 I'm also going to have Barb Drescher come in periodically to help me out with some of the areas and she's going to give extra detail on certain subject areas. So let's get started. This is businessman James McCormick. He was found guilty of fraud in May of 2013 for making bomb detectors that he sold to military departments around the world, including Iraq. And it's not clear how many bombs were allowed through checkpoints and exploded, causing casualties. His device consisted of no working electronics and was basically a glorified dousing device. There is no physical mechanism for dousing to work and in many, many scientific tests it has failed but McCormick made millions on these devices. Psychic Sylvia Brown. Psychics like her have been called out repeatedly for wrong predictions. Sylvia Brown just recently for her claim 10 years ago on TV that Amanda Berry was dead. She wasn't dead, yet her mother died thinking that she was. This failure was capitalized on by several media outlets. Hopefully this exposure tarnished her brand and celebrity psychics across the board. So here we are, one to the 21st century and seems we're living in the future but people still put their faith even with life or death consequences into dousing rods a form of magical divination. They still love their psychics and they're buying into conspiracy theories like never before and the internet transmits misinformation across the globe in seconds and there are very good reasons to doubt that. So now is the time to be skeptical. Everyone should be a skeptic, it's not a bad word. It's a mean, it means to pause and think and question. So we're bombarded with these questionable claims every day. It's not that nonsense has not necessarily gotten weirder or loopier. Some of the ideas aren't even new sometimes. They're available every minute of the day. All of the world fed into our eyes and ears via the media and our families and our friends and our colleagues and this is why skepticism is important for you as an individual as a core value for organized and individual activism and in the public sphere. So what I'm here to talk to you about is the basis of skepticism and the basics with special emphasis on the media and what it means to be an effective skeptic and why skepticism is important. So this is a guide for new people who feel drawn to rational thinking and for those who want to learn more about the skeptical view like writers or reporters. So if I could distill this talk into three words I can do it. Evidence, show me. And it sounds overly critical and dull but it's critically important and it makes a difference. The philosophical skepticism is usually characterized as the stance of disbelief or agnosticism about some specific claim. But what I'm advocating is scientific skepticism which is more than a stance. It's a process of evaluating claims usually extraordinary ones using scientific methods and the emphasis is on the evidence. So exposing fake bomb detectors and psychics are just two of the important efforts that organized skepticism networks have spearheaded and James Randi has played a role in both those stories. And it's nice to have some touchdowns for the rational thinking team now and then. We often feel like we're pushing that rock up the hill every day only to have it roll back down and have to do it again tomorrow. So it's that never-ending job to be the counterpoint view regarding scams, shams and fake science. But the sensational, exciting, dramatic stories, they get a lot of attention in the press because we want them to be true. New medical breakthrough cancer treatments, big foot evidence is found, sea monster washes up on shore. They will always get attention. Therefore there should always be a counterpoint. Now I have a clip of one of the world's foremost professional skeptics, Michael Sharmer. It's about two minutes and he's demonstrating a version of the bomb detector Dowsing Rod I mentioned from Jim McCormick, except this one was sold for another purpose. Another kind of detection. Let's look at what he says about skepticism. Hey, I am Michael Sharmer, the director of the Skeptic Society, the publisher of Skeptic Magazine. We investigate claims of the paranormal, pseudoscience and fringe groups and cults and claims of all kinds between. Science and pseudoscience and non-science, junk science, voodoo science, pathological science, bad science, non-science and plain old nonsense. And unless you've been on Mars recently, you know there's a lot of that out there. Some people call us debunkers, which is kind of a negative turn, but let's face it, there's a lot of bunk. And we are like the bunco squads of the police departments out there flushing out. Well, we're sort of like the Ralph Nader's of bad ideas. Trying to replace bad ideas with good ideas. I'll show you an example of a bad idea. I brought this with me, this was given to us by NBC Dateline to test. It's produced by the Quadro Corporation of West Virginia. It's called the Quadro 2000 Douser Rod. This was being sold to high school administrators for $900 a piece. It's a piece of plastic with a radio shack antenna attached to it. You can douse for all sorts of things, but this particular one was built to douse for marijuana in students' lockers. Is you go down the hallway and you see if it tilts toward a particular locker and then you open the locker. So it looks something like this. I'll show you. Well, it has kind of a right-leaning bias, so I'll show you. Well, this is science, so we'll do a controlled experiment. It'll go this way for sure. Sir, you want to empty your pockets, please, sir? So the question was, can it actually find marijuana in students' lockers? And the answer is, if you open enough of them, yes. So now let's get to the word skeptic and the images and association that it conjures up. I wish there was a sexier word, but we don't have a catchy term for effective applied scientific skepticism. And I'd argue it's more about the process than the label. But if you Google skeptic skepticism, you'll find it's described as having a generally questioning attitude. And that's not usually a popular position to take. You can be accused of being impolite by challenging someone or you're being a downer or a balloon buster. You're not open-minded. You're cynical or a contrarian who dismisses everything out of hand. Those are the typical reactions to practicing skepticism. Now, do I look like a grumpy and curmudgeonly old guy? No, skeptics are diverse. We come from many fields, not all of them science, and I have scientific training, but most of my best skeptic friends teach history, rhetoric, English, music, or are technical specialists or engineers or magicians. And I participate in this weekly web show called Virtual Skeptics Parsec Award nominated weekly web show, I'm happy to say. And we're silly, we're irreverent. We just have a bunch of fun every week. We just get together, a group of friends just talking about stuff. And I'm the only oligest in the bunch, but that doesn't matter. We can all apply skepticism to current events we discuss and skepticism can be equally applied to a health claim or consumer product. As it can be applied to a historic claim or regarding linguistics or the truth about a rumor or a legend, which is why diversity of interest and expertise is important. And you would be amazed at the variety of diversity and interests that are there. And the skeptical voice can be found cutting through all kinds of questionable claims like a hot knife through butter, money making schemes, alternative medicine claims, and health treatments, dietary supplements, literary and art hoaxes, and conspiracy theories. Now skeptics are mostly known for their attention to extraordinary claims, the paranormal, supernatural, anomalous claims. And I admit these are my personal favorite topics and they are very popular in the culture. So you'll see these people on TV shows or quoted in written pieces. And it's also moderately acceptable to believe in paranormal claims. And it's getting more common to hear about skeptics being the counterpoint to that view. And they're there to provide a natural explanation or a more plausible explanation for supernatural claims. And I love to talk about the paranormal and lake monsters and anomalous natural phenomenon, like strange lights and sounds, I love that stuff. And I don't dismiss those subjects as silly because I'm not biased about them, but I do apply skepticism as a tool to determine how I should think about them. It would be nice if everyone did that, right? But they see things on TV, it'd be nice if you knew that the stuff you see on TV, it's probably fiction and just enjoy it as fiction. That would be great, I wouldn't need to be here, but that's not what happens. Now I would like to be able to reclaim the name of skeptic from the stereotype of a cynical curmudgeon or downer because I'm a