Archive for category Pseudoscience
Dowsing For Danger: ‘Grosvenor Scientific’ Raided
Posted by Marsh in Divination, Pseudoscience, Skepticism on June 9th, 2010
Last night I got a very interesting phone call, just as I was about to rush off to Manchester for the Greater Manchester Skeptics In The Pub talk with Simon ‘Quacklash’ Perry (which was, as expected, brilliant). The call was from a journalist at ITV, regarding the bomb detectors which don’t actually detect bombs, and what I knew about a company called Grosvenor Scientific. The answer, alas, was pretty much zilch, although a quick Google got me the following:
Exporters raided in bomb detector fraud inquiry
Police have raided three companies suspected of selling ineffective bomb detectors to overseas markets, in a case that raises questions of whether Britain has done all it can to curb the much-criticised trade.
City of London police said yesterday that they had raided five properties and planned to interview a number of individuals as part of an expanding investigation into the sale of the hand-held devices, which critics say have endangered lives in Iraq and elsewhere.
The police action was launched after Britain introduced a ban in January on the export of the devices, but applied it only to Iraq and Afghanistan because it said it lacked the power to extend it to countries in which UK and allied forces were not engaged.
The police said they executed five search warrants at premises in Kent, Devon and Nottingham linked to the companies Grosvenor Scientific, Scandec Inc and Global Technical, seizing a large amount of cash and several hundred explosive detection devices and their component parts – Source: Financial Times
Now, Global Technical I had heard of – in fact I wrote about their GT200 back in April. It’s great to see the police taking action, finally. Still, while we’re aware of the actions of ATSC (whose CEO Jim McCormick is still on police bail after his arrest earlier this year over the same charges these new companies now face), and both Scantec and Global Technical are well documented too, Grosvenor Scientific appear to be somewhat off the radar – with very little information to be found on them. Read the rest of this entry »
Druid, Where’s My Car Crash?
Posted by Marsh in Divination, Pseudoscience on May 28th, 2010
The modern world has given us all manner of road safety initiatives, from speed cameras to road bumps, all the way down to that 70s Green Cross Code advert where Alvin Stardust told some girls they’re out of their tiny minds. Look it up on youtube, I’m not even kidding.
Still, having 70s glam rockers with chipmunk names yelling patronising insults at children isn’t the stupidest method employed in an attempt to promote road safety, given that reports from Austria this week suggested that druids have been working with local road safety authorities in an attempt to mitigate the dangers of accident blackspots.
“Austrian authorities say druids have been so successful in dealing with motorway accident blackspots in one area that they plan to extend the project nationwide. As well as using quartz standing stones to restore the area’s ‘natural energy’, the druids have come up with a cheaper modern-day option – burying plastic slates with magnets in the ground.
Arch druid Ilmar Tessmann was called in as a last resort after a high number of fatal accidents were reported on a straight stretch of motorway near Salzburg. He said the crashes were caused by radiation from a nearby mobile phone mast disrupting the area’s normal ‘terrestrial’ radiation. Installing the monoliths has successfully counteracted that, he claimed.”
The Metro reports that the rate of accidents has decreased from 6 per year, to zero in the 2 years since the druids have been applying their magic. Scientists, surprisingly enough, are somewhat skeptical, with a range of questions springing to mind. Read the rest of this entry »
Dowsing For Danger: Is The ADE651 Still On The Market?
Posted by Marsh in Divination, Pseudoscience, Skepticism, science on April 12th, 2010
A little while ago, our good friend and past guest speaker Trystan Swale covered the ADE651 – the so-called bomb detector that didn’t, well, detect bombs. The story had been widely reported, with prominent skeptic Bruce Hood working with the BBC to expose the inefficacy of the devices, culminating in the arrest of ATSC CEO Jim McCormick. James Randi, of course, had long since identified the ADE651 as little more than a dowsing device, having slapped the $1million challenge on the table if McCormick were able to prove him wrong – an offer which was, unsurprisingly, refused.
All this is well-known, and can be found in greater detail elsewhere on the web, so I won’t bore you by re-hashing the details. However, there is something I can add to the story – we here at the MSS were recently contacted by a journalist wanting to know a little more about the device, specifically if it’s still on sale. Always happy to oblige, I got to doing a bit of digging, and having found – unsurprisingly – the ATSC’s website down ‘for repair’ (I can only assume it’s the company’s morals that are undergoing repair), I was kindly pointed in the direction of the online trade outlet ecplaza, and specifically the page for the ATSC ADE 651.
Well, what better way to find out if this disgraced and disproven device is still on sale, than to call up the manufacturers directly? Luckily enough, ecplaza lists the phone number for the sales department of WooBombDetectorsRUs as +44 207 681 2036… which is a number out of service. Presumably, the phone lines are also down for repair. Still, on the page there’s this lovely, shiny, inviting orange box titled ‘Inquire Now’… so I did. Presumably, I thought, if the website is down and the CEO under investigation for fraud, then the email enquiries would either bounce back an auto-reply saying ‘this device is no longer on sale’ (or word to that effect), or it would simply disappear into a black hole.
