It may be the season for vampires, ghosts and zombies. Just remember, they’re not real, warns physicist Costas Efthimiou.
Obviously, you might say.
But Efthimiou, a professor at the University of Central Florida, points to surveys that show American gullibility for the supernatural.
More than 1 in 3 Americans believe houses can be haunted, a 2005 Gallup poll showed. More than 20 percent of Americans believe in witches and that people can communicate with the dead. TV shows such as “Medium” and “Ghost Whisperer” are popular.
University of Maryland physics professor Bob Park, author of the book “Voodoo Science,” said scientists have to keep telling the public what seems all-too-obvious.
“There are things that we need to point out that are crap,” Park said.
And Halloween? Both physicists will suspend disbelief when vampires, ghosts and zombies come to their doors.
“I give them candy and I feign fright,” Park said. “They enjoy it, what the hell. The problem is the ones that never get over it.”
I suppose I needn’t remind folks that — given temporal and secular qualifications — these superstitious dweebs get to vote. So, don’t wonder why I’m a cynic.
As for TV shows, remember “Touched By An Angel” was also popular, and “Highway to Heaven”. That’s just fairly recent stuff.
There was also a news story a couple days ago explaining why vampires couldn’t exist – not for biological reasons, but because of the numbers – if a vampire bites one person per month, and the bitten becomes a vampire, math demonstrates that they would have run out of victims (start date was about 1600 C.E.) long before today, and starved to death.
J/P=?
Yep, and 1 in 3 Americans believe our own government killed 3,000 citizens on September 11, 2001. I don’t care which party they belong to, our country would be better served if these people don’t vote.
Are Americans gullible for the supernatural?
I would hope not, knock on wood.
What an awesome picture – I want that on a t-shirt. 🙂
Google answers all questions, Rob:
http://www.wickedcoolstuff.com/sudedryblt.html
2. That about matched the number of people who think Bush is doing a good job. our country would be better served if these people don’t vote
our country would be better served if these people don’t vote
And by “our”, you mean the collection of narrow minded simpletons like yourself?
7. Yeah thats exactly what I mean [edited].
[edited: see comments guide]
7. xrayspecs, OOPS that only applies if you were responding to my post. If you were responding to number 2. Then I apologize.
Headline:
“Americans Gullible”
End of headline
Of course superstition exist, it has elected Bush and company as superstitious leaders of the worlds only super superstitious power..
Americans who don’t do drugs need an escape via supernatural, because lets face it, reality is scarier.
#9 – Jesus H. Keerist on a stick, with both hands bloody, where do you people dream up this Logic-Free™© humbug??
“It is against the Humanist religion to believe the supernatural exists.”
BZZZT. Wrong-o.
Supernatural = “Beyond or outside of nature”
Religion = belief in ancient ‘supernatural’ horseshit which lacks a single mu meson of evidence to support it, in irrational denial of megatons of evidence against it.
Humanism = Belief in ONLY those things which have supporting evidence, i.e., things that actually exist and can be proven to exist.
Join the millions of brainwashed sheep who have spent billions of man-years attempting vainly & insanely to demonstrate one single thing that exists or has ever existed “outside of nature.”
“After all, its nihilist roots assume there to be none. “
Ahh, I don’t know how to break this to you, but it is logical and correct to assume that any phenomenon which lacks any evidence of existence is virtually certain to not exist. When evidence of said existence is produced, then the assumption is no longer made.
You see, when you make the claim that witches, or angels, or little green men, or God exists, the burden of proof falls upon you, the party making the claim. Perhaps you think that the absolute and total absence of all evidence supporting your claims is just some kind of unfortunate coïncidence.
Sorry to pop your little bubble there.
“…even if you are looking right at it.”
Looking right at what, exactly? If you can look at it, it exists. If it exists, it is, by definition, not supernatural. Conversely, if it is supernatural, you cannot possibly “look at it” – unless you are insane, that is.
“…witches can practice their arts with impunity”
Now it is clear that I am addressing yet another candidate for a straitjacket and a Stelazine drip.
Deluded and/or dishonest people who claim, without evidence, to be “witches,” do exist.
Witches do not exist.
