CSICOP at Twenty PAUL KURTZ

FROM THE CHAIRMAN CSICOP at Twenty PAUL KURTZ Founded twenty yean ago amid controversy azines are presenting the case for psy- In the statement we speculated about chic healing, psychokinesis, immortal- and uncertainty, CSICOP is now a well- the future course of the Committee by ity, reincarnation, Kirlian photography, established part of the contemporary intellec- orgone energy, psychic surgery, faith saying that we did not know how large the tual and scientific landscape. The construc- healing, astrology, the Chariots of the Committee would become or how ambi- tive skepticism it promotes is all the more Gods, UFOs, Dianctics, astral projec- tious its efforts would be. And we invited tion, exorcism, poltergeists, and (he crucial now with the emergence of global leading scientists and experts in many "talents" of Uri Geller. Edgar Cayce, mass media and a seemingly reduced appre- and Jeane Dixon. Often, the least shred fields to join us in this important venture. ciation of the scientific attitude. of evidence for these claims is blown The call was signed by many distin- out of proportion and presented as "sci- guished scientists, scholars, and skeptics, entific" proof. A Brief History including George Abell, Isaac Asimov, Antony Flew, Martin Gardner, Sidney he Committee for the Scientific The statement went on to say that Hook, Philip Klass, Ernest Nagel, W. V. Investigation of Claims of the Quine, B. F. Skinner, James Randi, Many individuals now believe that there TParanormal (CSICOP) was estab- is considerable need to organize some Marcello Truzzi, and others. The organiz- lished at a specially convened interna- strategy of refutation. Perhaps we ought ing meeting was held under the auspices of tional conference on "The New not to assume thai the scientific enlight- The Humanist magazine, which I then •nationalisms: Antiscience and Pseudo- enment will continue indefinitely; for all edited. I had invited as many skeptical we know, like the Hellenic civilization, it science," April 30 and May 1, 1976, on may be overwhelmed by irrationalism, researchers as I could locate to the confer- the newly opened Amherst campus of the subjectivism, and obscurantism. Perhaps ence^—in all, some 300 people attended. State University of New York at Buffalo antiscientific and pseudoscientific irra- News of the Committees formation where I was a philosophy professor at the tionalism is only a passing fashion; yet became immediately known worldwide one of the best ways to deal with it is for time. One of the reasons that prompted die scientific and educational commu- and was featured in newspapers as diverse me to form such a committee was the fact nity to respond—in a responsible man- as the New York Times, the Washington that I helped initiate in late 1975 a state- ner—to its alarming growth. Post, and Pravda, and science magazines ment, "Objections to Astrology," which With these thoughts in mind we are such as Science, die New Scientist, and was endorsed by 186 leading scientists forming an organization tentatively Science News. Indeed, a story in Science from the National Academy of Sciences, called the Committee to Scientifically News, written by its then editor, Kendrick Investigate Paranormal and Other including eighteen Nobel Prize-winners. Phenomena. Frazier, who attended the conference This statement aroused such an affirma- elicited more mail than any othet feature tive response that I decided that we The name of the Committee was then published in that magazine. needed to go beyond astrology and deal changed shortly thereafter to its present The Committee apparently crystallized with the wide range of other paranormal form. a widely felt need that there should be claims. T h e initial call—which I drafted— The statement continued some responsible scientific and scholarly announcing the formation of a committee body that would ferret out and examine read as follows: We wish to make it clear that the pur- rhe popular claims that were proliferating pose of the Committee is not to reject in the broader culture. This would have to There has been an enormous increase in on a priori grounds, antecedent to public interest in psychic phenomena, inquiry, any and all such claims, but be an interdisciplinary body that would the occult, and pseudoscience. Radio, rather to examine them openly, com- draw upon specialists in many fields, who television, newspapers, books, and mag- pletely, objectively, and carefully. would cooperatively investigate claims of SKEPTICAL INQUIRER July/August 1996 5 the paranormal. that it would be difficult to enumerate CSICOP, die SKEPTICAL INQUIRER, and Later in 1976, CSICOP established a them all here. the entire skeptical network have emerged new journal, originally called The Zetetic, Many leading scientists have flocked to as the "official opposition" to paranormal edited by Marcello Truzzi (who also served the banners of CSICOP and the claims. Leading print and broadcast jour- as cochairman of the Committee). In the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER