Articles tagged with "machine"

As we talked about at the end of last year, there's been a real push to sell Kangen Water devices in NZ recently. An article in the Herald recently has detailed Ainsley Brunton's efforts to sell the water in Whanganui to unsuspecting customers. Her water devices are selling for $4,000, with promises that the water can help with cancer, diabetes and other serious diseases. Enagic in Australia is selling the machines to New Zealanders who are passing them on, and Enagic's prices for a machine that does nothing useful to water vary between $2,300 and $6,500.

In the Autumn 2004 issue of the NZ Skeptic, we reported on Vicki Hyde's prediction in the Dominion Post that George Bush would win the US presidential election. Given that this was at the height of the scandals over Abu Ghraib prisoners and the lack of Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, it seemed a bold claim indeed, on a par with her prediction that the All Blacks would miss the 1999 World Cup final. But once again, history has shown our chair-entity to be better at the prophecy game than almost any of the professional seers.

Next time you visit the US don't miss the Museum of Unworkable Devices, the brainchild of physics Professor Donald Simanek from the University of Pennsylvania.

Cellulite is the term used by women's magazines to describe dimpled fat. It has no scientific or anatomical validity and it is simply ordinary fatty tissue that assumes a waffled appearance because fibrous tissue prevents the skin from fully expanding in areas where fatty tissue accumulates. This has been confirmed by a study where biopsies of fat and cellulite were microscopically indistinguishable by pathologists who were blinded as to the samples' origin. Calling fat "cellulite" is part of the modern trend to seeking alternatives to the (unpalatable) truth, in this case an adipose euphemism.

As Professor Cole explained at the last Skeptics' Conference, "Quantum Booster"-like devices have been around a long time.

John Riddell has a few confessions to make.

"Mind my left ear." cautioned Mrs X, "there's a needle in it."

You know those little white areas you don't see at the bottom of newspaper columns, it would be nice if we could avoid them here too. Were it not for this message you would be looking at a blank (possibly shaded) space. In order that this catastrophe be avoided in future issues we make the following appeals: