alright then, who would this be Below: Lisa Williams searches the Studio 10 Lisa, you’ve been chatting with Bill, but for you please? audience for another connection. you’re getting another … [Comment]Why is it that Lisa

LW: Yeah.

SH: … another message coming through?

LW: I was chatting with Bill and he’s going to get his knee sorted so just remember that.

[Comment]We are not privy to what was said to Bill in the commercial break.

(Laughter)

LW: Um, yeah. I wanted to throw

36 The Skeptic March 16

removed from Lisa Williams’ ‘message’ [Comment]A massive impact as through in rainbows and there’s a and has left her nowhere to go with in an accident and probably a car feeling of music, so you may find that this man. But since no one in the accident, has now been changed into music is very prominent, okay. audience seems to be able to relate to a an emotional impact on the family son or daughter, “friendship” suddenly following a death. Of course this will [Comment]Teddy bear, socks, dancing, appears. be the case. rainbows, music. She is throwing out so many things that could relate to Gill Hicks (Guest host and survivor of Man: Yes. a little girl. And yet we still have no the 2007 London bombings): Mmmm specifics. If this spirit is able to show ... LW: And I kept being shown there her teddy bears and socks, then why that something still needs, something not her name, age, how she died, LW: Can you understand this? still needs investigating favourite colour, name or there was still some of the bear, her mother’s GH: No. Only the bombings. form of investigation “ Teddy bears and name? that’s gone on ‘cause socks, then why not Man: (Unclear) I don’t feel as though LW: Did your sister ever you’ve had full facts. her name, age, how mention any of this? LW: Okay and it happened very, very Do you understand she died, the name quickly. And this would be friend of this? of the bear? Man: Ah, no. yours, is that right? ” Man: Ahh, sort of. LW: Okay, well speak to [Comment]Originally it was a younger your sister about it. person who had died in an accident, [Comment]Still one last try at seeing now it has become a ‘friend’. if any sort of accident is involved. It [Comment]Another classic cold could also relate to a death in hospital reading technique. It gives the Man: Sister’s daughter. or under care in which case there appearance that Lisa knows more would have been an investigation. about the deceased than even the man [Comment]Wrong guess from Lisa and More asking questions. himself. Later, if the man asks his the friendship line disappears. sister and there is in fact a hit with LW: Okay, it’s as though nothing… one or some of the objects, he will be LW: Okay. And it happened…it I feel as though there was other things impressed. If he does ask and this is that needed to come out, okay? Now way off base, then it doesn’t matter as what… She’s jumping up and down, the performance is long over and the she’s telling me she looks a lot like her studio and TV audience will never mum or looked a lot like her mum. Do know. you understand this? LW: Would she have had a brother as [Comment]No surprise that a well please? child resembles a parent. “Do you understand this?” is just another way of [Comment]Why doesn’t she know this? asking “Am I right?” Why can’t the dead tell her this?

Man: Yes. Man: Ah yes. ...I’ve… Can I come to you please? Because this happened really, really LW: And she’s showing me that the LW: Alright because she’s quickly. May I come? Alright. photos resemble her. She actually saying acknowledging the brother that she “Can you say hello to the family?” and comes through in the brother’s dreams, Man: Ah… My sister’s daughter. there’s a connection to a teddy bear that as well. they still have, of hers. Alright, and this LW: Okay, so this happened really is really important. She just showing [Comment]Oh, so now the spirit is quickly. And what I’m actually being me socks for some reason. Whether she telling her she does have a brother. shown is that, that it’s, it was like always used to have socks on … there The dead are inarticulate, aren’t they? this massive impact, okay. It had a was a particular things about socks. But the man has just told her there is massive impact on the family. Do you And she’s dancing. She’s giving me the a brother. She is now making it seem understand this? fact that she’s dancing around. And as if she is getting that information she’s also showing me that she comes from the spirit world. Dreaming of a 37 ARTICLE Psychics

[COMMENT He has just told her But throwing in something quirky does The Medium this]. Okay you look like a lot like provide comic relief. one of your… one of the… umm… Continued... members of the fam … the parents. LW: There you go. They’re laughing [COMMENT: Oh dear – this is really about the shoes all the time alright? It’s painful.] just something she’s doing, okay? So just dead sibling once or from time to time watch out for that, alright? So I’m just would not be unexpected. ‘Cause she just keeps coming though going to leave you with that. with “The face. The face.” And it’s a, LW: This was a massive ch… Ah, right. it’s a, it’s a mirror. And she’s actually [Comment]It’s very unclear what is Is there a separation in the family now? showing me that you’re a good guy, actually meant here. Watch out for Maybe mum and dad are parted ways? alright? You’re such a good boy, you’re shoes? Don’t spend your money online? a good boy. You’re a good boy, alright? What exactly is the important message [Comment]More questions. No And she wants to acknowledge that in from the other side here? Is that really specifics. that case that you are a good boy and the best that this ‘spirit’ can come up that she has the daughter. with? Man: No mum and dad are both passed. [Comment]This is known in cold Man: Thank you. reading as “fine flattery” which is LW: Your mum and dad are both crediting the subject with positive LW: Alright. passed? personality traits, but in a subtle and indirect way. In this case it is seemingly SH: Lisa, we are running out of time. Man: Yes. via a message from the dead and not Umm, look is there anyone in the from the psychic herself. audience that is deeply spiritual and LW: Okay. She’s showing me that the believes that perhaps someone has a celebr… there was a separation in the LW: So, if you can just let them message for them? Are you picking up family with the mother and the father know that they have them, they’re all anything else? so that would them be, together okay? And them coming through. again, she wants A: I just want to know, when are you Right, okay thank you. ‘Fine flattery’, to acknowledge coming to Australia next to do your “ the ring, she wants shows? [Comment]The separation which is crediting the everyone to look (Laughter) or divorce Lisa Williams subject with positive after her ring and was looking for has personality traits. dad’s got something LW: Well I’m actually tea … I do suddenly disappeared ” as well, alright? … I’m at the Festival of Dreams this and she is using the weekend and then I’m teaching the information she was just [Comment]It is following weekend how to do this sort of told to make the word “separation” fit almost universal that people are told work. Umm, but I’m hopefully coming in another context. that the dead are okay or doing fine. back next, next year to actually do a big Rings or other jewellery and other tour because I tour around. LW: Your father’s crossed correct? personal items handed down in the family is also very common. But why SH: What do you say Lisa, just quickly, [Comment]He has already told her is it that the dead seem to want to to the skeptics, ‘cause obviously there this. “acknowledge” things. Why don’t they are a lot of people here that do believe. just say outright what they mean? Man: Yes. LW: Ah ah. LW: But I want you to know that LW: Alright. You are very similar to they’re all together. Okay? Something SH: What do you say to the people him. You look a lot like him. Is that about the shoe size, they’re laughing who don’t? correct? Would you understand that? about the shoes. Have you gotta get new shoes? LW: Well my father was a big skeptic Man: Ah, no. I…. my mum. and I always say you know if you Man: (Laughing) Ah um… I buy shoes don’t believe me, that’s up to you, but [Comment]Another miss. online. don’t ruin it for everybody else who does believe. Umm, and just be open LW: Or do you look like your mum? [Comment]Shoe size? New shoes? No. minded. Be prepared to change your 38 The Skeptic March 16

Or psychics are using a powerful tool called cold reading to convince people that these messages are real and that it is the client who makes the connections and that the need to believe and the power of wishful thinking simply do the rest. Whether consciousness does indeed exist after death is a question of science and one that we cannot answer with complete certainty. But what we do know is that for over a hundred years psychical research from parapsychologists and assorted paranormal investigators have failed to convince the skeptical community that psychic communication with the dead is nothing but wishful thinking at its best, and at its egregious worst, outright fraud by manipulative con artists exploiting those at their most vulnerable. It is a pity but no surprise that TV shows like Studio 10 still trot out celebrity psychics. A TV show is, at the end of the day, dependent on advertisers, and those advertisers depend on ratings, and the paranormal mind, because sometimes you might be sells. We will leave it up to our readers wrong and sometime you might be right. as we suspect, a rather poor example to decide for themselves. . of cold reading and desperate attempts [Comment]Skeptics are quite willing at ‘fishing’. Indeed, this performance REFERENCES to change their mind, it’s part of the could easily be replicated by non- Hyman, R. (1977). Cold reading: How to scientific approach. But we do ask paranormal means. If Lisa Williams convince total strangers that you know for good evidence and that was sadly was really getting messages from the all about them. Skeptical Inquirer, 1(2), lacking in these readings. Believers may dead, then why was her performance 18-37. well have a different interpretation. The no different to a standard cold reading? Randi, J. (1980). Flim Flam. Buffalo. question is, however, are they willing to Indeed it would be judged as a very Prometheus Books. change their mind too? Holding people poor cold reading at that. If anyone Shermer, M. ( 1998). Talking twaddle with the to account who are making claims is could indeed talk to the dead, it dead. Skeptic, 6(10), 48-53. not an attempt to ruin anything, it’s an would surely mean a dramatic and attempt at getting at the truth. drastic change to society. Everything that we know about biology would SH: Well, Lisa, as you said, will be be overturned and the world would About the authors: appearing at the festival of dreams this be a very different place. But, that Richard Saunders is an weekend, she’s got a huge following. To paradigm shift does not appear to be ex-president of Australian find out more and see who else will be imminent. Skeptics Inc, and host and there, head over to festival of dreams There are two options here. Lisa producer of The Skeptic Zone. dot com dot au. Lisa, thank you very Williams and her kind may be much for joining us. genuine psychics and are receiving communications from the other side, END OF TRANSCRIPT. thus proving that life continues after Krissy Wilson is a psychology death contrary to everything that we lecturer and formerly ran It is entirely up to the reader know about science and biology and the Science of Anomalistic to determine if this is evidence of that there is clearly nothing to fear Phenomena research facility at communication with the other side or, as we are all going to live forever. Charles Sturt University. 39 ARTICLE Medicine NOSALVATION Jo Alabaster looks at skeptical activism, large and small, beginning with , and leading to influencing major e-commerce sites.

