Weird Water and Fuzzy Logic: More Notes of a Fringe Watcher

Features

• Cover Type: Hard Cover with 260 pages
• Published by: Prometheus Books October 1996
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 1573920967
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-1573920964
• Book Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.4 x 1 inches
• Weighs: 1 pounds

From Publishers Weekly
In an adventurous roundup of his Skeptical Inquirer columns as well as book reviews in various magazines and newspapers, Gardner takes a sharp hatchet to faith healers, theists, Norman Vincent Peale's "'feel good' Christianity," Deepak Chopra's claims for Ayurvedic medicine, beliefs in lost sunken continents and in the curative power of ordinary water and magician Doug Henning's immersion in Transcendental Meditation. In his opinionated, outspoken collection, Gardner maintains that an epidemic of "false memory syndrome" is scarring misdirected patients as well as the family members they mistakenly accuse of having sexually molested them in childhood. He charges Joseph Campbell, scholar of myth, with racism, anti-Semitism and narrow-mindedness. He dismisses the New Age bestseller A Course in Miracles (said to have been dictated by Jesus) as a crude rehash of 19th-century spiritualist ideas. Gardner applies his skeptical critical intelligence to Margaret Mead's portrayal of Samoa as a stress-free, sexually liberated Eden; and to E-Prime, a language invented by semanticist Alfred Korzybski that eliminated all forms of the verb "to be."
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Description
At a time when popular knowledge of basic science has sunk to a new low and books promoting angels, parapsychology, and bizarre forms of medicine and healing outnumber sceptical books by more than a thousand to one, we need a voice of sanity. This book introduces readers to mind-wrenching probability paradoxes, recent attacks on the Big Bang Theory, and Marianne Williamson's success promoting "The Course of Miracles", which is said to have been channelled by Jesus. Other columns address E-prime, a language that omits all forms of the verb 'to be'; Norman Vincent Peale's beliefs in the paranormal; repressed memory therapy; science blunders by famous writers; the influence of Transcendental Meditation on the career of Doug Henning; a critique of 'Klingon' and other artificial languages; and much more.

Reader Reviews
Nothing is more fascinating than to follow a lively mind poking about for curiosities. And nobody had a livelier mind than Martin Gardner. The Oklahoma philosopher played with ideas as varied as the background to Lewis Carroll and mathematical games and brain-teasers. Other writers, too, have been interested in "Alice in Wonderland" and in brainteasers. Gardner was a unique national asset because of the effort he expended on cranks. For many years, a main outlet for his inquiries was Skeptical Inquirer magazine, the journal of what used to be the Center for the Scientific Investigation of the Paranormal and is now just PSICOP. Sixteen of his "Notes of a Fringe-Watcher" columns are reprinted in "Weird Water & Fuzzy Logic," along with almost 50 book reviews. He gives most attention to repressed memory therapy and false memory syndrome. The explosion of claims by adults that they were sexually abused as children is called "the greatest scandal of the century in American psychology." Gardner does not deny that there are many case of unreported child sexual abuse -- who would dare? -- but he does contend that these cases are hidden, not forgotten. His book was written well before the revelations of sexual abuse by Roman Catholic priests. What we learned from that tends to confirm Gardner's opinion. Already, he wrote, a vast industry of memory creators was at work. It includes -- it is with us yet -- therapists, most with dubious or non-existent credentials; gullible cops and social workers; and prosecutors run amok. Gardner does not say so, but in some of the worst witchhunts, it seems pretty clear that prosecutors pushing these cases were deranged. What else can explain going to court with cases of horrible physical assaults that children describe, but which leave not a mark on their bodies? The claims of the people who believe these wild tales are not noted for the rigor of their evidence, and the repressed memory people are heavily cross-fertilized with believers in alien abductions and satanic cults, for which evidence is equally lacking. Hundreds of people already have been imprisoned by these witchhunts and more hundreds have had their lives ruined. A lot of what Gardner writes about is more goofy than anything else, but false memory syndrome is another matter altogether. In recommending Lawrence Wright's book "Remembering Satan," which recounts a monstrous Washington case, Gardner states solemnly: "It is a book every American should read. Someday you may be called for jury duty on a repressed-memory case that can result in terrible injustice unless you and your fellow-jurors are adequately informed." Usually, however, Gardner is involved in realms where the looniness is comparatively harmless. These include a famous case in which scads of Ph.D.s in mathematics made fools of themselves over a fairly simple problem in logic, Margaret Mead's humbug in Samoa and a collection of scientific blunders in novels. The blunders are original compilations by Gardner; many of the other columns are simply charmingly retold exposes done by others, such as Derek Freeman's destruction of Mead's reputation. For those who delighted in these pieces in Skeptical Inquirer, the book version is even better, because it includes the responses of the wounded and bellowing pedagogues whom Gardner has skewered. One was set off by his review in Book World magazine of a life of Joseph Campbell, who is revealed as a sap and an anti-Semite. The bellows of the Campbellites were loud indeed. Few of us would ever have heard of Campbell, a shabby pretender, if it had not been for the drumbeating on public television by that ignorant hedge-preacher Billy D. Moyers. Gardner uncharacteristically passes up a chance to heave a harpoon into Moyers' sleek hide. Too bad. That would have generated more letters and more fun.