Articles tagged with "power"

I have a friend who I've written about before who, although she's always had pseudoscientific ideas (like giving her children homeopathic remedies), since the pandemic has fallen down the rabbit hole and is currently at the bottom of said hole, picking up more and more daft ideas as she sits there, wallowing. I haven't seen her in a while now - not since I bumped into her at the parliament protest in February - but I do hear about her recent high jinks, and I see her Facebook posts which suggest that she's given up any effort to think critically.

It's funny how things come around. Last week I watched a fascinating documentary on the Bogdanoff brothers. For those not in the know, the Bogdanoffs are a fascinating case study - two brothers who became celebrities via a TV show promoting science, and then somehow bluffed their way into receiving PhDs in physics despite their theses being nonsensical in places. Many of you might recognise the brothers from their later years, where they used extreme plastic surgery to radically alter their look.

I'm sitting here writing this week's newsletter with music playing in the background - I've just listened to tracks by (and I'm name-dropping here) Malcolm Middleton, the Flashbulb, Madvillain, PJ Harvey, Mogwai and 65daysofstatic. I'm enjoying this music being played from Plex on my Chromecast, through my TV, via a Sony home theatre amp, to my in-wall 7.1 surround sound speakers. The entire setup might have cost me $1,200, if we exclude the cost of the TV (another $1,500). But could I be enjoying my music more if I'd spent more money buying reference equipment from high-end specialist companies?

--- > > Last weekend I visited the Home Show in Christchurch. All the usual suspects were there, Bioptron, Shuzi and the Magnetic and Titanium healer. This was surprising as I had scanned the exhibitor list in the morning and they did not appear. So I suspect they are on some hidden/covert/backdoor list. > > Anyway, once again it was Shuzi. I have crossed swords with this lot before, a few years ago they were doing the power balance stunt first exposed by Richard Saunders in Australia, Google "richard saunders exposes the power balance trick" for several versions of the trick and countermeasures. I did this to the demonstrator who was most unhappy to be messed with! I then entered a discussion over their patented NVT (Nano Vibration Technology). It was trivial to defeat his every statement, but I was dismissed as "having a closed mind". My last riposte was the old "I've an open mind but not so open that my brains fall out". But it's a waste of time, and it's much more satisfying to talk to the pot plant on the corner! > > Next year I was armed with Australian media reports that essentially ran them out of Australia. So I walked up and requested a comment. He hotly denied it, tried to grab it (but I was far too quick) and after a few short exchanges he got out his cellphone and called security, or so he claimed. I like to think I spoiled a couple of potential sales. > > So now I wander up and mention to all those hanging about, that it's woowoo nonsense, based neither on science nor evidence. What is also interesting is that in previous years they have had many (hundreds?) of brochures there. Not one to be seen this year. > > Here's a bit more from the Australian skeptics, including an abortive attempt to get Shuzi to front up for a real test. > > https://www.skeptics.com.au/2012/08/13/if-you-knew-shuzi/

You may be aware that there's currently a bill before parliament to change the way that fluoridation of our drinking water is handled. Presently District Health Boards have the individual power to decide whether the water for the populations they serve is fluoridated or not. The bill would take that power away from the DHBs and give it to the Director-General of Health.

I've seen adverts pop up recently on news sites, such as NewsHub and YouTube, that are selling a device which claims to be able to cut your power bill by 90%. Now, wouldn't that be nice - if it were true!

Last week was a busy one. On Monday I visited parliament for a church service called The Power of One, along with another couple of skeptics. The event was organised by a group called Jesus for NZ (who formed back in 2017 when Jesus was taken out of the parliamentary prayer), hosted by Alfred Ngaro and facilitated by Simon Bridges. There was a lot of talk about Jesus re-taking the nation until everyone in this country is a believer, and restoring NZ to its “former glory”. Personally I'm much happier with NZ being a rational, secular democracy than a theocracy, but it turns out that not everyone wants a fair society and equality for all.

New Zealand has a nuclear free policy. In relation to weapons, I totally agree with that. A nuclear bomb is an obscene and horrible device and the sooner the world can see its way to eliminating all of them, the better. But what of nuclear energy? Should that share the same horror? Lots of people think it does, but why?

Fijian government representatives, including leader Frank Bainimarama, were at a lavish launch event a couple of weeks ago to announce the launch of a new app which is set to revolutionise our mobile phone use.

"… she successfully resisted the forces pitted against her, giving an astounding manifestation of some power other than that making up the ordinary phenomena of nature." So wrote the Feilding Star on 25 October 1899, reporting on an early incarnation of the supernatural showpeople that still tour the world today. But other newspapers took a sceptical line that media today could learn from.

A recent UMR Research poll has provided a snapshot of what New Zealanders believe about a range of paranormal subjects. More than half accept that some people have psychic powers; on the other hand, only 24 percent think astrology can be used to predict people's futures and two thirds do not believe aliens have visited the Earth.

Given his ratings, only a tiny handful of you probably saw Paul Holmes in his new slot on Prime a few weeks back, talking to Don Maisch, described as an Australian expert on the health effects of magnetic fields. More precisely, he's doing a PhD in the Arts Faculty of Wollongong University on changes in the health status of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome patients following removal of excessive 50 Hz magnetic field exposure.

Recently returned from a posting in Saudi Arabia and now suffering from a cold and a bleeding nose, John Welch continues his column on medical matters.

Numerology, or What Pythagoras Wrought, by Underwood Dudley, Mathematical Association of America, Washington DC, 1997

I found it interesting to read Bernard Howard's article on complaining to the authorities. I myself complained about an incident that happened some years ago, when someone who was promoting a book he was trying to sell to a school library maintained that the author was "working with the health department on a cure for AIDS". The book was called Magnetic Healing and Other Realities. I complained to the Department of Trade and Industry, where I was in fact treated with the utmost courtesy and consideration.

The following message from James Randi was posted to the Usenet newsgroup sci.skeptic on February 4th by Jim Kutz.

A Sprite in your Spirit, a Bogle in your Benzine, a Fury in your Fuel, a Greyhound in your Gasoline. With acknowledgement to the oil company which, many years ago, urged us to "Put a Tiger in your Tank."

Magic potions made from natural ingredients are generally hailed as environmentally friendly. But is this necessarily true? Not if you're a rhinocerous!

Among the papers at the Skeptics conference were Bill Malcolm's four. entertaining "illustrated truth kits" — short two-projector slide-shows on topics like fad diets, the New Age, fringe therapies, and scientific method. This one is the New Age primer.

E. Frenkel, the Russian who late last year undertook the ultimate test of his ability to stop on-coming trains using only his brain power, was a hit with NZ Skeptics too. Members have sent in eight clippings relating to the incident—an all-time record by a long way.

Acommon failure of the imagination and of intellectual rigour is the belief that these two qualities cannot co-exist. In fact one is indispensable to the other if art and intelligence are not to be separated and trivialised.

Jesus Christ lives on Venus. Earth has narrowly escaped invasion by the Fish Men. Two machines pull in healing energy from deep space and spread it around Earth each night.

The New Zealand Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (Inc.) seeks nominations for its annual journalism/media awards for 1986-1987. Awards will be presented at the annual meeting of the Committee, held this year at Victoria University in Wellington, August 29-30.

Your state of mind can make you sick or speed your recovery from illness. This idea is hardly new but only now is it gaining respect and attention from Western doctors. The result is a variety of new medical therapies being developed for the future. This approach, called holistic medicine, is based on four general principles.

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.