Auerbach is one of Randi’s strongest critics…and vice versa. According to Auerbach, no one has won the prize because there’s no possible way of matching Randi’s strict guidelines. Ghosts don’t operate on cue, says Auerbach, and they don’t follow people to labs (mostly).
OCCAM’S RAZOR
A 14th-century English theologian and philosopher named William of Ockham said that when you’re trying to solve a mystery, you first have to “shave off” any unlikely assumptions. That leaves you with the simplest explanation—which is usually the correct one. As it relates to the paranormal, skeptics use what became known as “Occam’s razor” to mean, “If you hear howling in the night, the simplest explanation is that it was the wind.”
“Well, it cuts both ways,” says Michael Schmicker, author of Best Evidence—an Investigative Reporter’s Three-Year Quest to Uncover the Best Scientific Evidence for ESP, Psychokinesis, and Ghosts. “If a million people report a ghost, Occam’s razor says that ghosts probably exist. Based on the evidence we have—ghost sightings, deathbed visions, near-death experiences, historical reports from various cultures and eras—Occam’s razor says that consciousness does survive death.” That said, skeptics cite numerous simple explanations for phenomena that believers attribute to ghosts:
• Physiological: A medical condition known as phantom limb afflicts amputees who can “feel” a missing appendage, proving that the brain is capable of creating a reality that does not exist in actual life. Joe Nickell, a senior research fellow for the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, says that people create “false realities” all the time. For example, many who claim they’ve seen ghosts often report feeling paralyzed when they wake up and see the apparition in the middle of the night. “This is just sleep paralysis,” he says. Also referred to as a “waking dream,” this occurs when the body is asleep, which causes the paralysis, but the brain is teetering between sleep and consciousness.
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People who sense a “presence” in an empty room perceive it as the opposite sex 90% of the time.
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• Environmental: Temperature and humidity fluctuations cause houses to settle and creak. High EMFs caused by faulty wiring can cause nausea and hallucinations. Mix in low-frequency sound waves, such as the buzz of a fluorescent light, and that can cause people to hear unusual things. The flickering lights themselves cause eye strain and fatigue. These factors, say skeptics, lead to most “sightings.”
In a 2007 case in China, two brothers found a great bargain—a five-story house for $6,500, reduced from $34,000. Why? Strange, ghostly noises echoed through the home, scaring out the previous owners, and the ones before them, going back 10 years. The brothers traced the noises to a pipe and then to an underground stream. The “ghosts” turned out to be catfish splashing. The brothers sold the house for $133,000.
• Psychological: Either due to wishful thinking or for more nefarious reasons (such as TV ratings), most “hauntings” are fabricated by the witnesses themselves. Nickell concludes his article with, “I’ve investigated haunted houses, inns, theatres, graveyards, lighthouses, castles, old jails, and even office buildings. And I’ve never once found a paranormal explanation.”
CASE CLOSED…RIGHT?
But then a curious thing happens when you go to the comments section following Nickell’s article, which ran on MSNBC’s news site during Halloween 2009: You find post after post saying, “That’s BS; me and my brother saw a ghost at the same time for 20 whole seconds!”—or, “Don’t tell me I didn’t watch my remote control fly across the room by itself!” And dozens more.
Despite what the skeptics say, ghost hunters aren’t going to stop hunting for ghosts. For their story, float on over to page 174.
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Orcas (killer whales), when traveling in groups, breathe in unison.
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THE WEEKLY WILD NEWS
Behold these bizarre animal tales that might seem like sensational tabloid stories…except they’re all real.
SNAKE WITH FOOT KILLED WITH SHOE!
Suining, China – Dean Qiongxiu, a 66-year-old woman, was awakened late at night in September 2009 by a strange scratching sound. “I turned on the light and saw this monster working its way along the wall using his claw.” The monster was a 16-inch snake…that had a tiny foot growing from its belly, complete with a claw. Dean whacked it to death with her shoe. Biologists were unable to determine why the snake had grown a foot.
STONED WALLABIES MAKE CROP CIRCLES!
Tasmania – “We have a problem with wallabies entering poppy fields, getting as high as a kite, and hopping around in circles,” said Tasmania’s Attorney-General Lara Giddings in 2009. The dope-loving, kangaroo-like marsupials are having an adverse effect on the country’s opium crop, which is grown for use in legal morphine. In addition to the wallabies, deer and sheep are also getting high after ingesting the poppies—but unlike the wallabies, they only walk around in circles, which is less damaging than hopping.
GOAT BOY FRIGHTENS VILLAGERS, POLITICIAN!
