Richard Wiseman: Quirkology

When I was a kid I used to read a lot of stuff about weird facts, and in a way this book reminded me of one of my childhood books of the bizarre and irrelevant.

We expect science to be wearing a white coat and be lurking menacingly in a laboratory full of smoking test tubes. Richard Wiseman simply takes the scientific method out of the laboratory and onto the streets to analyse our everyday lives. So unlike my childhood book of facts, this is a book of experimental results on tests that mainstream science thought too silly.

Richard unearths the scientific truth behind a whole host of things like: astrology, how to tell when someone is lying, how to distinguish false smiles, subliminal messaging, haunted houses, strange coincidences, walking on red hot coals, the world's funniest joke and the best chat up lines.

Many of the experiments require examining the psychology of the test subjects, but in order to remain objective, the subjects are often either not told the true purpose of the experiment or initially led somewhat astray. One particular set of experiments involved testing the honesty of people by using overtly generous cash machines freely dispatching a nice crisp ten-pound note and over munificent shop assistants giving away far too much change.

As perhaps expected, most people are far happier to take from faceless banks or corporations than independent shops or individuals, as Richard says, perhaps we just see it as an opportunity to get even with a bank we feel has already overcharged us. However, shortly after reading this chapter I noticed that someone had abandoned a very nice bicycle just outside my house. My immediate thoughts were therefore to look around for a hidden camera subtly tying to test the psychology of passers by. Five days later it was still there and had even been neatly stowed against a lamppost awaiting it owners return, so I figure I must live in a pretty good neighbourhood.

Another area explored at the length in the book, is the search for the worlds funniest joke. Inspired by Monty Python’s Ernest Scribbler, writer of the world’s funniest joke. The Laugh-Lab experiment invited the public to submit and rate jokes on to a web site where the results were analysed. Dirty jokes were politely removed from the database, and I suspect that the real worlds funniest joke, if submitted, was probably jettisoned with the other unsuitable material. I’ll not steal Richard’s thunder by repeating any of the jokes here, but the most interesting part of the experiment was how different groups of people laugh at different things. For example older people tended to laugh at jokes dealing with the problems associated with old age and genders find jokes associated with stereotypes of the opposite gender more amusing.

The book is so easy to read and crammed full of witticisms that if anything, I feel a little cheated that I finished it so quickly. Also, if you every get the chance to see Richard, its certainly worthwhile as the contents of this book combined with his presentation and magic skills translate into a highly entertaining talk. And if you haven’t already visited, the web site contains some experiments to partake in and some great video clips.

Terms and Conditions Apply

I’ve just sent off my application forms and deposit for the kids to attend Camp Quest at the end of July. Camp Quest is the first residential summer camp for the children of atheists, agnostics, humanists, freethinkers and all those who embrace a naturalistic rather than supernatural world view.

Anyhoo, whilst I was filling in the forms and ticking the box to say that I had read the terms and conditions, I thought as a novel idea, just for a change, I might actually read what I’m signing my kids up for. The terms and conditions included a check to ensure I had read through the “Affirmations of Humanism”, having just read through them, I thought I’d stick them on my blog, as I have never read a set of principles before that I felt so totally aligned with my thinking.

So here they are:

1. We are committed to the application of reason and science to the understanding of the universe and to the solving of human problems.

2. We deplore efforts to denigrate human intelligence, to seek to explain the world in supernatural terms, and to look outside nature for salvation.

3. We believe that scientific discovery and technology can contribute to the betterment of human life.

4. We believe in an open and pluralistic society and that democracy is the best guarantee of protecting human rights from authoritarian elites and repressive majorities.

5. We are committed to the principle of the separation of church and state.

6. We cultivate the arts of negotiation and compromise as a means of resolving differences and achieving mutual understanding.

7. We are concerned with securing justice and fairness in society and with eliminating discrimination and intolerance.

8. We believe in supporting the disadvantaged and the handicapped so that they will be able to help themselves.

9. We attempt to transcend divisive parochial loyalties based on race, religion, gender, nationality, creed, class, sexual orientation, or ethnicity, and strive to work together for the common good of humanity.

10. We want to protect and enhance the earth, to preserve it for future generations, and to avoid inflicting needless suffering on other species.

11. We believe in enjoying life here and now and in developing our creative talents to their fullest.

12. We believe in the cultivation of moral excellence.

13. We respect the right to privacy. Mature adults should be allowed to fulfill their aspirations, to express their sexual preferences, to exercise reproductive freedom, to have access to comprehensive and informed health-care, and to die with dignity.

14. We believe in the common moral decencies: altruism, integrity, honesty, truthfulness, responsibility.

15. Humanist ethics is amenable to critical, rational guidance. There are normative standards that we discover together. Moral principles are tested by their consequences.

16. We are deeply concerned with the moral education of our children. We want to nourish reason and compassion.

17. We are engaged by the arts no less than by the sciences.

18. We are citizens of the universe and are excited by discoveries still to be made in the cosmos.

19. We are skeptical of untested claims to knowledge, and we are open to novel ideas and seek new departures in our thinking.

20. We affirm humanism as a realistic alternative to theologies of despair and ideologies of violence and as a source of rich personal significance and genuine satisfaction in the service to others.

21. We believe in optimism rather than pessimism, hope rather than despair, learning in the place of dogma, truth instead of ignorance, joy rather than guilt or sin, tolerance in the place of fear, love instead of hatred, compassion over selfishness, beauty instead of ugliness, and reason rather than blind faith or irrationality.

22. We believe in the fullest realization of the best and noblest that we are capable of as human beings.

Francis Wheen: How Mumbo Jumbo Conquered the World

Anyone who is likely to read my blog will not need it pointing out to them that the modern world is full of mumbo jumbo. Irrational beliefs seem to be the norm, whether they be pseudoscience, new age mythologies, quackery, astrology, conspiracy theories, mediums or turbo charged religious fundamentalists.

Can we trace all this mumbo jumbo back to a point in time where the world was primed for the spread of these unfounded beliefs over rationality. This book suggests that a likely candidate might be 1979. I have always associated 1979 with Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” and the Clash’s "London Calling”, but maybe I should try and look at the wider world. Francis Wheen identifies two key events in this year whose consequences, he competently argues, are major contributors to paving the way to today’s world of woo. The first is the return of the Ayatollah Khomeini to Iran on the 1st February 1979, and the second is election of Margaret Thatcher as British Prime Minister on 1st May 1979.

Wheen obviously doesn’t argue that 1979 is a clear demarcation point where such nonsense previously did not exist. He does however take a left-wing political perspective to show how the policy changes set the scene for a series of unrelated beliefs to challenge modernity and enlightenment. Taking a political viewpoint rather than a scientific viewpoint allows this book to encompass a wider remit than say Carl Sagan. Wheen therefore muses on some of the following items:

What turned Britain into a nation of blubbering idiots following the unfortunate accident with a Mercedes, a Parisian tunnel and an over pampered Princess?

How could America’s mid 80’s foreign policy be influenced by the President’s wife’s astrologer?

How did the stock market manage to float dot com companies consisting of nothing much more than a concept on a the back of fag packet for a ludicrous amount a money before a single penny of revenue had been received?

Why are people religiously following the authority of dodgy self appointed life style Gurus and self help books?

Why did people become so attentive to the ravings of Nostradamus and attempt to match up any random convoluted coincidental fact they could dig up

Why has science become so mistrusted?

I’m not going to attempt to answer these questions in the blog, but read the book as it makes a decent and amusing attempt at answering them

The back of the book lists the standard series of glittering reviews. I did however find it quite ironic that it included a rather nice review from the Daily Mail, as I’m sure they’re not completely blameless.

Are We Alone?

I noticed this news article today on the BBC website stating that there could be thousands of intelligent alien civilisations out there.

This is exciting stuff, and I think the confirmation of extra terrestrial intelligent life would be probably the most significant discovery in the history of our civilisation and something that I like many others, would dearly love to see in my lifetime. Despite the hope and desire for such evidence I have a little more pessimism than many of my much-respected heroes who have far greater knowledge in this area.