and have supported nalists and media producers constandy first year, a disagreement about editorial our aims. Among our distinguished come to us for die scientific viewpoint, and policy ensued between Truzzi and other Fellows and Scientific Consultants arc we have provided a reliable source of infor- members of the Executive Council of CSI- Carl Sagan, Stephen Jay Gould, Francis mation to scholars and researchers, profes- COP. Truzzi wanted a scholarly sociologi- Crick, Glenn Seaborg, Murray Gell- sionals and lay people. We book guests on cal magazine, and he wished that propara- Mann, Elizabeth Loftus, and Milton hundreds of television and radio programs normalists be equally represented in its Rosenberg. worldwide annually and we participate in pages. The Executive Council said that There have been massive efforts to dis- hundreds of news interviews. We are a con- there was no avowedly skeptical magazine credit die Committee, and even to destroy stant resource for tliose who need up-to- in existence and it wished to deal not only it: such as me intemperate attacks on the date information. Wc need to be fair- with scholarly questions but those of pop- study of Michel Gauquelin's Mars effect and minded and ever-ready to examine any ular interest as well. After a vote of no- Klass's spoofing of space alien proponents; responsible claim to any truth, however confidence, Marcello Truzzi resigned. T h e bizarre. Yet we also need to evaluate die journal was renamed the SKEPTICAL Hyman's tangle with parapsychologists; and, claims as we see them. They are more often INQUIRER, and Kendrick Frazier was in recent years, efforts by Uri Geller, Eldon unanimously elected its new editor, a posi- Byrd, and odiers to embroil CSICOP and dian not unproved, uncorroborated, and tion he has held with distinction ever Randi in protracted and costly legal suits. based on insufficient evidence. since. (Frazier has outlined the history of All of these have failed. Today, I am happy Our unkindly critics call us "the gate- CSICOP and the SKEPTICAL INQUIRER in to report, CSICOP is alive and well and keepers of science," and if we reject a claim an article in the Encyclopedia of the stronger than ever, and it is now a well- they accuse us of being "close-minded." Paranormal, 1996, Prometheus Books, established pan of the contemporary intel- Alas, die role of the skeptic is overshad- Amherst N.Y.). lectual and scientific landscape. owed in the media by comparison with the From its inception, CSICOP has been pro-paranormal viewpoint, but at least we The SKEPTICAL INQUIRER'S circulation an international organization: its Fellows, have a presence. More important is d i e fact grew in 20 years from 1,000 to more than Scientific and Technical Consultants, and that die preponderance of scientific opin- 50,000—with little capital and no adver- Executive Council members come from ion generally supports our positions. tising revenue, supported enthusiastically dozens of countries worldwide. CSICOP Since our inception, we have broad- by its readers. has helped to organize cognate commit- ened our subject matter beyond the para- Heading CSICOP as chairman these tees in many parts of die world—the normal to other borderline areas of sci- twenty years has been exhilarating for me. United Kingdom, France, Canada, ence: repressed memory, facilitated com- CSICOP has been embroiled in contro- Mexico, and Australia at first, and later, in munication, alternative health cures, m u l - versy from the start, attacked on all sides an additional twenty or more countries. ticuJturalism, postmodernism, and odier by the disciples of the paranormal—from From its start CSICOP has been a grass- interdisciplinary issues that in our view parapsychologists and astrologers to roots movement, especially with the for- undermine the integrity of science. UFOIogists and alternative health-care mation of forty local and regional groups Our overall goal is to encourage a therapists. Members of the Executive worldwide. Although these groups are responsible approach to the objective Council of CSICOP have played a bril- autonomous and independent, we share examination of paranormal and other liant role on the national and international common goals and methods, and we have unusal claims, and to develop a public scene: Phil Klass in keeping alive a skepti- formed a unique international network. appreciation tor science, die methods of cal attitude about UFO visitations; Ray CSICOP has also helped to initiate and scientific inquiry, and the need for critical Hyman. James Alcock, and Susan convene meetings in Europe, Canada, thinking. Blackmore in carefully examining, in Latin America, and elsewhere. The twen- CSICOP has expanded its programs cooperation with parapsychologists, tieth anniversary will mark the first World enormously. In addition to publishing the claims of psychic phenomena; Martin SKEPTICAL INQUIRER (now bimonthly) Gardner and James Randi in fearlessly Skeptics Congress (to be held June 20-23, debunking die various forms of nonsense 1996).

Load more