skeptic and I'm not a cynical curmudgeon or downer. I love to talk about this stuff. So here's a short clip of another atypical skeptic, Debbie Borebaches and you can just, you can feel her passion and enthusiasm for what she does. And she's speaking at a science and skepticism conference about her promotion of science programs for girls and the very first thing she says as she's walking away from the podium is cut off, but she says, this is what I live for. I can't say that I'm successful most of the time. In fact, perhaps less than I would want to. But we all have to fight the good fight. And I encourage all of you to use whatever resources you have to inspire young people to think curiously, skeptically about the world, to help them get the tools, not so much the facts, but the tools to discover and to weigh evidence to know that it's not about the fact that apples always fall down from a tree. It's also the fact that if evidence based, we can collect data to show that there's not one single occurrence of an apple falling up from a tree. And so that curiosity, engaging people in waiting, you know, the debates out there in public and really taking it to themselves to not trust authorities and media and governments that are telling them to believe in certain things, but just to suspend their belief. And I think that's all our task. And I hope that you'll join me in creating that atmosphere for young generations around the world. So thank you very much for your attention. The idea of practicing effective skepticism has a long history, because since there have been people, there has been magical thinking and certain individuals trying to pull a fast one on other individuals. And here we have some actual snake oil salesmen. So the skeptical route means that you're thinking, questioning, deciding whether there is any plausibility to their claims. Do I bother investing time, interest or money in it? Who doesn't want to have those tools to be critical of claims? Well, these people don't. They want your money. They don't want you to be critical. So Barb's gonna give us another example of this. And I'll pass that on to her. What I really wanted to talk about in this little section is what I think is the perfect model for a skeptic. And these are not old curmudgeoning, old, you know, white beard men. They're teenagers. And this is what they do, okay? Scooby-Doo and the gang, they hear about a ghost. The ghosts of Merlin, the sorcerer and his evil servant, the Black Knight. Ghost? Ghosts are no ghosts. We're not going anywhere until we find Shaggy's uncle. Then they see a ghost. Then they explain what they saw. See who these two characters really are. But he gets mad at them for revealing the truth, of course. And it's usually because they spoiled somebody's fun. And when I was listening to Sharon talk about why we do what we do, one of the reasons we do what, or the major reason we do what we do is because these things cause harm. If you notice when Scooby-Doo go to the castle or the inn or the cruise ship or whatever, they're usually there because somebody asks for their help because their business is falling off because of the Loch Ness monster, you know, or because something is haunted, nobody wants to visit anymore. Everybody's afraid. So they're somebody who's selling fear for a reason and they come in and solve a mystery. But the other aspect about Scooby-Doo that I like so much is they never say there's no ghosts. There's no such thing as ghosts. In fact, they're terrified of ghosts. And yet they stay there and they try to solve the problem. Okay, so they approach it with let's look at the evidence here and think about what are the plausible explanations for what we're seeing that maybe aren't ghostly or supernatural, but they never say, you know what, you were wrong, you didn't see what you said you saw or what you think you saw. They saw it. There's usually a projector or somebody with a mask on or something. People are seeing what they're seeing. The trick isn't to tell them that they're wrong about what they're seeing. The trick is to get to the bottom of it, to provide an explanation that's alternative to their psychic or something. And you see that when you see a lot of Randy's work. You know, he didn't say Peter Popoff wasn't talking to God because there is no God. He said, look, there's somebody talking to him in his ear. So he uncovered something, some other explanation for what it was. And to them, to me, that's the perfect skeptic or a skeptical activist that we're talking about. So. So let's apply skepticism to everyday things like news stories. I spend part of everyday critically evaluating news stories that have an element of doubt to them. And one subject that is very popular these days is the fear of electromagnetic radiation from Wi-Fi smart meters, cell phones, but also environmental hypersensitivity in general. And this is an all too common story. The story appeared last September in a Texas news outlet. This woman is convinced that modern life has made her sick. She has to breathe pure oxygen. She wraps her books in cellophane because of the volatiles in the ink. She uses aluminum foil to insulate the cable box. And she wears a gas mask when she goes outside of her living quarters, which is in the building that caters to people who claim to have this syndrome. She has big problems, no doubt, but it's probably not environmental hypersensitivity. And the story presented in this outlet was very one sided, showing her as having a difficult life because of this condition, which is true. She can't work. She can't contribute to society. There was one sentence in the whole piece that suggested there was no basis to the claim that people were getting sick from the side effects of their tech environment. One sentence that questioned the extraordinary claim that she was making. Otherwise, it was completely credulous. What else is wrong with this story was that it spreads the idea that this syndrome is a thing. And these things spread through our culture. And stories like this become more commonplace. They become more believable. No one checks the accuracy or validity and it moves around the world. It becomes acceptable to think this way. But social acceptability of claims does not make them true. I mean, remember witchcraft? It's just because everyone believes it doesn't make it true. Slightly different from this very one sided, credulous story is the journalistic effect of false balance, which unintentionally or perhaps intentionally distorts the reader's perspective or on a topic. False balance is where there is an attempt to look objective and the reporter or news source gives equal footing to a poorly supported idea as to the well supported idea with regards to evidence. And not all ideas are worthy of your attention. They aren't all equal. False balance is used most often in stories about climate change and evolution versus creationism in schools and most recently and very damaging vaccines. And in these cases, the false balance coverage has created what is called a manufacturer versa. There is no controversy in the scientific community about climate change or evolution or vaccines. But those who wish to promote their unsupported ideas do a very fine job to appeal to the sense of fairness or academic freedom and create a controversy and subsequently public confusion. A textbook example of a manufacturer versa is the attention that the UK press paid to one study regarding the MMR vaccine and autism back in 1998. And Barb's gonna tell that story. So the story I wanna tell is there's a lot of detail and I'm really just gonna hit the highlights. The things that I think that we agree are important here. What Andrew Wakefield did was not publish a story that showed or a scientific article that suggested that vaccines cause autism. That isn't what happened. And that isn't why the article was eventually retracted either. There was one little sentence in the discussion of an article that was really about gastroenteritis in children with autism. And it was kind of a pilot study because it had a very small sample size to begin with. There were a lot of different measures. So there were a lot of different statistics and conclusions or results to talk about. But there was one little sentence that barely, barely sort of suggested that maybe we want to have some caution when it comes to the MMR. The MMR, if you're not aware, is a multiple vaccine. So it's a vaccine for mumps, measles, and rubella that's given all in one shot. It's very convenient and it's very effective. And it had been at the time. He suggested that maybe we want to be cautious about giving that because of a very possible low statistical connection or link between that and autism. And then he gave a press conference and in that he suggested just a little more. And the media took it from there because they're digging for the