My simplistic view of the likelihood of alien intelligence is based on the Drake Equation. The equation takes a whole bunch of crazy variables such as the number of likely planets, the number of those in the goldilocks zone (not too hot and not too cold), and the probability of life emerging, and eventually evolving intelligence on each habitable planet before becoming extinct.

I’ve cut and pasted the full equation below from the ever reliable wikipdeia:

Where
R* is the average rate of star formation in our galaxy
fp is the fraction of those stars that have planets
ne is the average number of planets that can potentially support life per star that has planets
fℓ is the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop life at some point
fi is the fraction of the above that actually go on to develop intelligent life
fc is the fraction of civilizations that develop a technology that releases detectable signs of their existence into space
L is the length of time such civilizations release detectable signals into space.

Technologies in detecting extra solar planets such as Gravitational Microlensing, Transit Method and Radial Velocity have been successful in detecting over 330 planets in recent years. My understanding is that these discoveries have afforded us confidence to feed in higher values for the variables fp and ne than previous conservative estimates. I imagine that upping these values based on this new evidence has increased the value of N (the number of civilisations in our galaxy) to between 361 and 38,000 according to the BBC news article.

The reason for reserving my personal optimism is that it only takes one zero in the equation to piss on our strawberries. No matter how large the other fractions, multiplying by zero will always give you a result of zero. The variable that concerns me is fℓ. In theory it is possible for life to independently develop elsewhere, but apart from our small blue planet we have no evidence that it actually has. Even if we could see evidence of life on earth that came from another root, it would demonstrate the inevitability of life evolving eventually under the right conditions.

To me the initial spark of life could be so utterly improbable that it may have only happend once in a trillion multiverses and we only witness that one vastly improbable example through the anthropic principle. Douglas Adams, used somewhat similar logic in the quote below:

"It is known that there is an infinite number of worlds, but that not every one is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so if every planet in the Universe has a population of zero then the entire population of the Universe must also be zero, and any people you may actually meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination."

In order to increase my optimism in the possibility of life elsewhere the one thing I want to see is evidence of simple microbial life unconnected with our tree of life. A long extinct simple organism with nothing more than a mechanism for replication on Europa would do me. I would argue that future space missions should take this into account on deciding how to spend the meagre budget afforded by most governments for the exploration of space. Once we have found that small piece of evidence we can be confident there are no zeros in the equation and I will be convinced that it is only the vastness of space that has hindered our first contact.

Marcus Chown: Quantum Theory Cannot hurt You.

I don’t pretend to really understand quantum mechanics, but the reason I find it such a fascinating subject is its so completely counter intuitive to the non-quantum world in which my brain evolved and attempts to make sense of the Universe. I was listening to the news this morning about the latest initiatives and campaigns to make science more popular and seem less elitist. This is exactly the sort of book that scientists need to be writing in order to purse this goal.

Chown, splits the book into two sections, the world of the very small, and the world of the very large, and shows how the fundamental laws that govern these two worlds greatly differ from each other, and the small slice of space and time that we are able to perceive.

The world of the very small is introduced by a few interesting facts to fully illustrate how quantum mechanics farts in the face of our blinkered reality. The logic and consequences of these facts is elucidated, not by mathematics and complex equations, but by comparisons, anecdotes and thought experiments that even I could get my head around. For example, if there were some way to squeeze all of the empty space out of the atoms in our bodies, humanity would fit into the space occupied by a sugar cube. Or an atom can be in two different places at once, the equivalent of you being in New York and London at the same time. That makes Phil Collins’ dual appearance at Live Aid in Wembley and Philadelphia seem positively pedestrian. I especially liked the chapter that explained how atoms influence each other instantly even when they are vast distances apart without being subject to all those tedious light speed limits enforced by Einstein’s cosmic police. This is exemplified by two spinning coins, one in a sealed box on the ocean floor, and one on a cold moon in a distant galaxy. The instant the coin on earth comes down as heads, its cousin a billion light years from earth instantly comes down as tails. The consequences of mastering for example, quantum computing, as we have mastered the electron opens up feasible possibilities that make many fantasy writers seem to be unimaginative dullards.

The second half of the book takes a look at the bigger things and therefore concentrates mainly on Einstein and how he discovered the interchangeably of mass and energy as nicely summarised by: E=mc2. Again Chown draws on comparison and anecdotes to illustrate his points, for example the weight of the sun is reducing every second by about the weight of a super tanker. Therefore showing that “photon’s have mass”, and inducing Woody Allen to quip, “I didn’t even know they were Catholic”. Chown concludes with the ultimate Rabbit out of Hat trick or how we learned that the universe has not existed forever but was born from in a titanic explosion 13.7 billion years ago

I’ve always wondered why many people seem far more concerned with the amount of cellulite on a particular celebrities fat arse than with the fascination of our universe and indeed our existence as made sense of by the scientific method. Chown has insured that the excuse of elitism and lack of understandability can no longer be used as a valid defence by such bum watchers.

On Face Recognition

The organic cerebral source code that has evolved in our brains is a wondrous thing, and way beyond my humble comprehension. One of the more power subroutines of this complex neural code must be the one dealing with face recognition. We are remarkably efficient at picking out faces and instantly matching them from previous experience to immediately identify a myriad of friends, family and celebrities. This powerful process ensures that a couple of dots and a line are all we need to recognise a pair of eyes and a mouth. The consequences of this usefully evolved ability is the fact that we can also easily see faces when none are actually present. The Madonna on a pop tart, Jesus on a slice of a toast, a face on a mars, a monster in the curtains, and a ghost on the stairs seem to me more likely explained by this natural ability of our brains rather than crazy paranormal phenomenon.

The new face recognition software on iPhoto ’09 must work in a similar, but far less sophisticated way. My prediction, whilst installing iLife ’09 last night, and mulling this over, was that surely even the geniuses at Apple aren’t as clever as many hundreds of thousands of years of natural selection, honing and fine tuning our minds. Therefore surely iPhoto ’09 will also see faces where there are none.

The face recognition software turned out to be better than I had expected, despite the fact that I noticed on Stephen Fry’s twitter feed that he was having some problems getting it to recognise himself. However, as I suspected after sorting a large number of faces, iPhoto did eventually start seeing things. I’m not going to count, the cigar stall Indian, the statue of Horus and the picture of Carl Sagan on my T-Shirt, all of which iPhoto asked me to name. But as expected, iPhoto eventually found a face in the folds on my wife’s skirt, and in the craggy light and shade of a rock face. I write this not as a criticism of iPhoto ’09, which I was most impressed with, despite the fact that it did once ask me to confirm that a bearded and bespectacled gnarled old man was my beautiful wife. I’m writing this to ask a question; if we can now write software that not only efficiently apes one of our more complex brain functions, but is also prone to the same delusions as us, does this make genuine artificial intelligence or even artificial consciousness seem just a little more probable at some point in our species future?

Stephen Fry: In America (The Book)

I’m fascinated by the sights, sounds, philosophies and cultures of foreign lands. However, like many others, the constraints of time and money severely restrict my ability to witness much of this fascination at first hand. These fascinations and constraints have made me an avid world traveller through the televisual medium of Michael Palin, and fired me with enthusiasm to view one of the worlds most fascinating countries through the witty and informative eyes of Stephen Fry. Although our close Anglo-American ties mean that much of America is familiar to the British, a country so vast and varied invariably has a few wonders and surprises in store for the more intrepid tourist. Unfortunately the TV series did not quite live up to my high expectations, but the book succeeded by providing a more candid interpretation of Fry’s travels, unsweetened for a less generic audience.

Although Fry travels through and writes about each of the 50 States individually, what this book is not, is a travel guide. As the author clearly outlines in the preface, anyone looking for a detailed account and description of the 50 American states will be sorely disappointed. Furthermore, any inhabitant of any specific state may be outraged by the scant and incomplete coverage of his or her homeland. (especially if you home state is Idaho). What the book does provide in abundance, is an overall taste and flavour of the country as a whole by the agglomeration of random vignettes and anecdotes peppered across this vast land. In fact, I think the book provides two levels of insight. Firstly, for the British reader, Fry provides a sympathetic insight into the belief, cultures and traditions that seem alien to us. Secondly, for the American reader, Fry provides a view of the familiar from an unfamiliar and foreign perspective.

