Houdini, Bigfoot, and the Jackson Pollock Effect (2012)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , , , , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on Nov 13, 2012. An archived version is available here.

Recently Skeptical Inquirer writer Benjamin Radford posted a question to the Facebook Group thread for Skeptic magazine’s cryptozoology-themed podcast MonsterTalk on the topic of the infamous Patterson-Gimlin film, purported to show a sasquatch striding across a sandbar in the woods. What are we to make, Radford wondered, of claims that the film cannot be duplicated because it would be too expensive, too difficult technically—or perhaps even impossible to recreate due to the anatomical limits of human actors? I responded to say that all such arguments are in my opinion baloney, but that this does not necessarily imply that attempts to recreate the film to the satisfaction of fair viewers actually ever will succeed. Even if the original was a crude hoax accomplished by cheap, simple means (as I suspect) it may still be the case that it can never be matched. Read more

The Memory of Expertise (2011)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on Sep 6, 2011. An archived version is available here.

Llamas! I mean, sheep. I used to know a lot about these critters, back in the 1990s when I took this picture.

I was saddened last weekend to miss Dragon*Con’s Skeptrack in Atlanta—usually a highlight of my year—due to family and professional obligations. I knew months in advance that I wouldn’t be able to go, but there were a number of panels on topics close to my heart (on the scope of skepticism, its history, and its future) in which I would have loved to participate. (Luckily, I was able to watch some of those streaming live, completely for free—something some of you may wish to note for next year.)

But for my family and I, there was a major silver lining: the 144th Saanich Fair! Western Canada’s longest running agricultural fair, the Saanich Fair has been a tradition in my family since—well, since about the 110th Saanich Fair. There’s a special kind of life satisfaction that can only arise when you gaze in wonder upon prize pumpkins and blue ribbon pies. It casts a powerful nostalgic spell. The scents of hay, dust, and manure. The cooing rows of fancy pigeons, each more Darwinian than the last. Teams of draft horses. Supporting the Lions Club through the delicious means of volunteer-sold midway hotdogs. Hearing the screams of teenagers spun, flipped, shaken, and dangled upside down for no good reason. It’s all so familiar and magical—the pleasure of being transported back to childhood (especially now that I have a child of my own to share it with).

But that sense of time travel is an illusion. Which brings me to my topic for today: the fading of expertise. Read more

The Wooliness of Memory (2010)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on April 13, 2010. An archived version is available here.

Jolene leading 1500 sheep. (Photo by Daniel Loxton.)

A very old friend of mine came into town over the Easter weekend. I went to elementary school with Jolene, and much later she was an apprentice shepherd on my crew. After a few seasons she became a Project Manager with a crew and flock of her own. My wife was a shepherd on Joe’s crew, as was our current upstairs neighbor Julie.

We only see Joe once a year or so now, so it’s always a bit of an occasion. We cracked a few beers that evening and it soon became a sheep camp reunion. And, that brought us to a small moment of skeptical reflection. Read more

Farewell to Pyramid Power Promoter Max Toth (2013)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , , , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on Nov 18, 2013. An archived version is available here.

Junior Skeptic 23 cover illustration by Daniel Loxton

Junior Skeptic 23 cover illustration by Daniel Loxton

In an upbeat moment the other day, I tried proposing on Twitter that we might take a moment to try naming some things we like, respect, or even admire about a person, movement, organization, or subject area over on the paranormal / fringe science advocacy end of things. I offered up a few examples of my own. One of the first to come to mind was a conversation I had with 1970s “pyramid power” promoter and bestselling author Max Toth.

I spoke with Toth while I was working on my Junior Skeptic story on pyramid power back in 2005 (Junior Skeptic 23, bound inside Skeptic Vol. 12, No. 2) and found him an unusually friendly and generous source. Toth was happy to share his experiences and insights into a once flourishing for-profit paranormal business—the kind of information available only from insiders, and only if they are willing to share. Toth was entirely willing to share his recollections openly, despite the fact that he claimed to have “no doubts, none whatsoever” regarding the alleged paranormal powers of the cardboard pyramids he manufactured—and despite the fact that he knew I would critique that belief in my article. Read more

Sharon Hill on the Unsettling Truth About Everything You Think You Remember (2013)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on Dec 5, 2013. An archived version is available here.

Doubtful News editor and fellow cryptozoology critic Sharon Hill has a new post up at her Huffington Post: Weird News column on the topic of the fallibility of memory—and on the very serious implications of that fallibility upon eyewitness testimony, whether of Bigfoot, Satantic Ritual Abuse, or regular everyday crime. Most everyone who follows the skeptical literature (or of course the psychological literature) is to some degree aware that memory is fluid, dynamic, creative stuff by its nature. (I’ve written about the fluidity and impermanence of memory myself.) Read more

Hoaxed Bigfoot Bodies Floating at the Disreputable Low End of Bigfootery (2014)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on Jan 7, 2014. An archived version is available here.

