Professional pseudo-skeptic, amateur magician, mathematician and prolific writer Martin Gardner, died on May 22, 2010.
Long before organized pseudo-skepticism were formally founded by materialist philosopher and atheist Paul Kurtz in the 70's, Gardner was a leading exponent of pseudo-skepticism and debunking with his pseudo-skeptical book Fad and Fallacies in the Name of Science, published in 1950. (This book was followed by many others of the same or similar kind) So, we can consider Gardner as the real founding father of the contemporary organized pseudo-skepticism.
Personally, I liked Gardner's books on mathematics and even some of his pseudo-skeptical books are funny and informative.
What characterized Gardner's books on pseudo-skepticism were his erudition, sense of humor (which Gardner used in an ad hominem way), arrogance, lawyerly prose and clear anti-paranormal bias. One of his main strategies on debunking was making bold, extremely confident and unsupported assertions and claims, which were useful to misguide and confuse näive, ignorant or biased readers (specially, materialistic atheists, whose anti-paranormal wishful thinking and typical epistemic/intellectual/cognitive malfunctiong made them extremely credulous and uncritical of Gardner's anti-paranormal falsehoods, misrepresentations and rhetoric)
For example, in his philosophical book of 1983, Gardner wrote:
How can the public know that for fifty years skeptical psychologists have been trying their best to replicate classic psi experiments, and with notable unsuccess? It is this fact more than any other that has led to parapsychology's perpetual stagnation. Positive evidence keeps coming from a tiny group of enthusiasts, while negative evidence keeps coming from a much larger group of skeptics
Commenting on Gardner's above assertions, professional parapsychologist Charles Honorton wrote in his classic paper "Rhetoric over Substance":
Gardner does not attempt to document this assertion, nor could he. It is pure fiction. Look for the skeptics' experiments and see what you find. (To his credit, Gardner did get one thing right: half a century is a more accurate time-frame than 100, 130, or 150 years.) The lack of research by critics serves to perpetuate the psi controversy by enabling them to shift continually from one line of criticism to another as each is successively answered through new research conducted by parapsychologists.
Gardner's above text is a fine example of his misleading pseudo-skeptical rhetoric.
Note, by the way, that even if Gardner were right about the "skeptical parapsychologists" failing to replicate psi, he never questioned if such supposed failing was due to the skeptic's own bias. Why should the bias, and its impact on the experimental results, run only in the direction of "enthusiasts" of psi? Is it implausible to think that a strong bias against the existence of psi can explain why the (imaginary) "skeptical psychologists" eager to research psi have failed to replicate psi experiments?
At least, one prominent skeptical psychologist, Donald Hebb, has conceded that 1)The evidence provided by Rhine for ESP is scientifically sufficient to convince us of any other issue; and 2) that his (Hebb) own rejection of that evidence is based on subjective opinion and personal prejudice: Why do we not accept ESP as a psychological fact? Rhine has offered enough evidence to have convinced us on almost any other issue... Personally, I do not accept ESP for a moment, because it does not make sense. My external criteria, both of physics and of physiology, say that ESP is not a fact despite the behavioral evidence that has been reported. I cannot see what other basis my colleagues have for rejecting it... Rhine may still turn out to be right, improbable as I think that is, and my own rejection of his view is - in the literal sense - prejudice (Quoted in Chris Carter's book Parapsychology and the Skeptics. Emphasis in blue added)
So Gardner favoring of the credibility of the results by the "skeptical psychologists" over the "tiny group of enthusiasts" (non-skeptical psychologists?) seems to be an arbitrary double standard to evaluate the scientific replication of psi and ESP evidence, and favors only the pseudo-skeptical (anti-ESP) position.