Fry rightly refuses to play up to unfounded British stereotypical prejudices and visions of superiority. The vast majority of his travels, interviews and encounters ensure that the inhabitants of this country come across as the genuine, honest, kind and interesting individuals that I know they are. However, whilst unashamedly rejoicing in the landscapes, achievements and cultures, he is not afraid to point out America’s biggest failing, i.e. the inability to understand cheese. As a British person, I may be advised not to throw stones in my own greenhouse when it comes to criticising another countries culinary abilities, but cheese should never be squirted from cans.

I found a couple of interviews on the TV programme a little annoying, In particular, a witch interviewed in Salem, and a Bigfoot tracker interviewed in Oregon. Fry’s inner thoughts on the utter absurdity of beliefs of the Bigfoot tracker in particular where not as apparent until I read in the book. In fact the whole book affords the reader a much deeper insight into Fry’s mind, not only emphasising what is clearly ridiculous but further celebrating what is great and wonderful about the country and its peoples.

Here’s a brief extract from the Massachusetts chapter on Salem:

The shameful, primitive and disgusting events of the 1690’s have receded into jokey folklore and Salem now embraces its position as the Halloween and Olde Puritan capital of America, abounding with Publick Houses and Crafte Shoppes. Indeed there are now real witches in Salem, witches who are out and proud. “Can you feel the positive energy here?” “Er, well, since you mention it, not really…” I meet the High Priestess Laurie Cabot in her occult shop “The Cat, The Crow and the Crown”, the first of its kind, she claims, anywhere in the world. She and her co-religionists have fought long and hard for “the Craft” to be treated as any other faith under the constitution. Laurie is the “official witch of Massachusetts”, a title granted by Governor Dukakis in the seventies. She is not to know that I am entirely allergic to anyone using the word “energy” in a nonsensical, New Age way. A hundred years ago it would have been “vibrations”. I am determined not to be surly and unhelpful, however, so I plough on. “Big Day for you, today, Laurie, Halloween.” “Today is not Halloween.” She says, putting me right, “it is the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain. The Christians took it over, along with so much else.“ There is no black cat perched on her shoulder, but there might as well be. “The Christians went on from persecuting us to scorning us for what they call superstition.” I murmur sympathy, which is genuine. To me, all religions are equally nonsensical and the idea that Christians, with their particular invisible friend, virgin births, immaculate conceptions and bread turning into flesh, could have the cheek to mock people like Laurie for being “superstitious” is appalling humbug.

A very enjoyable read and it has certainly fuelled me with an even stronger desire to tick off a few more States.

Faith: A humanitarian perspective

“Oh ye of little faith”, the pious religions mock
Because I exercise free thought, instead of following the flock
Society kowtows, to spiritual devotion
And reverence increases, with the absurdity of notion

Humanitarian thinking, I hear to my dismay
Is unsuitable material, to air on “Thought for the Day”
They say that lack faith, is the primary reason why
Critical thinking, has led my thoughts awry

But I have lots of faith, of this I am quite sure
Despite your weird delusion, which I find so immature
I have faith in many things, so I shall make a list
And put them in a poem, to show you they exist

I have faith in all my friends, and especially in my family
I have faith in my convictions, and that my children will astound me
I have faith when I get home, my wife will drink some tea
I have faith no matter what, she’ll always have love for me

I have faith than in the summer, I’ll be quaffing lots of cider
And that knowledge will be gained, from the Large Hadron Collider
I have faith in education, and reading books by Sagan
I have faith that learning science, will stop us turning Pagan

I have faith that young musicians, in spite of Simon Cowell
Will learn to play guitars, instead of throwing in the towel
I had that Faith that Roger Waters, would talk to Dave Gilmour
I have faith that modern medicine, will strive to find a cure

I have faith in quantum mechanics, gravity and evolution
That scientific method, provides the best solution
I have faith that several men, have walked upon the moon
If others share my faith, we could return quite soon

I have faith that detox diets, are a way of making money
You have no psychic powers, and there is no Easter Bunny
But I have faith that every fraud, and alternative medicine maker
Will be exposed by Mr Randi, or the wit of Ben Goldacre

I have faith in secular government, although they’re much maligned
I have faith conspiracy theories, are purely in your mind
My faith in modern morality, beats your old religious ways
I prefer to respect women, free slaves and befriend gays

I have faith in Mr Darwin, And Mr Einstein too
And all of the experiments, that proved their theories true
So I have lots faith, but it’s not the religious kind
It’s based on solid evidence and certainly isn’t blind

Polarisation of the Populace

It was nice to read Rebecca Watson’s top tens of 2008, listening her top ten people who have contributed the most to the cause of Skeptisim, Science and Enlightenment and on the other side of the coin, the top 10 douche bags who’ve done their best to promote pseudoscience and miss information, often at a terrible human cost.

I was also recently listening to Quentin Cooper’s Material World Podcast and noticed that a number of the celebrities who were taking in an interest in science and climate change where among some of the performers I saw at Robin Ince’s Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless People just before Christmas.

Putting these two pieces of information together, it seems as if more and more celebrities and the public in general are starting to make a conscious decision on where they stand regarding this issue and are declaring their hand.

Perhaps I am just viewing things from too deeply from within the Skeptical community of which I am starting to become involved. Maybe this gives me the false impression that many people are starting to stand-up and be counted. I suspect that the effect would be far less noticeable from a general more disinterested populace. Although the recent success of Ariane Sherine’s “Atheist Bus Campaign” suggests that maybe there is some wide spread interest.

It has felt recently as if the small community of individuals interested in science reason and critical thinking (to work in my blog title) seems to be encompassing many well known comedians and musicians. It’s reassuring and pleasing to see that some of the most talented of these share some similar thought processes to me. (I was going to stick a list of names in here, but decided against it as it would be incomplete).

It is of course disappointing when public figures with the ability to sway the public opinion promote pseudoscience and superstitions. Especially when it is a celebrity I liked. Damn, why does Jim Carey have to support his mad wife, I liked him!

However after listening to Maria Maltseva on this weeks Skepticality Podcast she opened my eyes to a potential danger behind this polarisation. I personally view the dogmatic, inflexible, contradictory and incompatible doctrinarians of established religions as one of the seeds of hatred, oppression, violence, war and terrorism that we could well do without. Anyway, I certainly wouldn’t want the polarisation of views between Skeptics and Believers to harbour seeds of hatred that could lead to conflict beyond healthy debating. Fortunately, I’ve found the Believers who’ve visited us at “Skeptics in the Pub” in London to have been brave and charismatic individuals and I hope we can continue to debate and drink with them in the amicable way that I know we can.

Perception

I started to think last week about the difference in what we physically see and what we actually perceive in our minds. The catalyst for these thoughts where as a result of watching the same television programme as some other people but having a completely different perception of what we had seen.

I visualised the following diagrammatic metaphor as a means of understanding this behaviour. But first a disclaimer, I have no knowledge of the optical mechanics of the human eye or the vastly complex neural processes that convert electrically stimulated cells on the retina into a conscious understanding in the brain. The diagram a few paragraphs below is therefore purely a metaphor.

Without intelligence, an image has no meaning. A digital camera can record a 7 million pixel crystal clear image of the world, but to the camera itself, it is worthless, the camera cannot deduce anything from the image or have a sense of beauty or wonder at the image it has captured. The human eye itself is somewhat similar, it merely captures an image of the world through a lens. The brain however, is able to decipher this image into some type of meaning. I suspect however, that it can’t do this without some prior knowledge and learning, and the nature of that knowledge and learning will determine how the image is perceived.

I remember an anecdote Billy Connolly once gave where he took his young children to the top of a mountain to show them a breathtaking view and had to explain to them that it was beautiful. Without learning what beauty is, and relating it to images, how can we judge what is beautiful? So once we have a little knowledge we can start to truly see things. I suspect however that our limited knowledge and learning greatly restricts what we are in fact able to see.

In the diagram below the eye is seeing a complete image of the world, but the limited knowledge of the brain processing the image is severely restricting what the viewer perceives to the green shaded area.








According to this crude metaphor: education, learning and knowledge have a great deal to play in actually being able to see what is around us. Not only does the breadth of knowledge affect what we can see, the nature and details of the knowledge will also affect how we see it.

