Mile
Zero

From an article on the revamp of James Randi's Million Dollar Challenge:

Rescued from comments over at Design Synthesis. I think it's an argument that needs more exposure.

UPDATE: Now, before anyone says anything crazy in comments, remember--that's my job. Patrick notes that this is still a democracy, and that I might simply be mad at the neanderthals occupying power. Fair enough: it is (so far) and I am. But he doesn't link the two together, and perhaps I should have to forestall discussion. After all, the neanderthals in power got there because they were (discussions of voter fraud aside) elected through the democratic process. And therein lies the point of my ethical appeal.

The deciding factor in the last election, we are told and I believe, was "moral values." Most of the time in this country, that's code for "gonna hate me some gays and some Muslims," but I would like to think that it does actually signify some amount of identification with a code of ethics--thou shalt not kill and the rest. Frustrated by a set of policymakers who only pay lip service to these values ("Constitutional amendment to protect marriage! Massive carving of the ten commandments! Mr. Bush, build up that wall!"), many voters find themselves driven toward the fringes--and there they become the subject of animosity by people like me, and the cycle continues.

But what if there were a way to bridge the gap? To appeal to those people in terms they can understand, but not sell out freedom and the scientific method in the process? Much has been made in recent times about the need for political liberals to trumpet their own moral values: fairness, standing up for the little guy, giving everyone access to a good education and healthcare. The same moral case can be made for science--and should be! True, we will never win over the fundamentalists (any more than they will convert me), but we can try to make the case to the decent human beings huddled somewhere around the middle of this country to say that scientists aren't all bad. We can point out that doing good is more effective with science, that it helps us achieve the humanitarian goals that we all, on some level, share. We can save the planet--science can help!

That's my real point here. Yes, I think that an argument for moral authority can be a real rallying point for those already on the side of science. And true, I consider it one of the real differences between me and the "hippies." But I also hope that it might be influential for those who simply don't know the difference, and need someone to explain in simple, inspiring terms why the scientific method is one of hope.

Science is not a religion. It's not equivalent to a religion. It's not a belief system. It's very annoying when people claim that the two are the same sheep in different wolves' clothing.

What's the difference?

The snarky answer, which is abrupt but no less apt because of it, is that science actually works. Science gave you television and the Internet. Religion put people on television and the Internet who say that Jesus needs money, and he takes Visa.

I started thinking about this because Chris at Only a Game had written a silly, self-congratulatory post on what he considered skepticism. I don't usually read Only a Game, because people who use Greek terms to discuss video games annoy me. In this case, I was surprised to see a review of the philosopher Paul Feyeraband on gameblogs, and clicked over. Putting that review aside, Chris claims that skeptics exposed scientific "belief" when they raised the possibility of fraud in the laughable Ganzfeld telepathy experiments.

Confused? I don't really follow that either. Because the experiments (which still have a methodological hole a mile wide due to their reliance on experimenter interpretation) could be faked, the problem is science? The only way you reach that conclusion is if you've already decided that ESP is real and the experiment was perfect. In which case, why were you experimenting in the first place? Don't you have a seance to get to?

Now you might be asking, why get all bent out of shape over this? After all, Only a Game is a pretty nutty blog. In that same skeptic post, Chris also insinuates (and I paraphrase) that James Randi and Carl Sagan had someone killed for discovering mystical "orgone" energy! And I agree, that's pretty far out there. What bothers me about it is not this specific incident, but the recurring devaluation of scientific thought, of which his post is just one example.

The assertion of which, by the way, is not scientific. My claim to observe some kind of general trend from anecdotal evidence is exactly the kind of ridiculous and unfounded assertion you'd expect from a journalist trained in Intercultural Communication, not in science. Guilty as charged.

But on the other hand, 42% of the population told the Pew Center last year that life has existed in its present form since the beginning of time--they don't say, but I'm guessing for a lot of those people "the beginning of time" is only 6 thousand years away. Of the 48% who admitted a prediliction for evolution, 18% of them still figured that it was divinely guided. Homeopathy--literally selling people water that's had other substances waved at it--is a multimillion dollar industry. Chiropractics, another debunked psuedoscience, has billions in revenue even though it can be actively harmful to your health.

