Photo credit: Bruce F. Press Photography In an open letter on his website, he writes: At 86 years of age, I feel that it’s now well time to officially retire, so I’m stepping down from my position with the JREF –- the James Randi Educational Foundation. This doesn’t mean that I’m retiring from my battle […]
Richard Dawkins, the brilliant evolutionary biologist and author of “The God Delusion” and other bestsellers, reads some of the vitriolic mail sent from fundamentalists who hate him because he’s an outspoken atheist. Each missive is ugly and awful — like most online comments sections — some including death threats. In fact, the tone and verbiage […]
Earlier this week, I linked to a story from London about a shopkeeper who was supposedly robbed by a thief who hypnotized him temporarily. The story sounded bogus to me, so I asked Ben Radford (deputy editor of The Skeptical Inquirer and author of seven books) to take a look at it and share his […]
I have a very skeptical view of hypnosis, and doubt I could ever be hypnotized. That’s why I call bullshit on this article about a shopkeeper who claims he was put in a trance by a thief who then went through his pockets and stole all his money. I’d be willing to bet it was […]
The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry has published an open letter — signed by James Randi, Bill Nye, Ann Druyan, Daniel Dennett, Lawrence Krauss, Sanal Edamaruku, Eugenie Scott, and a slew of other scientists and Nobel Prize winners — asking the media to stop using the word “skeptic” to describe climate change deniers: As Fellows of […]
There was a time not too long ago when my email inbox would be filled daily with people sharing a link to some bizarre story, rumor, or conspiracy — often the same one, as I was on lots of my listeners’ mailing lists. The vast majority of the stories (95%+) turned out to be garbage, […]