Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition, and Other Confusions of Our Time

by Michael Shermer

  I also noticed that during the film-changing breaks, Van Praagh would make small talk with the people in the room. "Who are you here for?" he asked one woman. She told him it was her mother. Several readings later, Van Praagh turned to the woman and said, "I see a woman standing behind you. Is that your mother?" At all times he kept it positive. There was redemption for all—our loved ones forgive us for any wrongdoing; they still love us; they suffer no more; they want us to be happy. What else would he say? "Your father wants you to know that he will never forgive you for wrecking his car"? One young woman's husband had been run over by a car. Van Praagh told her, "He wants you to know you will be married again." It turned out that she was engaged to be married, and, of course, she credited Van Praagh with a hit. But, as I explained on camera, Van Praagh said nothing of the sort. He gave his usual positive generalization with no specifics. He did not tell her she was presently engaged to be married. He just said that someday she would marry again. So what? His alternative was to tell the young lady that she would be a lonely widow the rest of her life, which is both statistically unlikely and depressing.

  The most dramatic moment of the day came when Van Praagh got the name of a couple's son who had been killed in a drive-by shooting. "I'm seeing the letter K," he proclaimed. "Is it Kevin or Ken?" The mother responded tearfully in a cracking voice, "Yes, Kevin." We were all astonished. Then I noticed around the mother's neck a large, heavy ring with the letter "K" inscribed in diamonds on a black background. Van Praagh denied having seen the ring when I pointed it out on camera. In eleven hours of taping and small talk during breaks, surely he saw the ring. I did, and he's the professional.

  The reactions of the audience members I found even more intriguing than the mentalist techniques of Altea and Van Praagh. Anyone can learn cold-reading techniques in half an hour. They work because subjects want them to work. Every person at the Unsolved Mysteries taping except me wanted Van Praagh to be successful. They came there to speak with their loved ones. In the post-session interviews, all nine subjects gave Van Praagh a positive evaluation, even the few for whom he obviously missed. One woman's daughter had been raped and murdered many years ago, and the police still have no clues to the perpetrator or even to how the crime was committed. The mother had been making the rounds on talk shows, desperately seeking help in finding her daughter's killer. Van Praagh went to her heart like salt into a wound. He reconstructed the murder scene, describing a man on top of the young woman raping her and stabbing her with a knife, and left this grieving mother in tears. (Van Praagh was credited by all with getting this cause of death correct, but earlier, in the morning session, while he was fishing around by rubbing his chest and head, the mother slashed her fingers across her throat, indicating that her daughter's throat had been cut. Everyone but me had forgotten this clue by the time Van Praagh used it.)

  After the Unsolved Mysteries taping, it became clear that everyone but me was impressed with Van Praagh. The others challenged me to explain all his amazing hits. When I finally told them who I am, what I was doing there, and how cold-reading works, most were uninterested but several walked away. One woman glared at me and told me it was "inappropriate" to destroy these people's hopes during their time of grief.

  Herein lies the key to understanding this phenomenon. Life is contingent and filled with uncertainties, the most frightening of which is the manner, time, and place of our own demise. For a parent, an even worse fear is the death of one's child, which makes those who have suffered such a loss especially vulnerable to what "psychics" offer. Under the pressure of reality, we become credulous. We seek reassuring certainties from fortune-tellers and palm-readers, astrologers and psychics. Our critical faculties break down under the onslaught of promises and hopes offered to assuage life's great anxieties. Wouldn't it be marvelous if we did not really die? Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could speak with our lost loved ones again? Of course it would. Skeptics are no different from believers when it comes to such desires. This is an ancient human drive. In a world where one's life was as uncertain as the next meal, our ancestors all over the globe developed beliefs in an afterlife and spirit world. So, when we are vulnerable and afraid, the provider of hope has only to make the promise of an afterlife and offer the flimsiest of proofs. Human credulity will do the rest, as poet Alexander Pope observed in his 1733 Essay on Man (Epistle I, 1. 95):

  Hope springs eternal in the human breast;

  Man never Is, but always To be blest. The

  soul, uneasy, and confin 'd from home,

  Rests and expatiates in a life to come.

