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Post #1 Title - Paranormal and Pseudoscience Assignment 1

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Post #1 Title - Paranormal and Pseudoscience Assignment 1

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by Hannah Ireland, working individually

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Definition
Appeal to Authority - an assertion deemed true because of the position or authority of the person who is asserting it. ex.) someone wearing a lab coat, endorsements from celebrities

Connection
In the photo shown below Jennifer Aniston is seen endorsing Smart water. Smart water hasn’t been proved to make you smarter or to be any more healthy than regular bottled water, but when it is endorsed by a celebrity people are more likely to buy the product.

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Definition
Red Herring - irrelevant information that distracts without addressing facts. This is done by misleading the topic of conversation to another topic to distract from the actual issue at hand.

Connection
This video of the TV show Family Guy is an example of the Red herring red flag because it shows Mayor West avoiding the question being asked by leading the conversation into something way off topic. Brian then gives Lois advice by telling her to give short simple answers where she talks about irrelevant topics.

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Definition
Ancient Wisdom - beliefs that have been passed down from ancestors which are seen as better than our modern way of living

Connection
There were many people who said that the world was going to end on December 21st 2012 because they believed that was the last day according to the Mayan Calendar. It was said a planet called Nibiru was going to collide with Earth and that would be the end. In the below article they say the Mayan prophecy was a "misconception from the very beginning."

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Dec. 21, 2012, wasn't the end of the world, and here's why.

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Definition
Confirmation Bias - the tendency to remember events that coincide with beliefs, and ignore or forget those that don’t

Connection
In 2011 there was a widespread rumour that Barack Obama wasn't born in the United States. A photo of his birth certificate was released to prove he was born in the country but there were still skeptics. The state of Hawaii had to release a statement saying the document was authentic.

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Barack Obama's birth certificate is a forgery. See Example( s )

EXAMPLES

Collected via e-mail, June 2008

I read that Obama will not release his birth certificate. Have heard rumors it's because he is listed as white. Or that because he isn't a U.S. born citizen.

In April 2011, President Barack Obama sought to put end to rumors claiming that he was not a natural-born citizen of the United States by obtaining and releasing a copy of his long form birth certificate issued by the state of Hawaii. Officials from that state certified that the copy of the certificate they provided to President Obama was authentic:

The Hawaii State Health Department recently complied with a request by President Barack Obama for certified copies of his original Certificate of Live Birth, which is sometimes referred to in the media as a "long form" birth certificate.

"We hope that issuing certified copies of the original Certificate of Live Birth to President Obama will end the numerous inquiries related to his birth in Hawaii," Hawaii Health Director Loretta Fuddy said. "I have seen the original records filed at the Department of Health and attest to the authenticity of the certified copies the department provided to the President that further prove the fact that he was born in Hawaii."

On April 25, 2011, pursuant to President Obama's request, Director Fuddy personally witnessed the copying of the original Certificate of Live Birth and attested to the authenticity of the two copies. Dr. Alvin Onaka, the State Registrar, certified the
copies.

As they had with the Certification of Live Birth made public by the Obama campaign in June 2008, birthers immediately claimed that the long form birth certificate was also a forgery. The primary arguments advanced to demonstrate that the certificate was forged were claims that some textual elements of the certificate were anachronistic, and that the existence of layers found when the PDF file was opened with Adobe Illustrator proved that it had been altered. All of these arguments are erroneous.
The claims of anachronism stemmed from three elements in the certificate:

1. Back in 1961 people of color were called 'Negroes.' So how can the Obama 'birth certificate' state he is 'African-American' when the term wasn't even used at that time?

2. The birth certificate that the White House released lists Obama's birth as August 4, 1961. It also lists Barack Hussein Obama as his father. No big deal, right? At the time of Obama's birth, it also shows that his father is aged 25 years old, and that Obama's father was born in "Kenya, East Africa". This wouldn't seem like anything of concern, except the fact that Kenya did not even exist until 1963, two whole
years after Obama's birth, and 27 years after his father's birth. How could Obama's father have been born in a country that did not yet exist? Up and until Kenya was formed in 1963, it was known as the "British East Africa Protectorate".