piece of information that's going to create this controversy or something that they can talk about. And what they can talk about is, hey, there's a link between this vaccine and autism. Even a link doesn't necessarily mean cause either and yet that's where people take it in our heads because that's how we think. So that created a media storm. The media storm was followed by a whole anti-vaccine movement. Okay, so one little suggestion in one little paper that was actually eventually retracted by 10 of the authors, this was very early in the process because they didn't think that the results suggested that at all. So they simply retracted that part of their discussion. Eventually the article was pulled because as it turns out, there's so much more to the story than just somebody suggesting something in a press conference too. It was very carefully planned. Andrew Wakefield turns out falsified the data. He put children's lives at risk. The recruiting process was not ethical. They coerced kids into participating. He even had, there's some great audio online somewhere you might wanna Google it where you can hear Andrew Wakefield laughing while he's telling a group of parents about how these kids were vomiting and fainting when he took their blood at a birthday party for his son. He gave him $5 and took their blood for a different study. So this is not a man who's actually concerned with kids getting autism. Why did he do it? Well, because he had a vaccine ready to go that he wanted to sell to the public. A vaccine that would replace the measles component. A vaccine that he also, by the way, claimed would be the cure-all for things like inflammatory bowel disease and cure-autism, strangely enough, yeah. But in order to sell his vaccine, he had to unseat. He had to put doubt in people's minds that the MMR was the way to go. In his initial press conference, he suggested spacing out the doses of the vaccines. He didn't suggest not vaccinating your children. He didn't even suggest not giving them the measles or the monster or the rubella vaccine. He suggested spacing them out, which means you can't use the MMR. That was what he wanted to discredit, was that one vaccine. And because he wanted to discredit that one vaccine, we now have things like measles coming back in parts of the world that was nearly eradicated. That's the kind of damage that this sort of claim does. One tiny little claim, and we've had children dying of a disease that should have been eradicated. And we're still fighting back. It's been more than 20 years now. It's been 30 years now, 2025. And we're still fighting back against this fear that people have because of that one tiny little claim. And the scientists didn't jump on this because initially it didn't seem like an issue for scientists. It wasn't a controversy for scientists. Skeptics had to do this work. That's why we have to do this work. And we can't rely on science to take care of everything like this. So you see, skepticism would have helped a lot. The obvious red flag for me, when someone says I'm skeptical, people have actually said I'm skeptical of your skepticism. And I walk away. There's a casual use of the word skeptic. I'm skeptical about this, et cetera. And then there's this particular use that we're talking about here. This specific approach or stance and scientific skepticism is not just sit back and doubt. It's looking for evidence. It's an active effort. And this brings me to the distinction of between skeptics and not skeptics. Or not really skeptics. Climate change, denialists and truthers, the ultimate skeptics. No, it is very important for me to distinguish between positive useful practice of skepticism and the denialists, the climate skeptics and the 9-11 and Sandy Hook truthers. I'm concerned that when most people Google the word skeptic, they come up with those who use the term to mean denial of the accepted evidence-based explanation. And in the case of climate skeptics, they are denying the collective body of science from multiple fields that provide us with converging lines of evidence that point to the best explanation we have at this time. And truthers do a similar thing. Truther is a term that was used initially for those who rejected the accepted explanation for the 9-11 events. And then for every tragic event after that, we've had this similar upwelling of those who distrust the mainstream explanation, which was, again, derived by converging lines of evidence, forensics, physical evidence, in corroboration with the witnesses and the motives. They discard that narrative of evidence for an alternative one of their own making. And truthers who are conspiracy theorists look for anomalies. They seek out the discrepancies and the proponents of these theories will cherry pick or distort the errors or inconsistencies in the story. And those sorts of things are bound to be in any story because humans make mistakes and observations. But they like to say, we're just presenting the facts, we're just raising questions, you know, simple, right? No, it's not that simple. Conspiracy theorists use a very selective method of piecing together disparate bits, exaggerating certain details and just finding the evidence that suits their particular pre-existing narrative. And they've come up with that narrative already and then they're taking the evidence and trying to fit it back in. So it's a bit backwards and sideways. It's not logical, it's not reasonable, but it's common. And people aren't stupid. I mean, these are complex storylines, but the stories have no solid foundation. So let's take a look at an example. And this has been a huge year for conspiracies. It's been the biggest year of conspiracies ever, thanks to the events that fed into each other and social media. And the ability to make and publish your own website and films and it's gotten mainstream press attention. Conspiracy theories are tricky because they are not in false survival. You can't effectively argue against them because that's what they want you to think. And that element of being fooled by hidden agendas is hard to argue against. So here's an example from a website of a professor at Florida Atlantic University who calls himself a media critic and educator, describes his blog as quote, a forum for criticism and commentary on sociopolitical issues and phenomenon overlooked or misreported by the mainstream media. And as part of a blog post that showed victims of the Boston Marathon bombing now missing his legs below the knee, he contends that the actors among all the blood removes the person's prosthetic to make it look like he was horrifically injured. And this is the quote from the website. No, I noted that certain words in yellow because they stuck out to me that he was definitely trying to use emotional aspects to this. What exactly took place on April 15th at the Boston Marathon is unclear. Yet what is now evident is a stark divergence between the narrative description of excessive carnage meted out as a result of the explosive devices and at least a portion of the video and photographic documentation of the bombing itself. The corporate media proceeded in lockstep with dutifully propagating the authorized narrative of a combat-like environment at the Marathon finish line. The jaw-dropping part is that he is doing the outrageous distortion of the evidence, inserting a completely fictional narrative that he imagined. I mean, there are confessions that corroborate the extensive evidence in this case. You can't get much more solid. And his website says that the media distorts things. What he has done, well, I have no words because it's appalling. But you can imagine that presenting the evidence as a counterpoint to this isn't gonna work. And often the best way to counteract this type of arguer is to not publicize them at all. When this comes up in casual conversation, maybe you have friends or relatives who are conspiracy theorists, don't argue with them. It just entrenched their beliefs even more. Reasoning won't work. And this is a complicated social phenomenon. And it just can't be a head-to-head discussion about one of these topics and someone's mind will be changed. It does happen, but it's rare. It's not going to be simple. Conspiratorial thinking is part of a person's worldview and they don't discard their worldview overnight over one discussion. Denialists, conspiracy theorists, they're not doing skepticism. And you can see why I think it's important to make that distinction, for credibility's sake at least. And to note that faced with good evidence to the contrary, the application of skepticism will lead you to a new conclusion based on that evidence. Bring to the world a body of Bigfoot, even a solid scientific peer-reviewed paper and I will change my mind. The conspiratorial minded are too invested in their story to ever change. Their minds are really close to alternatives. So there's