An Open Letter to All New Zealand Skeptics

Dear Fellow Skeptics,

Our recently founded "Skeptics Society" is growing fast. We now have almost 50 paid-up members through the country and, by the time this reaches you, we should be a legally incorporated

Society. Through individual and media communications NZCSICOP is providing a counterbalance to the ever-increasing number of paranormal claims. The response from the media has to date been most receptive and encouraging, and NZCSICOP seems to be fulfilling a genuinely-felt need for a rational and skeptical approach to magic, myth, and mystery. It has been a pleasant surprise to encounter many hard-nosed skeptics in the media and perhaps they too have grown weary of the psychics and mediums who seem to claim all but demonstrate nothing.

But there is no room for complacency. Consider just one week of TVNZ programming in February, chosen at random:

Monday, 17th: 7.30-8.30 pm, TV-1 "Seekers" featured a visit to a medium in which an episode of spirit possession is realistically displayed as an unquestioned fact (the first installment of a new prime-time N.Z. made series).

Tuesday, 18th: 8.00-8.30 pm, TV-2 "Arthur C. Clarke's World of Strange Powers" gives the usual dollop of pseudoscience in documentary style. Clarke makes a token gesture towards skepticism but cleverly leaves an overall impression of mystery and magic. He has to, otherwise the public may not want to watch, or buy the book.

Wednesday, 19th: 10.10-11.00 pm, TV-2 "Seeing Things" is "a series about a bumbling but clairvoyant reporter who solves crimes" (Listener)

Thursday, 20th: No paranography tonight.

Friday, 21st: 8.30-9.30 pm, TV-2 "Moonlighting". In this episode of a highly popular US-made series, a clairvoyant steals company secrets and sells them to a major competitor.

Saturday, 22nd: Another rest day.

Sunday, 23rd: 10.40-11.30 a.m. TV-1 "That's Incredible". This programme usually makes me feel slightly sick, and I didn't actually see this one. But the paranography quotient is typically fairly high (about 30-40%).

Drama programmes, which incorporate paranormal themes are in some ways more disturbing than so-called "documentaries" of the Arthur C. Clarke and Horizon kind. While the latter are usually biased towards belief in the paranormal, they at least question the reality of the phenomena they present; the dramatist seldom does. Paranormal happenings are presented with those of a perfectly normal kind in such a casual manner that the unsuspecting viewer can be further coaxed into accepting that nothing extraordinary has actually occurred. We simply do not know the degree to which occult beliefs are directly or indirect caused by the mass media's positive and unquestioning treatment of occult material,but such programming can hardly be conducive to increased skepticism.

In daily newspapers horoscopes are published as useful, important information. For example, the Otago Daily Times puts this mindless twaddle at the top of a page entitled "PUBLIC INFORMATION". Here we can also read world and N.2. weather reports; weather forecasts; times of sunrise, sunset, high and low tides; and Air New Zealand and bus timetables. Shouldn't any responsible newspaper clearly state that the astrology column is purely for entertainment and keep it well separated from serious and genuinely useful public information?

And then there are the dozens of psychics, mediums, spiritual healers, past-lifers, water diviners, and plainly cranky kooks who seem to command as much media attention as they need to gain their dubious livelihoods. Can psychics really read minds using ESP? Can mediums really communicate with the dead?

If so, this committee would dearly love to confirm these phenomena in properly controlled scientific investigations.

We hope that all practising mediums and psychics will make contact with NZCSICOP so that we can investigate their claims under reasonable and mutually agreeable test conditions. In addition to the personal satisfaction of knowing that one's claims can be supported by proper scientific evidence, claimants would be eligible for some pretty massive financial rewards. Over $200,000 is available world-wide for mediums who can demonstrate spirit survival in front of CSICOP-appointed observers, and over $140,000 for any other paranormal claim. More details of this offer will be announced at our conference on 9-10th August, in Dunedin.

But if psychics and mediums don't allow their claims to be properly verified, then they can hardly blame us (or the general public) if we conclude that their powers are not as they claim. The excuse that they are too busy helping people, or that their powers are suppressed inside the laboratory environment, or that the powers don't work when money is involved, simply will not wash. If psychics and mediums won't let their claims be properly tested, then they should quietly withdraw their services from the public scene. The results so far with psychics Colin Amery and Julia Vazey have been entirely negative, but at least they are sincere enough to let their claims be tested. Medium Mary Fry's refusal to be properly tested confirms that the spirits she says she contacts really are 'all in her mind'.

I hope that you will support NZCSICOP's aims and activities, and I look forward to the possibility of meeting you in Dunedin in August at our first annual convention. Please contact me directly if you would like more information on this conference, and please send any proposals for talks and speakers as soon as possible.

David F. Marks, BSc(Hons), PhD, FBPsS, FNZPsP

Fellow, CSICOP

Chairperson, NZCSICOP