Huffington Post, February 2, 2012 "Psychic" Sally Morgan Sues Critics for £150,000 After Refusing $1 Million to Prove Her Powers “...when the allegations that "Psychic Sally" was a cheat were front-page news, our organization along with peer organizations in the UK offered her $1,000,000 and the chance to clear her name, simply by proving her powers were real. Yet, she declined. Why?”
Skeptic Money, February 1, 2012 DJ Grothe Calls Dr Phil On BS Psychics In an open letter to Dr Phil, DJ Grothe, past host of Point-of-Inquiry, requests he “get real” and stop pandering to psychics.
Ask An Atheist, January 21, 2012 “Dr.” Homeopathy (feat. James Randi) Deanna, Mike and Sam talk to to James Randi, the man at the front of a foundation with a million dollar prize for scientifically valid proof of the paranormal and a legend among skeptics.
Last week, Sally Morgan -- a performer who bills herself as "Britain's best-loved psychic" -- sued the publisher of the Daily Mail for £150,000 for printing an article suggesting that she and other self-proclaimed psychics might be using trickery rather than mystical powers when they appear to talk to the dead.
Maybe the Mail's article (by magician and former psychic Paul Zenon) really did damage Sally Morgan's reputation so much that she needs the money. The irony is that just after that article was published, when the allegations that "Psychic Sally" was a cheat were front-page news, our organization along with peer organizations in the UK offered her $1,000,000 and the chance to clear her name, simply by proving her powers were real. Yet, she declined. Why?
The Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science is holding a contest to produce the best video to illustrate their Ten Point Vision For a Secular America, intended to persuade the broader public and inspire organizing and action in the secular movement. The finalists have been chosen, and they're all pretty fantastic. Head over to RichardDawkins.net, watch the seven videos and vote for your favorite.
Here's RDFRS's Sean Faircloth explaining the Ten Point Vision.
A few years ago a magician friend dropped by the JREF with a very strange gift, a stack of bright red 12” x 8” x 2” books that would have taken up 19” of shelf space in the Isaac Asimov Library – if they’d been of any use other than door-stops. This was a set of Technical Bulletins from the Church of Scientology [COS] running from 1950 to 1979 – almost 7,000 pages of drivel that I now keep in a back cupboard to avoid being embarrassed. It had belonged to my friend’s mother, who bankrupted the family by her devotion to Hubbard and Scientology. However, I’ve found a use for this bound waste paper: when I’m interviewed on the subject, I trot out any volume – each some 5.5 pounds – to show a reporter just how vapid the contents are. I’ll give you an example of my having turned at random to one page in one of books, for a media visitor. To very slightly clarify the picture, I must translate a pair of the exotic terms used here.
Here is a recap of the stories that appeared last week at Science-Based Medicine, a multi-author skeptical blog that separates the science from the woo in medicine.
There is no known mechanism by which cell phone radiation could cause cancer. Pasche’s research on cancer treatment with “tumor-specific” AM frequencies might possibly elucidate such a mechanism. It seems highly implausible, but his methods are those of good science. Rather than rejecting it as “impossible” we should wait to see where his results lead.