hen you spot something that’s of Wconcern, it can be worth spending a couple of minutes filling in a report, or noting it publicly via social media. Little mechanism by which Above & left: Black salve - in actions such as these are greater than no Black Salve can mobilise this case Cansemea - and the action; they do add up, and can be the and destroy cancer cells in a horrifiyng effects it can have. starting point for greater change. targeted manner; the salve merely Recently I had a minor procedure damages tissue, healthy or not. to remove a lesion after having a skin Use of Black Salve can result in while others self-diagnose skin cancers, cancer check performed. It’s highly ulceration, infection, skin damage, deep or act on the opinions of unqualified unlikely that the lesion is potentially tissue damage, and muscle damage. If people online. problematic, but that can’t be you are feeling not too squeamish and There is a reason we have doctors completely ruled out unless it’s sent to want to see the extent of damage Black who are specially trained in skin pathology and examined. Salve can cause, Google Black Salve and cancer detection and treatment, and This experience had me thinking have a look at either the Google image pathology labs who conduct histological about skin cancer and alternative search tab, or the Black Salve Facebook examination of tissue samples. medicine… namely, Black Salve. page. Be warned though, you’ll see people Diagnosis of skin cancer is by no means For those of you not familiar with with huge ulcers, large scabs, and people as simple as looking to the opinion of Black Salve (also known as ‘Bloodroot’ who have literal holes in their faces and somebody unqualified to do so. or ‘Cansema’) it is a herbal preparation large areas of tissue missing from arms, Of course, do keep a close eye which proponents claim can “draw out necks, and breasts. It’s fairly disturbing, on your own skin, and make an cancer cells” when applied to the skin. frankly – both that people believe that appointment with a GP or skin cancer Black Salve preparations typically they’re doing themselves good by using clinic if you notice anything unusual contain zinc chloride, and chaparral Black Salve, and that they feel that or concerning. Speak with them about – also known as creosote bush, and damaging themselves in this way is less how regularly it would be appropriate bloodroot – the extract of which is called traumatic than going to a doctor, being for you to have your skin checked by a sanguinarine, an ammonium salt which examined, and undergoing evidence- professional. attacks and destroys living tissue. based cancer diagnosis and treatment. Two in three Australians will be Black Salves are corrosive substances, And here’s another thing which is diagnosed with skin cancer by the classified as ‘escharotics’. Escharotics are troublesome: many users of Black Salve time they are 70, so this is really worth substances which cause tissue to die and hear of it via word of mouth from keeping on top of. To find out more slough off. Black Salve proponents believe Black Salve users, naturopaths, and about reducing risks and screening, that when this escharotic destroys tissue, other alternative medicine proponents. there’s a lot of useful information on the it is somehow targeting cancer cells, and Some decide to use Black Salve after Cancer Council’s website. that when scabs form and fall off, the a diagnosis from a GP – my own skin Back to Black Salve. Self or internet cancer is being removed from the body. cancer doctor has had people ask him diagnosis and the use of Black Salve This is sadly very wrong – there is no about its use, much to his dismay – don’t allow for accuracy. Some lesions 40 The Skeptic March 16

and skin spots are benign and don’t didn’t have to look too hard – there were whether they’re inspired to take action. require any treatment at all. Conversely, several listings on eBay for Black Salve, There are days when I feel rather over- those that do need treatment need to posted by sellers based in Australia. whelmed by the amount of dangerous have their progression assessed. Black I filled out reports for each one on quackery out there, and helpless to do Salve can leave behind cancerous cells, their item pages, then decided to have much about it. I’m acquainted with and its use can lead to pointless injury, a go at contacting eBay publicly via some people who accomplish amazing NO and a false sense of having cancer treated. Twitter: “Several Au listings for Black things - medical researchers, doctors and ALVATION Why do people choose to use Black Salve/Bloodroot Salve. Unsafe and not nurses, journalists, SAVN and the Good S Salve? Well, mistrust of evidence-based on TGA register. Can you remove?” I Thinking Society, and individuals who medicine is a factor, alongside the belief didn’t have a great deal of confidence use their expertise and passion to expose that Black Salve is somehow ‘safer’ that anything would come of it, but and formally complain about charlatans, because it is ‘natural’. As with many thought it worth a try nonetheless. The quacks, and dangerously misled other dangerous beliefs, getting accurate next morning, I was pleasantly surprised proponents of woo. I’ve had the privilege information into the public sphere can to get a reply from eBay’s Australian of meeting great activists and educators, help, but it can also further polarise those account: “Hey Jo, thanks so much for dedicated communicators, those who who are heavily invested in the belief – bringing this to our attention. We’re engage with the media, the public, and there’s a substantial number of Black Salve removing all listings now.” with bodies creating policy, and their adherents who believe that Black Salve is a A few more listings for Black Salve did efforts completely blow me away. cure for cancer that is being suppressed by appear from the same sellers, with words I’ve become convinced that we can all Big Pharma, the goverment, Lizard People slightly changed in order to try and be doing something useful. Whether it’s and what have you. evade detection and deletion. I sent links as simple as sending a complaint to an Publicising the dangers of Black Salve to them to eBay and e-commerce website, is one way to reduce its use; another is they promptly deleted engaging politely on via regulation. This is a difficult one, as these also. When I let “ I’ve met activists social media with while the TGA has deemed it ‘unlisted’ eBay know how much and educators, and those in a position to on the Australian Register of Therapeutic I appreciated their help, help stop quackery, Goods, there is no effective ban on Black the person handling their efforts completely sharing evidence- Salve products. their Twitter account blow me away. based information The TGA has, however, issued an replied “No worries at ” when somebody alert recommending people do not use all. I made the mistake makes an inaccurate Black Salve and associated ineffective of googling that stuff.” claim, and publicly or financially cancer cures, which is useful, as we can I suppose for most people, the supporting campaigns run by other then report those selling Black Salves images of Black Salve use speak for skeptics. or products recommending their use themselves, and I feel very fortunate Many great skeptical triumphs which (such as the notorious DVD titled “One that I happened to come across have helped diminish the proliferation Answer to Cancer”) to the TGA. somebody in a position of power to of woo began with a single person In 2013, the TGA responded to a virtually get it off the shelves who noticing something was wrong, perhaps complaint made regarding the Australian was eager to assist when making a discussing it with other skeptics, and Vaccination Network’s promotion of complaint. acting upon it. That said, don’t discount Black Salve and sale of the DVD, citing Such people are out there. We don’t the tiny triumphs – they definitely add several breaches of the Therapeutic always find them (or they can’t always up. If there’s a chance that an action you Goods Act 1989. The TGA ordered act) when trying to alert businesses, could take may bring about any measure the removal of any promotion of Black organisations, or dare I say government- of good, please consider going ahead Salve from the AVN’s website, and that a run health websites on dangerous with making that complaint or politely retraction be posted, including a link to misinformation or products that they engaging with somebody. It may well be the TGA’s consumer alert on its use. perhaps unwittingly promote. Lobbying worth it. . Personally, I would like to see against quackery is often more time regulatory agencies come down harder consuming and complicated than a Note: This article initially appeared as a report on dangerous products such as Black couple of eBay forms and some tweets. on The Skeptic Zone podcast #337, January Salve, but their consumer alerts can be It really is worth taking that first step 10, 2016. useful when approaching third parties. though, whether it results in a small and immediate success or is the beginning ACTIVISM of a greater campaign. And if you About the author: The night before my minor procedure, don’t feel that larger scale complaints, Jo Alabaster is a Skeptic I decided to have a quick look online to lobbying and publicising are your thing, Zone reporter and science see whether I could find anybody selling get in touch with other skeptics, let communicator. She writes Black Salve in Australia. Unfortunately I them know what’s going on, and see at evidenceplease.net. 0341 ARTICLE Conspiracies Calculating theLeaks Steve Roberts reviews a recent paper that applies maths to conspiracies and the likelihood of their existence being revealed. Sometimes they just don’t add up.

n a recent paper Dr David Grimes, provides a clean historical example. but not the hoped-for revolution, Ia physicist and cancer researcher The plan was to blow up the House then there would be N=13 men out at Oxford University, gives a of Lords during the State Opening there, in fear of their lives, who knew mathematical proof that conspiracies of England’s Parliament, hopefully what really had happened. None cannot survive for very long. His assassinating James I in the process would confess, obviously, and affairs paper is published in an open-access and fomenting revolution. There would have settled down again and on-line journal and is freely available were thirteen conspirators - originally the incident would have passed into to read and download, but contains fewer, but one was added because he history. There was a similar situation in some advanced mathematics and found out accidentally and others the limited time before the discovery makes for heavy reading (its second were added because they were thought or explosion. Due to natural deaths N word is “ideation”). His analysis also to be useful. There would have been would decrease from 13 to zero and requires estimations where he errs on widespread support from thousands hopefully nobody would ever find out. the generous side, causing his results of oppressed Catholics, had they (If N decreases too quickly, then the to be vague by orders of magnitude, known of the scheme, but only 13 conspirators are being helped to leave but he is doing the best that one can men actually knew the details and this mortal coil, and that is another in this most fuzzy and nebulous area were in a position to reveal and destroy conspiracy.) This is an example of a of human endeavour. the conspiracy, had they so wished. static secret that happens once and I’ll present my own observations The plot, of course, was discovered needs no further maintenance - unlike, from reading the paper. by external investigation - one of the say, preserving alien bodies in Area 51 Consider a set of N people who conspirators tried to tell a friend of his which is an ongoing effort; for that, N know a secret, or who are doing that it might be a bad idea to attend remains roughly constant for all time. something and this action is itself a Parliament; the letter came into the One should therefore wonder, for secret. The secret or the action must be gaze of the authorities, who searched example, whether there might now important, therefore the N people are the cellars and found Guy Fawkes, be another cache of 36 barrels of in positions of power, either to know who had difficulty explaining why gunpowder sitting under the Houses the secret or perform the action, and/ he was standing next to 36 barrels of of Parliament, known only to a select or to be able to reveal it. gunpowder with a fuse in his pocket. few, and when this might become The Gunpowder Plot of 1605 If the explosion had proceeded evident. So we are trying to calculate 42 The Skeptic March 16