One criticism that science is often charged with is that breaking the physical and natural world down into cruel, intelligible and atomic facts and processes can rob it of its beauty and majesty. Many popular science writers rebut this accusation with a contrary claim that knowledge in fact increases our ability of appreciating beauty and awe. My metaphor echoes this claim and my experience backs it up. I can certainly perceive a lot more about the world around me (including its beauty and awe) as a result of making a conscious attempt to understand it better.

Perhaps this metaphor can also explain a little about how religious and secular views of the world differ. The Church has historically made great efforts to control and restrict the knowledge and understanding of its followers to ensure they only perceive that small part of the world that is relevant to the Church’s teachings. Based on my religious friends, I suspect that the Church still attempts to instil notions and taboos in order to try and restrict the growth of knowledge outside of its worldview by censoring, or at least actively discouraging, secular books and TV programmes that threaten its cherished view. It is very easy to understand how religion had such a stronghold on the populous in the Dark Ages where knowledge was limited and Church controlled. No wonder natural disasters where routinely perceived as divine retribution and simple confidence tricks and coincidences perceived as miracles.

To take the metaphor once stage further, I think the notion of the knowledge of the brain deciphering the images of our eyes can extend beyond the small visible spectrum of light our eyes have evolved to process.

Our understanding of the universe, galaxies and planetary system largely exceeds what can be viewed by the naked eye. We had an understanding of the atomic structure in a time when glimpsing it was not possible. Perception can therefore be advanced beyond our sight by scientific peer reviewed theories backed up by incontrovertible evidence.

Perhaps this is what has led to a complex (although still incomplete) scientific perception of the world that often seems at odds with our “common sense”. A “common sense” that has evolved to make use of the more limited and less educated perception of the world. Is it this the same “common sense” that leads us up the garden paths of religion, paranormal, superstition, pseudoscience and quackery?

Tony Robinson and the Ghosts of Glastonbury: Channel 4, 30th Dec 2008

I was foolishly encouraged to watch a programme on Channel 4 last night about the “investigation” into a Victorian Archaeologist who claimed to have received his guidance from a long dead monk via the medium of automatic writing.

The reason I was initially keen to watch, was that Tony Robinson was accompanied by his own Dana Scully, a Skeptic called Becky McCall. Not sure if anyone else in the Skeptical community has heard of Becky but she was new to me. I’m not sure if the programme’s producer’s simply edited the footage in favour of the woo argument or if Becky didn’t really ask the sceptical questions I wanted her to. The programme therefore seemed biased in propping up the paranormal argument in the face of contrary evidence.

Three key sequences could have presented a more realistic explanation of the phenomenon:

The First was where Tony visited a purveyor of finest quality woo in an attempt to produce some automatic writing, guided by the long dead monk. 95% of the scribbles produced by Tony were completely unintelligible. Even with the guiding hand of the woo artist helping Tony out. But a small subset of the doodles could be vaguely construed as having some relationship to familiar letters, and some of these together hinted at possible words. One of the words determined from the writing session was “Wallace”, although to be fair, I could make out a W shape and a vowel shape followed by a bit of a squiggle. A later telephone conversation between Tony and the programmes researchers unearthed the name “Wallace” in some of the research documents.

This seemingly unlikely coincidence was trumpeted as a strange phenomenon for which no natural explanation was given. Disappointingly the Skeptic could not come up with a valid reason for the coincidence, which made this scant evidence seem even more plausible.

I would have liked the Skeptic to have explained a little about coincidence, probability and how the logic and statistics behind what seem unlikely events are often due to the laws of probability not aligning terribly well with human intuition and expectations. (Dawkins has written at length on this subject). I would have liked the Skeptic to conduct a similar experiment under conditions that are purely random with no suggestion of the paranormal. For Example, an alternative sample of automatic writing or other randomly produced text could be compared against another preselected document of similar size to the research material. If a word from this text could be deciphered and matched with a similar word or name in the preselected document, it would demonstrate how good the human brain is at recognising such patterns and being amazed by the coincidence once seen.

Secondly, Tony Robinson gave a little time to our old friend, Chris French, to provide a rational, logical and natural explanation for the phenomenon of automatic writing. Chris duly provided a valid natural alternative to supernatural guidance. However, even if Chris was given an equal amount of time to present his argument, I believe the programme would still have biased in favour of the supernatural explanation. As I have written before in previous blogs, presenting two sides to an argument, gives the false impression that each alternative has a 50% chance of being true. All of the empirical evidence that I am aware of for this phenomenon supports the argument put forward by Chris French. This was not made clear, and the viewer is left to pick what are presented as two equally valid alternatives.

Thirdly, the automatic writing allegedly assisted by the monk led the Victorian archaeologist to locate further archaeological features close to the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey. Again I was disappointed to see that no attempt was made to see how many predictions he had made in total and how many were hits and how many were misses. It seems to me as if he was just playing a huge game of battleships, with the ruined abbey playing the part of the aircraft carrier. Surely all the archaeologist had to do was fire off a few salvos in the squares adjacent to the hit and he’s bound to find something else. To her credit the Skeptic did unearth another prediction from the archaeologist’s automatic writing that suggested another site of archaeological interest. The suggested area was surveyed by the geophysics team, and no archaeology was detected, supporting the hypothesis that he just made a lucky hit with the other location. I would still have liked to know how many predictions he made and how many hits he got, and then compared that to pure chance.

The programme also examined what were believed to be the bones of the monk, although a modern investigation showed no evidence of the wounds inflicted at his death and no way of substantiating the claim that the bones belonged to the monk. One of the bones claimed to be part of the monk was however identified as a medium sized mammal (non human) bone. As one of the words that could be vaguely deciphered from the automatic writing session was “pig”. The programme was allowed to close by reminding us that a pig is in fact a medium sized mammal (Cue the Twighlight Zone Music).

I believe the producers of this programme were desperate to try and present an equally weighted programme between paranormal and scientific explanation. In order to achieve this they had to underplay scientific evidence and big up circumstantial evidence and coincidences to bolster the paranormal argument. In the end all this did was keep the plates of woo spinning for this particular phenomenon, when scientific investigation of the claims could have led to case closed.

Boo Channel 4.

By the way, happy new year to everyone. This time of the year is good for top 10 reviews of the year and in case you haven’t read Rebecca Watson Top 10 Heroes and Villains of 2008, link below:
http://skepchick.org/blog/?p=4996

Nine Lessons And Carols for Godless People – Bloomsbury Theatre, 19th December 2008

Just because I take a rational and scientific view of the world we live in rather than a religious viewpoint, I don’t see this as a barrier to enjoying this festive time of year. I love the time off work to spend with family and friends, eating, drinking and making merry, and I see no reason to curtail my partying just because I cannot accept the notion of implausible virgin births and other associated incredulous doctrines. This lack of faith has led me on a journey of scientific discovery and enlightenment that has pushed my levels of wonder and awe of the universe far beyond what religion ever achieved for me. I’m therefore very keen to celebrate that wonder, and this time of year seems to be a suitable time to do just that. I imagine the thought process that led Robin Ince to instigating this event must be somewhat similar to my motivation for wanting to attend. We don’t want to be perceived as a bunch of miserable Atheists wanting to take the joy out of Christmas. I for one am happy to maintain our Christian heritage and Culture in a secular way whilst fully embracing the knowledge and understanding that has superseded our religious myths.

So for those who missed last nights Nine Carols and Lessons for Godless People at the Bloomsbury, or for those who just wanted a reminder of what they saw, I have written a review of the evening. NB I wrote this blog for a general audience unlike the more focused clientele on the night so I have to apologise for competing with Cybil Fawlty at times on her specialised subject of the bleeding obvious.

Anyway I bumped into Sid Rodrigues in the Foyer prior to the show who told me that however good I thought this show was going to be, based on last nights feedback I could multiply that tenfold. Well Sid, I’m sorry to say you underestimated; it was even better than that.

