CSI(COP) – best example of the skepticfuckwits at work

Via Greg Bishop, this timely reminder of when the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims Of the Paranormal (CSICOP- now CSI-Committee For Skeptical Inquiry) conducted their one and only scientific study of an alleged paranormal phenomenon.

The full sorry tale, ‘sTarbaby’ told by physicist and ex-CSICOP Dennis Rawlins is here. RA Wilson told a truncated version in one of the Cosmic Trigger books, but this is the one with the full dirt…

I USED to believe it was simply a figment of the National Enquirer’s weekly imagination that the Science Establishment would cover up evidence for the occult. But that was in the era B.C. — Before the Committee. I refer to the “Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal” (CSICOP), of which I am a cofounder and on whose ruling Executive Council (generally called the Council) I served for some years.
    I am still skeptical of the occult beliefs CSICOP was created to debunk. But I have changed my mind about the integrity of some of those who make a career of opposing occultism. I now believe that if a flying saucer landed in the backyard of a leading anti-UFO spokesman, he might hide the incident from the public (for the public’s own good, of course). He might swiftly convince himself that the landing was a hoax, a delusion or an “unfortunate” interpretation of mundane phenomena that could be explained away with “further research.”
    The irony of all this particularly distresses me since both in print and before a national television audience I have stated that the conspiratorial mentality of believers in occultism presents a real political danger in a voting democracy. Now I find that the very group I helped found has partially justified this mentality…

3 thoughts on “CSI(COP) – best example of the skepticfuckwits at work”

  1. Oh my goodness, Slenderman is nnoihtg short of terrifying and so are the other children in costume! But I’m sorry, the amigarumis are just plain adorable. That fanged bat is spectacular . Happy halloween to you and yours x

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