another kind of conflation that goes on in the skeptosphere and that's between skeptics and atheists. And I think it's crucial to explain the difference here as well. That skeptic does not automatically equal atheists but there is a great deal of overlap. If you want to apply skepticism to the question of evidence for God, then you're in the realm of atheism. But several of today's atheists have not gotten there through the inquiry route by applying skepticism to their belief, although that's a good idea. And it doesn't happen all that regularly. Atheism is this whole other discourse. It's a whole other thing. So when I'm talking skepticism, I'm almost never talking atheism. But that's just me. Your mileage may vary for you individually but for the public, my opinion is that it's far better to view these areas as separate things, not the same exactly because there are different goals and values of the individuals addressing those issues. So we've talked about what skepticism is and what it isn't. And the important reason why we're here today, why we make the effort to bring this kind of education to the public is because everybody can use these critical thinking skills. Everyone would benefit from a skeptical approach to the many aspects of their life. Much of the work to bring these media issues in public health and education issues to the public is done by grassroots level volunteers and individuals like many people here. And it's because they want and value that rational approach and they find personal importance in it. They want people to apply some skepticism in their daily decision-making to make better choices and not be scammed. And there's no one right way to do skeptical activism and outreach. And you will find people writing blogs, doing websites, podcasts, video casts, interviews, local community activities, films, conferences, comics and art, music, editorials, articles and media stunts. And you can get very creative with this concept of promoting evidence-based critique and inquiry. It could be dramatic, it could be hilarious. And it gets the point across that you should be skeptical about claims in the media. And I love that those approaches are so diverse because the message is then part of the thread of society. Be skeptical, it's a good thing to be. It's a positive approach to understanding the world. It's not negative. You want the best explanation, not just the one that sounds cool and you get results from that. And there are all kinds of public advocates and activists out there. You got the aggressive, the authoritarian, the friendly, the casual, the professional. It does take all kinds, but the counterpoint is almost always lost if you maintain, if you manage to alienate that person right off the bat. If they dislike you, they're probably not gonna take what you say seriously. So I try never to talk down to people. I always talk to them and I have some empathy for why they believe what they believe, even if it's strange to me because we're people first. We all have our own values and opinions about how the world is or should be. And I like to talk to people who believe all sorts of things, weird things even, just because the topic is interesting, but I try to understand what they believe and why they believe these weird things. What's the benefit for them to buy into this idea? And I think it's necessary for a democratic society to have those types of debates and argue, but it's not necessary to be nasty or rude or act superior just because you feel you're correct and everyone that believes nonsense is dumb because that's not the truth. And we have some diversity of volunteers that are out there doing this, our spokespeople. It's a long way to go to bring about more civil discussion in all areas of human interactions everywhere, but I try to do my best. When a journalist or an interviewer wants to talk to me, even a paranormal proponent approaches me from my views on a topic, the last impression I wanna give them is one of the dismissive cynic. I've looked at both sides, pro and con. A lot of us used to believe in a lot of things and have changed our minds along the way, but so I think I could do a decent job at being objective. And I try to be prepared, I try to be fair, and I try to explain things in a non-derogatory way. Now there have always been critics of homeopathy, physics, and snake oil, and there will always be room for counterpoint. We have to speak out with the counterpoint based on evidence that's actually there not emotional ranting and outrage, though that does have its place. I think some of us get outraged about certain topics more than others, and it does come out at times, and it's good, because like I said, we're human, the emotion really does help. So here's the best example of two camps communicating civilly that I found in my readings. And you might wanna look up this story, because it's interesting of how they interacted professionally. This is Professor Ray Hyman and Dr. Charles Onerton. They had a difference of opinion over psychic and spelled experiments. And they ended up going back and forth, but then working together and eventually issuing a joint statement of what they found. Thank goodness there were no blogs back in the 80s because things have gone a different way. But I think this was a great example of them communicating and producing something that everybody could look at and say this was a good example. They may not have gotten the ultimate answer that they wanted, but they'd show that there was some progress made in understanding. So that's my individual way of communicating skepticism is civilly. Now, organizations of critical thinkers can accomplish a lot. And I think one step at a time, small steps, it could take you very, very far. And you can grow that counterpoint view and you can make a difference. And there is a very pressing need for organizing to speak out against bad consumer legislation for one or products that give bogus health claims or some other questionable claim. And one example is the Power Balance Bands and there were several similar products and they spawned this great skeptical activism idea, the placebo band, and Barb's gonna tell us a little bit more about the Power Bands and their knockoffs. I'm not just gonna tell you about it. I'm gonna show you a little bit about what they do. And of course, I'm gonna ask you to try really, really, really hard to set aside your skepticism for a few minutes because you already know I'm gonna say this is snake oil. But try to imagine you didn't hear that. This is a Power Balance bracelet. Power Balance is a brand name. But you will find things like this and sometimes they're silicone, sometimes they're a little more expensive, made of metal. I've even seen plain old Terry cloth wristbands that by a company called Titan. But there's something called iRenew. I mean there's a million different companies selling these things. These things are made in China for a few cents a piece. And somebody had the great idea to claim that the little hologram in it had some special magical powers. Does this sound really familiar? Okay, it should sound familiar because if you're familiar at all with crystals, it's very similar idea. And there's lots of claims about inanimate objects having special powers. But this one's great because it looks cool and it looks space-age and it looks science-y. These things, I told you they're made in China for a few cents a piece, right? They sell for about $30 a piece. This is a $30 piece of jewelry, but it's cheap silicone, okay? And how do they do this? How do they convince people that it has special powers? It's actually an old demonstration that's very, very convincing and I'm gonna do one. Actually I wanna use Sharon first for one quick one and then get a volunteer and I would like Ed if he's willing to because he told me he hadn't heard of power balance before today. So he's the perfect person for this. So let's move the podium out of the way real quick. No, podium's okay, I think I'm gonna move that to the side, we'll be okay. Okay, so let's do a test of flexibility here. What I'd like you to do is stand with your feet together, facing that wall, we'll do it that way and maybe move a little more this way because we can get you in the frame. Okay, now put one arm up like this and the other one straight out to your side. Okay, now I'd like you to pivot this way just at the waist as far as you can go. Okay, now I'm gonna mark this spot right here and I'm gonna put on the magic, yes, don't look. Look at the wall again, look forward. Magic wristband, okay. Okay, now put your arms down. All right, now put your arm out to your side again and do it again. Okay, very, very convincing, right? I'm gonna take this off. No, sorry, don't wanna snap you here. Okay, so let's do a slightly different, thank you, sorry, let's do a slightly different experiment this