Like many other pseudo-skeptics, Gardner was also well known by his dogmatism. In the book "The New Inquisition", Robert Anton Wilson commented: "Mr. Gardner has an infallible method of recognizing real science and of recognizing pseudo-science. Real science is what agrees with his Idol and pseudo-science is what challenges that Idol. Colin Wilson has written, 'I wish I could be as sure of anything as Martin Gardner is of everything. Not all the Popes of the 20th Century collectively have dared to issue as many absolute dogmas as Mr. Gardner." (p.39)
What's interesting is that Gardner's pseudo-skepticism wasn't actually inspired by the ideologies of metaphysical naturalism and materialism. Rather, it was another ideology: the fundamentalist religious belief that scientific testing and research of supernatural and paranormal phenomena (like praying or healing at distance) is blasphemous. In his philosophical book "The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener" of 1983, Gardner wrote:
As for empirical tests of the power of God to answer prayer, I am among those theists who, in the spirit of Jesus’ remark that only the faithless look for signs, consider such tests both futile and blasphemous . . . Let us not tempt God. (p. 239).
So, Gardner's opposition to research these phenomena was not based on the assumed non-existence of them, but in the religious assumption that such research (according to Gardner) is a kind of offense to God. (Note that contrast with all the other professional pseudo-skeptics, like Randi, Shermer, Hyman, infidels writers, etc. whose hyper-criticism and debunking of psi research is grounded in the dogmas of metaphysical naturalism and materialism, which entail the non-existence of supernatural and paranormal phenomena and therefore the obvious relevance of such phenomena as evidence against the naturalist ideology/worldview.)
Whatever is your opinion about Gardner, one fact remains: he was one of the most important writers on pseudo-skepticism in the 20th Century, and any researcher of the organized pseudo-skeptical movement should to get familiar with Gardner's pseudo-skeptical literature, in order to know the best anti-paranormal rhetoric ever written.
Links of interest:
-Some notes on organized pseudo-skepticism
-George Hansen's overview of organized pseudo-skepticism.
-Geroge Hansen's recent post on Gardner.
-Section on Martin Gardner of the book The Trickster and the Paranormal by George Hansen.
-James DeMeo's critique of Martin Gardner's attack on Wilhem Reich's research.
Long before organized pseudo-skepticism were formally founded by materialist philosopher and atheist Paul Kurtz in the 70's, Gardner was a leading exponent of pseudo-skepticism and debunking with his pseudo-skeptical book Fad and Fallacies in the Name of Science, published in 1950. (This book was followed by many others of the same or similar kind) So, we can consider Gardner as the real founding father of the contemporary organized pseudo-skepticism.
Personally, I liked Gardner's books on mathematics and even some of his pseudo-skeptical books are funny and informative.
What characterized Gardner's books on pseudo-skepticism were his erudition, sense of humor (which Gardner used in an ad hominem way), arrogance, lawyerly prose and clear anti-paranormal bias. One of his main strategies on debunking was making bold, extremely confident and unsupported assertions and claims, which were useful to misguide and confuse näive, ignorant or biased readers (specially, materialistic atheists, whose anti-paranormal wishful thinking and typical epistemic/intellectual/cognitive malfunctiong made them extremely credulous and uncritical of Gardner's anti-paranormal falsehoods, misrepresentations and rhetoric)
For example, in his philosophical book of 1983, Gardner wrote:
How can the public know that for fifty years skeptical psychologists have been trying their best to replicate classic psi experiments, and with notable unsuccess? It is this fact more than any other that has led to parapsychology's perpetual stagnation. Positive evidence keeps coming from a tiny group of enthusiasts, while negative evidence keeps coming from a much larger group of skeptics
Commenting on Gardner's above assertions, professional parapsychologist Charles Honorton wrote in his classic paper "Rhetoric over Substance":
Gardner does not attempt to document this assertion, nor could he. It is pure fiction. Look for the skeptics' experiments and see what you find. (To his credit, Gardner did get one thing right: half a century is a more accurate time-frame than 100, 130, or 150 years.) The lack of research by critics serves to perpetuate the psi controversy by enabling them to shift continually from one line of criticism to another as each is successively answered through new research conducted by parapsychologists.