whether any of N conspirators may 20 conspirators, depending of course conspirators, such that the secret could decide to reveal a secret, or may on how hot the conspiracy is, how not be kept secret for very long. (He accidentally reveal it. dedicated to it they really are, and how does not mention the JFK assassination rewarding it is for each of them to keep - clearly he must be privy to that one.) THE REASON FOR LEAKS it secret or to reveal it. For example, Attention to conspiracies that have Grimes’s paper guesses at some none of the aides that surrounded the been revealed gives a further idea of probabilities and analyses this late Howard Hughes in his later years the extreme difficulty of keeping a possibility. He estimates that with has (yet) fessed up with the bizarre secret - the Iran-Contra scandal of more than about 1000 conspirators, details of Hughes’ behaviour that the 1986, for example, the Watergate a secret would leak out within a few public has craved for; clearly there is conspiracy (known only to a handful years, but his figures have wide margins enough reward in not doing so. of people), Volkswagen engine of estimation error. He uses only one Dr Grimes does strongly emphasise software, etc. Wikipedia gives an parameter for revealing a secret, with that modern conspiracies involve enormous list of conspiracies, ancient a likelihood of 4 in a million per far too many people to be kept and modern, that some people believe conspirator per year, but I would say secret at all. For example, faking the in - “there’s nowt so queer as folk”. it is far more likely than that, as there Moon landings. NASA had 477,000 And in the Skeptics’ experience, if are multiple ways that revelation can employees, although most of these a person believes in one conspiracy, happen, not all of them voluntary: would not be in on the detailed secret. they are likely to believe in another, or • Accidentally, for example from I would estimate maybe only 500 even all of them, thus reducing their revealing one’s position at a critical employees would be in a position usefulness in society. time and location; of detailed knowledge and power, As Dr Grimes points out, not • External circumstances change, and could thus blow the whistle everyone who believes in a conspiracy making the secret morally harder with credibility. Now consider the is unreasonable or unthinking. Some to keep; motivation of such a person - from people have an anti-scientific mindset • The secret itself gets expanded in whom is this really and are beyond an unacceptable way; being kept secret? recall on some • A conspirator’s own moral values From the taxpaying “ Dr Grimes strongly topics, but it is change - finds God, communism public? So isn’t there emphasises that modern hoped that proper etc; some moral value if analyses using cold • Whistleblowing, by a conspirator I reveal it? And if I conspiracies involve far facts will show who has always had dubious sold the story to the too many people to be wavering people loyalty to the scheme; press, I’d be famous kept secret at all. that a conspiracy • Greed, or a desire for fame; and they’d pay me ” is unlikely to exist. • Talking too freely, after noting that lots of money - Humanity has other conspirators have begun to especially if I’m the first - and what are better and more urgent things to do talk more freely; they going to do, kill me? They can’t than to pursue notions that do not • Bragging about it, while drunk etc; even throw me into prison for this ... exist in reality. . • Deathbed confessions; So even 500 employees is far too many. • Blurted out while under stress over Further examples Grimes gives REFERENCES something else; and include the ghastly vaccination Grimes DR, On the Viability of Conspiratorial • Externally, through investigative ‘conspiracy’. Again, hundreds of Beliefs, PLOS ONE, 26 January 2016, journalism or police work thousands of scientists, in numerous accessed at http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/ competing organisations, would journal.pone.0147905 CONSPIRATORIAL NUMBERS have to be in on this, each one being http://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2016-01-26-too- I have worked with secrets over some persuaded to keep a secret that many-minions-spoil-plot years, and have actually seen most of vaccines were useless or harmful these things happen, so I would assign despite knowing the overwhelming a likelihood of more like 1 in 10,000 public evidence that diseases have been About the author: to most of them and thus estimate reduced or eradicated. He also analyses Dr Steve Roberts is a that it is far, far more likely that a the Tuskegee syphilis experiment, mathematician and a secret leaks out than the conservative the scale of NSA activity revealed cryptographer. Apart from figures in Grimes’s paper show. The by Edward Snowden, analytical everything else, he once best laid plans o’ mice and men gang procedures in the FBI forensics lab, worked with cryptanalyst aft agley, you know. I would estimate suppressed cures for cancer, and denial Joan Clarke, who was that a Fiendish Plot or a Cunning of global climate change, showing each briefly engaged to Plan should not involve more than of them to involve many thousands of Alan Turing. 0343 ARTICLE Health Does your chewing gum lose its favour? Mike Morgan and Eric Reynolds ask if chewing gum is actually good for your teeth?

recent study from the Oral A Health Cooperative Research Centre (http://tinyurl.com/htpow9d) found that sugar-free products can be just as damaging to your teeth as sugar because many of them contain acid that causes tooth erosion. But what about sugar-free gum? Chewing gum can be very bad for your oral health, good for your oral health, or very good for your oral health - it all depends on the kind of gum you are NOT ALL GUM IS CREATED EQUAL chewing. If you’re regularly Be aware, if your sugar-free gum chewing gum containing contains food acids, which are sugar, then you are at risk of added to some gums for flavour, developing dental caries (tooth you could be causing dental decay). erosion. Unlike dental caries, But if you’re regularly dental erosion is not caused by chewing a sugar-free gum, sugar or bacteria, but occurs evidence over the past 30 years when acid dissolves the hard shows you will be stimulating tissues of the tooth. the production of saliva which In its early stages, erosion is beneficial to your oral health. strips away the surface layers of Saliva contains minerals that tooth enamel and in advanced are essential for healthy teeth stages it can expose the softer and which neutralise the acids dentine or even the soft centre in plaque which feed bacteria (or “pulp”) of the tooth. that cause caries. Conventional In its early stages, erosion can sugar-free gums that are cause sensitivity to cold foods. recognised as having potential If it progresses, then more oral health benefits include Orbit sugar-free mint gum and Extra sugar-free peppermint Left: 1950s advertisement from the and spearmint gums. sponsor of Bandstand 44 The Skeptic March 16

severe pain is likely. Not all sugar- effects of CPP-ACP in chewing gum free gums contain food acids and, indicate the agent might not only generally speaking, mint-flavoured remineralise teeth, but may also gums are less likely to be erosive than reduce the level of harmful bacteria other flavours. in the mouth. A study published earlier this year found a statistically THE HOLY GRAIL OF GUM significant reduction in salivary Chewing gum is the only food Streptococcus mutans – a bacterium permitted under Australia’s food associated with dental caries – in standards regulations to make subjects who chewed CPP-ACP gum any claims about improving oral daily for three weeks. health. Under Standard 1.2.7 Chewing sugar-free gum can be (Nutrition, Health and Related particularly helpful to people at Claims), manufacturers can claim high risk of tooth decay including that chewing gum contributes to people whose oral hygiene may be tooth mineralisation and to the inadequate and people whose saliva neutralisation of plaque acids. production is affected by medication This is only if the gum is or health conditions. But it should sugar-free and if it is shown never replace daily toothbrushing it doesn’t lower the pH of with a fluoride toothpaste, regular GET THE FACTS! plaque below 5.7 during flossing and check-ups by a dental Visit our new website the 30 minutes after practitioner. consumption. Chewing gum is not www.skeptics.com.au Both the Australian and recommended for anyone American dental associations experiencing any type of jaw pain or allow the use of their quality symptoms of temporomandibular seals on sugar-free chewing disorder (problems with your jaw gums that meet similar criteria and the muscles in your face that to Australia’s food standards. control it). In addition to sugared and sugar- But for everyone else, chewing free gums, there are also functional sugar-free gum can be a great way to chewing gums, which are enhanced keep your teeth healthy – if you pick with minerals or agents that can not the right flavour and variety. . only protect against caries, but in some cases can even repair the early stages of caries. Note: This article is reprinted with Some gums, such as Trident permission from The Conversation (www. Xtra Recaldent and Trident theconversation.com) White with Recaldent, contain a remineralising agent derived from a milk protein called CPP-ACP (casein phosphopeptide-amorphous calcium About the authors: phosphate complex). This agent has Prof Mike Morgan is been shown in numerous studies to Chair of Population Oral increase the hardness of softened Health + Head of School, enamel and protect teeth against Melbourne Dental School, caries and erosion. University of Melbourne. A clinical trial in 2008 found those using gum containing CPP- ACP had a smaller number of tooth The latest news, events, surfaces in which caries lesions had developed over the two years of the Prof Eric Reynolds is from opinions, back issues study. This group also had a greater the Melbourne Dental number of lesions that had regressed, School and CEO of the Oral and good stuff! or remineralised. Health CRC , University of More recent research into the Melbourne. 0345 ARTICLE Medicine Diploma-cy Tim Mendham looks at medical qualifications – chiros v GPs

hiropractors want to be the first comment that the article was biased, Cport of call for healthcare, but with Bray apparently showing a lack how do their qualifications stack up of understanding of what training against those of GPs? chiropractors go through, “which is Is it true that GPs and chiropractors a full three-year Bachelor’s degree in do the much the same level of training science followed by a two-year Master’s and are thus equally qualified to degree”. practice primary healthcare? Should chiropractors play the role that GPs currently do as the first stop for medical consultation? The argument used by chiropractors to practice as primary healthcare is that they must go through the same level of though rest assured, as per law. medical training as GPs, including the “Chiropractors also learn ECG same courses, and are thus as qualified monitoring, blood pressure etc (that’s to offer primary healthcare as GPs. why they can do this stuff also) as The question is whether this is true. you get taught this in anatomy and The vision statement of the chiro- physiology second level. The only parts practic profession’s peak body, the where they differ is GPs branch off Chiropractors’ Association of Australia into getting training for drugs where (CAA), positions chiropractic as an chiropractors actually keep going with alternative health system distinct from even more in-depth anatomy and the mainstream and aims to “achieve a physiology specific to what they deal fundamental paradigm shift in health- with each day. care direction, where chiropractic is “Even the years are the same, check recognised as the most cost efficient and “If anyone does some research instead out the Australian AMA page, takes effective health regime of first choice, of taking extreme biased views they 4-6 years. Chiropractic takes minimum that is readily accessible to all people”. can clearly see chiropractors do take five. Then medical does a further one In an article on the Choice extensive training and just as much as year normally hospital residency. A website, Karina Bray, senior content GPs in the science side of things. The chiropractic does this in addition to its producer - health for Choice, laid courses are very similar, GPs require [sic] normal studies for two years in their out some of the issues associated with and the same as chiropractors’ courses in Master’s degree. chiropractic and differences between anatomy, physiology, physics, chemistry “Both are classified as Doctors. it and the GP profession. Apart from and biochemistry, neuroanatomy, etc. One is of medicine to prescribe drugs. the level of qualifications, these issues These courses do not differ. They are not The other is a non-drug prescribing included the anti-vaccination stance taught by anyone different either. The profession. Both have their needs in of many chiropractors, the potential person in question teaching the specific society. Most nurses or MDs agree with for misdiagnosis, and preventative course has to have a degree in that this.” manipulations which may cause specific course, ie a biochemistry teacher OzSydGuy admits that “more problems where none previously existed has to have a Bachelors of Biochemistry research is needed” but adds “If people with honours etc, depending on the are getting relief from this and there is THE CLAIM FOR CHIROPRACTIC TRAINING university of the min requirements, lack of scientific evidence around, that ‘OzSydGuy35’ responded to Bray’s hence some are better than others just does not mean it does not work. Just article on the Choice site with a like medicine, both require a minimum means we need more studies to show 46 The Skeptic March 16