I mean, don't treat it as gospel, but that looks like a problem to me.

Now, in a liberal society it's important that people have freedom to do whatever they want, within reasonable limits. The people who alter their bodies and post pictures at BMEZine, for example, could easily be considered strange and disturbing. But if they want to jam pieces of metal through themselves, that's their right as long as they don't make me watch.

Yet people are actually hurt by unscientific ideas. They take homeopathic remedies instead of seeking treatment for medical problems. They get their spines cracked by chiropracters. And they get fleeced by fake psychics and astrologers, losing money and making bad decisions on flawed assertions. Someone is profiting by the exploitation of another person, a deeply immoral proposition. It is this exploitation that most self-labeled skeptics find most offensive, not just a call to truth.

Science isn't a belief, it's a method. Specifically, it's a method of knowing--and unlike other methods of knowing, like ESP and religion, it produces reproducible, useful results. You can critique the policies surrounding it (such as the problem of global warming) or its cultural position (it's still too dominated by white males), but it's impossible to seriously dispute whether or not we are healthier and made more capable thanks to that method of experimentation and falsifiability.

It's true that science requires us to believe in an objective reality, where something can be "true" in that it accurately predicts outcomes. But why would we want it any other way? While considering the subjective/objective debate makes for a good intellectual bull session, when people begin being harmed or exploited (as they are) then you have entered the realm of policy--and that requires you to prioritize some policies as better or worse within an objective framework in order to make good decisions. Science is our best--I would say our only--reliable means of making those prioritizations. It should be our primary method of knowing for policy purposes.

So by all means, go ahead and believe crazy things. Consult astrologers, read your bible, and cleanse your aura. But let's not pretend that those methods of knowing reach the same level of quality as science. Clearly, from any pragmatic perspective, they don't. If you disagree with that, it's your right to head out into the forest sans flashlight, manufactured clothing, or botanical reference. Have the courage of your convictions and leave science behind.

I doubt we'll see a lot of takers on that one.

Beth Kampschror writes in the July/August '06 Archeology:

Well, that's different. According to the article, Osmanagic has become quite the celebrity for these claims, assisted by charisma and an apparent tendency to dress like Indiana Jones. But is he crazy to think that there are pyramids in Bosnia?

Yes.

Wait, haven't I heard something like this before? From the similarly credentialed Freelance Police?

And as usual, and I hate to keep making this point over and over again but there's just no shortage of woo out there set me off, sloppy thinking from mystics and the credulous is actually going to cause much more serious problems down the line. Osmanagic's been able to take advantage of the disorganized Bosnian government and his new fame to grab digging permits for the hills. And while he's tearing them apart to look for little green men, real historical artifacts will almost certainly be disturbed or destroyed.

Like everyone else who makes these kinds of ridiculous claims, Osmanagic simply ignores critics and lies about his "accomplishments," claiming to have published articles that don't exist, and trumpeting laughable evidence. The pictures in Archeology are always fantastic, but here they're stunningly mundane. In one, Osmanagic stands next to a cordoned-off trench revealing what he claims is the first wall of the pyramid. It just looks like a big rock. The hill itself doesn't look particularly pyramid-like. If you published that picture with the caption "Low mountains of the Shenandoah river valley," no-one would look twice.

Archaeology has an update on the article, and the gullible media coverage of the "pyramid," here. Atlantis figures into it.

This Rolling Stone article on Scientology has been making the skeptical rounds in the past couple days, and it is very interesting. (Those Scientologists! So nutty! So wacky! So litigious!) But this part alerted my snark detector, in a paragraph discussing the "operating thetan" category of ubermensch:

That's right: Tom Cruise can control time and space with the powers of his mind. Reportedly he'll gain the ability to act when he reaches the next level.

There's also an RPG joke just waiting to happen here, but I'll leave that up to you.