time with Ed. We're gonna test your strength instead of your flexibility, okay? So I'd like you to face the hammer here. Put your feet together, toes and heels together. Okay, now let's do this one. Let's put your arm out, your hand up like this out so that I can push on it. So all the way out, maybe you wanna turn it the other way. Yeah, there you go, okay. And cup your fingers like this. Okay, keep your eyes at the camera though, don't look at me. All right, now, okay. Now I'm going to put on the magic wristband. And we're gonna see how strong you are. Okay, hopefully the watch won't interfere with the magic frequencies in the band. And it didn't move at all. Amazing. Amazing, isn't it? Now take a look. It's not a power balance band. It has no special properties, thank you, Ed. This is a placebo band, Jareff Orange. Okay. It has a little hologram in it, but it says Jareff. Okay. That's a placebo band. Yeah. So what's going on here? Any guesses? How did Sharon suddenly, suddenly go further? Is it always the second time? It usually is the second time, yeah. Almost every one of these demonstrations, they start by showing that the person has a weakness and then they show them how they're going to fix that weakness. So why is it so important that it's the second time? And Sharon asked if it was always the second time. One, I mean, I already moved, so I'm gonna have a little bit more flexibility that way. Yep, you're gonna have a little more flexibility. You also know what your mark is and you know how far, how much farther you're supposed to go. So there's a little bit of social, what we call in psychology, social contract you're playing along. You know you're supposed to do better. You do better. So what about the situation with Ed though? He didn't move at all that second time. I mean, whoa, was it all surprise? There's a little trick involved. I pulled slightly away from his body the first time and I pulled straight down and sort of a little bit toward his body the second time. Now, what's interesting about this is I've seen people demonstrate this who believe that these things work and they don't even realize that they're pulling in different directions. It's a little like clever hands. And clever hands, if you've never heard of clever hands, was a horse that could count, right? And he could do math. Everybody thought he could, you can see this actually, Google math dogs sometime, this absolutely cracks me up. There's dogs that can count. And they can do, there's one that the owner claimed that he could do calculus. But what's amazing is if the owner leaves the room and if there's no way that the person who's asking the dog what the answer is could know the answer, the dog kid doesn't get it right. Clever hands was counting. And he always got it right because he was taking subtle little cues from his trainer. And his trainer didn't even realize that he was doing it. The slightest little slump of the shoulders when the horse reaches the right answer can give the horse that cue. Our own expectations are very, very powerful things. So even somebody who firmly believes that these things work can do these demonstrations and sell these things to other people. And it's a very, very powerful experiment. It's a very powerful demonstration. It's evidence, it's strong evidence, but it's not new. It's not new. These same tricks were used by chiropractors selling crystals and things like that. It's called applied kinesiology. And there are also, Richard Saunders is in one of the pictures here, has a video where he demonstrates how both of those are used. And I think a third. And I find it absolutely fascinating. But this is a skeptic success story because even though these things are on the market everywhere, if you walk into Sports Shelly, you will find them. They're not doing quite as well as they used to. They aren't. And part of that is because in Australia, the Australian skeptics put a lot of pressure on the company who makes this particular band Power Balance. And Power Balance was actually forced to retract all of their claims and they retracted them here in the US too. And they settled something like $57 million lawsuit here rather than have to give full refunds to absolutely everybody like they did in Australia. So I think this is a success story for skeptics because it was skeptics that got the ball rolling with consumer groups and got them to retract the claims. And now when you go to the Power Balance website, you won't see any claims. It's hilarious. They say it's based on Eastern philosophies but they don't actually say what it will do. They say we have lots of testimonials but we invite you to try it for yourself. The reason these things do still sell somewhat is because of word of mouth in the past. And what we need to do is get out word of mouth and that it's been debunked and that they've had to retract all their claims. Even though Power Balance has declared bankruptcy, they're still making products. So stick around for their next incredible quantum-based product for sale. They're still working at it. So this brings me to the meta part of the discussion. So you might end up thinking that the skepticism thing that I've been talking about is a community with clear boundaries and consistent practices and a single goal. But that's not really how it works. As I pointed out in the beginning, this is a highly diverse group and it's a diverse array of people participating in different ways. And there are those organizations and a few people who are the professional skeptics and they do the organized campaigns and outreach and media interviews and articles and sound bites, et cetera. But there are many good websites to check out and people follow to hear their skeptical take on things. And I try to give those interested in this type of subject a few key places in people to follow. And science-based medicine always and doubtful news, I'm gonna plug my own site, of course. And the three major skeptic orgs in the US and point them to their local groups or good research sites. And the network of people is really important. But we all still act as individuals and the community is very fuzzy at the edges. And I just wanted to point that out for clarification because I don't want people to think that there is this core group and we all move along in the same direction because we don't, we're all very individual free thinkers. So after all that, the whirlwind view of today's modern skepticism, your primary takeaway from this, when you hear something interesting, some claim, some story, your first step is to ask, what is the evidence for this thing? Is that evidence any good? Then if you ask, how do you know you are much better prepared to assess that claim on your own? Now humans are not usually naturally skeptical. But we are very capable of it. And the more you practice, the easier it becomes to think this way and look for the information you need to notice what is missing or what is wrong. So go practice. Get into the habit of thinking this way, ask the claimant, show me the evidence and you are applying good skepticism. So thanks to Barb Drescher, thank you. Questions? Who's got a question? Comments? Wendy. Wendy wins. What is the most effective thing grassroots skeptics can do to to make the public aware of these crazy marketing schemes and... I would suggest contacting reporters with a good story. That's what I would suggest, is getting that out into your local community. I think that lots of reporters are interested in a good story like that, especially towards a product claim and just getting that sort of attention. Or there's been appearances at psychic events that get attention. I mean, that's a stunt, but it works. I think it brings attention, maybe not to the people who are going into the event, but to everybody walking by. I just... Can you just remind her if future questions repeat the questions? I'm sorry. Yeah, Wendy's question was how were the... What's the best way for a local group to get the word out and get attention to what they're doing or to do these claims and so forth? And I just wanted to add that I certainly have no idea how to get the word out, but I know what a good story is. And in particular, it's interesting that you would ask because you're involved with the IAG, the Independent Investigations Group. And a good story isn't, hey, there's this stupid laughable thing that's some ghost claim or something. The good story is we're gonna challenge you. We're gonna challenge what you're doing. Let's find out if this is true. Everybody wants to know what the truth is. Things like the power balance demonstrations, doing a double-blind placebo-controlled experiment using J.R.F. placebo bands would be something that I think that most people would be interested in. I think the media would recognize that, wouldn't you think? I think so, I think. Like I said, they're always looking for