Gardner's above text is a fine example of his misleading pseudo-skeptical rhetoric.
Note, by the way, that even if Gardner were right about the "skeptical parapsychologists" failing to replicate psi, he never questioned if such supposed failing was due to the skeptic's own bias. Why should the bias, and its impact on the experimental results, run only in the direction of "enthusiasts" of psi? Is it implausible to think that a strong bias against the existence of psi can explain why the (imaginary) "skeptical psychologists" eager to research psi have failed to replicate psi experiments?
At least, one prominent skeptical psychologist, Donald Hebb, has conceded that 1)The evidence provided by Rhine for ESP is scientifically sufficient to convince us of any other issue; and 2) that his (Hebb) own rejection of that evidence is based on subjective opinion and personal prejudice: Why do we not accept ESP as a psychological fact? Rhine has offered enough evidence to have convinced us on almost any other issue... Personally, I do not accept ESP for a moment, because it does not make sense. My external criteria, both of physics and of physiology, say that ESP is not a fact despite the behavioral evidence that has been reported. I cannot see what other basis my colleagues have for rejecting it... Rhine may still turn out to be right, improbable as I think that is, and my own rejection of his view is - in the literal sense - prejudice (Quoted in Chris Carter's book Parapsychology and the Skeptics. Emphasis in blue added)
So Gardner favoring of the credibility of the results by the "skeptical psychologists" over the "tiny group of enthusiasts" (non-skeptical psychologists?) seems to be an arbitrary double standard to evaluate the scientific replication of psi and ESP evidence, and favors only the pseudo-skeptical (anti-ESP) position.
Like many other pseudo-skeptics, Gardner was also well known by his dogmatism. In the book "The New Inquisition", Robert Anton Wilson commented: "Mr. Gardner has an infallible method of recognizing real science and of recognizing pseudo-science. Real science is what agrees with his Idol and pseudo-science is what challenges that Idol. Colin Wilson has written, 'I wish I could be as sure of anything as Martin Gardner is of everything. Not all the Popes of the 20th Century collectively have dared to issue as many absolute dogmas as Mr. Gardner." (p.39)
What's interesting is that Gardner's pseudo-skepticism wasn't actually inspired by the ideologies of metaphysical naturalism and materialism. Rather, it was another ideology: the fundamentalist religious belief that scientific testing and research of supernatural and paranormal phenomena (like praying or healing at distance) is blasphemous. In his philosophical book "The Whys of a Philosophical Scrivener" of 1983, Gardner wrote:
As for empirical tests of the power of God to answer prayer, I am among those theists who, in the spirit of Jesus’ remark that only the faithless look for signs, consider such tests both futile and blasphemous . . . Let us not tempt God. (p. 239).
So, Gardner's opposition to research these phenomena was not based on the assumed non-existence of them, but in the religious assumption that such research (according to Gardner) is a kind of offense to God. (Note that contrast with all the other professional pseudo-skeptics, like Randi, Shermer, Hyman, infidels writers, etc. whose hyper-criticism and debunking of psi research is grounded in the dogmas of metaphysical naturalism and materialism, which entail the non-existence of supernatural and paranormal phenomena and therefore the obvious relevance of such phenomena as evidence against the naturalist ideology/worldview.)
Whatever is your opinion about Gardner, one fact remains: he was one of the most important writers on pseudo-skepticism in the 20th Century, and any researcher of the organized pseudo-skeptical movement should to get familiar with Gardner's pseudo-skeptical literature, in order to know the best anti-paranormal rhetoric ever written.
Links of interest:
-Some notes on organized pseudo-skepticism
-George Hansen's overview of organized pseudo-skepticism.
-Geroge Hansen's recent post on Gardner.
-Section on Martin Gardner of the book The Trickster and the Paranormal by George Hansen.
-James DeMeo's critique of Martin Gardner's attack on Wilhem Reich's research.
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