The publisher of Skeptic magazine, Michael Shermer, wrote what is considered a fairly definite book with that title about delusions like Holocaust denial, UFO abductions, and creationism, among others. My biggest problem with the book is that it never answered the title question in any real detail--it was primarily composed of Skeptic magazine columns, adapted for print. That was great for someone like me who doesn't necessarily want to subscribe to Skeptic, but I wanted more. Shermer has offered a slightly better hypothesis here in his Scientific American feature. Anne's Anti-Quackery and Science Blog breaks Shermer's conclusions down into plainer language:

Very true! I'm reminded of a post at Skeptico, one of my favorite blogs, that touched on the bizarre theories of Masura Emoto. Mr. Emoto (I refuse to actually call him "Dr.") is a profoundly disturbed Japanese man who believes that water contains a form of spiritual consciousness and can react to the world around it. Emoto tests these theories by putting water in jars and playing heavy metal at some, classical at others. The classical water formed soothing crystals, while the heavy metal water formed jagged "angry" crystals. Emoto also taped words to the jars, and found that "love" and "thank you" produced more attractive displays than (and I quote) "You make me sick. I will kill you."

I hope that you've reacted to that paragraph with a grin and a rueful shake of your head--oh, what a wacko! You'd have to be crazy to believe something like that! Or do you? This isn't the first time that I've heard of Mr. Emoto (wait, he thinks water has feelings and he's named "Emoto?" Oh, sweet irony). Although he didn't know the name, a former editor of mine talked about "a Japanese scientist" who had discovered these amazing properties of H₂O while we were discussing religion and cults. I'm not going to claim that this editor friend of mine (we'll call him Ed) was a grounded thinker*, but he was clearly a sharp guy. Despite that intelligence, while hitting me with lines about spiritual worlds beyond, mystical Eastern medicine, and (of course) psychic water, Ed let slip the real stunner.

"Science is just another belief," he said. "It can't prove these things. You have to experience them for yourself."

That really was the crux of the argument, just as Shermer indicates. Although I tried to make it clear to Ed that science isn't the facts, it's the process by which we found those acts, he just couldn't understand. To him, science was simply another set of perceptual laws, and laws were up for debate. He couldn't apply the critical reasoning of science to his own beliefs, because (like many people) he didn't realize that's what science was.

But is that all? I agree with Anne that we need to teach the method, not the facts, in order to create better critical thinkers. Shermer is also correct that intelligent people often use confirmation bias to uphold their stupid beliefs intelligently, rather than to challenge them. Yet honestly, at some level, shouldn't a person confronted with Scientology, or Emoto's water crystals, or any other number of weird philosophies be able to step back and say "hang on, does this make any sense?" I hate to use the phrase, but shouldn't common sense step in?

In his book, Shermer notes by way of explanation the tremendous human ability to find patterns. I think that's a step closer, but all of these different theories are just sidestepping around the basic fault--for some reason, people want to believe weird things. I think that's why I could never convince my editor of the virtues of the scientific method--his worldview was a story that somehow fulfilled him on a level rational thought couldn't reach. Maybe it's a messiah complex, or maybe it's a deep human desire for narrative. I don't really know why people have this need for a self-delusion, and worse, I don't know any way to deal with it. But we do need to learn to deal with it, because living in a democracy and a free society it is crucially important that our populace become well-reasoned and informed.

Any ideas?

Archivist's note: I received the following excerpt the other day on the fax line that I give out for my freelance work. It looked to have been originally printed on cheap newsprint, crumpled, and then rescued from a trash can. At first, I figured it was a wrong number or an advertisement, and went to throw it away. After a closer examination, however, I was fascinated by the story within. I've tried to reproduce it here to the best of my abilities, in the hopes that someone else can verify the information inside.

Hope you enjoyed this take on the Skeptic's Circle, and be sure to check out the next edition at Circadiana, to be held on December 8th. Thanks to Orac for letting me host, and have a great and skeptical Thanksgiving!