  This hope is what drives all of us—skeptics and believers alike—to be compelled by unsolved mysteries, to seek spiritual meaning in a physical universe, desire immortality, and wish that our hopes for eternity may be fulfilled. It is what pushes many people to spiritualists, New Age gurus, and television psychics, who offer a Faustian bargain: eternity in exchange for the willing suspension of disbelief (and usually a contribution to the provider's coffers).

  But hope springs eternal for scientists and skeptics as well. We are fascinated by mysteries and awed by the universe and the ability of humans to achieve so much in so little time. We seek immortality through our cumulative efforts and lasting achievements; we too wish that our hopes for eternity might be fulfilled.

  This book is about people who share similar beliefs and hopes yet pursue them by very dissimilar methods. It is about the distinction between science and pseudoscience, history and pseudohistory, and the difference it makes. Although each chapter can be read independently, cumulatively they show the allure of psychic power and extrasensory perception, UFOs and alien abductions, ghosts and haunted houses. But more than this, the book deals with controversies not necessarily on the margins of society which may have pernicious social consequences: creation-science and biblical literalism, Holocaust denial and freedom of speech, race and IQ, political extremism and the radical right, modern witch crazes prompted by moral panics and mass hysterias, including the recovered memory movement, Satanic ritual abuse, and facilitated communication. Here the difference in thinking makes all the difference.

  But more than this—much more—the book is a celebration of the scientific spirit and of the joy inherent in exploring the world's great mysteries even when final answers are not forthcoming. The intellectual journey matters, not the destination. We live in the age of science. It is the reason pseudosciences flourish—pseudoscientists know that their ideas must at least appear scientific because science is the touchstone of truth in our culture. Most of us harbor a type of faith in science, a confidence that somehow science will solve our major problems—AIDS, overpopulation, cancer, pollution, heart disease, and so on. Some even entertain scientistic visions of a future without aging, where we will ingest nanotechnological computers that will repair cells and organs, eradicate life-threatening diseases, and maintain us at our chosen age.

  So hope springs eternal not just for spiritualists, religionists, New Agers, and psychics, but for materialists, atheists, scientists, and, yes, even skeptics. The difference is in where we find hope. The first group uses science and rationality when convenient, and dumps them when they are not. For this group, any thinking will do, as long as it fulfills that deeply rooted human need for certainty. Why?

  Humans evolved the ability to seek and find connections between things and events in the environment (snakes with rattles should be avoided), and those who made the best connections left behind the most offspring. We are their descendants. The problem is that causal thinking is not infallible. We make connections whether they are there or not. These misidentifications come in two varieties: false negatives get you killed (snakes with rattles are okay); false positives merely waste time and energy (a rain dance will end a drought). We are left with a legacy of false positives—hypnopompic hallucinations become ghosts or aliens; knocking noises in an empty house indicate spirits and poltergeists; shadows and lights in a tree become the Virgin Mary; random mounta
in shadows on Mars are seen as a face constructed by aliens. The belief influences the perception. "Missing" fossils in geological strata become evidence of divine creation. The lack of a written order by Hitler to exterminate the Jews means that perhaps there was no such order ... or no such extermination. Coincidental configurations of subatomic particles and astronomical structures indicate an intelligent designer of the universe. Vague feelings and memories evoked through hypnosis and guided-imagery in therapy evolve into crystal-clear memories of childhood sexual abuse, even when no corroborating evidence exists.

  Scientists have their false positives—but the methods of science were specifically designed to weed them out. Had the cold fusion findings, to take a recent spectacular example of a false positive, not been made so public before corroboration from other scientists, they would have been nothing out of the ordinary. This is precisely how science progresses— countless identified false negatives and false positives. The public, however, does not usually hear about them because negative findings are not usually published. That silicon breast implants might cause serious health problems was big news; that there has been no corroborative and replicable scientific evidence that they do has gone almost unnoticed.