But most relevant to persons with a poor grasp of reality, such as yourself:
Psychiatric treatment to address delusional disorders, DOES exist.
So Diagnoseth The Ghoti
[editor’s note: we removed/edited #9 post — just a plug for his religion website]
not religious by any means, but i do believe i have been haunted by my rabbit george who passed away a couple of years ago. i swear that i see him running arround the house sometimes, my wife too.
Why is your wife running around the house?
my wife is still living, i meant that she sees george too
Oh, poo. There I go, shooting ghosts in a barrel again…
#14, The supernatural is not provable by the scientific method, but by the legal/historical method. Statistical inference with a high confidence factor is necessary for coming to the conclusion. This is true of most of life. Chemistry and physics hypotheses can be proven by the scientific method. Things that can’t be isolated, repeated or verified can’t be.
I have a large number of incidents where I have given people relief from physical and mental problems by praying to the god of Jesus for them and by commanding something to leave them. And they don’t even have to know I am doing so for it to happen. The Z factor is high.
By the way, Humanism is a religion as declared by the U.S. Supreme Court. Google “torcaso watkins”. They defined religion as having a higher object of devotion and a moral code based upon that higher object of devotion. This was the basis of draft dodging by conscientious objectors — freedom of religion. Secular Humanist religion.
I hope this helps you.
19: You are right–the supernatural is not provable, by the scientific method or by any other method. The legal/historical method (whatever that is) can’t prove anything about the supernatural that I can think of.
Your faith healing would have happened whether you prayed or not. “Post hoc ergo propter hoc” is a fallacious argument.
Humanism is not a religion because it doesn’t have any religious tenets or dogma. From Wikipedia:
“Humanism entails a commitment to the search for truth and morality through human means in support of human interests. In focusing on the capacity for self-determination, Humanism rejects transcendental justifications, such as a dependence on faith, the supernatural, or divinely revealed texts. ” No dogma there…
The Supreme Court decision you refer to, made invalid a State of Maryland constitutional requirement of “a declaration of belief in the existence of God” in order for a person to hold “any office of profit or trust in this State” (Wikipedia again). No definition of humanism there…
Come back when you’ve done a bit of research…
Our original ranch house(1887) is haunted. I don’t care what any of you say, YOU weren’t chased by the rocking chair…..I was!!! 🙂
#19 – Sorry, friend, but neither do you win the fire-brick necklace.
Let’s try it one more time: the same faulty reasoning that leads you to believe in something in the total absence of one single particle of evidence is the faulty reasoning that leads you to believe that there is any standard of objective proof other than the scientific method.
What is this crap? “Legal / historical method?” Oh, my stars and little comets.
Only the scientific method addresses issues of fundamental existence, a.k.a. reality. Law is a abstract system of rules addressing human actions and the disposition of human property. It hasn’t the first thing to do with natural laws. The only things that can be proven in law are matters OF law, nothing outside that system, because a law is nothing more than an arbitrary declaration.
History, the study of human accounts of past events and people, is immensely useful to society, just like law, but equally impossible to use to determine the accuracy of objective assertions about the fundamentals of reality.
You really need to get a grip.
You can statistically infer from here to Proxima Centauri and it proves absolutamente nada. A confidence level of 51%, 90% or 99.99999999999% can only be indicative of a fact, not proof. Proof means, and only means, 100% certainty. There is no such thing as “99.9999999999999% factual;” either an assertion is true-to-fact or it isn’t. If an assertion is untestable, then it cannot be proven or disproven. And if it cannot be proven, it cannot be called a fact.
As long as you religious types choose to use scientifically bogus definitions, the premises of your arguments will remain nothing more than unsupported assertions and therefore your arguments will remain not only unproven, but unprovable. And that means that the truth will continue to elude you.
One of the, if not the, most irritating thing about IDers is how they blindly and blithely swallow the preposterously idiotic idea that the scientific method is – or could even BE – anything other than what science says it is.
So Sayeth The Ghoti
If it’s the case that people who believe what they “cannot see” shouldn’t vote, there go all the Bush supporters who think he’s backed by an invisible man in the sky.
so if i shout “Fire” in a theatre..
it’s ok to do so if that is the name of the ghost i saw?