As it turns out, I was wrong Read the rest of this entry »
Tarots And Tattoos In Tijuana
Posted by Marsh in Pseudoscience on April 7th, 2010
Last week, CBS News posted the following report, which can be filed firmly in the THAT’s The Harm box:
“Police running scared from drug gangs in one of Mexico’s deadliest cities are using bizarre rituals involving animal sacrifice and spirit tattoos to seek protection from raging violence on the U.S. border” – Source: CBS
As the story continues (and it’s worth reading the whole thing), an increasing litany of pseudoscience emerges as being relied-upon by police involved in one of the most dangerous drug wars on the planet, including:
- Tarot card symbols
- Magical protective tattoos
- Animal sacrifices – chicken
- Haitian Voodoo, Cuban Santeria, Mexican Witchcraft
- Priests
- Patron saints (including Jesus Malverde, patron saint of drug traffickers)
- Statues and skulls
- Ritualistic behaviour
- Spirits
- Full moons
What strikes me most about the story is the extremity of the situation – given the grip drug gangs have on the region, and the inevitable supply of funds this affords criminals in their war with the police, the local authorities are understandably up against the wall. Many are forced (often at gunpoint) to switch sides and work for the gangs. Clearly, the honest police are fighting a losing battle, and one with deadly consequences… and so they turn to whichever belief system might offer them a chink of hope.
Psychologists often talk about the habit of the human mind to delve into unscientific, ritualistic behaviour at times of great stress or anxiety. Rarely have I ever seen a case so illustrative of that simple fact. We truly are just pattern-seeking pigeons, it seems.
Pssst! Needle-Free Acupuncture: Reality-Free Bullshit
Posted by Marsh in Acupuncture, Pseudomedicine, Pseudoscience, Quacks, Skepticism on April 6th, 2010
Mind Body Wallet Bullshit Spirit festivals are an endless source of textbook woo – be it past-life regressionists taking people back to prehistoric times, psychics claiming to have been involved in all manner of police investigations, or dowsers explaining that wooden dowsing rods work because wood naturally seeks out water. Come to think of it, I’ve seen all of those things – in the very same room. They really do have to be seen to be believed.
Often, the contents of a MBWBS event tend to vary from the silly, to the deceptive, to the outright ridiculous and offensive – that’s relatively standard fare, really. Sometimes, however, an exhibitor is thrown up that’s simply and utterly dangerous – and it was the charming practitioners from Innersound that filled the role at the last festival I visited. (Listeners to our Skeptics With A K podcast will already know all about Innersound and their needle-free ‘Qi’ therapy).
Before you all dash off to Google Innersound and check out their woo-filled website (don’t worry, I’ll be doing that for you in a bit anyway), let me first explain to you how I came across them initially. Wandering around said MBWBS event, checking out the various stalls, I got chatting to an elderly Korean woman with a massage table. She explained to me that, due to fear in the West over the use of needles, she was giving people the chance to try needle-free acupuncture. Or ‘acu’, you might call it. Obviously, I was intrigued, I was mystified, and above all I was skeptical. “How do you do acupuncture without needles?”, I thought.
“How do you do acupuncture without needles?” I asked her.
“Oh, it’s simple – we use sound vibrations applied along acupressure points, which resonate with the frequencies of our own bodies, so that they interact with the healing centre of our inner core and unlock the healing energy within”, she replied Read the rest of this entry »
Political Astrology: Star Guff In The Huff-Po
Posted by Marsh in Pseudoscience, astrology, cold-reading on March 25th, 2010
As our educated, smart and – I’ll say it! – downright sexy readers are doubtlessly aware, the Huffington Post is a great source of… well… crap. For one thing, there’s Dana Ullman making wild statements about homeopathy, Jenny and Jim trying to kill babies… it’s rarely a tome worthy of a great deal of respect.
However, even I was surprised to see the angle taken by the Huff-Po this week, when I spotted Patricia Martin’s column ‘The Politics of Astrology and the Secret Lives of CEOs‘. In an interview with Astrologer Susan Miller, the article explores the ways in which astrology can play a part in politics and business… and, bizarrely, doesn’t come to the conclusion ‘none’. Quoting the article:
Over slabs of glazed salmon at the Drake Hotel dining room, Ms. Miller and I discussed the astrological year ahead for American politics. Cheerful even when delivering hard news, Ms. Miller offered up the following outlook:
So, lets take a look at what the stars predict for the political year ahead in America -
Healthcare reform will pass, but undergo tweaks and revisions for several months to come.
I think that’s fair to call it a hit. I think it’s also fair to say it’s a hit I could have come up with – the political weight behind the healthcare reform definitely had it in the ‘plausible’ pile, and the opposition to it most certainly had it in the ‘undergo tweaks and revisions’ pile. What’s more, what controversial bill doesn’t get tweaked and revised? Poor hit.
President Obama should not stop with health care reform, she twinkled. “He’s going to be very powerful these next few months and he should use it to his advantage”
Excellent, this is interesting – for one, she’s saying the President of the USA will be powerful. Which is obvious. What’s more, she’s not actually making a prediction there at all – his level of power isn’t quantifiable, for one thing, so nobody can dispute it. On top of that, she’s said he should use it to his advantage, not that he will, or can, or anything definite. So if he doesn’t make the most of it, she can claim that she told him he should have! These kind of predictions of potential (rather than actuality) are classic examples of cold reading, and something to look out for – a good psychic (ie someone who’s good at faking magical powers) will never tell you anything for certain, instead they’ll give you statements about your potential, leaving themselves the exit strategy of the ‘untapped potential’. Add to that the fact that Obama’s potential is to use his power to ‘his advantage’ – an entirely vague outcome – and we can see how lame this ‘prediction’ really is. Read the rest of this entry »
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