  What, then, you may ask, does it mean to be a skeptic? Some people believe that skepticism is rejection of new ideas or, worse, they confuse skeptic with cynic and think that skeptics are a bunch of grumpy curmudgeons unwilling to accept any claim that challenges the status quo. This is wrong. Skepticism is a provisional approach to claims. Skepticism is a method, not a position. Ideally, skeptics do not go into an investigation closed to the possibility that a phenomenon might be real or that a claim might be true. For example, when I investigated the claims of the Holocaust deniers, I ended up being skeptical of these skeptics (see chapters 13 and 14). In the case of recovered memories, I came down on the side of the skeptics (see chapter 7). One may be skeptical of a belief or of those who challenge it.

  The analyses in this book explain in three tiers why people believe weird things: (1) because hope springs eternal; (2) because thinking can go wrong in general ways; (3) because thinking can go wrong in particular ways. I mix specific examples of "weird beliefs" with general principles about what we can learn from examining such beliefs. To this end, I have taken Stephen Jay Gould's style as a model for a healthy blend of the particular and the universal, the details and the big picture; and as inspiration James Randi's mission to understand some of the more perplexing mysteries of our age and ages past.

  In the five years since we founded the Skeptics Society and Skeptic magazine, my partner, friend, and wife, Kim Ziel Shermer, has provided countless hours of feedback during meals, while driving in the car and riding bikes, and on our daily jaunt up the mountain with the dogs and our daughter, Devin. My other Skeptic partner, Pat Linse, has proved to be far more than just a brilliant art director. She is one of a rare species, an artistic and scientific polymath, whose prolific reading (she doesn't own a television) enables her not only to converse on virtually any subject but to make original and constructive contributions to the skeptic movement.

  I also wish to acknowledge those who have been most helpful in producing Skeptic magazine and putting on our lecture series at Caltech, without which this book would not exist. Jaime Botero has been there with me since I taught the evening course in introductory psychology at Glendale College a decade ago. Diane Knudtson has worked nearly every Skeptics Society lecture at Caltech for nothing more than a meal and food for thought. Brad Davies has produced videos of every lecture and provided valuable feedback on the speakers' many and diverse ideas. Jerry Friedman constructed our database, organized the Skeptics Society survey, and provided valuable information on the animal rights movement. Terry Kirker continues to contribute to the promotion of science and skepticism in her own unique way.

  Most of the chapters began as essays originally published in Skeptic magazine, which I edit. Skeptical readers may then reasonably ask, Who edits the editor? Who is skeptical of the skeptic? Every essay in this volume has been read and edited by my publisher's editors, Elizabeth Knoll, Mary Louise Byrd, and Michelle Bonnice; by my partners, Kim and Pat; by one or more of Skeptic magazine's contributing editors; and, where appropriate, by a member of Skeptic magazine's editorial board or by an expert in the field. For this, I heartily thank David Alexander, Clay Drees, Gene Friedman, Alex Grobman, Diane Halpern, Steve Harris, Gerald Larue, Jim Lippard, Betty McCollister, Tom McDonough, Paul McDowell, Tom Mclver, Sara Meric, John Mosley, Richard Olson, D'art Phares, Donald Prothero, Rick Shaffer, Elie Shneour, Brian Siano, Jay Snelson, Carol Tavris, Kurt Wochholtz, and especially Richard Hardison, Bernard Leikind, Frank Miele, and Frank Sulloway, for not allowing friendship to get in the way of brutal honesty when editing my essays. At W. H. Freeman I wish to thank Simone Cooper who brilliantly organized my national book tour and made it a joy rather than a chore; Peter McGuigan for bringing the book to audio so people can hear it as well as read it; John Michel for his critical feedback on this and the transition to my next book, Why People Believe in God. A special thanks to Sloane Lederer who maintained the progress of the publishing and promotion of this book throughout numerous personnel changes at the publisher, as well as for understanding the deeper importance of what we skeptics are trying to accomplish through writing books such as this. Thanks to my agents Katinka Matson and John Brockman, and their foreign rights director Linda Wollenberger, for helping to bring about the book in this and other languages. Finally, Bruce Mazet has made it possible for the Skeptics Society, Skeptic magazine, and Millennium Press to battle ignorance and misunderstanding; he has pushed us well beyond what I ever dreamed we were capable of accomplishing.