a good story. And normally, it's the pro people who are going to them and trying to get publicity for their thing. And they listen to them. So I mean, go out and give the counterpoint view. I think they'd be interested in having that. Pitch it. Give them a good pitch. Be prepared. I said things with visuals are good. So actually showing somebody visuals, doing experiments are very good because then just putting a video up on YouTube, then you have something there that you could pass around to the reporter or to the, and they like to embed those videos and news stories on the web. So that would be an easy thing to do to get that out there. It's not easy to do the videos, but it's an easy way to get mileage off of it. Something else that, something that the, if you're talking about a local news station or something like that, something that they can take ownership of and claim. For example, I was thinking of what Richard Saunders did in Australia was with a station called, or a show called Today Tonight. And the producers took ownership of that. Yes, he's the one that did the experiment, but it was, you know, their camera and their people and all of that. And they can say, hey, we told the truth or we did this test. Any other questions? Yes? What the problem I see is, I think that upstate here is pretty different from what you guys talked about, is the word evidence. We in this room would consider evidence. UFO people have been talking about their evidence for things removed from someone's foot. They call that evidence. So how can we distinguish when we say the word evidence versus what they say? What's like to do with the word skeptic? We have to kind of reclaim that word. How do you say that? Yeah, reclaiming the word evidence. Yeah, there's definitely a difference between what I consider good evidence and what somebody else considers good evidence because of the way I would view it as scientific evidence or just eyewitness testimony. Knowing sort of a tier of evidence that you're looking at. And most people aren't aware of the differences between those types of evidence. And they aren't aware of the fact that anecdotal evidence and eyewitness testimony is so flawed that the paranormal people are really reliant on eyewitness testimony and anecdotes firsthand or third hand. They love that stuff. They rely on it. And they don't understand that it can be flawed because it's coming from people. In fact, the funniest thing I read about evidence from a paranormal group was one website that said, you are the best tool. I'm the worst tool. Because... Maybe they didn't use specifically. No, they meant you as a human being have feelings and senses and you are the best tool in the world to discover what it is in the environment around you. And I thought, wow, you just don't get it. Because that was just the worst thing to say. I'm so glad you asked that question. Because we were talking during the break, actually, about this concept of summing up skepticism as show me. Well, I just showed you with the power balance demonstration. I showed you evidence that power balance improves your flexibility and your strength. So what's the problem there? The problem isn't just evidence. It's also being able to evaluate that evidence in a skeptical manner. What critical thinking actually means, it sounds so negative, critical. But the idea is that you're looking for holes in the explanation. Not that you're discounting the evidence, but that you're trying to explain the evidence. And in explaining the evidence, you wanna look for what's wrong with your explanation, not what's right with it. We were talking about ghost hunters. When they go in, I can't remember what you said. They go in with their temperature gauges and their equipment, and they're gonna be objective and they're gonna find this out. And they're gonna attract the ghosts with crucifixes and religious items. So they're looking for evidence. And if you watch ghost hunter shows, that's what they do. They go in and they measure things and they look for evidence. Their explanation's already there. What they're doing is looking for things to support their explanation, and that's backwards. What they should be doing is looking at what they've seen, what they've heard, all those things that your tool has given you, and look for the explanation that makes the most sense. The explanation that doesn't require you to take leaps into areas of the unknown. And the explanations that, as Ben Radfors has turned the lights on, right? Actually see what it is you're dealing with. So it's not just about evidence, it's also about providing alternative explanations for the evidence. And that's actually, if you look at the history of what Randy has mostly done, is things like debunking Peter Popov. I know I assumed that everybody in the audience had heard about that, but he used to claim to be able to, that God was talking to him and allowed him to heal people, and he knew all sorts of things about people in his audience. And it turns out that he was being told those things by his wife in a little earpiece. And they were able to show that by tuning into the frequency of the earpiece and recording her voice. So they looked for- Things they had poked out beforehand and just be speeding back to him. Things that she had heard them talking about in the audience or that she had talked to them about or that they filled out on their cards. She had their address and she fed that stuff to him through an earpiece. That's, the evidence is that he was able to say things about these people or he knew things about those people that they didn't, that he shouldn't know. That's evidence. What Randy did was show an alternative explanation for that evidence. An alternative to Peter Popov is getting information from God. Does that make sense? Another question? That's kind of related to this one, that, you know, we all have confirmation bias. Yes, we do. About that. So the other people claim that we also go in with they tend to debunk it. And so we are looking, possibly biasing our looking to see the things that are negative against it and not doing the trade. And maybe prove that some people do. I think it is true that we, skeptics do have to be very, very careful that we are not walking in with the idea of debunking things, that we're approaching things open mindedly and looking for those explanations. And there is an issue of what happens when we don't find those explanations or when those explanations aren't more plausible than what somebody else has said. I think there's a danger in that particular when we're talking about things like alternative medicine and things that don't involve the supernatural but claims about the natural world. Sometimes things are a little more complex than a non-expert or even that experts don't have the full information. Does that mean that we leave room for bogus ones? But I don't know, it's a tough road that we, it's a tough line to know where it is all the time. I hear UFO proponents talk and they'll use the skeptics straw man by saying, oh, all you skeptics, you're just gonna say it's swamp gas. What was there like one person at one time who said swamp gas? And it's become the default explanation that skeptics are going to say. That's dumb, nobody says that anymore. But the problem with things like UFOs is because one, we don't have all the full information and we may never be able to get all the information in order to make a decision about what it probably is. And two, it could be so many things. It's the range of things that it could be are huge and getting greater as we have more things up in the sky, radio controlled helium balloons and people actually pulling hoaxes on purpose. And then somebody would ask you, well, how do you explain this? Well, I can't explain this, I wasn't there and you can't give me the information I need to make that decision. So don't put me on the spot for that. But I say, I don't know. I don't have any problem saying I don't know. I think a lot of people do have a problem saying I don't know, but we should get used to saying that because I don't know doesn't mean therefore paranormal. But it also doesn't mean therefore no UFO. Right, it just means the question remains open and I'd rather leave it there than get the wrong answer. Right, one time when I first started attending the IHEG meetings and learning to be a skeptic, well I think I was a natural skeptic but there was a lot to learn. And I was really ready to say, oh well, there's no UFOs, it's never landed. And Brian said, no, no, no, no, no, there's just no evidence yet. There's nothing that anybody could have past presented that can't be explained some other way. There's no metal, there's no piece of metal, there's no, nothing material. What did you say to him? You don't remember? That's another way. That's another way. You're teaching me a lot, you don't admit more. I