During the first half of the show I managed to take a few notes on my phone to help jog my memory on who was performing and the running order. However, at the half time break my wife gave me a load of grief for tapping away on my phone during the show. Apparently it’s rude. Anyway as a result I failed to make any notes during the second half and as a consequence my review will inevitably and unforgivably miss out some of the acts or at best have them in the wrong order. So here’s a summary of the acts, bearing in mind that if your planning to see this show on Sunday night at the Hammersmith Apollo, you may want to stop reading now as the rest of the blog is bound to include a few spoilers.

Carl Sagan
I may not necessarily pick Carl Sagan as my choice for the greatest scientist of the 20th Century, but if I had to pick one person whose passion for science and whose skill in writing and broadcasting did the most to promote the public understanding of science in the 20th century, it would have to be Carl. Sagan is perhaps the only author I have read who is capable of writing poetry that just happens to be about science. In fact, so skilled and passionate was he in promoting the wonders of science and the awesomeness of the universe; he is not overly inconvenienced by his unfortunate death in 1996 in continuing this mission. His presence this evening opened the show with a description of our planet taken from Cosmos. Sagan’s dulcet tones explaining how the small pale blue dot on the screen caught in a ray of sunlight is the only stage on which all events in human history have played out. It’s the nearest thing to being placed in Adams’ Total Perspective Mind Vortex. As Sagan’s voice drifts over us the Mystery Fax Machine Orchestra led by Martin White on the Accordion pipes in with Strauss’s Also Sprach Zarathustra (from 2001 a space odyssey) and we’re off.

Robin Ince
Our compare for this evening welcomes us to his folly and sets the comedy bar at a frighteningly high level for the subsequent acts to follow. Ince is please to be playing to a knowledgeable scientific audience and I think he promises a Heisenberg gag later on and, but I’m uncertain. Ince also notes that he will need to be careful to get his facts right. I therefore don’t feel too much of a pedant in pointing out that his story of Charles Darwin noting a comment from his brother Erasmus on “Survival of the fittest” is fatally flawed in the fact that the quote should be attributed to Herbert Spencer rather than Darwin.

Phil Harris
Our first musical act of the evening required a bit of a sing along, and although the words were simple enough, “Maybe something’s, wrong with me.”, as an audience we failed to raise the rafters and I sure my out of key droning along probably didn’t really help.

Stewart Lee
Although one half of the comedy duo Lee & Herring, Stuart Lee is now very well known as an outspoken atheist and his Jerry Springer Opera has certainly touched a few Christian nerves, much to my amusement. It turns out that we were lucky not to loose Stewart to the other side, after all surely a being as complex and intelligent as Richard Dawkins could not have evolved by chance. This evening Stewart shared with us his thoughts on Pope John Paul II lollipops, and mused on the likely Catholic opinions of licking the face of the Pope on a lolly after his death. And what should the face of the new Pope, Benedict XVI, adorn, well Stewart suggestion was a warning on Bleach bottles.

Phil Jupitus
This is the second time I’ve seen Phil Jupitus this year, the first time was filling in for the late great Ian Dury with the Blockheads. Tonight was somewhat different as Jupitus read us a couple of poems, one of George Stephenson and one on the joy of lying to children at Christmas. Phil freely admitted that reading his freshly written poems is much easier than having to do stand up and remember his lines, but due to the high quality of poems, he’s fully excused.

Simon Singh
Introduced by Robin Ince as his favourite living physicist, Simon Singh was one of one of the best performances on an evening of high standards. Simon Singh latest book “Trick or Treatment” is still wrapped up under my Christmas tree, so I can’t comment on that, but “Big Bang” made a superb job of explaining how we have gained our understanding of the universe, and this was his text for this evening. The Book itself explains how our knowledge has built up, from discovering the earth is round, to discovering the circumference of the earth and that we in fact revolve around the sun, right the way up to expanding universe and big band theory. At each stage of the journey he eloquently shows how we worked it out and built upon our previous understanding to arrive at the complex understanding we have today. This evening, Singh jumps right in at the end of the book to explain how Georges Lemaître predicted the expanding universe theory in 1927 and how it was confirmed by observations ten years later by Edwin Hubble. The main point of Singh talk however was his annoyance at the lyrics to the Katie Melua song “10 Million bicycles”. I have listed Katie Melua’s original lyrics below, with Singh’s corrections underneath.
Melua:
We are 12 billion light-years from the edge,
That’s a guess — no-one can ever say it’s true,
But I know that I will always be with you
Singh:
We are 13.7 billion light-years from the edge of the observable universe,
That’s a good estimate with well-defined error bars, Scientists say it’s true, but acknowledge that it may be refined,
And with the available information, I predict that I will always be with you
More amazingly, Simon tells us that Katie actually got in touch with him and recorded a version of the song with Singh’s more accurate lyrics, which he kindly played to us.

Darren Hayman
The singer and guitarist from Indie band Hefner entertained us all with jolly song played on a jolly small ukulele

Ricky Gervais
I had to look this guy up on Wikipedia, but I guess we can’t expect a completely star studded line up. Anyway, it turns out that he’s pretty well known as a result of pigging backing on the success of that deep philosophical muse, Karl Pilkington. You know, the chap with a head like a fucking orange. Anyway, this Gervais fellow admirably entertained those present by testing out some stuff from his new show “Science”. From the extracts given, “Science” bears as much resemblance to its title as its predecessors, “Animals” and “Politics”. But as this was a Christmas show, Gervais showed us one of his previous gifts. A small card explaining that his present was a goat that had been given to an African Family. Gervias’ comic outrage on missing out on his present in lieu of some goat given to people he doesn’t know, was well received be my wife who to her dismay received a Well donated to Africa from one of her friends a few years ago. I assume the look on my wife’s face after receiving this gift was what encouraged her friend to purchase another gift for her a few days later.

After a brief intermission to empty bladders and purchase more beer Robin Ince gave us another short set before introducing what for many, me included, was the main draw of the evening.

Richard Dawkins
Not that we Skeptics accept truth merely on authority, but the first lesson after the intermission was taken from the 6th Gospel of St Richard (Unweaving the rainbow). Prior to this extract however, Dawkins read his article on “Gerin Oil”, which is an anagram of widely available and extremely dangerous drug.

It is of course at this point of the evening that my lack of note taking in the second half lets me down. The remainder is therefore the hazy memories of the next day. Curiously enough later on Chris Addison, assumed as Skeptics and Scientist we would all be taking notes. I gave the wife a hard stare at this point. Anyway, on with the show….

Phil Jeays.
Phil Fucked us all with a jolly child friendly little ditty about the attitude of a dying man on his deathbed. A laudable attitude that I hope to take myself one day, although not yet.

Robyn Hitchcock
Robyn had a little trouble plugging his guitar in. Trying to plug to female connectors together I think, but as he commented at the time, there’s nothing wrong with that.

Josie Long
Josie told as a completely true anecdote relating to David’s Hume’s refusal to have a deathbed conversion. What I liked about this event, is that Josie found no need to fill in such a knowledgeable audience on whom she was talking about.

Jo Neary
For those not bought up in the UK in the 1970’s, Pan People’s dance routines to one of the weeks top pop songs were renowned for their literal translation of lyrics into the medium of dance. Jo took this literal translation one step further with her one woman pan’s person dance version of Harry Nilsson’s “Without You”. The facial expressions and exaggerated mine had the whole family pissing themselves.

Gavin Osborn
Gavin song about his fateful date with one of the curtain twins (Anna Curtain). It all was going swimmingly until he realised there were 3 people in the relationship. Having been involved with the Church during my teenage years I found this masterful song very easy to relate to.

Mark Thomas
After listening to the tales of Mark’s family and upbringing, I’m intrigued to meet his dad, Colin.

Christina Martin.
Christina put the fear of God in us, Oh hang on, not the fear of God, but the fear of something. Anyway she proclaimed herself to be a born again Christian with a captive audience of atheists. Fortunately she turned out be as sane and rational as the rest of the audience, only an awful lot funnier.

Colin Watson – (AKA Waen Shepherd)
Woooo, Yeah. Well actually I don’t remember those beach boyesque hits of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s but his song about a monkey, a blind kid, a shoe and something else was a complete triumph.

Natalie Haynes
After a hilarious routine on her annoyance with parents, I tried not to catch her eye as I had my kids sat on either side of me, they were incidentally finding her routine very amusing too.