  In his 1958 masterpiece, The Philosophy of Physical Science, physicist and astronomer Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington asked about observations made by scientists, "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?—Who will observe the observers?" "The epistemologist," answered Eddington. "He watches them to see what they really observe, which is often quite different from what they say they observe. He examines their procedure and the essential limitations of the equipment they bring to their task, and by so doing becomes aware beforehand of limitations to which the results they obtain will have to conform" (1958, p. 21). Today the observers' observers are the skeptics. But who will observe the skeptics? You. So have at it and have fun.

  PART 1

  SCIENCE

  AND

  SKEPTICISM

  Science is founded on the conviction that experience, effort, and reason are valid; magic on the belief that hope cannot fail nor desire deceive.

  —Branislaw Malinowski, Magic, Science, and Religion, 1948

  1

  I Am Therefore I Think

  A Skeptic's Manifesto

  On the opening page of his splendid little book To Know a Fly, biologist Vincent Dethier makes this humorous observation about how children grow up to be scientists: "Although small children have taboos against stepping on ants because such actions are said to bring on rain, there has never seemed to be a taboo against pulling off the legs or wings of flies. Most children eventually outgrow this behavior. Those who do not either come to a bad end or become biologists" (1962, p. 2). In their early years, children are knowledge junkies, questioning everything in their purview, though exhibiting little skepticism. Most never learn to distinguish between skepticism and credulity. It took me a long time.

  In 1979, unable to land a full-time teaching job, I found work as a writer for a cycling magazine. The first day on the job, I was sent to a press conference held in honor of a man named John Marino who had just ridden his bicycle across America in a record 13 days, 1 hour, 20 minutes. When I asked him how he did it, John told me about special vegetarian diets, megavitamin therapy, fasting, colonics, mud baths, iridology, cytotoxic blood testing, Rolfing, acupressure and acupuncture, chiropractic and massage therapy, negative ions, pyramid power, and a host of weird things with which I was unfamiliar. Being a fairly i
nquisitive fellow, when I took up cycling as a serious sport I thought I would try these things to see for myself whether they worked. I once fasted for a week on nothing but a strange mixture of water, cayenne pepper, garlic, and lemon. At the end of the week, John and I rode from Irvine to Big Bear Lake and back, some seventy miles each way. About halfway up the mountain I collapsed, violently ill from the concoction. John and I once rode out to a health spa near Lake Elsinore for a mud bath that was supposed to suck the toxins out of my body. My skin was dyed red for a week. I set up a negative ion generator in my bedroom to charge the air to give me more energy. It turned the walls black with dust. I got my iris read by an iridologist, who told me that the little green flecks in my eyes meant something was wrong with my kidneys. To this day my kidneys are functioning fine.

  I really got into cycling. I bought a racing bike the day after I met John and entered my first race that weekend. I did my first century ride (100 miles) a month later, and my first double century later that year. I kept trying weird things because I figured I had nothing to lose and, who knows, maybe they would increase performance. I tried colonics because supposedly bad things clog the plumbing and thus decrease digestive efficiency, but all I got was an hour with a hose in a very uncomfortable place. I installed a pyramid in my apartment because it was supposed to focus energy. All I got were strange looks from guests. I starting getting massages, which were thoroughly enjoyable and quite relaxing. Then my massage therapist decided that "deep tissue" massage was best to get lactic acid out of the muscles. That wasn't so relaxing. One guy massaged me with his feet. That was even less relaxing. I tried Rolling, which is really deep tissue massage. That was so painful that I never went back.