James Randi
James Randi
James Randiis a Canadian-American retired stage magician and scientific skeptic who has extensively challenged paranormal and pseudoscientific claims. Randi is the co-founder of Committee for Skeptical Inquiryand the founder of the James Randi Educational Foundation. He began his career as a magician under the stage name, The Amazing Randi, and later chose to devote most of his time to investigating paranormal, occult, and supernatural claims, which he collectively calls "woo-woo". Randi retired from practicing magic aged 60, and from the...
NationalityCanadian
ProfessionMagician
Date of Birth7 August 1928
CityToronto, Canada
CountryCanada
Paranormal phenomena have a habit of going away whenever they are tested under rigorous conditions. This is why the $1,000,000 reward of James Randi, offered to anyone who can demonstrate a paranormal effect under proper scientific controls, is safe.
There exists in society a very special class of persons that I have always referred to as the Believers. These are folks who have chosen to accept a certain religion, philosophy, theory, idea or notion and cling to that belief regardless of any evidence that might, for anyone else, bring it into doubt. They are the ones who encourage and support the fanatics and the frauds of any given age. No amount of evidence, no matter how strong, will bring them any enlightenment. They are the sheep who beg to be fleeced and butchered, and who will battle fiercely to preserve their right to be victimized.
Heroin also makes people feel better, but I wouldn't recommend using heroin.
I questioned her further, and eventually got to talk to her doctor. And her doctor sort of shook his head and he said, I have examined her for throat cancer at least 15 times in the past few years.
Death is the ultimate disappointment
A quick example of that is a woman who said she'd been healed of throat cancer where the faith healer admitted he touched her on the forehead.
The market for nonsense is infinite.
Uri Geller may have psychic powers by means of which he can bend spoons; if so, he appears to be doing it the hard way.
One thing that has made a big comeback just recently is this business of speaking with the dead. To my innocent mind, 'dead' implies incapable of communicating.
The New Age? Its just the old age stuck in a microwave oven for fifteen seconds.
... We in the USA have been depending on prayers, pleading, and self-abasement to a deity to bring us magical advantages, and have been encouraged to attribute our prosperity and general success among nations, to that sort of action. In my opinion, hard work and dedication to logic and reason ought to be recognized as the reasons for our achievements, not appeals to a mythical friend-in-the-sky. We got where we are in spite of, not because of, those incantations.
We owe it to our kids to inform them and train them how to think, not what to think.
No amount of belief makes something a fact.
There was a small boy on crutches. I do not know his name, and I suspect I never will. But I will never forget his face, his smile, his sorrow. He is one of the millions robbed of hope and dignity by charlatans discussed in this book. Wherever and whoever he is, I apologize to him for not having been able to protect him from such an experience. I humbly dedicate this book to him and to the many others who have suffered because the rest of us began caring too late.