A best-selling book claiming to present evidence of life after death may not be all it's cracked up to be. I recently read an article ("Heaven's Gate", SA Weekend Magazine, The Advertiser, December ... (1475 words)

A lot of effort goes into science communication, but the effectiveness of much of it is debatable. This article is based on a presentation to the NZ Skeptics Conference in Wellington, 7 September ... (895 words)

Alison Campbell considers the current state of tertiary education. The title for this article is taken from one of the search terms used by people visiting my 'other' blog, Talking Teaching, which I ... (1045 words)

Adam van Langenberg gives practical suggestions on how to run a high school skeptical society, based on his own successful experience. In late 2010 I was fortunate enough to see noted US skeptics ... (1834 words)

Gold looks back at the first year of Skeptics in the Pub. I had been listening to skeptical and science-based podcasts for about four years when I decided that I wanted to do something more than just ... (490 words)

Gold gives the inside story of the beginnings of Skeptics in the Pub meetings in New Zealand. I first heard about Skeptics in the Pub on the Skeptics Guide to the Universe podcast ... (834 words)

The idea that low self-esteem is the cause of violent behaviour has been current for some time. Many years ago I attended numerous education meetings where I heard that certain (male) individuals ... (836 words)

What name do you give to a quirky bunch of people who are scientifically literate, who question fads, and who want their beliefs to rest on evidence from the material world -- the sort of evidence ... (603 words)

John Riddell reckons he's a sensible bloke. But then, doesn't everybody? A while ago I had to take my wife out for our anniversary, so while we were waiting for our burgers and fries I flicked ... (773 words)

Around 300BCE there started a school of Greek philosophy called Skepticism. It continued for centuries, but was more like dogmatic doubt than the modern version. Bertrand Russell put their creed as ... (1281 words)

IT'S nothing short of a miracle that this issue has made it to the mailbox. For the last six months the family, including our cat and retired cattle dog, have been living in a small housetruck. (Just ... (633 words)

This is the second half of the article begun in the last NZ Skeptic Representativeness Seemingly unusual events must be considered for their representativeness of that class of phenomena. In the case ... (4400 words)

This article originally appeared in the excellent US magazine Skeptic, edited by Shermer, (Vol 2 No 3) and also forms Chapter 4 of Shermer's book Hope Springs Eternal: How Pseudoscience Works and Why ... (3873 words)

All the Trouble in the World, by P.J. O'Rourke; Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd 1994; 340 pages; $20.00 paperback Everyone will enjoy this book. Well, everyone except paranormalists, ecological ... (471 words)