Re: Brief Comment: Parapsych, Skepticism, and Native people et al.

[Adam Levenstein <cleon42@xxxxxxxxx>]

--- Sam Pawlett <rsp@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Actually, the various skeptic societies, especially
> the one around Michael
> Shermer are quite enamoured of psychology,
> particularly evolutionary
> psychology (or sociobiology as it used to be
> called.) His magazine promotes
> the work of Susan Blackmore who has taken the 'meme'
> theory of culture to
> it's extreme. They also promote the work of the big
> names , thinking that ev
> psych is the logical extension of hard-nosed
> Darwinian science into
> psychology, the humanities etc. It seems their
> scepticism is pretty
> selective. It does not extend to capitalism itself.
> In his book "Why People
> Believe Weird Things", Shermer does not examine why
> people believe weird
> things like 'capitalism benefits everybody' or
> 'capitalism is just and the
> free market provides equal opportunity for all'. I'm
> waiting for them to
> join the global warming and resources exhaustion
> debunkers and denialists.

Skeptic is more philosophical than the Skeptical
Inquirer. Neither really takes on economic or
political ideas, but Skeptic gets very wishy-washy,
particularly on the religion question. I enjoy reading
both magazines, but my personal preference is towards
CSICOP's Skeptical Inquirer.

> That said, Shermer is a former follower of Ayn Rand
> and still has strong
> sympathy for her philosophy (sic). In one of his
> books or essays he has an
> interesting piece on the Rand cult where he admits
> to once being one of
> them.

Shermer's book "Why people believe weird things" has a
significant section on the Rand cult, and he calls it
just that - a cult. He doesn't really explain what he
"admires" about Rand's philosophy outside of "personal
responsibilty" (but then, as he points out, who
*doesn't* consider themselves to believe in "personal
responsibility?").

> Martin Gardner is probably the best of these
> skeptical types, his
> essays debunking libertarianism and supply side
> economics are useful. His
> essay on Marx is not.

I actually haven't read much of Gardner's stuff,
though he is considered to be the founder of the
"modern" skeptic's movement. Do you know where I can
find these essays?

Adam


=====
Adam Levenstein                          cleon42@xxxxxxxxx
ICQ: 17125158

And now, for something completely different.

__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Send instant messages & get email alerts with Yahoo! Messenger.
http://im.yahoo.com/