Contents Introduction: Viewing the World with a Rational Eye I. Science 1. Colorful Pebbles and Darwin''s Dictum: Science is an exquisite blend of data and theory 2. Contrasts and Continuities: Eastern and Western science are put to political uses in both cultures 3. I Was Wrong: Those three words often separate the scientific pros from the posers 4. The Shamans of Scientism: On the occasion of Stephen W. Hawking''s sixtieth trip around the sun, we consider a social phenomenon that reveals something deep about human nature 5. The Physicist and the Abalone Diver: The differences between the creators of two new theories of science reveal the social nature of the scientific process 6.
A Candle in the Dark: Instead of cursing the darkness of pseudoscience on television, light a candle with Cable Science Network 7. The Feynman-Tufte Principle: A visual display of data should be simple enough to fit on the side of a van 8. The Flipping Point: How the evidence for anthropogenic global warming has converged to cause this environmental skeptic to make a cognitive flip 9. Fake, Mistake, Replicate: A court of law may determine the meaning of replication in science 10. Wronger Than Wrong: Not all wrong theories are equal II. Skepticism 11. Fox''s Flapdoodle: Tabloid television offers a lesson in uncritical thinking 12. Baloney Detection: How to draw boundaries between science and pseudoscience, Part I 13.
More Baloney Detection: How to draw boundaries between science and pseudoscience, Part II 14. Hermits and Cranks: Fifty years ago Martin Gardner launched the modern skeptical movement. Unfortunately, much of what he wrote about is still current today 15. Skepticism as a Virtue: An inquiry into the original meaning of the word "skeptic" 16. The Exquisite Balance: Science helps us understand the essential tension between orthodoxy and heresy in science 17. The Enchanted Glass: Francis Bacon and experimental psychologists show why the facts in science never just speak for themselves 18. Fahrenheit 2777: 9/11 has generated the mother of all conspiracy theories III. Pseudoscience and Quackery 19.
Smart People Believe Weird Things: Rarely does anyone weigh facts before deciding what to believe 20. Mesmerized by Magnetism: An eighteenth-century investigation into mesmerism shows us how to think about twenty-first-century therapeutic magnets 21. Show Me the Body: Purported sightings of Bigfoot, Nessie, and Ogopogo fire our imaginations. But anecdotes alone do not make a science 22. What''s the Harm?: Alternative medicine is not everything to gain and nothing to lose 23. Bunkum!: Broad-mindedness is a virtue when investigating extraordinary claims, but often they turn out to be pure bunk 24. Magic Water and Mencken''s Maxim: Social critic H. L.
Mencken offers a lesson on how to respond to outrageous pseudoscientific claims 25. Death by Theory: Attachment therapy is based on a pseudoscientific theory that, when put into practice, can be deadly 26. Cures and Cons: Natural scams "he" doesn''t want you to know about IV. The Paranormal and the Supernatural 27. Deconstructing the Dead: "Crossing over" to expose the tricks of popular spirit mediums 28. Psychic Drift: Why most scientists do not believe in ESP and psi phenomena 29. Demon-Haunted Brain: If the brain mediates all experience, then paranormal phenomena are nothing more than neuronal events 30. Codified Claptrap: The Bible code is numerological nonsense masquerading as science 31.
The Myth Is the Message: Yet another discovery of the lost continent of Atlantis shows why science and myth make uneasy bedfellows 32. Turn Me On, Dead Man: What do the Beatles, the Virgin Mary, Jesus, Patricia Arquette, and Michael Keaton all have in common? 33. Rupert''s Resonance: The theory of "morphic resonance" posits that people have a sense of when they are being stared at. What does the research show? 34. Mr. Skeptic Goes to Esalen: Science and spirituality on the California coast V. Aliens and UFOs 35. Shermer''s Last Law: Any sufficiently advanced extraterrestrial intelligence is indistinguishable from God 36.