Have you heard that Bigfooters finally have the proof we’ve been waiting for? At long last, after half a century of hunting, they have finally gotten their hands on a really seriously genuine Bigfoot body—again! And by astonishing coincidence, this totally completely real Bigfoot body is being offered up to the media by one of the exact same guys who gave us the previous totally real “Georgia Bigfoot” body, way back in the storied yesteryear of 2008. That case was a hoax. As the hoaxers explained, the 2008 “body” was really a costume stuffed with roadkill.

“It’s just a big hoax, a big joke,” said car salesman Rick Dyer. Dyer told Channel 2 he never intended to put it across as the real deal. “It’s bigfoot. Bigfoot doesn’t exist,” he said.

Now that same hoaxer is now back, making headlines with the claim that he shot and killed another Bigfoot. “I’m going to go down in history as the best Bigfoot tracker in the world,” he boasts—and for some reason we’re talking about it. Read more

Is Debating Pseudoscience a Good Idea? Carl Sagan Weighs In (2014)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , , , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on Feb 3, 2014. An archived version is available here.

Tomorrow, as many of you know, Bill Nye “the Science Guy” will take the stage with Answers in Genesis frontman Ken Ham to debate the topic of evolution. For those of you interested, the event may be watched streaming for free, live at 7 PM Eastern on February 4, 2014.

Are such debates a good idea? As you might gather from the many divergent opinions on Nye’s choice, the answer is far from clear. Too much depends upon the circumstances, format, and participants of the “debate.” Also, it is often argued—and I tend to agree with this argument—that there are figures too cynical to be fruitfully engaged in any format. (My initial gut feeling was that Ham may not be a fair-minded opponent, and that this particular debate may not have been a wise decision for Nye for that reason—though Randy Olson has almost brought me around with this thoughtful post.) Read more

The Profound Awfulness of Discovery’s Russian Yeti: The Killer Lives (2014)

Daniel Loxton (Old) Skepticblog, Posts , , , 0 Comment

This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on June 1, 2014. An archived version is available here.

Tonight sees the premiere of a two-hour Discovery Channel Monster Week “documentary,” Russian Yeti: The Killer Lives. With its horror movie trappings, it makes a sensationalist hash out of a genuine historical mystery—the tragic deaths of nine hikers in the Ural mountains in February of 1959. Known as the “Dyatlov Pass incident,” this unsolved cold case has unusual aspects that give it something of an air of the inexplicable, leading to the rise of conspiracy theories and paranormal speculations. Notably, though the bodies of the hikers were eventually recovered by a search party, they were found scattered over a large area in states of partial undress, as though they had fled their tents in the night in a panic. Perhaps, some speculate, they were running from someone—or something? Cue X-Files theme. Read more

Tribal Skepticism? (2012)

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This article was originally published at the defunct Skepticblog.org on Feb 21, 2012. An archived version is available here.

I’ve been enjoying an “Uncorrected Advance Reading Copy” of the upcoming U.S. edition of Mike McRae’s Tribal Science from Prometheus Books, which has once again put me in mind of something I think about often: the considerable bogusness of the conceit of “skeptics” versus “believers.” There is a social subculture that can be called “skepticism” and there is a niche of scholarly activity by the same name, but it’s a mistake to suppose that skeptics and believers are very different sorts of people. The true landscape of skepticism and belief is so complex that I can’t resist summing it up with a wonderful T-shirt slogan from Ben Goldacre: “I think you’ll find it’s a bit more complicated than that.” Bulldozing the complexity of human striving for understanding into tribal “skeptic” and “believer” piles distorts reality, and makes it harder to do the already difficult work of solving mysteries and promoting science literacy. Read more

QAnon Is Just a Warmed Over Witch Panic — and It’s Also Very Dangerous (2020)

Daniel Loxton (Old) eSkeptic / Skeptic.com, Posts , , , , , , , 0 Comment

This article was written in Oct 2020, prior to the conspiracy theory motivated insurrection at the Capitol Building in Washington, DC on January 6, 2021. It was originally published in Skeptic magazine (Vol. 25, No. 4, 2020) and then online at Skeptic.com. An archived version is available here.

As 2020 nears its end and the COVID-19 pandemic continues, a rapidly growing far right conspiracy theory increasingly dominates headlines. QAnon is a crowd-sourced online mythology inspired by cryptic anonymous internet posts appearing since 2017 from an unknown figure (or group) known as “Q” or “Q Clearance Patriot.” It is an expanded successor to the debunked 2016 “Pizzagate” conspiracy theory, which claimed that Hillary Clinton and other prominent Democrats operated a child sex trafficking ring under a Washington, DC pizzeria called Comet Ping Pong. QAnon is also rooted in much older mythologies about sinister secret societies of Satan worshippers, witches, or Jews. Read more