think what you're saying is that he basically said absence of evidence is not evidence of the absence. That's a sound bite. I'm not exactly what I said. Yeah, that's a sound bite but it's a true sound bite. It also doesn't mean though that you go with the explanation that you like the most either. The best explanation is either to not have one, you know, to leave it there or to come up with the most plausible. Okay, but I think the key here is always to have an open mind is to never walk in with that idea that something simply is not true. Unless then there's the absolutely extraordinary claims that you've all heard that tagline extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Well, there's a reason for that. Yes, we should be open to evidence but as Randy always says, don't be so open-minded to your brain's fallout. If something is so counter to what we know about the world, then it requires much more convincing evidence to change. It should require for, you know, for at least for consensus on something like that. And I think what he said was, he's about to be there when there is convincing evidence. Yeah. I would too. That really is having an open mind, I think. Somebody asked me the other day, well Sharon, haven't you ever had a paranormal or supernatural experience? And I said, I can't recall that that's ever happened. And I can't imagine ever thinking that way because I would always be looking for what it was. You can't ever say that. As a scientist, you can't ever say that all you could say is I don't know. You can't say it is supernatural. You just have to say, I don't know. And so I don't think I could ever have that experience. And then Barb relates her experience to me which is just they end up being freaking coincidences. And I've had freaking coincidences too but I just, oh it's a coincidence, ha ha ha. You know, the odds are crazy. And I'm satisfied with that. And not everybody is satisfied with that. They look for that deeper undertone in life looking for something beyond what's here. And I don't find the need to do that. I don't see myself ever doing that. I think it's more comforting when you have an explanation. You know, when it makes sense, it makes sense. Where our brains are designed, not really, but they have evolved and developed. It's not just evolution, it's also development across the lifespan. It developed to come to conclusions. And so there is a discomfort. There's a amount of discomfort with not having a conclusion especially about specific things. But even more so, there's that pull to accept something when it just makes sense. The story that I told her about was one time when I was laying in bed and I was reading a story and it was very, I used to like horror books. You know, a lot of Stephen King and that sort of thing. And it was really scary and it was all about demonic possession and so forth. And I used to have a stack of LPs, you know, vinyl. Yes, I'm that old. On a record player, you know, we had these things that hold them up and it drops them one at a time and the needle comes over and it starts the next record. And for some reason it dropped four of them at a time. Not the whole stack, but it dropped like four records at a time. And just as I'm getting the scariest part about the devil, Hotel California played. It makes sense that there was some force in doing that. My records never did that before. I never believed in, you know, wholeheartedly in my head because I was a skeptic that there was anything supernatural there, but you got to admit the odds are crazy. It is freaky and it's easy to accept because it makes sense and we want the world to make sense. We desperately want it to make sense. So much so that we fight about it all the time. Any other questions? Cutie. She has it. She is absolutely convinced because Google told her. Oh. Does she break light bulbs all the time? She says she gets my belief, but she, you believe me, right? It's horrible when people don't believe me. The doctors don't believe me. She's getting all her information from the worst blogs and websites they have. So I'm not sure whether to, because I told her all I can, which is that's not how, there's no way you're gonna, I'm trying to tell her, you know, this is scientific, I think she does, but of course she doesn't go for that. She sides with the bloggers who also think they're having. Would you say, is it draws people away from the skeptical science blogs and things and draws them towards? Yeah, so you're saying that a person who believes in something like electromagnetic hypersensitivity or environmental conditions are causing their issue, or even if someone who is committed to go and see a chiropractor or using homeopathy or something like that, trying to dissuade them from those activities is going to be really hard. I don't, I'm not sure, I think it really depends on your relationship, it's going to be very specific with that person what you can do and how far you can push that issue without offending them. I usually let it go. You know a lost cause, when you see it you feel bad, but I often let it go. I've never had that particular situation, but. The only other thing that I could add to that is, I think one of the reasons why people are so drawn to those explanations is because they are explanations and they're answers, that if she could just get rid of the cell phones then the migraines would go away. I think part of the problem is the doctors aren't giving her answers that are satisfactory. The people who have these environmental sensitivities, they don't want to hear, you know, get up off your couch. And even if they did, that doesn't mean that they're going to feel good when they go out and exercise if that's the problem. If doctors don't have the answers and they don't always, they don't always know what's wrong, then it's going to be very difficult. I think that what you can do is plant the seed and you have and eventually when she has done everything that she can to rid herself of the cell phones and she hasn't gotten better, she may find some other explanation or she may eventually accept yours. But, you know, seeds germinate a lot more often than we think, we're not always around to see them. But sometimes if you just plant the seed and you do it gently and you allow them the space to back away gracefully, they do, it just takes time. And sometimes they think it was their own idea. Yeah. That was actually a great topic and something we've all but it's dealing with skepticism on a global level. It's going to affect your friendship. I mean, if it's really bothering you that you're doing this, how do you guys think you're doing this? Drawing the line on personal skepticism. Boy, you know, in my daily life, not many people know what I do. Really? Yeah, they don't. They know that I know a lot about big foot monsters. But they, I don't go around proselytizing skepticism. If the thing, if the topic comes up, I'll be like, you know, that's really kind of a questionable claim. There's some dispute about that. Maybe you'd want to check out this. I read something about that, you know, just sort of push them into that general direction. If they really don't want to go there, they're not going to go there and nothing I could say can get them there. But I don't think pressing stuff on them is the answer. I don't think that works really well. No, no, no, I agree. I mean, in my personal life, I've tried to provide good information to people that I know are leaning one way or the other. But if they're completely and utterly convinced of something, there's not much that you can do, except try to avoid the topic to not ruin your relationships. John, are you just waving or did you have a question? I have a question, actually, yeah. Because hi. Hi, I was wondering, where do you guys draw the line as far as dismissing false claims? And when I say that, I mean, I see a lot of adults in this room who are willing to, out of hand, say there's no such thing as Santa Claus, there's no such thing as leprechauns, yet for something like ghosts and blipfoot, where there's also no evidence whatsoever, whoa, we don't know yet. We don't know one way or the other. Well, there's evidence, there's just bad evidence. Yeah, well, yes, you definitely, there's a difference there. There's more evidence for Santa Claus, he's on the news, we track him, we don't see him, the cookies are eaten. I mean, there's way more evidence for Santa Claus. I would actually say that it's not our job to dismiss claims. I am saying that. Period. It's, oh, we have Santa Claus in the audience. See? You're wrong. I don't think it's our job to dismiss claims. I think it's our job to provide alternative explanations for the evidence and allow people to critically think for themselves, because when they own that conclusion, they own it. When people come to a conclusion themselves, it's hard to unseat them. It really