Skepticism: The First Rule of Freethinking
by Louis Guzman
Once you have read Terence Hines' Pseudoscience and
the Paranormal (2003, Prometheus Books), you'll hardly believe any
popular story fed to you as truth. It turns out that much of what
we hear and read is not much more than fairytales. Why it must be
so is a matter for future research. In the meantime, we labor under
the misconceptions of what Hines calls pseudoscience and the paranormal,
the latter a subset of the former. Of course, Hines' effort does not
represent the end of such stuff. In 13 chapters, citing specific topics,
he lays out a persuasive panorama of junk often called fact. Much
of it is the product of what he calls the "constructive nature of
human perception." Essentially, the human brain will invent as fact
any story that is even circumspectly suggested to it. He didactically
digs into the nature of evidence in laboratory parapsychology and
finds it wanting. Importantly, he cites a plethora of scientific evidence
to support his conclusions. |
Take Freudian psychology. It was fed to me as reliable
social science at UCLA in the 1950s. Hines debunks it as bad science,
right along with psychoanalysis, Jungian thinking, humanistic psychology,
spiritualism, psychic readings, psychic crime detection, prophetic
dreams, thought pictures and demonic possession. Ghosts, poltergeists,
near-death, out-of-body experience and reincarnation receive no better
treatment. Astrology, moon madness and biorhythm theory are more of
the same ilk. As for UFOs and related phenomena, such as close encounters,
photo evidence, abduction, ancient astronauts, pyramid power, Von
Daniken, the Dogon and, gasp, the Bermuda Triangle, forget about 'em.
|
Faith healing drives Hines bonkers, so much so that
he lectures the reader on the nature of disease, reminding us of its
factuality. Thus faith healing techniques, along with psychic surgery
and the role of shrines have not even chance value. Alternative medicine,
featuring homeopathy, therapeutic touch, countless herbal remedies
and other alternative techniques get no better treatment. Collective
delusion, mass hysteria and environmental health scares, often relentlessly
driven by media hype, are unsupported by scientific testing. In Chapter
13, "Special Topics," facilitated communication as a cure for autism
is thrown into the dust bin, joined by creationism, cryptozoology,
dowsing, the magic pendulum, fire-walking, graphology, Kirlian photography,
polygraphy, and, of course, the Shroud of Turin. |
There are undoubtedly many more untrue presumed phenomena
to record, but that will be for an avid author to vacuum up and offer
in an ordered compendium for popular use. What Terence Hines does
is arm the freethinker, the secularist, with the philosophical underpinning,
the scientific methodology and the rhetorical firepower with which
to manage the daily grind. |
There are undoubtedly many more untrue presumed phenomena
to record, but that will be for an avid author to vacuum up and offer
in an ordered compendium for popular use. What Terence Hines does
is arm the freethinker, the secularist, with the philosophical underpinning,
the scientific methodology and the rhetorical firepower with which
to manage the daily grind. |
|
Send us an Email
Or write to us at:
Freethinkers of Colorado Springs
P.O. Box 62946
Colorado Springs, CO 80962-2946
Phone: 719-594-4506
|