In response to my previous post on evolution, I've gotten involved in a couple of discussions on the subject. I've pitched Richard Dawkins's The Blind Watchmaker as a introductory text, seeing as how he's an excellent writer and covers the arguments for natural selection very well. In the process, the theory was advanced that Dawkins might be hurting his reputation by his hostility to religion.

I call double standard.

In The Blind Watchmaker, which I have right in front of me, I can't find a single place in which Dawkins actually takes on religion. He does attack specific, flawed religious arguments against evolution, in particular the Argument from Personal Incredulity ("Because I can't think of a possible way for evolution to achieve a given goal, there is no possible way.") and the Irreducible Complexity argument (also known as Intelligent Design). Within this book, however, he doesn't take the next step and imply that the failure of these arguments means that a god does not exist. He simply argues that they have not made successful case against evolution as a scientific theory.

That doesn't mean he hasn't made a strong atheistic case in other places. Take, for example, the following excerpts from an interview with Salon:

The whole interview is worth reading, because while Dawkins can be a jerk he's clearly a sharp guy and good at explaining his atheism. But these relevant portions make his view clear: sure, you can believe that the universe and life within it was divinely created. You can believe it was built by cosmic hamsters, too, if you feel like it. But as Dawkins sees things, since there's no direct evidence at all for either of those scenarios, while there is an overwhelming amount of evidence for alternatives that can explain each step of the creation and evolution processes, we can statistically treat both God and cosmic hamsters as null.

This is controversial even with scientists, because it's a very strong hypothesis. The weak form (not weak as in persuasive power, but as in reach) merely states that a god's existence is an unfalsifiable claim, and so science doesn't have anything to do with it. That's likewise perfectly reasonable. They're simply different views of the same problem--Dawkins says the glass is almost certainly empty, while religiously-inclined scientists state that the glass might be full or empty and science can't tell either way, thank you very much.

I'm not trying to take sides on which side is correct. I'm trying to use it to illustrate a bigger point. We're pretty certain that the tooth fairy doesn't exist, and we're positive that there are no cosmic hamsters. Dawkins simply applies the same inductive reasoning to the divine--and frankly, if the dominant cultural position wasn't Christian, no-one would blink at his assertions. What we're seeing here is what I like to call Christian privilege.

If you've read feminists, either published or around the web, or if you hang out with any of the well-educated feminists, you have probably heard of male privilege. It's the concept that being a man in Western society comes with certain invisible advantages, making life easier. For example, men do not usually face the suspicion that they slept their way into a position. Men are often given priority in conversation, because there's an unspoken cultural imperative for women to be silent and defer to male opinion. Likewise, there's a white privilege. Appropriately-named guest writer Angry White Kid at That Colored Fella's Weblog has a few examples.

Privilege can be held by any dominant culture, and it suppresses co-cultures by way of setting the norm. If you'll allow me to sink back into my native Marxism, it's a tool of hegemony. Privileged people aren't aware of their privilege, because they've lived with it all their lives, and it's built into the society. It's "soft" discrimination. However, if you ask someone from a co-culture about the idea, they'll know what you're talking about right away. It can be a real shock as a member of a privileged class to run up against this form of covert discrimination, and very difficult to learn to remedy it.

There is, once you start looking for it, a clear Christian privilege at work in Western society. Our politicians go out of their way to express how religious they are when they're campaigning (and no doubt many of them are sincere). No-one questions a self-professed Christian, but atheists face curiosity and often outright hostility for their views (or, to be technical, absence thereof). Implicitly, we distrust people who can't profess to a "spirituality," and we may assume that there's something missing from their lives. Religion, and more specifically Christianity, is the norm, and we distrust people who deviate from that norm. They do not have the privilege of immediate trustworthiness.

None of this will make fundamentalists re-examine their views. They are too deep into their persecution complex. But for rational, liberal Christians who consider themselves open-minded, it can be helpful to consider the many ways your life is easier because of your religion. When most reasoning people, religious or not, consider science and faith to be separate, it would be a shame to miss a good science book like Dawkins just because his views on faith disagree with yours.