is. Especially in a public sphere, and privately that's something else. I mean, I'm not afraid of, I don't know how family friendly we are, but of telling a friend that what they're saying is bull. But when it comes to activism and when it comes to the public, I think that it's our job to provide alternative explanations for evidence and to examine evidence and to teach critical thinking and scientific thought and to analyze research and things like that, whatever our expertise is. But you'll notice in science, scientific studies, every discussion ends with more research as needed. Every single one of them. Isn't that required? It is pretty much required to end your paper because if we knew everything, it would stop, right? That's what science does. They say this is what's likely. We don't say this is what's true because that word truth is so loaded with problems. It just is. One thing I wanted to touch on with what you said, comparing Santa Claus and those ideas with ghosts and UFOs and things like that. You're talking about a specific thing, a character, a person and a phenomenon, whereas where I think they go wrong is you're trying to answer the question about what, if anything, happened here and then make it accountable to a thing, a phenomenon, a person, whatever, instead of saying does this person exist? So do ghosts exist? I can't stand that question because what is a ghost? She can't even, we can't even- There's no scientific consensus about whether or not ghosts exist. We can't even define the thing because it's changed over the centuries on what a ghost is. And it's still today, everyone's got a different idea of what ghosts can be. So you're talking about actually what happened in this situation. You're trying to explain not that ghosts exist. So I think people are still having experiences. It sure would be nice to know the explanation for their experiences. They think it's ghosts, I have another idea and it's complicated. Just like it would be nice for your friend to be able to explain her migraine so that she can treat them. And she's looking for that explanation. So I think providing the alternative is much better. You can't do that because you're not a doctor. All you can really do is explain what's wrong with the explanation that she found or maybe guide them to that other piece of evidence. Well, why don't you try yoga or why don't you try meditation or something like that? Whatever the doctor said. Yes. How do we get the general public to be more knowledgeable about probability? So things like your probability. She doesn't want to touch that one. Beginner statistics and that's it. That's pretty tough stuff though, it is. You don't need t-tests and all that but just need them to understand that for the rule of the size of the chances are pretty good that two of us have the same birthday. We just want doctors to stop neglecting base rates, right? Yeah. Do you ever face the question? Oh, I'm sorry. She asked how we could get the public to understand probability a little better. That's a tough one. I mean, psychologists have been working on that for years. There are some psychologists who still believe that we are constantly calculating probabilities in our head and I think that's not quite right. We do in a sense but we don't do it in the sense that we're calculating probabilities. Part of one of the efforts that Wendy and the audience here and Brian have started as a website called The Odds Must Be Crazy. That's why we're always laughing when we talk about the odds being crazy and that I think has helped. Talking about these stories like my Satanic record story, record player. No, I didn't throw out the record player by the way. But many of the people from the general public access have said sorry. What happened was it started out as, well, the story's too long. It became a very well known podcast and so it's global. And since we know that people have these experiences and enjoy them and make up stories about them and everyone has coincident stories, we think that it's spread to people outside of the skepticism community. Wendy is saying that this website has become part of a podcast, Skepticality. So it's a little. Non-skeptical podcast. No, it's actually a skeptical podcast as one of the first Skepticality but it was initially, when it initially started, it was really more the general public, I think, that knew about it. But now that it's becoming more well known within the skeptic community, I think it's being spread all over the place. So it doesn't look like a skeptical website. It really doesn't. And yet you've got all the players involved in it or somehow involved in skeptical activism in other ways. So I think the audience for the website is probably vast and wide. It includes a lot of the skeptic community but also a lot of the general community, wouldn't you say? Yeah, because we get mentioned something. It's the hashtag. It comes back and my other partner, Jared, who is in the room right now, he knows how to figure that out and where they're coming from has nothing to do with skepticism. Yeah, I'm wondering if people accidentally, or they use the hashtag the odds must be crazy and not even realize that they're getting somebody's attention. That one's website called the odds must be crazy, Brian. If you ever figure out how to increase people's knowledge there's a couple guys in Vegas who have shallow grave. Ah! You know there's actually a lot of popular books on the topic that I think are good. I like Joel Best, myself, Damolized and Statistics. There's kind of an old one, but he talks about how statistics is misused a lot. And the discussion looks on more Damolized and statistics. Yes, more. The drunkard's walk. Yeah, drunkard's walk is a good one. You specifically created Las Vegas in the desert. Yes, there's a whole city just built on that. The funny, if you want to know the funniest thing though, statisticians love to gamble. Every statistician I know likes to gamble, including myself. We're just very, very conservative gamblers. That one. The second thing is related to that is people don't understand risk. Yeah, it's true. I mean, that's also statistics. They are much, what was the word that Dr. Hamlin used? He used to convert the vividness, I think. You're right. That people see things like, you know, somebody was in a coma for six years and woke up. And so now they're going to say, I can't turn off my life support because they might. Yeah, I think it's just education, honestly. And there's effort after effort after effort. It's just a tough nut to crack. It's really hard. Probability is such a difficult thing for people to wrap their brains around. When I taught statistics, I would find that my students would learn how to calculate probabilities so well. And they were so good at it. And the second I interjected anything, I put it in a real world context, like I changed it from colored marbles to M&Ms. That's all I had to do. And they bombed at it. Well, is there one more kind of a problem-raising issue of secondary claims? Yes. I wonder how each of you would explain the concept. How do you explain the concept to people and the importance of it to skepticism? Well, I can only really answer the way I used to teach that because I would teach that little sound bite to try to get my students kind of in green and skeptical before they even start with research methods. And the way that I define extraordinary, I think is pretty much in line with the way that Carl Sagan meant it. And that is anything that grossly contradicts what we currently understand about the world, about the way the world works. So an extraordinary claim is anything that is supernatural, anything that not just something that we can't explain, but something that literally defies the way the world, our current scientific understanding of the way the world works. I mean, really defies it. It seems to me that one of the big challenges is that many people don't know what extraordinary it is. Yeah, I'd agree. And then the previous question. Yeah, I'd agree. And I think that's our biggest challenge is trying to understand where people are coming from rather than because if we can start with an understanding of where they're coming from, that to them, this is good evidence. And to them, this is not so out there. Then we have a better chance of reaching them through the side rather than head on. It's amazing when you talk to paranormal people, how they're convinced that this one or two stories through this body of second or third hand evidence is enough to overturn all the biology and physics. And it's like, come on, if I got to throw away all these textbooks, I think you might be wrong, because that would be a paradigm shift and that would be pretty extreme. And yeah, it happens, but not that often. Not everyone is a Galileo. So you're probably wrong, then. Probably, yeah, probably. So with that, thank you.