why it works in the people that it does completing a medical degree. difficulties? Musculoskeletal complaints? and how.” “While their science degree was Dermatology? I could go on, but to There are many chiropractors who similar, they only did one major simplify things to the idea that ‘all GPs would share OzSydGuy’s views. in anatomy, and so missed out on do is prescribe drugs’ is ludicrous. Unfortunately, those views are not physiology and biochemistry. Just A chiropractor is trained now in Diploma-cy correct. anatomy. They were not exposed universities, Mr Cunningham says, but to nearly as much detail of the “many aspects of their curriculum are THE REALITY OF MEDICAL TRAINING other subjects as medical students, not evidence-based. Simple as that.” Mr John Cunningham is an Australian- nor did they learn anything about “And saying ‘more research is needed’ trained orthopaedic surgeon who human behaviour, microbiology or is not the same as saying ‘it works’. specialises in the treatment of spinal pharmacology. Much research has disorders. He is a Fellow of the Royal Just anatomy. already been done, Australasian College of Surgeons “To even “ Many aspects of the and the only thing and of the Australian Orthopaedic suggest that chiropractors’ curriculum that chiropractic can Association. In the 2016 Australia Day chiropractors learn treat better than GPs honours, he was awarded a Medal of the ECGs in the same are not evidence-based. is acute back pain, and Order of Australia (OAM) for services detail as a medical Simple as that. only then in a small to medicine and the promotion of practitioner is ” subset of patients. immunisation. laughable. Researching it more He suggests that OzSydGuy’s “Making a may provide more “understanding of chiropractic training, claim that the two streams simply evidence for other conditions, but it also and the training of GPs, is considerably branch off is ridiculous. They share may not. One’s chickens should not be lacking”. no common ground to begin with, so counted before they’re hatched. For a start, Mr Cunningham says, cannot ‘branch off’, as OzSydGuy puts “Suggesting that chiropractors can a GP must complete a medical degree, it. replace GPs because some of their which these days is often a 6-7 year “And a medical degree is only the subjects have the same broad title as each program of the medical sciences as well start. GPs must also complete a three- other is blatantly false. You might make as clinical medicine. It is taught by year Vocational Training Pathway the same claim about physiotherapists, scientists specialised in the field, as well covering many aspects of medicine not osteopaths, nurses, pharmacists, and as clinicians. covered in detail in the undergraduate I could go on. GPs have their place, “Medical practitioners are taught section of training, as well as passing and that is as the primary family evidence-based medicine, meanwhile more exams, and then a fellowship physician. Chiropractors should learn chiropractors are taught make- exam. So we’re up to ten years just now. their place too, and it’s not where they believe like Gonstead, pregnancy and “And OzSydGuy thinks that’s think it is.” . paediatric chiropractic - completely only about drugs? What do GP’s without evidence. Medical students see? Only the broadest range of are not taught by chiropractors, nor conditions that can be treated with are chiropractors taught by medical evidence-based medicine. Yes drugs About the interviewer: practitioners. The courses differ and are used, but what about, say, an Tim Mendham they differ enormously. How do I asthma plan? Diabetes counselling? is executive officer and know? Because I did a science degree Family planning? Psychiatric care? editor with Australian with chiropractors at UNSW before End of life care? Paediatrics? Learning Skeptics Inc.

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0347 REVIEWS Spiritualism

investigation, to be sure. Bells and raps and Spirited debate missing clothes were evaluated in Nova Scotia (an adolescent girl was judged to have been the earthly cause). An aspirant to the prize The Witch of Lime Street: Seance, Seduction, and insisted that he be locked with the interviewers Houdini in the Spirit World in a room, and only then did he divulge his secret: the spirits wanted a $25,000 investment By David Jaher so he could make a fabulous machine that Cown Publishing, A$20.96 did something or other. Another would-be claimant insisted on the committee’s evaluating her peculiar claim that famous people whose hat happens after we die photographs were in the newspaper resembled Wis the great question that certain animals, and she had photos of both everyone has an answer to because categories to prove it; what this had to do with everyone wonders about it and a psychic ability is not clear. anyone’s answer is as good as anyone Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, whose boosting of else’s. Many religions are built to spiritualism is a feature on many pages of this varying degrees on the comfort that book, warned that a money prize would bring something does happen after death, out the kooks, and he was right. Many of the and the something is going to be fun aspirants were deemed so bogus as to not need and happy. any investigation by the full committee, and the But religions come and go. ones that got such an investigation were easily In the years after World War I, found to be frauds. spiritualism had a great following. That is, until the committee discovered the Getting in touch with the spirits on spooky effects wrought by Mina Crandon. (For the other side was something like the investigation, she was given the pseudonym tuning a radio to the right station, Margery, but her identity became public in the a metaphor from an engineering middle of things.) She was a vivacious blonde, gadget that had been brought forth married to an older man who was a respected by practical science. Indeed, finding those spirits surgeon in Boston. She claimed to have had was likened to a scientific endeavour; Thomas no psychic gifts until she was attending a Edison proposed to construct a valve that seance led by another, and then found she was would amplify the transmissions from what the able to channel forces that would, say, make a spiritualists called “Summerland”. table crash to the floor. She started leading her Another scientific endeavour would be simply own seances, and produced astonishing and to investigate the mediums who said they were convincing effects. Her dead brother Walter talking to, or manifesting actions from, spirit proved to be the master of ceremonies in the sources. Scientific American set up a panel to sessions; he would, through her voice, sing investigate mediums, and got some impressive or recite his own poetry. The sessions seem results. The Witch of Lime Street: Seance, spectacularly animated - speaking trumpets Seduction, and Houdini in the Spirit World would be thrown into the air, bells would ring, (Crown Publishers) is about the most impressive clocks would freeze, ectoplasm (a mysterious results. It is written by David Jaher, and this supernatural substance emitted from Margery’s is his first book. It is a surprise to read about body) would be produced, the table would go him that he has been a professional astrologer, galloping around the floor, the room would and in his acknowledgement pages, he thanks turn cold, spirit lights would fly around, the someone without whose help “I would still be Victrola would play and then slow down, and reading natal charts, rather than writing books, much more, all while Margery’s limbs were for a living.” Jaher indeed believes in psychic being held or restrained. phenomena, but even readers who are more The scientists who witnessed such things skeptical will have no difficulty in enjoying his were astounded, but who wouldn’t be? Just engrossing story of a scientific foray into the because you have a doctoral degree in physics or spirit world. psychology does not mean you will avoid being Scientific Americanwas ready in 1923 to put bamboozled. A rabbit pulled from a previously up $2500 as a reward for real psychic displays. empty hat will look, to twenty scientists with Of course, the editors got to say what was notepads, like a rabbit being pulled from real and what was not; it was to be a scientific a previously empty hat. It was known that 48 The Skeptic March 16

investigators had to supplement their number grabbed his hand and put it between her legs. with a magician who was alert to the way tricks With Houdini, she was not so bold, but she was were done, and that is how Houdini came to the cordial and friendly with him. assistance of Scientific American. He had caught Houdini had respect for a fine display of fake mediums before for the committee, but he magic, but not one in which the performer was evenly matched with Margery. claimed to be aided by the spirit world. She was different from the others; she was He found that Margery had the slickest smart, extroverted, witty, and playful. She ruses he had seen, and while a particular was also seductive; part of the sensation of séance impressed all the other attendees, he investigating mediums was that their clothing pronounced it, “All fraud - every bit of it.” He and persons had to be closely inspected, and could reproduce all the effects himself, he said, she showed eagerness rather than modesty for without any supernatural assistance. And he did such procedures. The seances were held in the so, in his stage shows, as part of his debunking dark and the lady was bound and surrounded by crusade. The truth is, though, that he may men, so of course there was a sexual atmosphere; have met his match in Margery. Although he but at least one investigator said Margery had did expose her methods, at the last session he attended, he said he could duplicate what he had seen, but he never did. Margery and her promoter husband thought this was a victory. The prize, however, was not awarded. There was infighting among members of the committee, but no agreement overall that Margery’s effects were supernatural. Never fulfilled were the hopes of people like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle that science would verify visitations from the other side and that spiritualism would be the religion to overtake all other beliefs. The world moved on from the dizziness of the Jazz Age to the grimness of the Great Depression, and the fad for séances waned. So did the newspaper publicity; Boston and national papers were wild about Margery and then fashions changed and she was forgotten. Scientific Americanno longer has a prize to give a genuine psychic, but spiritualists have not been able to claim the analogous prize maintained by Randi [and Australian Skeptics – Ed]. The Margery vs Houdini duel was a sensation in its time, and has been brought back here in full, in a funny, dramatic retelling that is fair to both sides, and to their considerable egos and those of the rest of the investigators.