3. On the birth certificate released by the White House, the listed place of birth is "Kapiolani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital". This cannot be, because the hospital(s) in question in 1961 were called "Kaui Keolani Children's Hospital" and "Kapi'olani Maternity Home", respectively. The name did not change to Kapi'olani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital until 1978, when these two hospitals merged. How can this particular name of the hospital be on a birth certificate dated 1961 if this name had not yet been applied to it until 1978?

Claims that these elements are anachronistic to 1961 (the year of Barack Obama's birth) are incorrect:

As for the argument that opening the birth certificate's PDF file in Adobe Illustrator reveals the presence of multiple layers, which proves that the image was altered, that claim was debunked by an Adobe-certified expert:

It didn't take long for some of President Obama's doubters to claim the long-awaited birth certificate posted online by the White House had been altered or might be a fake.The doubters have latched onto the idea that Adobe Illustrator - the premier program for computer graphic artists - "reveals" evidence of document manipulation in the Obama birth certificate. They note Illustrator reveals nine separate layers of the document, and claim it's "proof" the file has been altered.

But that's not so, says Jean-Claude Tremblay, a leading software trainer and Adobe-certified expert, who has years of experience working with and teaching Adobe Illustrator.

He said the layers cited by doubters are evidence of the use of common, off-the-shelf scanning software - not evidence of a forgery. "I have seen a lot of illustrator documents that come from photos and contain those kind of clippings - and it looks exactly like this," he said.

Tremblay explained that the scanner optical character recognition (OCR) software attempts to translate characters or words in a photograph into text. He said the layers cited by the doubters shows that software at work - and nothing more.

"When you open it in Illustrator it looks like layers, but it doesn't look like someone built it from scratch. If someone made a fake it wouldn't look like this," he said. "Some scanning software is trying to separate the background and the text and splitting element into layers and parts of layers."

Tremblay also said that during the scanning process, instances where the software was unable to separate text fully from background led to the creation of a separate layer within the document. This could be places where a signature runs over the line of background, or typed characters touch the internal border of the document.

"I know that you can scan a document from a scanner [and] most of the time it will appear as one piece, but that doesn't mean that there's no software that's doing this kind of stuff," he said, adding that it's really quite common.

John Woodman, author of Is Barack Obama's Birth Certificate a Fraud?: A Computer Guy Examines The Evidence for Forgery, also debunked the "layers" argument in a series of videos:

The March "Cold Case Posse" investigation of Barack Obama's birth certificate conducted by Arizona sheriff Joe Arpaio produced no new evidence demonstrating that document to be a forgery; that entity's report by Mara Zebest simply recycled old arguments that had long since been thoroughly debunked in detail. Likewise, a July 2012 announcement from Sheriff Arpaio repeated more rumors that had already been debunked.
Got a tip or a rumor? Contact us here.

Snopes Delivered to Your Inbox:

Hinkelman, Michael. "Judge Rejects Montco Lawyer's Bid to Have Obama Removed from Ballot."
Philadelphia Daily News. 25 October 2008.

Koppelman, Alex. "Sex, Lies and Creatively Edited Interviews with Sarah Obama."
Salon. 5 December 2008.

Lee, Carol E. "Obama Seeks to Quell 'Birther' Talk."
The Wall Street Journal. 28 April 2011 (p. A4).

Nakaso, Dan. "Obama's Certificate of Birth OK, State Says."
Honolulu Advertiser. 1 November 2008.

Nakaso, Dan. "Hawaii: Obama Birth Certificate Is Real."
Honolulu Advertiser. 27 July 2009.

Nakaso, Dan. "Hawaii Officials Confirm Obama's Original Birth Certificate Still Exists."
Honolulu Advertiser. 28 July 2009.