Lower Gweru, Zimbabwe – In 2009 villagers were shocked when a goat gave birth to a…thing with the body of a goat but the head of a human baby. The newborn creature was so freakish that even dogs refused to get near it. The “Goat Boy” only lived for a few hours, but fearing that it was evil, the villagers burned the corpse beyond recognition. The province’s governor, Minister Jason Machaya, believes the “abomination” was the result of an illicit affair between a man and a goat. “It is my first time to see such an evil thing,” he said. “It is really embarrassing.” Provincial Veterinary Officer Thomas Sibanda disagreed, stating that our two species are incapable of interbreeding. He theorized that the goat suffered from hydrocephalus, or water on the brain, which resulted in a huge, grotesque head.
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The average American consumes 7 bottles of liquor, 12 bottles of wine, and 230 cans of beer a year.
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LOITERING CROC ARRESTED, THROWN IN JAIL!
Gunbalanya, Australia – When a giant female crocodile wandered into this small Northern Territory town in 2009, “She just sat there next to a fence, trying to look innocent,” said officer Adam Russell. He had no choice but to arrest her. “I wanted to jump on her Steve Irwin style, but the rangers wouldn’t let me.” Instead, they bound her jaws shut and hauled her off to the local jail, where she spent three days in a cell before being taken to a croc farm. “She got a bit cranky and started hissing when people came near,” said Russell, “but otherwise she was a model prisoner.”
MUTANT HYBRID-DOG THING BECOMES ROADKILL!
Turner, Maine – After 15 years of missing pets, sightings of glowing eyes, and mysterious shrieks in the night, in 2006 the reign of terror ended when the creature responsible was found dead on the side of a road. But what was it? “It was evil, evil-looking, like something out of a Stephen King story,” said resident Michelle O’Donnell. “And it had a horrible stench I will never forget.” The creature, described by some as a giant rodent-dog hybrid, has been blamed for killing (among many other things) a Rottweiler. Before wildlife officials could inspect the corpse, however, vultures had eaten most of it. No positive identification was ever made.
GAY PENGUIN GOES STRAIGHT FOR WIDOW NEXT DOOR!
San Francisco, California – Harry and Pepper were the most controversial pair of the 40 Magellanic penguins at the San Francisco Zoo. The two males paired off in 2003, causing a barrage of antigay protests. But once the furor died down, Harry and Pepper were given an abandoned egg to incubate. “Of all of the parents that year, they were the best,” said zookeeper Anthony Brown. But then in July 2009, Harry left Pepper for Linda, whose mate had recently died. Brown called Linda “conniving,” claiming she had lured Harry away. Whenever Pepper tried to visit his ex-husband, Linda aggressively chased Pepper away. The news of the breakup renewed the controversy: The Christian group OneNewsNow said it proved that “nature prefers heterosexual relationships.” Outspoken gay
-rights advocate Wayne Besen disagreed: “There is no ‘ex-gay’ sexual orientation. Harry is simply in denial. The penguin is living what I call the ‘big lie.’”
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Fuel for thought: About 1 in 6 pregnant women get a craving to chew on coal.
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STOP TALKING
We’re just going to let these folks’ words speak for themselves.
“There are many dying children out there whose last wish is to meet me.”
—David Hasselhoff
“I don’t like any female comedians. I think of her as a producing machine that brings babies in the world.”
—Jerry Lewis
“My notion of a wife at 40 is that a man should be able to change her, like a banknote, for two 20s.”
—Warren Beatty
“Out getting a taco.”
—sportscaster Bob Griese, on the absence of NASCAR driver Juan Pablo Montoya
“My music isn’t just music—it’s medicine.”
—Kanye West
“I believe in white supremacy until the blacks are educated to a point of responsibility.”
—John Wayne
“A woman’s place is in the wrong.”
—James Thurber
“I’m blacker than Barack Obama. I shined shoes. I grew up in a five-room apartment. My father had a little laundromat in a black community not far from where we lived.”
—Rod Blagojevich
“I’ll fight any man, any animal. If Jesus were here, I’d fight him, too.”
—Mike Tyson
“The Romanians, they’ll stick a knife in you as soon as look at you. There might be some good ones. Forgive me if there are any here, and hopefully that’s a ‘no’ because I wouldn’t get out of here.”
—English city councilor Robert Fraser
“Boy, they were big on crematoriums, weren’t they?”
—George H.W. Bush, visiting Auschwitz
“Old people should just die and know when it’s time to move over and leave the future for the young.”
—Roseanne Barr
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Worldwide, the average child receives $32 worth of toys per year. The average American kid: $328.
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STRANGE FOLK
Just a few strange entries about strange people who do strange things in this strange world.
CARPET BAGGER
A 48-year-old man identified only as “Georgio T.” goes to New York City bars and lies down on his stomach on the floor, because he likes it when people step on him. He even carries around a rug he can attach to his back, along with a sign that says “Step on Carpet.” Georgio explains, “When we were kids, one friend wanted to be the doctor, another wanted to be the carpenter. I wanted to be the carpet.”