- Reviewed by Rob Hardy

49 REVIEWS Religion + Science Distant disbelievers

Battling the Gods: Atheism in the Ancient World religious orthodoxy and no scripture; the priests By Tim Whitmarsh managed rituals and the affairs of the temples, but did not tell people how to believe. Beliefs Knopf, A$48.99 within the city-states were always different, anyway, with different gods and different emphases. Atheism might have been considered n ancient Athens two slaves are an extreme position to take about gods, but it Icomplaining about their lot, and was one of many acceptable ones. Built into the one of them proposes that the best Olympian myths was the idea that the gods, relief would be to get to a statue even Zeus, could be overthrown or thwarted; of a god and prostrate themselves atheism was a possibility within this narrative. before it. The other is surprised that The paucity of texts specifically on belief or the first believes in gods: “What’s disbelief is a problem often confronted here. We your proof?” he demands. “The fact have Anaximander and Anaximenes who spoke that I’m cursed by them,” comes of gods, but we don’t have their own words. the reply. This is an exchange from Their ideas that air is the same as god, or that the Aristophanes’s comedy Knights, and infinity of the cosmos surpasses any individual it is quoted in Battling the Gods: manifestation within it, may reflect a here-and- Atheism in the Ancient World by now view of gods, or god as nature. This was the Tim Whitmarsh. The author is a view of Xenophanes, who wrote that humans professor of Greek culture, and in try to explain the as-yet inexplicable in nature this fascinating volume undertakes to by proposing that gods perform the mysteries, show that disbelief in various forms but that the wonders of the world are physical was a distinct school of thought phenomena, not supernatural. He wasn’t an among the ancients. atheist, but he redefined deities as not being those Whitmarsh writes, “Atheism has a tradition Olympian beings but rather the ebb and flow of that is comparable in its antiquity to Judaism matter and life. Whitmarsh posits that nothing (and considerably older than Christianity would be lost if whenever Xenophanes writes “the or Islam).” He has not written a discourse one god” we substituted “nature”. This anticipates supporting or denying atheism, but only an Spinoza, and Einstein’s affirmation of belief in appreciation that its roots are far deeper than Spinoza’s God, not a personified deity but instead even the New Atheists usually consider. Atheism the beautiful comprehensibility of nature. is modern, we are usually told, born of the The idea of no gods being in charge was fit for Enlightenment and the advance of science and discussion in plays not just by Aristophanes. In a the secular state. This is simply not so, and fragment of Bellerophon, the playwright Euripides Whitmarsh’s book amply proves it. poses the classic Problem of Evil, pondered then Whitmarsh has drawn on many texts of the and now, unsolved then and now: ancient Greeks, inscriptions, plays, essays, and Someone says that there really are poems. One of the problems of such work is that gods in heaven? there are many remarks about disbelievers (such There are not, there are not... I reckon that as in Aristophanes, above), but few texts from the tyrants disbelievers themselves. The voluminous writings Kill very many people and deprive them of the Greeks do include comments about of their property skeptics, and while not all the comments are And break their oaths to sack cities; critical, accounts of Greek religion and culture And despite this they prosper more are almost always written from the point of view Than those who live piously in peace every day. of those who believe in gods, normative accounts The stage was a venue for examining the painting a normative picture of the society. workings of gods, or their absence. Interestingly, But Whitmarsh shows that the polytheism Athenian courts, while they might take up an of the Greeks was usually far more accepting of occasional charge of crimes that were religious disbelief than was the monotheism that followed in nature, never saw themselves as instruments it. Atheism was sometimes forcibly repressed of the will of the gods. “Athenian law was not by the Greeks, but usually not. There was no theological. It existed solely to determine human 50 The Skeptic March 16

responsibility for human action; those who tried power they especially granted to the empire. to shift the blame onto the gods were mocked.” This is one of the many points which ring Nonetheless, if you were suspected of with present day tones; many of my fellow US disbelief, bad things might happen; some citizens are certain that their particular deity philosophers were taken to court for disbelief has a particular interest in the advancement of or impiety, particularly during times of social our nation. Also, Greek and Roman citizens turmoil. The most famous, of course, was sometimes fretted that those who do not believe Socrates. What he really thought cannot in gods could not do their part to promote be known, as his ideas come to us from a just society; I wonder if my contemporary descriptions by others. What threatened the believers will insist that ancient Greek atheists citizens was that he claimed access to a direct were wrong to believe that Zeus and Mars and communion with an unspecified deity, which the rest did not exist, and were bad citizens would have left conventional religion as a mere because of such disbelief. also-ran. Socrates might have had a sort of The general point Whitmarsh makes is a humanism, with his insistence on questioning useful mirror to our times. In all societies, even everything and living according to what you those of thousands of years ago, you can expect can justify rationally, and this may well have to discover people who find that believing in appeared close to atheism. supernatural gods raises more mysteries than it Although there was general toleration of resolves, and that attempts to understand the disbelief in Greece, this did not hold so true physical world are sufficient. within the Roman Empire because to question the gods was to question the divine conquering - Reviewed by Rob Hardy

would be a brave secondary school teacher who Sense of science would expect their students to cope with this. Not that the themes are too hard - they are areas that are an important grounding in the The Meaning of Science thinking behind science - but the discussion is By Tim Lewens not always easy going. For instance, it would Penguin, A$19.95 have been helpeful to discuss how scientific research is actually done before getting into the philosophical questions of Popper and inductive enguin Books has returned to versus deductive reasoning. Pits old Pelican imprint - the That said, the book would readily fall into ones in blue covers - for a series university degree courses on the history and covering various topics, primarily as philosophy of science, the discipline that the introductions to the particular area author, a Cambridge professor, hails from. of study. Thus we have Economics: For skeptics, there is some discussion of what the User’s Guide; Human Evolution; makes pseudoscience, in which Lewens lumps and Greek and Roman Political Ideas. homeopathy in with ‘intelligent design’ and The book under review looks at economics (presmably he doesn’t have many the “wonder” of science, what we friends in the economics faculty). He discusses mean by “science”, and what science what makes good versus poor evidence (the means for us. Each of these sections evidence for intelligent design is “risible”), and is subdivided into further discussion, cites the recent NHMRC damning assessment of looking generally at values, the studies on the efficacy of homeopathy. assessment of science, etc. Each chapter can be read in isolation, but a It has been suggested in at least full reading is best as the book builds its case on one online review that this would the values (and dangers) of science in practice be a great introduction to the issues and in thought. behind science for students in the later years of high school, but it - Reviewed by Tim Mendham 51 REVIEWS Pseudo-Anthropology Let’s all join together

The Mysterious Origins of Hybrid Man biological evolution isn’t true.” By Susan B. Martinez PhD Susan B. Martinez PhD, we are told on the back cover of this book, “earned her doctorate Bear & Company, A$43.99 in anthropology at Columbia University, where she also served as a lecturer in ethnolinguistics”. That sounds promising at first. But her degree he study of hybridisation and its is in cultural anthropology - on page 32 there Tevolutionary consequences is, in is a photo of her doing her doctoral fieldwork every sense, a sexy topic at the moment studying the culture of the Guajiros of Venezuela. in biology. The idea that evolutionary Presumably she learned their language, and so lineages can not only diverge but can earned the right to lecture in linguistics. But come back together again has been either she learned nothing about human evolution finding increasing favour over the past in her anthropology degree, or she has since 20 years or so. forgotten it; and she may have learned the Guajiro In some cases it goes no further than language but she sure has long since forgotten genes from one species introgressing what linguistics is all about. into another’s genome; some The book is a rave about creationism. Not the populations of deer, for example, turn creationism that we have all come to know and out to have incorporated some DNA love, the Bible, or the one that briefly poked its from a different species. In other head above the parapet about twenty years ago, cases, males of one species dominate creationism Hindu style. What Susan B. Martinez those of another, and breed with their PhD promotes is to be found in a book called females, then with the hybrids, and Oahspe. This was written and presented to the so on for several generations (known world in 1882 by one John Ballou Newbrough. as nuclear swamping); in Southeast Asia, this Strictly speaking it was not written by him. It has happened between two species of wild cattle was produced by automatic writing; he sat at his (banteng have ‘swamped’ kouprey). In yet other newfangled machine, the typewriter, until his cases, two species’ genomes seem actually to fuse fingers started to move by themselves, tapping to produce a new species with unexpectedly novel out the history of the world (which began 72,000 features (known as transgressive speciation); the years ago); its creator Jehovih (sic); the various bizarre Père David’s deer and the simply grotesque races called Asu, Ihin, Druk and Ihuan who Stumptail Macaque monkey are two species that interbred to form Ghan (modern humans, to have probably been generated in this way. you and me), hence the book’s title; and their And now we know that the ancestors of some homeland, the lost continent of Pan (otherwise human populations (everyone except Africans, Whaga, Lemuria, Mu or other names), in the actually) did this and that, and a bit of the other, Pacific Ocean. When Mu/Pan sank below with Neandertals. the waves, 24,000 years ago, five fleets of its So of course when in December I saw an adver- inhabitants, the Ihin, set out to populate the other tisement for a book called The Mysterious Origins continents – the tribes of Shem, Ham, Jaffeth of Hybrid Man, my beady eyes lit up and, over- (sic), Yista and Guatama. looking the sexism of the title, I sent an email to The Mysterious Origins sets out to convince us Santa, who duly obliged. It was only when I un- that all this is true, and in so doing the author has wrapped it that I began to smell a metaphorical rat. to disprove evolution (of course), but interestingly It is written by Susan B. Martinez PhD, it said she is also scathing about Biblical creationism and on the cover. Scientists writing books, whether Intelligent Design. This does not prevent her from technical or popular, simply put their unadorned citing creationist authors like Marvin Lubenow, names on the cover; it is overwhelmingly not to mention generalised nutters like Charles creationists who seem to feel the need, or have the Berlitz and Erich von Däniken, as authoritative paranoia, to parade their university qualifications when it suits her purpose. on the covers of their books, as if to reassure Of Pan and Whaga I know nothing; but the potential readers that “It’s okay, folks, I have a concept of a lost continent called Lemuria was degree in engineering/biochemistry/education, so invented by a 19th century zoologist, Philip Lutley I am really, really qualified when I inform you that Sclater, to explain why lemurs and their relatives 52 The Skeptic March 16