Andrew Collins
One of the great Christmas traditions, mused Andrew, is the Christmas Movie, and after inviting the audience to nominate the best secular Christmas film, he went on to proclaim the Poseidon Adventure as the champion and the cause for his conversion to atheism. While the believers hang around in the upturned hull of the ship, awaiting rescue, the non-believers escape through the arse of God. Great Stuff.

Peter Buckley Hill
Peter gave the audience a choice of songs this evening, one about maths or one about Xmas. The audience’s clap-o-meter provided little help in making his mind up so he opted for the Xmas song on account of performing the maths one the previous night. I wanted to hear the maths songs, but was very happy with his choice in the end celebrating all the greats things about X, during this Xmas period.

Ben Goldacre
Ben defends the Rational from the attack by the Woo’s from his regular column in the Guardian and his equivalently named Bad Science Blogs and Book. Ben always takes a strong stance against quackery, alternative medicine and pseudoscience and the dangers they may lead to. This evening was no exception with a poignant and harrowing account of countless thousands of deaths in Africa from Aids due to the suppression of anti HIV drugs in favour of vitamin pills. Ben left the audience reeling with the true cost of the harm that one small piece of bullshit can cause. A tough act for the next comic to follow.

Chris Addison
Familiar to many, including myself as Ollie from BBC’s “The Thick Of It” Chris started off his set with “In the beginning was the word”. This turned to be far more relevant to an enlightened atheist audience than a meaningless bible quote. Chris talked about the importance of language and how the invention of the printing press was the key catalyst in the spreading of knowledge and the precursor to the advances in technology and understanding. So taken in was I, that I failed to notice the time, it was getting quite late by this point but I didn’t realise how late until Chris pointed out that my 10 year old son sat next to me in the front row should be in bed by now.

Tim Minchin
Tim’s 9 minute beat poem about “Storm” an Australian guest at a Dinner Party he attended was an unexpected treat and for me the highlight of the show. The poem itself was sheer genius, with Tim biting his lip throughout the first half of the poem listening to the inane ranting of Sagittarian, Storm and her spiritual and pseudoscientific viewpoint before finally cracking in an abuse of logic and reason. I tried to find a clip on YouTube to share with you all, but I couldn’t find one. If anyone can spot one please forward on to me.

Carl Sagan
Carl Sagan and Martin White’s Orchestra brought the evening to a close. I was hoping Robin would make a final appearance to take a bow on harvest his well-earned standing ovation, but the house lights came on, and we shuffled off into the night.

Well that’s about it for this review. Almost as long as he evening itself. The only better way I can see of fully expressing the feeling of joy, awe and comedy at this festive time other than “Nine Lessons and Carols for Godless People” is to hope that this is merely the inaugural annual “Nine Carols and Lessons for Godless People”. I sincerely hope we can do it again next year, if so can we invite Stephen Fry, David Gilmour and Eddie Izzard. Thanks

Crispian.
20th December 2008

For my 2008 album click here

Room "Fluffy"

I recall that some time ago when the UK’s national treasure, or Stephen Fry, as I believe he is also sometimes called, appeared on Room 101, he suggested a less negative and cantankerous alternative to Room 101. He suggested that Room “Fluffy” would be a good location in which to store the better aspects of life. So having listed my Top 10 items for Room 101 in my previous blog, I now turn my attention to the nicer things in life that I shall place in Room Fluffy.

Apple Macintosh Computers
My first job, back in 1984, was as a computer programmer, programming an Apple IIe micro computer. The Apple IIe had a 6502 chip, the same one used by the BBC Model B microcomputer, making it very similar to program. But I got swept along with the new IBM PC’s that were becoming available at this time and regrettably abandoned Apple until 2007 when I finally convinced myself to replace my latest dead PC with a Mac. Now all the PC’s in the house have been replaced by Mac’s and I’ve turned into an evangelical Mac bore. I don’t miss Ctl-Alt-Del or mucking around in the registry trying to remove spyware or wondering my PC is full of crap and running like a dog. The Mac just works.

BBC Radio 4
Despite whinging about “Thought for the Day”, Radio 4 remains one of the last bastions against the deluge of mindless, dull, banal entertainment. It’s a place where great comedy is born, (The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy, The League of Gentleman, Little Britain etc etc) and it’s probably the only remaining public broadcaster in the UK to continue to put out thought provoking broadcasts covering multiple topics including my personal favourites of science and philosophy. There comes a point when the tedious self opinionated disc jockeys, their appalling choice of music, and pointless topics of conversations and telephone call-ins become too much to bear. When you eventually despair of them, try Radio 4.

Podcasts
Podcasts allow me to combine my love of Radio 4 and of Apple Gadgets with a perfect means of accessing the programmes I am interested in at a time that is convenient for me. In addition to some great Radio 4 podcasts, it’s also proved to be a valuable medium for accessing the thoughts of people with whom I share some interests. From my particular perspective, podcasts have enabled me to become more involved and informed on items such as critical thinking science and reason via great podcasts like the SGU, Point of Enquiry, Little Atoms, Skeptoid and Skepticality.

Technology & Gadgets
Like almost everyone in the privileged developed world, I have a small device in my pocket that can convert sound into radio waves that can be beamed up to an artificial satellites orbiting the planet and allow me to speak to someone on the other side of the earth. So what, I’ve got a mobile phone. But if you pause and think about it for a while and its pretty amazing. The technology I carry with me (which are all the by products of good science) would make me seem like I have the powers only attributable to a major deity to my ancestors.

Curry
Most people grow out of having to have the hottest curry possible. I didn’t, I just developed a love of spicy food.

Gibson Les Paul & Fender Stratocaster
These two pieces of wood have been the key ingredient in producing the most moving and evocative art I have ever appreciated.
The Gibson Les Paul is of course the weapon of choice for: Martin Barre, Jeff Beck, Chuck Berry, Marc Bolan, Peter Green, Dave Grohl, Steve Hackett, George Harrison, , Steve Jones, Alex Lifeson, John Lennon, Bob Marley, Paul McCartney, Gary Moore, Mike Oldfield, Jimmy Page, Keith Richards, Carlos Santana, Slash, Eddie Van Halen, Snowy White and Neil Young.
While the Fender Stratocaster is the primary axe for: Ritchie Blackmore, Eric Clapton, The Edge, David Gilmour, Jimi Hendrix, Mark Knopfler and Hank Marvin
Imagine how dull your record collection would be if you omitted the above names.

Science
Science is such a simple and brilliant idea. Instead of making stuff up or claiming to have had a divine inspiration, you use your brain to form an hypothesis, rigorously test your hypothesis using controlled repeatable tests, and get it peer reviewed by unbiased colleagues with no hidden agendas to form an accepted theory. Then, here’s the clever bit, rather than decreeing this theory as the gospel truth, you allow for modifications, tweaks and updates to advance our understanding as new data and evidence become available. Rather than treating Newton’s groundbreaking understanding of gravity as gospel, we allow a patent clerk to refine it a little further, eventually enabling us to accurately track and plot our positions on the earth via satellite navigation. Instead of assuming that we were sneezed out of the nose of the Great Green Arkleseizure, thanks to a ships naturalist who took a nice trip around the Galapagos Islands, we can piece together the origins of our species. And with the help of other great minds we can also understand the origins and age of our planet, galaxy and indeed, Universe by building upon successive knowledge, learning, understanding and theories. Science has enlightened us with the understanding of our origins, taken us to the surface of the moon, and enabled us to live longer. Why are we not all getting excited at what we can achieve next? What breakthrough will we make when we finally get the LHC working? Can we solve world hunger through genetic modification of crops? Can stem cell research provide us with the knowledge to cure many diseases? Of course we need to be careful, but I’m excited to see what science can do for us next rather than be swept along by the tide of pseudoscience and fear of science promoted by ignorance and religions fearful of knowledge and understanding undermining their myths and loosening their grip on our minds.