THAT SUCKS
“Some people like baseball better than football,” says Michigan teenager Kyle Krichbaum, “but I like vacuum cleaners better than anything.” Kyle loves the sound, feel, and look of vacuum cleaners, as well as the act of vacuuming. Kyle’s love of vacuum cleaners is purely platonic, he says, but he just can’t get enough of vacuum cleaners. In fact, he has more than 200 vacuum cleaners…and vacuums his parents’ house five times a day.
EEK!
A 37-year-old woman in Stockholm, Sweden, suffered from musophobia, an unreasonable fear of mice. Her 59-year-old ex-husband knew that, and wanted revenge after their bitter divorce—so he went to her apartment and pushed 19 mice through her mail slot. “She is now being cared for in a hospital,” said police. The man was arrested on harassment and animal-cruelty charges (and has demanded that all 19 mice be returned to him).
STUCK ON YOU
Thomas Borkman was arrested in Cook, Australia, after he broke into a woman’s apartment. The woman woke up to discover that Borkman had glued his face to the sole of her foot. It took surgeons three hours to separate foot from face. Police said that the act had “some sexual significance.”
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The city of Kobe, Japan, built a 60-foot statue of the cartoon robot Gigantor. Cost: $1.5 million U.S.
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BEAT THE PRESS
You’d think that in this world of Internet searches and instant fact-checking, it would be hard to slip a fake story into the news stream. But actually, it’s pretty easy.
THIS JUST IN! “VP guns for shootout with Hillary”
THE STORY: In the early days of the 2008 presidential campaign, the Boston Herald published an odd news story: Vice President Dick Cheney had challenged presidential candidate Hillary Clinton to a hunting contest. According to the Herald, Cheney had issued the challenge during an appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press. Then, the story went on, Clinton declined the offer, saying, “I fired a gun once, but I didn’t like it, and I didn’t recoil” (a joke referring to her husband’s infamous “I smoked marijuana, but I didn’t inhale” remark). The Herald story was picked up by Google News…and then by everyone else.
NEVER MIND: Apparently the editors at the Herald didn’t bother to verify whether Cheney had recently appeared on Meet the Press (he hadn’t). Nor did they notice that the writer listed as the original source was Andy Borowitz—a well-known comedian and satirist. Borowitz had posted the story on his blog as a joke, and was as surprised as anyone when he saw it had been picked up by the Herald as a real story. The Herald’s publisher, Kevin Convey, admitted, “We were bamboozled.”
THIS JUST IN! “Stunning photos of underwater North Pole”
THE STORY: In August 2007, news sites around the globe ran a Reuters news-service story about how a crew of Russian deep-sea explorers had planted their flag on the seabed under the ice of the North Pole. The accompanying pictures showed the Russian submersible they’d used to find the pole.
NEVER MIND: No one in the dozens of news organizations that reran the Reuters story noticed that the photos were actually images from the movie Titanic. Who did notice? A 13-year-old boy from Finland, who contacted his local newspaper to inform them of the mistake. Reuters later apologized and claimed that they’d pulled the images from a Russian television broadcast that showed how such an expedition might look. Reuters had incorrectly captioned the photos and sent them out to the world. The good news: A Russian submarine did actually find the underwater North Pole—just not the one in the photos.
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Bernd Eilts, a German artist, turns dried cow manure into wall clocks and wristwatches.
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THIS JUST IN! “Chinese rocket makes historic launch”
THE STORY: On September 25, 2008, China’s official state-run news Web site, Xinhua.org, posted a story about the much-anticipated launch of the manned Shenzhou 7 rocket—a mission that would feature China’s first-ever space walk. The story described the launch in great detail: “The firm voice of the controller broke the silence of the whole ship. Now the target is captured 12 seconds ahead of the predicted time.” The article concluded, “Warm clapping and excited cheering breaks the night sky, echoing across the silent Pacific Ocean.”
NEVER MIND: Astute viewers noticed one mistake: The report was posted two days before the launch occurred. When pressed for an explanation, Xinhua.org blamed it on a “technical error.”
THIS JUST IN! “United Airlines files for bankruptcy”
THE STORY: This headline flashed across the financial news site Bloomberg.com in September 2008. Almost immediately, United’s stock began to plummet—from $12 per share down to $10, then to $8, to $3, eventually down to a penny—wiping out more than 99% of the stock’s nearly $1 billion value. In short, the headline nearly put the already-struggling airline out of business.
NEVER MIND: The headline wasn’t from that day; it was from a story that had run in 2002—six years earlier, when United did file for bankruptcy. (The company had since regained some of its financial footing.) The New York Times tried to piece together the chain of blunders: “An old Chicago Tribune article was posted on the website of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. That article was
picked up by a research firm, which then posted a link to it on a page on Bloomberg.com, which sent out a news alert.” The timing couldn’t have been worse. The country was in the grip of the 2008 economic crisis, and investors were jittery. When the goof was discovered, trading was temporarily halted. United’s shares soon returned to their pre-panic price of $12.
Uncle John's Bathroom Reader The World's Gone Crazy Page 12