live on Madagascar and in tropical Asia but not in the ultimate underpinning of Nazi race theories, between - and it was in the Indian Ocean, not the was very much in vogue in anti-Darwinian circles Pacific. And the name Mu derives from a mis- throughout the latter half of the 19th century, decipherment of Mayan inscriptions by Augustus and it is perfectly feasible that Newbrough and Le Plongeon in the mid-19th century - and it was his followers had read it and absorbed some of its in the Atlantic, again not the Pacific. Geology ideas. knows of no such lost continents in any ocean. The lapses of logic, “how-do-you-explain” Nothing daunted, Dr Martinez resurrects Mu factoids, and non-sequiturs of every kind continue and Lemuria, amalgamates them, and transfers the throughout the book, and my reactions fluctuated result to the Pacific. And, she tells us, the names of between laughing out loud, fighting an urge to this lost continent are preserved in various locations hurl the book at my innocent dog and, towards and peoples all over the world today. From Pan the end, sheer tedium. we get Japan, not forgetting the Pandavas of the I choose just one more section with which to Mahabharata. From Mu we get so many names: test your good nature. Beginning on p149 we have the Mu of Hawaii, the Muruts of Borneo, Muza an imagined debate between POE (“professor of in Arabia, the Mulattos (yes!), and “the Murrian evolution”, whatever that may mean – a scientist, people of Australia”. By “Murrians” she evidently presumably and, to judge from the accompanying means the Murrayians: the Aboriginal people of cartoon, a male) and A (adversary, obviously Susan southeastern Australia, invented by J.B.Birdsell in B. Martinez PhD, herself). POE begins by saying the 1930s as one of three supposed races which he that Neandertals evolved into modern humans, claimed had populated Australia and fused to form but later on changes his mind. He mentions the the Aboriginal population. I had always thought early whales Pakicetus and Basilosaurus, but lets that the term “Murrayian” was derived from the A get away with a diversion about flippers and Murray River, which in turn was named after Sir vestigial organs (get both POE and A to read George Murray, who in the 1930s was British Thewissen’sThe Walking Whales, I recommend). Secretary of State for War and the Colonies. I stand A won’t accept Archaeopteryx as any sort of corrected. intermediate. The Cambrian Explosion gets an She finds that the five races mentioned airing. A asks POE “Well, what about the rapid in Oahspe can all be identified with various jump from australopith’s tiny brain (500cc) to mythological concepts and generally with particular H.erectus’s 800 to 1100cc? This is evolutionarily fossil hominins. The Asu were Ardipthecus ramidus; “inconceivable”, but somehow refrains from asking they were pretty hopeless, really, “without speech him when he stopped beating his wife. POE and meagre in consciousness”. The Ihin, “the sacred mentions the horse ancestor Eohippus, to which little people … with Europoid features”, were the A makes the astonishing claim, “Eohippus, I’m ones who came out of the sunken continent, and afraid, has been found in the same strata as the naughtily interbred with the Asu, producing first modern horse.” I cannot trace the origin of this the australopithecines (though they were mainly cavalier claim, whether it is a misunderstanding or Asu genetically) and then the Druks, who were an outright fabrication; let us be kind and suppose Homo erectus. The Ihuan, hybrid products of that, like every other unsubstantiated claim put Ihin and Druks, were the Cro-Magnons and the into the mouth of A, it is a misreading of a second- Paleo-Indians (earliest American inhabitants), and hand popularisation of a summary of an abstract they hybridised with the Druks to produce the of a scientific paper. Neandertals. Finally the Ghan – that’s us – derive In a way, it is interesting to find that there is from a cross between Ihin and Ihuan. yet another kind of creationism lurking there The spread of the Ihin, it turns out, was in the gloom, ready to make a claim to absolute recorded in lots of myths, in otherwise unexplained truth. Like Mormonism, or “creation science”, similarities in writing and language, in lost or intelligent design itself, it did not spring civilisations, and in peculiar racial features like forth fully formed, but has its unacknowledged the heavily bearded Ainu people of Japan and antecedents, from the half-baked claims of an supposed out-of-place white-skinned and small- amateur archaeologist to the pseudoscientific cant footed people. I must say that, as I read all this, I of an aristocratic racist, while – though most of was strongly reminded of the 1865 treatise On the them might not like to think so – the very idea inequality of Human Races by Count Gobineau, of a human intermediary writing the words of an in which white people were depicted as rushing angelic messenger goes back to Muhammad in the around founding civilisations in Egypt, Asia and cave of Hira. the Americas (although Gobineau’s superior whites were not small in size). Gobineau’s book, which was - Reviewed by Colin Kline 53 REGULARS

The cycle of life THE UNNAMED PLANET Planets, days, dates and death. On 20 January 2016, researchers Konstantin Batygin and Michael E. Brown at And so it goes, the almost inevitable Caltech announced calculation-based evidence of a realisation that all knowledge is massive ninth planet in the Solar System. The predicted planet would have an estimated mass of about 10 times connected and connectable. that of Earth, a highly elliptical orbit and could take 15,000 years to orbit the Sun. The existence of the so-called Planet Nine is still hypothetical, but its presence would explain the unusual orbital configuration of a group of trans-Neptunian THE END OF TIME objects that orbit mostly beyond the Kuiper belt. In their paper, Batygin and Brown simply referred to the object as Despite the artificial nature of “perturber”, and only in later press releases did they use the any calendar, dating systems have led nickname “Planet Nine”. It will not be officially named to fears of conspiracy and disaster. The until its existence has been confirmed with images. phantom time hypothesis is a conspiracy theory advanced by German historian and publisher Heribert Illig (b.1947) which proposes that the Anno Domini dating system was fabricated, adding in a period of ‘phantom time’ in the Early Middle Ages, from AD 614 to 911 which either occurred in a different period, or did not occur at all. Another dodgy issue for dates is the end of the world on December 21, 2012, as ‘calculated’ in the Mayan calendar. One suggested scenario for the end was a planet colliding with Earth. The planet, called ‘Nibiru’, is the supposed but What goes around ... debunked Planet X. However, with the demotion of Pluto in 2006, this

should now be called THE DATE-TIME CONSPIRACY Planet 9. When the new calendar was put in use, the difference was corrected by the deletion of 10 days. The Julian calendar day Thursday, 4 October 1582 was followed by the first day of the Gregorian calendar, Friday, 15 October 1582. The reform was adopted initially by the Catholic countries of Europe, but many Protestant countries feared the new calendar was part of a plot to return them to the Catholic fold. Britain and the British Empire (including the eastern part of what is now the United States) adopted the Gregorian calendar The end of the world as we know it in 1752, followed by Sweden in 1753. The last European country to adopt the reform was ... thanks to an unknown planet, but Greece, in 1923. leading to better times.

Source: Wikipedia, except where noted

54 The Skeptic March 16

THE NEW NAMED PLANET THE UNNAMED PLANET Planet 9 is not the only planet with naming On 20 January 2016, researchers issues. When Hanover-born William Herschel (below Konstantin Batygin and Michael E. Brown at left), along with his sister Caroline, moved to England and Caltech announced calculation-based evidence of a started their astronomical studies, he came under the patronage of massive ninth planet in the Solar System. The predicted fellow Hanoverian, the Elector, who happened to also be King George planet would have an estimated mass of about 10 times III of Britain. In 1781, when Herschell discovered a ‘new’ planet that of Earth, a highly elliptical orbit and could take 15,000 beyond the orbit of Saturn, his first thought was to name it Georgium years to orbit the Sun. The existence of the so-called Planet Sidus (George’s star) after his patron. This was not supported by Nine is still hypothetical, but its presence would explain the various foreign astronomers (and presumably by citizens of the unusual orbital configuration of a group of trans-Neptunian newly-independent USA who were not all that fond of George Herschel Jr in a photo by objects that orbit mostly beyond the Kuiper belt. In their III), and it was almost 70 years before the name Uranus photography pioneer Julia paper, Batygin and Brown simply referred to the object as was proposed. Margaret Cameron (1867). “perturber”, and only in later press releases did they use the nickname “Planet Nine”. It will not be officially named He’d seen better days. until its existence has been confirmed with images. THE DAY-TIME ASTRONOMER William Herschel’s son, Sir John Frederick William Herschel, 1st Baronet KH FRS (1792–1871), was an English polymath, mathematician, astronomer, chemist, inventor, and experimental photographer, who also did valuable botanical work. He named seven moons of Saturn and four moons of Uranus. He made many contributions to the science of photography, and investigated colour blindness and the chemical power What goes around ... of ultraviolet rays. His Preliminary Discourse (1831), which advocated an inductive approach to scientific THE DATE-TIME COUNT experiment and theory building, was an important The Julian day is the continuous count of contribution to the philosophy of science. days since the beginning of the Julian Period, used And he originated the use of the Julian primarily by astronomers. Outside of astronomy, day system in astronomy. the term Julian date may also refer to the day-of- year number (more properly, the ordinal date) in the Gregorian calendar. The most widely used civil calendar, it Pope Gregory, is named for Pope Gregory XIII, who introduced it in 1582. This was a refinement of the earlier Julian calendar which, originator due to inadequate calculations of the length of the year, of a Catholic was falling out of sync with reality. The motivation for conspiracy to take the change was to bring the date for the celebration days away from of Easter to the time of the year in which it was Protestants. celebrated when it was introduced by the early Church.

Source: Wikipedia, except where noted

55 FORUM Religion

The religious Koran of Mecca’s message is to A different reading obey Mohammad or burn eternally in hell while the political Koran of Medina’s message is the In which a response to “A Skeptic Reads the Koran” threat of jihad against the non-believers and their annihilation in this world. Overall, almost two- looks at sex, violence and democracy thirds of the Koran is directed against the kafir or the non-believer. Unlike the New Testament, there is no Golden Rule in the Koran as demonstrated irst of all, I am a skeptic as well as an atheist, so by the prescribed treatment of the kafir who is to FI do not promote any particular religion. be despised, hated, tricked, not befriended and In reply to Martin Bridgstock’s article “A Skeptic even decapitated. Reads the Koran” [The Skeptic, 35:4, p16], it is At this point it is worth noting the distinction important to stress the point that that the Koran between Jesus and Mohammed. Jesus’ only cannot be studied in isolation to the Sira and the reported act of violence was the overturning of the Hadith as the Koran constitutes only about 15 per money-changers’ tables in the temple. However, cent of the total Islamic doctrine. The Koran is Mohammed spread Islam in the remaining ten held to be the eternal and perfect word of years of his life commanding armies in many Allah, reportedly handed down piecemeal battles, slaughtering kafirs who would not turn to to Mohammed over his lifetime by Islam and, especially, Jews. As an example, after the angel Jibeel (Gabriel) during the battle of the Trench, 800 male Jews who had Mohammed’s numerous trances. It surrendered were taken back to Medina and were was an unfolding revelation of Allah’s decapitated in a spectacle in front of Mohammed permanent word dictated to and and Aisha, one of his wives who was only 12 written down by various scribes, as at the time. The remaining Jewish women and Mohammed was illiterate. children were sold into slavery, many for sexual The Koran that we see today pleasure. This treatment of kafirs is endorsed in is not the historical Koran given to the verses of the Koran of Medina. To demonstrate Mohammed. It is the product of all the the fundamentals of Christianity and Islam it is a scribes’ transcripts which Caliph Uthman good exercise to compare the words and actions of had collected together after Mohammed’s death – the original architects of these two religions, Jesus these transcripts were then subsequently destroyed. and Mohammed. A further comparison would The Koran that Uthman produced is not in be Buddha, in that his message also endorses the historical order and, therefore, is very difficult concept of Jesus’ Golden Rule, “Do unto others as to comprehend. It has been rearranged from the you would have them do unto you”. longest to the shortest chapter, it is repetitive with I am not sure how the issue of feminine very little context and, above all, it is contradictory. rights under sharia can be “certainly solvable” in However, if the Koran is studied in the western countries as Martin states in his article. chronological context of Mohammed’s life, As the Koran is the direct and eternal word of it makes sense – therefore the Sira (the life of Allah, it cannot be changed and those that call Mohammed) and the Hadith (the words and for a reformation of Islam will be disappointed. actions of Mohammed) are essential to its Mohammed stated, after his famous night journey understanding. to the Temple of Jerusalem and his ascension The historical Koran can be divided into the two to heaven, that most of the people in hell were periods in Mohammed’s life – his time in Mecca women. Mohammed had a low opinion of women as a teacher and a prophet, and his time in Medina but that might have been the general opinion in as a politician and a warlord. The earlier peaceful Arabia at the time. However, Mohammed also verses of the Koran of Mecca are abrogated by stated that women were less intelligent than men the sword verses of the Koran of Medina. It is to and were spiritually inferior, a woman’s testimony be noted that after some 13 years of proselytising is half that of a man, a woman along with donkeys in Mecca, Mohammed had only a cult following and dogs can nullify prayers, a kafir woman can be of one to three hundred devotees at best. After used as a sex slave and women are an affliction to moving to Medina, he radically changed his men. approach and within a very short time Mohammed Marriage inequality is demonstrated in that had thousands of converts. Islam in Medina a man can have four wives but not the reverse; a became a political and militaristic force with a man can marry a kafir woman but, again, not the religious motivation; this was the birth of jihad. reverse; a man is permitted to beat his wives and a 56 The Skeptic March 16

