Late in his life, in answer to a question, Freud compared the human condition approximately to the contents of a baby's nappy. When I first heard this story, it seemed to mark a bitter old man. That was when I was in high school in the late 1950s. Higher education was spreading in the world's democracies. Ignorance and superstition, the plague of the human species since the caves, were on the way out. Reason, knowledge and tolerance would rule the future of the world. Or so it seemed. Does it look like that today, even to high school students? A few news items:

Some Skeptics have been surprised that our organisation has been so restrained in its response to the purported moa sighting near Cragieburn. As we see it, the whole issue is fraught with difficulty.

A skeptical look at the Natural Law Party provided to journalists in preparation for the election.

This year's Bent Spoon Award has ruffled a few feathers. In a controversial decision, what the Skeptics described as an "alarmist" Justice Department report on domestic violence in New Zealand has received the award.

What's worth a Skeptic's attention? In this issue's Forum, Carl Wyant asks why worry about fraudulent spoon benders when there are far more harmful forms of ignorance and wickedness about, such as Chinese superstitions promoting female infanticide.

The Bent Spoon, as oft we've pointed out, is the only negative press award in New Zealand. Recipients' reactions to it have varied.

by Charles Berlitz; Grafton Books, 208 pp; $14.95 (paperback)

The Associated Press recently ran an item with interesting implications. Datelined Washington, the story (Christchurch Star, May 4) told of efforts by a panel of geneticists to obtain for analysis samples of cell material from Abraham Lincoln. Because Lincoln was shot, bits of his brain, with samples of blood and hair, were preserved from the surgeons' attempt to save his life.

Denis Dutton travelled up the Sepik River in New Guinea earlier this year to study tribal carving. He couldn't resist teaching the locals a few tricks.

by Carole Potter. Michael O'Mara Books. $39.95.

With this issue, the Skeptic comes under a new editorial regime. Vicki Hyde, whose excellent New Zealand Science Monthly has recently hit the stands, comes aboard as managing editor. Vicki's extensive science journalism background, her publishing experience and her literate editorial eye — not to mention her sceptical temperament — make her the perfect person for the job.

By Graham Phillips. Pan, 1990. 168pp. $9.95 (paperback).

By Michael Howard. Century Hutchison, 1989. 196 pp. $45.95.

The Skeptics have been saddened by the deaths of two of our most lively and engaged members.

While critical thinking is an essential part of the defence against pseudo-science, general knowledge also has an important role. The more knowledge you have about more things, the better equipped you are to detect the propagation of nonsense. However, the authorities may not be so concerned.

The Skeptics have organised some splendid meetings over the years, but our 1989 conference at the University of Canterbury promises to be the hottest ever—peaking at about 900 degrees celsius, to be precise....

Radio Clairvoyant: Mary Fry's Own Story (Grantham House, $14.95).

The "Cancer Line" programme shown on TVNZ (November 11) was in some respects an undoubted success. Television in general demands that most topics be exploited in terms of their emotional dimensions. (If you're ever interviewed by the "Close-up" team, you can be assured that your contribution will make it to air only if you manage to weep: the "Close-up" producers think the zoom lens was invented to magnify teary eyes). Not wanting to take the depressing route, "Cancer Line" determined to make cancer a real laugh, with McPhail and Gadsby and other entertainers. This probably helped keep viewer interest high.

Shortly after our Wellington convention, Radio New Zealand presented a superb Insight documentary on NZCSICOP. This half-hour programme was broadcast on a Sunday morning on National Radio and rebroadcast the following evening. The producer was Colin Feslia, who will be remembered for having patiently taped the whole of our Wellington meeting. We have to admire the way he assembled the material into a coherent, interesting half hour of radio. It is an excellent introduction to the Skeptics.

(Address to Joint Australia/New Zealand Health Inspectors Conference, Christchurch, 15 October 1987)

Our heartfelt thanks to the efforts of our many members who helped make the Wellington meeting such a success. The papers aroused great interest, and it was extremely gratifying to see the number of media reporters who stayed around simply to listen, long after they had fulfilled their obligations to their employers.

The Geller Effect. By Uri Geller and Guy Lyon Playfair. Jonathan Cape, 1986. 288 pp. $32.95

With a nearly firm programme in hand, the 1987 NZCSICOP conference is shaping up to be a remarkable event. The presentations will cover a wide range of arresting topics, from the dangers of alternative medicine and fraudulent faith healing, through the connections between paranormal belief and the decline of religion, to astrology, creationism, the not-so-mysterious Shroud of Turin, and more.

Evidence of the Shroud. By lan Wilson. Macmillan, 1986. 158 pp. $46.15.

Circle the dates 29 and 30 August on your calendar, for these are the days for the second annual conference of NZCSICOP, to be held this year at Victoria University in Wellington. We plan to have lectures and symposia all day Saturday and till noon Sunday, so there will be opportunity for a good mix of material. Accommodation will be in Weir House and can be expected to be quite reasonably priced. Last year's meeting was of course very successful, and we can expect an equally arresting series of presentations this year in Wellington. Plan now to join us. And if you have any ideas either for a presentation yourself or for a speaker or event you'd like to see, please let me know.

Medical graduates and workers in related fields are invited to a meeting to be held on Saturday 6 December 1986

About the time this newsletter arrives, the New Zealand Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal will have sponsored its first special-issue conference. The half-day meeting at the Christchurch Clinical School is entitled "Medicine: Orthodox, Fringe, and Quack, " and it brings together a diverse group of people on an important set of concerns. We hope that the next number of the "Skeptic" will have reports, both from us and from the press, to indicate that the meeting was a success.

In the after glow of our first annual convention, NZCSICOP members will have to feel pleased by the progress of our organisation. The meeting itself attracted considerable media attention, all of it favourable, and discussion of our aims and purposes continues to reverberate in letters weeks later. Our membership now stands at just short of a hundred and it is still growing. And well it must, for a group such as ours has much work to accomplish. Unless we have enough people scattered nationwide who are willing to take an active part in our projects we cannot flourish.

Pseudoscience in its various manifestations is now enjoying enormous popularity, is increasingly well organised and politically powerful. We can not identify pseudoscience by its errors. Seven hundred years ago Astrology was as wrong as now but was not pseudoscience, we might call it protoscience. The discovery of Polywater and the rush of confirming experiments was not pseudoscience. We know now that it was due to contaminated apparatus and wishful thinking and no one now has any evidence for it, so eventually its errors became known,