Olpihant, James. "President Moves to End 'Sideshows' Over His Birth."
Los Angeles Times. 28 April 2011 (p. A1).

Page, Susan. "Citing 'Sideshow,' Obama Offers Full Birth Certificate."
USA Today. 28 April 2011 (p. A1).

Shear, Michael D. "Citing 'Silliness,' Obama Shows Birth Certificate."
The New York Times. 28 April 2011 (p. A1).

Winter, Jana. "Expert: No Doubt Obama's Birth Certificate Is Legit."
FOXNews.com. 29 April 2011.

Voell, Paula. "Teacher from Kenmore Recalls Obama Was a Focused Student."
The Buffalo News. 20 January 2009.

Associated Press. "State Department of Health Declares Obama Birth Certificate Legal."
Honolulu Star-Bulletin. 31 October 2008.

Associated Press. "Challenge to Obama Is Dismissed."
The New York Times. 5 March 2009.

Associated Press. "Widow Says Husband Is Doctor on Obama Certificate."
28 April 2011.

The Economist. "Born Under a Bad Sign."
28 November 2008.

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Barack Obama's birth certificate is a forgery. See Example( s ) I read that Obama will not release his birth certificate. Have heard rumors it's because he is listed as white. Or that because he isn't a U.S. born citizen.

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Post #6 - Red Flag: Suppression by Authority 

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Post #6 - Red Flag: Suppression by Authority 

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Definition
Suppression by Authority - when someone of authority, like the government or a big corporation, conceal information in an attempt to protect their belief or ultimate goal

Connection
There is a theory that the government already has a cure for cancer but to continue receiving money for the required treatments they have not told anyone about these cures. Some also say they pay off the people who have found these cures so they keep quiet.

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A BRIDE-to-be diagnosed with leukaemia had her life saved at the eleventh hour
- after her fiancé found a miracle cure on the internet.

Natalie Langworthy was warned she had just weeks to live after months of
treatment failed to beat her cancer.

But fiancé Andy Fairclough refused to give up hope. He relentlessly researched
Natalie's condition on the internet before a friend tipped him off about a
clinical trial taking place in Germany.

He then raised more than £80,000 to fly her to Wurzburg, near Frankfurt, where
she was given a new drug called blinatumomab.

And tests showed the leukaemia that had been untreatable in Britain and
Australia - where the couple were living at the time - disappeared in just SEVEN
days.

Speaking exclusively to The Sun, Natalie, 34, told how she was diagnosed with
acute lymphoblastic leukaemia in March 2010, just eight months after giving
birth to her daughter, Elkie.

She went through four cycles of chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant. But
just two and a half months later the cancer was back.

"That was a Tuesday. By Thursday that figure had risen to 150, which doctors
told me was an 'explosive' relapse.

"Two days later, I went to see my original consultant who told me I could have
chemo now and again to keep me comfortable until I died.

"But I couldn't do it because it would validate the fact I was going to die
- and I wanted to fight to make sure that didn't happen."

Andy, 48, refused to give up hope and started researching online about
Natalie's type of leukaemia.

He spent hours sending emails all over the world trying to find help. But many
of the replies brought bad news.

Andy said: "As much as we wanted to believe there had to be an option, we were
starting to face the horrifying prospect that there wasn't one and Natalie
was going to die.

"Then, at 2am and three days into my research, a friend in California sent me
details of a trial in Germany which exactly matched Natalie's diagnosis.

"I'm no great believer in the almighty but 25 minutes later I was on the phone
to a doctor who said he would be happy to accept Natalie for the trial as
long as we could get her to Germany."

Natalie said: "I thought, 'Oh my God, I might actually live.' I just went
blank because by then I wasn't expecting to.

"I was so weak from the chemo that my mum was having to do everything for me."

The couple were living in Sydney at the time and had to raise more than
£80,000 for flights, accommodation and medical costs for Natalie to take
part in the trial.