wife cannot refuse her husband’s sexual advances. It democracy is government of the people, by the is thought that Mohammed had eleven wives and people, for the people and embraces free and fair numerous kafir concubines, Mary the Copt being elections, political participation by its citizens, one of them. All of Mohammed’s women were veiled. ensuring that human rights and laws apply equally Mohammed had a voracious sexual appetite for all citizens. There is separation of church and and one story is linked to a convenient verse in state, hence there is secular government. the Koran. Mohammad was sexually attracted to An Islamic government, on the other hand, is Zaynab, the wife of his adopted son, Zayd. On a theocracy based on the belief that Allah is the hearing of Mohammad’s interest in Zaynab, Zayd supreme power and the system of government is divorced her so that Mohammad could marry her. run according to his law, Sharia. Under a theocracy, To dispel murmurings in the ranks, Mohammad only spiritual leaders form government, human was given a convenient revelation from Allah (Surah rights take second place to religious decisions, the 33: 37-38). Up until this point, adopted children only law permitted is Sharia. There is no separation in Arabia had the same rights as children by birth of religion and state. Islam means submission and while Arabic custom opposed marriage between demands it. Therefore, theocracy is not democracy. a man and his son’s former wife, being viewed as Sayyid Qutb, a leading member of the Muslim incestuous. To get round this problem, Mohammad Brotherhood, said “It is Allah and not man who overturned the practice of adoption stating it was rules. Allah is the source of all authority, including Allah’s will – a clever move to sidestep a difficult legitimate political authority. Virtue, not freedom, situation. is the highest value. Therefore, Allah’s law, not Martin also makes the point that the Koran is man’s, should govern the society.” not a licence for murder and terrorism. I strongly The Arab Spring and its quest for democracy, the disagree. There are over 100 “sword verses”. For antithesis in Islamic countries, was always going to example: “I shall cast terror into the hearts of the woefully fail. Instead of nurturing democracy, the infidels. Strike off their heads, strike off the very movement has catapulted Islamist parties to power tips of their fingers” (Surah 8:12). Mohammed and left the Middle East in a worse condition than embraced violence unreservedly after he moved to before. Now brutal ideologies based on the sacred Medina and carried out an act of violence on an texts of Islam motivate many new followers. average of one every six weeks. On his death bed, The concept of duality is an important one in he did not have a single enemy left to speak or act Islam. Western logic demands that if two things against him – they had either converted to Islam or contradict each other at least one must be false - had been slaughtered. this is the basis of the scientific method. However, Mohammed is considered the perfect man in Islamic logic is dualistic in that if two things Islam and all Muslims should try to emulate him. contradict each other, both are true. The primary There is a good argument that the fighters of the example of this dualistic logic is the Koran itself. Islamic State are doing just that, together with There are two Korans, the one written in Mecca those responsible for the recent sex attacks on and the other in Medina. Both these Korans kafir women in Europe, notably Germany and, of contain passages which are contradictory but all are course, the high rape rate in Sweden. The tolerance true because they are the eternal words of Allah. to people with different beliefs belongs to the Koran Islamic doctrine refers to two groups of people, of Mecca but is abrogated by the sword verses, the believers and the non-believers, the Muslims highlighted by Mohammed’s murderous conduct and the kafirs. Kafirs can be treated well or treated in Medina. Martin mentions cherry picking badly is another example of dualism. Dualism passages – as previously stated, the Koran is not decrees that there is no universal rule for humanity in chronological order and cannot be interpreted - the Golden Rule - but, instead, all of humanity without the Sira and the Hadith but, again, must submit to Islam. A final note on dualism is examine the deeds of the man, himself. that the world is split into two parts – dar al Islam I have not yet mentioned the ethic of taqiyya or (the house of Islam or the house of submission) sacred deception. A kafir is inferior and not equal to and dar al harb (the house of war - inhabited by a Muslim and because Islam has no Golden Rule, kafirs). he can be deceived if it serves the advancement of The “religion of peace” only becomes peaceful Islam. Deception or taqiyya plays a very important when the whole world is compelled, by force if role in warfare, military jihad - “the religion of necessary, to submit to Islam, becoming one in dar peace” label is a good example of this. al Islam. I rest my case. Martin also mentions that very few Islamic Terry Coupland countries are democratic. The definition of Middle Ridge QLD 57 FORUM Religion + Sport

Martin Bridgstock replies … showed that they stemmed from war situations, or religious persecution (pages 18-19). This verse fits that pattern. There are similar numbers of peaceful, erry Coupland has written a huge ethical verses. Terry, apparently, didn’t notice these Tcommentary on my account of reading the points of mine yet they are crucial Koran. One problem is that he does not seem Terry compares Islam to Christianity, ignoring to have paid much attention to what I originally any evidence which does not suit him. For wrote. For example, early on, he says that instance, years ago, I read the Bible and pointed the Koran is deemed the word of God by out horrific verses in it. These include mass murder Muslims, and interpreted via a mass of of prisoners, killing disobedient sons, killing people documents called Hadith. Yes, and I wrote who practise witchcraft, killing slaves and much exactly that in my original article (on more. Jesus explicitly endorsed these verses in the page 16). What’s more, I pointed out New Testament (Bridgstock 2008). Terry does not that the different Islamic groupings seem aware of these points, yet they undermine his have different hadith, which is why I case. simply read the Koran. Terry also claims – without evidence -- that by Large parts of Coupland’s the time of his death, all of Mohamad’s opponents article are unsupported by any had either been killed or had converted. Since evidence. He states that the Mohamad finally controlled an area about half the Koran falls into two parts: size of the Arabian peninsula, that is a very weird says who? He makes claims about statement indeed. Mohamed’s sex life and character: where is Terry misrepresents me as saying that Islamic the evidence? Maybe this comes from profound countries are not democratic. I was actually scholarship, or maybe it is the ravings on a website. talking about Arab countries (page 20). There is We don’t know because Terry doesn’t tell us. a very large Islamic nation to our north, and it is Skeptics take evidence seriously: Terry should, too. democratic. So is Turkey. Terry cannot see how the problem of female Now maybe I am wrong about Islam: if so, I rights is ‘almost certainly solvable’ in western need to know. However, Terry Coupland’s claims countries. This should be obvious. We must make are not supported by evidence, are cherry-picked perfectly clear, in all our laws and policies, that to the point of misrepresentation and do not seem women are the equal of men, and we must enforce backed by knowledge of what I wrote. This is not it. Muslims in the west then face a simple choice: skeptical, and not even useful or informative. accept this or leave. Terry claims (again without evidence) that Reference there are a hundred war-like verses in the Koran. Bridgstock, Martin (2008) A Skeptic Reads the Bible. Pt1. He cites one. I analysed some in my article, and The Skeptic 28, 3: 8-11.

prominent Jewish athlete in history”, and in the The hurdles joke: “What’s the world’s shortest book?” — answer: “Great Jewish Sports Legends”. The influential Australian journalist, Philip In which is discussed myths about sport, medals, Adams, known for his generally skeptical outlook Philip Adams and Jews on things, writes that he “can’t think of too many Jewish sporting heroes, if you leave out David’s gold-medal skills with the sling-shot”, mong the many myths and stereotypes and gives the example that it’s “hard to think of Aspread about the Jews, one that is relatively a Jewish golfer on the US circuit” (The Weekend benign, but is nevertheless quite annoying, is Australian, 4 October 2014, “Jewels of The the old story that Jews are no good at sport. It Diaspora”). A quick internet search, however, is reflected in the words of bigots such as the brings to light ten Jewish golfers who have played American representative to the International the US PGA circuit: Amy Alcott (29 LPGA wins), Olympic Committee in 1936, General Charles Corey Pavin (15 wins), Herman Barron (4 wins), H. Sherrill, who once said: “There never was a Jonathan Kaye (3 wins), Morgan Pressel (2 wins), 58 The Skeptic March 16

how the most successful Jewish Olympic athletes fare, at the Summer Games, against the sports heroes of Australia— surely one of the great sporting nations. This is a good comparison because the world’s Jewish population and the population of Australia have each averaged approximately 12 million during the period that athletes have competed at the modern Olympic Games (1896 to 2012). Furthermore, both groups have competed at all the Games held during this period although Jewish athletes have been compromised by racism, killings and boycotts. German and Austrian Jewish athletes were prevented from competing in the 1936 Games. Jews from several Bruce Fleischer (1 win), Monte Scheinblum, Skip countries self-boycotted Hitler’s games. (The Kendall, Rob Oppenheim, and Laetitia Beck Nazis are known to have murdered at least 37 (though Pavin subsequently converted to ‘Born Jewish Olympic athletes. These athletes had won Again’ Christianity!). 18 medals of which 14 were gold.) At the 1972 The claim that Jews are no good at sport is Games, five Israeli Olympians were murdered. disproved by books such as Paul Taylor’s Jews Political boycotts prevented Jewish athletes from and the Olympic Games. One reviewer described Canada, the US and Israel from competing in this as a book that “finally and forever puts to the 1980 Games and prevented Jewish athletes rest the myth that Jews aren’t sportspeople”. from the Soviet Union and other East European Myths, however, are not easily put to rest. It took countries from competing in the 1984 Games. Philip Adams just a few taps of the keyboard to An internet search provided a list of athletes revitalise the one about Jews and sport. considered to be Australia’s ten most successful There are accurate records of the results at the Olympic athletes. I have compared the Olympic modern Olympic Games since its inception in records of these Australians - legends all - with 1896 to the present day. At the Summer Olympic my choice of the ten most successful Jewish Games, Jewish athletes have won at least 450 Olympic athletes. (See tables below.) medals of which 195 are gold. One would think The Jewish athletes won a total of 72 that this medal tally alone would be sufficient to medals, whereas the Australians won 70, but bury the myth that Jews are no good at sport. more striking is the discrepancy in the gold But, since Adams maintains that it is hard to medal count. The Jewish athletes won 43 golds think of a Jewish sporting hero, let’s consider compared to 36 won by the Australians.