Douglas Adams
Douglas Noel Adams (DNA) was always very proud of the fact that he was born in Cambridge in 1955, the same date and location Watson and Crick discovered an alternative DNA. Whilst being my favourite author, he is also a very good link to many of the other items I have placed in Room Fluffy. He beat Stephen Fry to be the first UK Apple Mac owner. He premiered his masterpiece (H2G2) on BBC Radio 4. He was a keen musician and fan of Procul Harlem and Pink Floyd, to which there are several references to in the Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy, and whom he played with briefly on the 1994 tour, and I’m sure he must have had a Les Paul and/or Strat in his collection. He was also an avid technology, gadget and science enthusiast and friend of Richard Dawkins. In fact if it wasn’t for his premature and untimely death in 2001, he would have been first choice for my fantasy dinner party guest list (Hopefully he could have bought David Gilmour, Richard Dawkins and Stephen Fry along with him).

V6, V8 or V12 Engines
It may well be more environmentally friendly to drive around in a small car powered by a lawnmower engine, but bollocks to that. You can’t beat be a good sized engine 3.0 litre V6, minimum. Something that puts a smile on your face when you put your foot down. I’ll Hopefully move up to a V8 or V12 next, so long as we haven’t run out of oil or died of carbon monoxide poisoning. However, if someone can invent an affordable clean equivalent then I’ll give it a go, but the Toyota Prius or Gee Whiz aint it.

TMS (Test Match Special)
There’s nothing better than getting in the car on a glorious summers day and having the car radio tuned to Radio 4 Long Wave (198) to listen to days events unfold. Having the dulcet tones of CMJ, Aggers and Blowers eloquently painting the scene at Lords of the English batsmen deftly picking off a steady stream of runs from the unfortunate tourists.

Crispian's Room 101

It doesn’t really matter that this blog is hardly ever read. I use it as a useful outlet in venting my frustrations and annoyances, as I have reached that age where I can now officially be classed as a grumpy old man. George Orwell’s convenient Room 101 is a suitable abyss in which to cast my current top 10 offenders. I think the format allows us to assume that war, cancer, child abuse and the like are already safely locked away in room 101, leaving me to concentrate on the aggravations peculiar to me. And as this is my blog, and not a TV show, there’s no one to stand in the way of the exit for the following items:

Dumb Down TV
Rather than whinge about how facile soap operas and tedious Saturday night singing or dancing popularity contests are, I choose to simply ignore them, my TV has a wholly serviceable “off” button. I’m perfectly happy to remain in ignorance while others discuss B-Z list celebrities I’ve never heard of, or the unfortunate love affairs of fictional soap characters I don’t recognise. What is annoying however is still treating me as an idiot when I try and watch something a bit more educational. I do not need a recap after every commercial break to bring me back up to speed with what they told me 3 minutes ago. My attention span is not so short that I need to be shown snippets of what’s coming up later in the programme. I accept that different levels of programming are required to cater for all requirements, but try and make some documentaries that assume we’re not complete idiots. On the subject of documentaries, it doesn’t count by making a so called documentary such as “Come and look at this weird/overweight/disabled person”. There called “Freak Shows” not documentaries.

Pseudoscience & Superstition
Many people say, “What’s the harm in x” where x can be various forms of Alternative Medicine, Paranormal /Supernatural beliefs, Pseudoscience, Superstitions or pseudo-religions. Well there’s shed loads of documented cases where irrational beliefs in such nonsense has caused immense misery, suffering and death not to mention the untold deaths, war and terror sponsored by major religions. The following website is a catalogue of specific examples of “What the harm is”. I wont attempt to list particular examples here, but please check out the following link:.http://www.whatstheharm.net Where my beef really lies with Pseudoscience and superstition (In addition to the physical harm listed on the above link), is the deluded worldview and fantasies it cultures in those it takes in. I’ve got nothing against fantasy, in fact I love a bit of Tolkien, but when ones fantasies cross over to the real world, delusions paranoia and irrational behaviour will follow. I despair when I hear of someone who has read some twaddle like the “DaVinci Code” and as a result has become disillusioned in mainstream religion only to turn to new age nonsense or paganism because the culture we propagate promotes supernatural explanations over science, reason and modern enlightenment. I suppose ultimately what I want to send into room 101 are the unscrupulous charlatans, conmen and TV producers who prey on the gullible people seeking love, health, lost ones and wealth by unnatural means. But I also feel frustration with those who are so eager to accept a supernatural or pseudoscientific explanation when a perfectly natural explanation can inevitably be sought once we have equipped ourselves with the knowledge to do so. Please don’t go to an astrologer or psychic to determine you future, make your own future. Don’t pray that you children don’t get polio or measles, inoculate them. Don’t go to a homeopath or faith healer to cure your cancer, get chemotherapy. There was a time when we all had no alternative to religion and superstition to answer our questions and give us solace; it was called the Dark Ages. Why are so many hell bent on returning to these pre-enlightened times? If I could recommend just one book to put pseudoscience and superstition in its place, I would choose “The Demon Haunted World: Science As a Candle in the Dark by Carl Sagan”.

"Thought for the Day"
Shame on the BBC for allowing irrational faith based communities to hijack their flagship news programme with their archaic, inane and irrelevant ranting. Why is bigotry, hypocrisy and self delusion given such a prominent soap box in a secular and enlightened country at the start of the 21st century. I don’t have to scan past episodes for a particularly nauseating example of such piffle, I’ll just use today’s hot air as a typical illustration. Today’s miscreant was a Muslim, but my annoyance is not directed at this particular delusion any more than any of the others given the platform of Thought for the Day to preach their drivel. The speaker today complained about the dangers of being drawn into virtual computer worlds such as “Second Life” and the escapism sought by sad individuals who are detached from reality. A religious person was complaining about the dangers of rejecting reality and truth in favour of being drawn into an imagined false reality. Hello?

Bad Grammar
I can tolerate regional accents, but there’s no excuse for not being able to construct a sentence with the correct syntax and semantics even if you come from Yorkshire. I went to see my wife’s bank account manager last week, (They wanted to see if they had any additional services they could sell us), and I spent the whole time biting my lip in attempt not to correct her grammar. She managed to get in several double negatives such as “I ain’t done nuffink” to which I have to resist the temptation of saying “Then if you haven’t done nothing, logically you must have done something”. Her most frequent annoyance however was her complete lack of understanding of tenses, when she used sentences such as. “I done him a favour” or “She come in her last week”. Arghhh. I accept that my grammar may be less than perfect, but I think I get the basics right. (I suspect that’s an invitation to receive comments on all of my grammatical errors in my blog). I am left with the inescapable conclusion that my Bank want me to think our accounts are being managed by retards?

Faith Schools
Of course I think the world would be a much nicer place without vast swathes of the population being indoctrinated into unchallengeable and incompatible beliefs systems based on pre enlightened wisdom and comparably barbaric morality. Such beliefs will inevitably lead to hatred, prejudice, injustice and war. But I can’t just vanquish religion as a whole to room 101, it forms part of our cultural heritage and has inspired great art, music, architecture and in its more benign forms provide comfort and solace to its followers. Banning religion to room 101 would obviously be no more effective than trying to ban alcohol or drugs, if a desire for it persists, its existence will flourish regardless. I’m also not terribly keen on loosing many of our traditions, holidays, ceremonies and buildings, but I do think these things can be maintained, but kept detached and impotent of their original intent. I very much enjoy visiting ancient Egyptian and Greek temples despite the fact that the deity’s they where constructed in honour of have now fully passed into mythology. I’d be happy to visit great Cathedrals and Churches, Mosques, Temples and Synagogues with a similar perspective to their relevance today whilst appreciating their architecture and cultural heritage. The key to a more enlightened populace, free from such dangerous superstition and faith is surely education and discovery rather than mandated dictation of any particular viewpoint. Such incredulous beliefs embedded in all religions could surely only take root in the furtive minds of the young. So instead of blindly indoctrinating children with the random beliefs of their parents, can we not equip them with empirical knowledge and the tools of critical thinking and the scientific method to allow them to form their own conclusions based on a critical review of the facts and evidence. One of the biggest hurdles I see to this philosophy in the UK, is the spread of faith schools who are free to preach their particularly dogmas and delusions. I don’t want my children to have Intelligent Design or Creationism presented to them as an alternative theory to evolution any more than I want them to have Alchemy taught as an alternative to Chemistry, Astrology and an alternative to Astronomy or Magic as an alternative to Physics. The UK has a great tradition of Catholic and Church of England schools with fine academic achievements. In a multi cultural society such us ours we should not be creating more faith schools for alternative belief systems, but converting existing faith schools to secular schools whilst maintaining and improving high academic standards and following an approved national curriculum based on established reason rather than historical myths.