Why ET Has Not Phoned In: The lifetime of civilizations in the Drake equation for estimating extraterrestrial intelligences is greatly exaggerated 37. The Chronology Conjecture Projector: Time machines, extraterrestrials, and the paradoxes of causality 38. Abducted!: Imaginary traumas are as terrifying as the real thing VI. Borderlands Science and Alternative Medicine 39. Nano Nonsense and Cryonics: True believers seek redemption from the sin of death 40. I, Clone: The Three Laws of Cloning will protect clones and advance science 41. Bottled Twaddle: Is bottled water tapped out? 42. Quantum Quackery: A surprise-hit film has renewed interest in applying quantum mechanics to consciousness, spirituality, and human potential 43.
Hope Springs Eternal: Can nutritional supplements, biotechnology, and nanotechnology help us live forever? 44. Full of Holes: The curious case of acupuncture 45. Airborne Baloney: The latest fad in cold remedies is full of hot air 46. Eat, Drink, and Be Merry: Or why we should learn to stop worrying and love food VII. Psychology and the Brain 47. The Captain Kirk Principle: Intuition is the key to knowing without knowing how you know 48. None So Blind: Perceptual-blindness experiments challenge the validity of eyewitness testimony and the metaphor of memory as a video recording 49. Common Sense: Surprising new research shows that crowds are often smarter than individuals 50.
Murdercide: Science unravels the myth of suicide bombers 51. As Luck Would Have It: Are some people really luckier than others, or is it all in their heads? Both 52. SHAM Scam: The Self-Help and Actualization Movement is an $8.5-billion-a-year business. Does it work? 53. The Political Brain: A recent brain-imaging study shows that our political predilections are products of unconscious confirmation bias 54. Folk Science: Why our intuitions about how the world works are often wrong 55. Free to Choose: The neuroscience of choice exposes the power of ideas 56.
Bush''s Mistake and Kennedy''s Error: Self-deception proves itself to be more powerful than deception VIII. Human Nature 57. The Erotic-Fierce People: The latest skirmish in the "anthropology wars" reveals a fundamental flaw in how science is understood and communicated 58. The Ignoble Savage: Science reveals humanity''s heart of darkness 59. The Domesticated Savage: Science reveals a way to rise above our natures 60. A Bounty of Science: A new book reexamines the mutiny on the Bounty, but science offers a deeper account of its cause 61. Unweaving the Heart: Science only adds to our appreciation for poetic beauty and experiences of emotional depth 62. (Can''t Get No) Satisfaction: The new science of happiness needs some historical perspective IX.
Evolution and Creationism 63. The Gradual Illumination of the Mind: The advance of science, not the demotion of religion, will best counter the influence of creationism 64. Vox Populi: The voice of the people reveals why evolution remains controversial 65. The Fossil Fallacy: Creationists'' demand for "just one transitional fossil" reveals a deep misunderstanding of science 66. Rumsfeld''s Wisdom: Where the known meets the unknown is where science begins 67. It''s Dogged as Does It: Retracing Darwin''s footsteps in the Galápagos shatters a myth but reveals how revolutions in science actually evolve 68. Darwin on the Right: Why Christians and conservatives should accept evolution X. Science, Religion, Miracles, and God 69.
Digits and Fidgets: Is the universe fine-tuned for life? 70. Remember the 6 Billion: For millennia we have raged against the dying of the light. Can science save us from that good night? 71. God''s Number Is Up: Among a heap of books claiming that science proves God''s existence emerges one that computes a probability of 67 percent 72. Miracle on Probability Street: The Law of Large Numbers guarantees that one-in-a-million miracles happen 321 times a day in America 73. Mustangs and Monists: The dualist belief that body and soul are separate entities is natural, intuitive, and with us from infancy. It is also very probably wrong 74. Flying Carpets and Scientific Prayer: Scientific experiments claiming that distant intercessory prayer produces salubrious effects are deeply flawed 75.
Bowling for God: Is religion good for society? Science''s definitive answer: it depends Acknowledgments Index.