Normal Paranormal
by Scott Hardie on September 29, 2006
This will offend believers in the paranormal, so read at your own peril.
Socially, I've tried to keep it a polite secret that I don't believe in any paranormal phenomena, including the everyday sort. Several of my local friends practice feng shui, buy healing magnets, size people up based on their birth signs, and go to dieticians who tell them not to eat foods of certain colors. I kept mum because it's impolite to pass judgment on other people's beliefs, but inside I yearned to urge them as a friend to stop giving away their money to scam artists. Today during a conversation, it was suggested that the illusionist Criss Angel actually practices real magic on his TV series (and that that's the only logical conclusion no less!), and my façade finally cracked. I love my friends; they're good people, but I'm taking a stand: They're spending their money on con artists.
A hundred years ago, people finally caught on that the traveling salesmen pitching "snake oil" out of their wagons were frauds, and started running them out of town for even attempting the swindle. I wish we were so resilient today. Acupuncturists, hypnotists, faith healers, astrologists, chiropractors, iridologists, Scientologists, polygraph administrators, quantum healers, fortune tellers, dream interpreters, feng shui masters, pet psychiatrists, geomancers, homeopathic healers, massage therapists, tarot card readers, numerologists, IQ testers, exorcists, speed readers, aromatherapists, Myers-Briggs administrators, handwriting analysts, psychics, fad dieticians, EVP analysts, and anyone who sells healing crystals, healing magnets, or Ouija boards – they're all scam artists, even the ones who believe in what they do. They make their living by convincing people to give them money to demonstrate a talent or effect that has no proven scientific basis.
Some of these services have a useful purpose. A hypnotist who puts on a good show deserves to be paid for the entertainment. A masseuse who helps someone relax deserves to be paid for the luxury they provide. I don't argue with the benefits of the placebo effect or the entertainment value of a TV show like Criss Angel has. I just want people to wake up and realize there's no basis for this stuff. Polygraph machines measure heartrate and respiration, but is there any proven correlation between those and lying? Dream analysts make interesting guesses about the symbols behind dreams, but are their claims proven? Handwriting analysts of the non-forensic kind like to say that people who loop their vowels a certain way possess a certain personality, but what's the proof? Chiropractors and masseuses might make you feel more relaxed, but there's no evidence that popping your spine or tapping your nerve endings actually improves the flow of any energy passing through your body, especially undetected energy that humans have somehow "known about" for hundreds of years. There's a reason these healers don't have medical degrees. Don't even get me started on pet psychics, who practice a con so ridiculously phony I can't believe they don't laugh at their gullible clients as they drive away. I'm willing to give a pass to experimental psychologists because of the rigorous scientific testing involved in their work, but their colleagues in theoretical psychology are only making shit up.
You'd think in our modern technological society that we'd be less susceptible to these unscientific practices, but perhaps it is that very technology that makes us so gullible. We have vehicles constructed of many tons of steel capable of flying through the air across entire oceans. Right now I'm pressing buttons on a plastic tray that make letters appear on a screen in front of me, and tomorrow you'll read these letters on a screen hundreds of miles away from me, or maybe you'll read them mere seconds after I'm done. In a world like ours, it's not hard to accept the validity of purely made-up tests like IQ and Myers-Briggs at face value, or to believe that a local Scientology volunteer could actually analyze your soul with an e-meter in just a few minutes. These things have the illusion of being scientific. If someone who bills himself as a professional illusionist can go on television, where literally anything can be made to appear to happen with editing and CGI, and some viewers come away convinced he has actually performed a magical feat, then the normal paranormal around us might not seem like a waste of money. But oh, it is, and despite my straight face I cry inside when I hear of another dollar spent on it.
Three Replies to Normal Paranormal
Kris Weberg | October 1, 2006
Likewise, while the whole "chi" thing is nonsense, there is empirical evidence for some of the claims made of acupuncture's therapeutic effects. We may not be able to explain the mechanism, but apparently the correlation between treatment and effect shades into causation when variables are removed.
Scott Hardie | October 4, 2006
I'm sure it's not easy to become a massage therapist. 33 states require certification and the practice is taken quite seriously. I don't take issue with someone taking money for massage as a physical act that reduces stress and relieves pain, only as a spiritual act that balances the chi, which I presume is scarcely mentioned in the certification process.
About acupuncture, it may well be that the needles tweak nerve endings to bring about pleasing sensations or healing effects, or that they trigger hormonal releases by the brain to the same result. I would like to see more rigorous scientific study devoted to acupuncture, since "it has been used for thousands of years" does nothing to prove that it works.
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Anna Gregoline | September 29, 2006
I agree with most of what you said, but I am a bit confused about the massage therapist thing - they DO get degrees, and have to be certified, at least as far as I knew. I knew a woman who was trying to get a degree in it, and the amount of physiology classes she took made it seem like no small feat.