TV Dinners
One of the most detestable excuses I frequently hear is “I work all day and don’t have time to prepare a proper meal with fresh ingredients”. I see no valid excuse for constantly troughing on individual salty microwavable mush whilst sat in the lounge glazed over by Eastenders. You may argue that my wife is fortunate enough to not have to work and therefore has the time to prepare a meal that can be enjoyed around the family dinner table when I get home from work. But when we we’re both working we still found time to do it. It’s simply a matter of priorities. Why do so many of us Brits place such a low importance on the family dinner table, it almost makes me want to be French. Well not quite.

Chav Suits
I’m sure that those that choose to wear pink velour track suits would view my rather nice Harris Tweed Jacket with equal contempt. But why do you need to wear a track suit when the only exercise you’re doing is sitting on the sofa, watching Tricia and eating crisps.

Cheap Chicken
When I was younger, I seem to recall that Chicken was more expensive and a bit of treat you wouldn’t expect more than once a week at best. We now live in a culture where chicken is so cheap it can be an everyday meal or snack. The consequences are of course born by the multitude of unfortunate and poorly treated animals cramped into vast barns for their short insignificant lives. I’m not an animal rights activist and I fully support the use of animal research to further scientific understanding and provide huge advantages in medical research and I’m perfectly happy to eat meat in many of its delicious forms, but I’m not prepared to unnecessarily abuse the animal before I eat it. I get immensely frustrated by people who will happily eat a chicken nuggets made from the beaks and arseholes of ill treated birds, but then balk at the prospect of eating a freshly shot rabbit that has lead a wild and natural life. (up until the point it was shot). If you can’t stomach the fluffy bunny whose guts you’ve seen spilled, then don’t eat the processed meat in the nice clean packaging just because the reality has been hidden. The consequence of “happy meat” will of course be increased cost, but if this means we can’t afford it everyday, then so be it.

Crap Music
This is one of my favourite topics to bleat on about, and I’ve whinged at length on the topic on the music page of my web site (http://www.crispian.net/crispian/my_music.html). If you’ve read my music page, you will be familiar with my despair in the popularisation of superficial music based on commercial formulas manipulated by business people catering for preferences in image and dance moves over musicianship and originality. I suspect I’m passionate about the subject because I’m passionate about good music, to me it has the power to provoke emotions unreachable in me by other forms of art. People often counter my arguments by saying that it’s simply a matter of taste, “Led Zeppelin are not better than Boyzone, that’s just your personal preference.” I say hogwash to that hypothesis. I dislike particular music not because of its genre or my personal taste, but because it’s simply poor music. Consider a two dimensional matrix containing the full set of artists, groups, composers and all contributors to the collective of music. Imagine the matrix has a number of columns representing all genres and subtypes of music. There are columns for Rock, Pop, Country, Blues, R&B, Dance, Techno, Opera, Classical, Ballet, Jazz, Hip Hop, Rap etc etc. Each column will inevitably contain good and bad music, original, intelligent, genre defining music and palpable dirge. The varying quality in music in each column is represented by the rows, with the top rows reserved for the quality music, gradually moving down the rows with reducing musical quality, being careful not to confuse current popularity with quality. For Example if you looked at the Pop column, you may see the Beatles somewhere near the top and Bros much lower down. I chose Bros as a semi random example of something lower down in the Pop column, because enough time has elapsed for the sedimentation process to allow the dregs to settle into their rightful place. The clouded perception of many contemporary eyes may need time to reach a valid evaluation of new arrivals. My sedimentation analogy also applies to this missed cream that gradually rises to the top. Nick Drake would be a good example of an artist whose merit and reputation have gradually only come to the fore over time. In order to rebuke the argument of what I perceive as crap music simply not fitting in with my particular tastes, I like to think that I make an effort to cast my musical net horizontally across the top of the imaginary matrix. As opposed to selecting individual columns based on personal preference of styles, as I believe many do. Hence the celebrity status wannabes of Saturday Night TV talent shows rarely, if ever, make it into my net for the simple reason that they’re crap.

Yorkshire
How many times have you been eating in a restaurant on Holiday in Europe or America only to hear a loud and whinging Yorkshire accent complaining about the foreign food or outrageous prices. Being a cricket fan, I follow the fortunes of my adopted county (Hampshire), but the cricket team I really support is whichever one is playing Yorkshire. Fortunately there’s a suitable icon that deftly represents the self opinionated and boorish Yorkshire mentality and their cricket team. I would therefore like to surrender him into room 101. In you go Geoffrey.

Debating Woo-Woo

Many rationalist take the stance that its not worth publicly arguing with believers as it gives nonsensical arguments an air of credibility by acknowledging that the matter is worthy of debate. I believe Richard Dawkins for one, cites this as one of his main reason for not concerning him self with such debates with creationists. I believe the other main reason is the likelihood of being unscrupulously edited and cut to misrepresent his argument. At first glance this seems irritating and frustrating to refuse to debate even though you hold all of the key facts and evidence required to fully slam dunk an argument and allow the public to reach a rational conclusion. But instead have to sit back and face the jibing taunts of the believers who claim that you are afraid to debate them.

The media claim that they like to represent the spectrum of viewpoints and political opinions. Therefore, in the UK we would expect to see equal amounts of time made available to representatives from each of the 3 major political parties. This in principle shows an unbiased viewpoint. The manifesto and proposals of each party will have certain supporters and who’s to say who’s right and who’s wrong, it’s therefore up to the media to provide equal unbiased reporting of each viewpoint to allow the public to form an opinion on their stance. This is fine when we are presented with potentially valid alternatives. However, when the media extend this philosophy to other matters such as supernatural phenomenon, alternative medicine, pseudo science and creationism/ID, the unbiased intention breaks down as the alternative viewpoints expressed are often of massively varying validity. If a widely accepted peer reviewed theory backed up with substantial and valid evidence is challenged by a believer who merely prefers a supernatural explanation for the phenomenon, then we cannot assume the same level of validity for his argument. However by presenting the argument in the media with one person representing the agreed scientific consensus and one person representing an unsubstantiated fantasy, the media automatically give the false impression that there is a 50/50 split in the validity of both positions by fairly granting equal time to both advocates. Even if the representative of the agreed scientific consensus successfully presents an incontrovertible argument significant members of the public will none the less be swayed by the preposterous alternatives because a respectable news channel or newspaper has given them the opportunity to air they’re views, or perhaps because of the celebrity status of its representative or shared beliefs or religious convictions in common with the representative.

In the UK the media do not extend the courtesy of allowing equal political debate time to the Monster Raving Looney party. Despite the fact that this is a “valid” political party, there are no cries of unfairness when the BBC does not allow the same amount of coverage for representatives of this party to present their manifestos and views. I suspect that this is because no one takes the Monster Raving Looney party seriously, and would therefore not expect it to be given an equal weighting. Indeed if it were given an equal weighting I imagine that there would be complaints of time wasting rather than focusing on valid debates. This suggests that the answer to the conundrum of ensuring the media do not cow-tow to the believers wishing to air their delusions and engage in pointless debates between established principles, is to ensure the opposing viewpoint is widely understood as nonsense. While the established viewpoint should be promoted and spread with rational education (and of course revised an updated in the light of credible evidence to the contrary), what is the validity in simply publicly ridiculing and deriding irrational beliefs to the extent that the public would view any such debate as a joke. Is there a sliding scale of things we can ridicule? The majority of us seem happy to deride flat earthers and UFO abductees, but what about young earth creationists, psychics, astrologers, dowsers, new age nutters, regression therapists, homeopaths and alternative medicine advocates, can the enlightened show no sympathy with such ideas and publicly treat these topics which such contempt and ridicule that the notion of an equal footing debate is something the media could not take seriously.

Having just re-read the above thoughts, I feel somewhat uncomfortable with my conclusions. As a person who likes to encourage the scientific principle to advance the truth, why am I advocating childish name calling rather than serious debate?