The Australian athletes won the following medals: The Jewish athletes won the following medals: Gold Silver Bronze Total Gold Silver Bronze Total Ian Thorpe (swimming) 5 3 1 9 Mark Spitz (swimming) 9 1 1 11 Dawn Fraser (swimming) 4 4 0 8 Agnes Keleti gymnastics) 5 4 2 11 Libby Trickett (swimming) 4 1 2 7 Morris Fisher (shooting) 5 0 0 5 Murray Rose (swimming 4 1 1 6 Dara Torres (swimming) 4 4 4 12 Betty Cuthbert (athletics) 4 0 0 4 Myer Prinstein (athletics) 4 1 0 5 Liesel Jones (swimming) 3 5 1 9 Lenny Krayzelburg (swimming) 4 0 0 4 Petria Thomas (swimming) 3 4 1 8 Jeno Fuchs (fencing) 4 0 0 4 Grant Hackett (swimming) 3 3 1 7 Irena Kirszenstein (athletics) 3 2 2 7 Shirley Strickland (athletics) 3 1 3 7 Ildiko Ujlaki-Rejto (fencing) 3 1 2 6 Shane Gould (swimming) 3 1 1 5 Maria Gorokhovskaya (gymnastics) 2 5 0 7 Totals 36 23 11 70 Totals 43 18 11 72 59 FORUM Sport

Moreover, among these sports heroes there astonishing 24 world records as well as several is one athlete who is surely the hero of heroes. Olympic records! That is Mark Spitz, who in 1972 won seven gold While myths will forever be perpetuated, medals - all in world record times. official records cannot be disputed. Analysis Let’s make one more comparison. Consider of the Olympic records reveals a multitude the over-sized athletes of the same two groups of Jewish athletes who qualify as sporting -these are the athletes who spectacularly combine heroes. If the biblical David, almost certainly strength, speed and agility, in order to hurl heavy mythological, is the only “Jewish sporting hero” objects through the air. that Adams can recall, then the record books Australians have won three Olympic medals show that his knowledge is massively defective. in throwing events, two bronze and a silver. The biblical David may have been the first Gael Martin, bronze, shot put; Daniela Costian, Jewish sporting legend, but he was certainly not bronze, discus; and Louise Currey, silver, javelin. the last. Jewish athletes have won 13 Olympic medals in the same events; four gold, five silver and four Michael Meyerson bronze: McMahons Point NSW In the shot, Tamara Press won gold in 1960 and 1964. Svetlana Krachevskaja won silver in REFERENCES 1980 and James Fuchs won bronze in 1948 and Jews and the Olympic Games, Paul Taylor 1952. Jews and the Olympic Games, Paul Yogi Mayer In the discus event, Lillian Copeland won Jewish Olympic Medallists, Dr George Eisen silver in 1928 and gold in 1932. Jadwiga Wajs Jewish SportsLegends, Joseph Siegman won bronze in 1932 and silver in 1936. Tamara “All Time Summer Olympics Medal Tally”, Press won silver in 1960 and gold in 1964. Olympics Universe In the javelin throw, Stephen Seymour won Encyclopedia of Jews in Sports, Bernard Postal silver in 1948 and Paul Winter won bronze in The complete book of the Olympics, 1932. Between them these athletes also set an David Wallechinsky

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Send to: The Skeptic PO Box 20, Ph: (02) 8094 1894 —Mobile: 0432 713 195 Beecroft, NSW 2119 Fax: (02) 8088 4735—email: [email protected] LETTERS To the Editor

What you think ... Institute of Complementary Medicine at Western Sydney University, which has a strong element of TCM in its The Shroud Freeman’s article may not be the current research portfolio. It has done definitive story of the Shroud, but it some good work, like debunking unshrouded is a fine piece of historical research copper bracelets for combatting and may raise the albatross from Mr arthritis. But it also includes a panoply Nickell’s back just a little. of stranger forms of alternative he report on the Annual Thanks for another interesting and medicine in its definition of CM on its TConvention in the recent Skeptic informative magazine. website. These include ‘therapies’ such [Vol 35, No 4] had Joe Nickell Roderick Shire as Ayurvedic medicine, Bach flower commenting about the ‘albatross’ on Rose Park SA remedies and crystal therapy. his back being the Shroud of Turin. The site doesn’t say they actually Might I refer you, and him, to an research those areas, but it is a concern article by Charles Freeman in the when a major source of funding for the November 2014 edition of History Institute, the Jacka Foundation, lists Today (pp38-45) in which it is TCM’s cohorts energy healing, , naturopathy, suggested that the Shroud is indeed homeopathy, spiritual healing, ‘thought a 14th century creation, a post-Black field therapy’, among others, on its Death object created for veneration as was recently given a copy of your website. a relic. Imagazine, and read with interest Between WSU, NICM and Jacka, The author comments that the Tim Harding’s article on traditional pseudomedicine gets an imprimatur it recent Shroud of Turin Research Chinese medicine [The Skeptic, 35:4, does not deserve. Project (STURP), however worthy, p32]. Harding makes the point that Maybe the Institute should apply the apparently made no use of experts in “TCM offends our sense of rationality same critical approach to these highly medieval weaving or relic cults and by being a useless waste of time and dubious areas of activity as it does to appears not to have studied the 50 or money.” copper bracelets. so representations of the Shroud made It might be of interest to to your Paul Anders between 1578 and 1750. readers that there is a National via email

CRYPTIC CROSSWORD SOLUTION DR BOB’S QUIZ SOLUTIONS

S H T A P E L E T R E G I T

R E P A A E N I R 1. A fireworks manufacturer.

S S Y B A C R E T S G U O Y N 2. The 75th anniversary of Popeye. It was lit green on

the weekend of January 16-18, 2004 as a tribute to the

U R H O S N B

G icon’s enormous love of spinach.

O H C Y S P P K O M A L E D

O 3. Xenu, 75 trillion years ago (L. Ron Hubbard’s idea of

H N A H M R E

L history.)

D A E H S E T I R T H G U O

R 4. The propriety of images of naked men’s … ahem

E R Y A E S S O … attachments, according to the UK Broadcasting

T S I W T U P I H S P T E Z S Standards Commission.

N L H O T A W O 5. The poor Americans are finding the container/

jugs tricky to pour from. There is increased spillage,

U M E B G O R T M I P O R T

C particularly by children. The larger width of the jug’s

A A I U N R W

P opening and its small lip are said to produce a wide

H P R O M O T C E E I W O Y E torrent of milk pouring out when the jug is at a shallow

slant. Some shops are holding demonstrations (with free

P S L A M B O

R cookies!) on how to use them.

N E I L N N R O C I R P A C A 6. 04:50, 3 September 1967 (Dagen Högertrafik). The early hour didn’t stop major traffic jams later in the day. 62 The Skeptic March 16

Local Skeptical Groups

VICTORIA TASMANIA

Ballarat Skeptics Launceston Skeptics Currently being re-activated Contact: Jin-oh Choi, 0408 271 800 See Facebook for details [email protected] www.launcestonskeptics.com Citizens for Science – Mornington Peninsula (formerly Peninsula Skeptics, aka The Celestial Teapot) Launceston: Skeptics in the Pub Contacts: Graeme Hanigan 0438 359 600 1st & 3rd Thursday of each month http://www.meetup.com/Citizens-for-Science/ 5.30pm @ The Royal Oak Hotel www.facebook.com/groups/peninsula.skeptics/ Launceston: Skeptical Sunday Great Ocean Road Skeptics – (Geelong) 2nd Sunday of each month Meets on the last Wednesday of each month from 6pm, City 2.00pm @ Cube Cafe Quarter, Cunningham Pier East Geelong Contact: Carolyn Coulson [email protected] QUEENSLAND https://www.facebook.com/groups/147741491945391/ The Surfcoast Summer Skepticamp is run annually by Brisbane Skeptics in the Pub members Meets on the first Tuesday of each month from 6:30pm at the Plough Inn, Southbank Melbourne Eastern Hills Skeptics in the Pub http://Brisbanesitp.wordpress.com - Meets second Monday of each month at The Knox Club, follow links for Facebook, Twitter and email list Wantirna South. Contact: Andrew Rawlings [email protected] http://mehsitp.codenix.org https://www.facebook.com/pages/Melbourne-Eastern-Hills- Skeptics-in-the-Pub/19241290737690?ref=ts

Melbourne Skeptics in the Pub Meets on the fourth Monday of every month from 6 pm at the Mt View Hotel in Richmond. http://www.melbourneskeptics.com.au/skeptics-in-the-pub/

Mordi Skeptics in The Pub Meets at 7.30pm on the first Tuesday of each month at the Mordialloc Sporting Club. ($2 to cover website costs) http://www.meetup.com/Mordi-Skeptics-in-the-Pub/

NOTE: LISTINGS WELCOME We invite listings for any Skeptical groups based on local rather than regional areas. Email us at editor@ skeptics.com.au with details of your organisation’s name, contact details and any regular functions, eg Skeptics in the Pub, with time, day of the month, location etc. Because this is a quarterly journal and most local groups meet monthly, it is unlikely we will be able to include references to specific speakers or events. The 32nd Australian Skeptics National Convention Melbourne 2016

November 25–27 University of Melbourne

convention.skeptics.com.au

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