Because of her high white blood count, she had to fly business class as she
needed to lie flat on her back and receive oxygen throughout the flight to
reduce the risk of deep vein thrombosis.

When the family arrived in Germany, Natalie had developed pneumonia and it was
touch and go as to whether she could go ahead with the trial.

But after two weeks German doctors had brought her pneumonia under control.
She began the trial last November.

Natalie was given blinatumomab, which works by latching on to the leukaemia
cells then activating the body's immune system to destroy them.

Natalie said: "It was the best Christmas present my family and I could ever
have had."

Natalie still carries the drug and a small pump around in a small shoulder
bag. It drips into her body continuously for four weeks. She then has a
two-week break before starting the whole process again.

She said: "Compared with having chemotherapy, with all its horrible
side-effects, this is a blessing."

Medics have since told Natalie she has achieved "the unthinkable".

She said: "I still have a long way to go but I am alive, in remission and am
regaining my strength. The incredible team of doctors have literally saved
my life."

Andy added: "Natalie has been given another chance at life. We still have a
long way to go but we have reached a milestone."

The foundation aims to provide assistance to others who qualify to take part
in the blood cancer drug trials in Wurzburg.

He said: "Blinatumomab is being talked about as a possible alternative to
chemotherapy for certain types of leukaemia and lymphoma in the future. It
feels like a remarkable breakthrough."

For more details of Natalie's story or to make a donation, visit flyingfishonline.com/helpnat.

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I beat cancer in seven days thanks to internet 'miracle cure'

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A BRIDE-to-be diagnosed with leukaemia had her life saved at the eleventh hour - after her fiancé found a miracle cure on the internet. Natalie Langworthy was warned she had just weeks to live after months of treatment failed to beat her cancer. But fiancé Andy Fairclough refused to give up hope.

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Post #7 - Reason for Belief: Patternicity

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Post #7 - Reason for Belief: Patternicity

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Definition
Patternicity - the tendency to find patterns in meaningless noise

Connection
The "Face on mars" is an example of Patternicity because it appears to be the face of a human and some may say this proves the idea of life on mars when it is most likely just a coincidence that the rock pattern formed into what looks like a human face.

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Post #9 - Reason for Belief: Unexplained

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Post #9 - Reason for Belief: Unexplained

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Definition
Unexplained - we don’t know what is currently unexplained

Connection
For a long time now there have been countless ghost sightings made by people all over the world. But there hasn't been any scientific evidence that proves they are real.

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A college student standing in the hallway of an old dormitory in Waukegan feels someone behind her, breathing on her neck. She turns around. No one is there. Suddenly someone pushes her down the stairs.

It gets scarier.

On a moonlit night, several teenagers shine a flashlight on an old wooden gate along River Road in Libertyville. In the light, they see the heads of several decapitated children on the gate posts.

All over Lake County, these stories are told, especially at this time of year.

They're true, at least according to the people who tell them.

True or not, these stories make you wonder: Could there be otherworldly spirits lurking in cemeteries, old buildings, even your own home?

Ron Dolski, who owns Something Fishy Pets in Fox Lake, said he once was a nonbeliever - but not anymore.

"I was totally the biggest skeptic in the world," Dolski said.

But reports of hauntings in Northern Illinois intrigued him, and he began researching them. He founded a Fox Lake based group in 2006 called Something Ghostly Paranormal.

Over the years, he's investigated public buildings, private homes, hospitals, insane asylums and other places in the county and around the nation, and he believes some of these places have been visited by spirits from another world.

There's the haunted doll in someone's home - the owners say she moves limbs at will, and he's seen it himself. He recently investigated a tavern in Fox Lake where he, a bartender and other workers heard strange voices after closing hours.

If that doesn't convince you, how about Dolski's claim that his house in Huntley is haunted by a little girl named Sally?

"One day, my wife and I were sitting on the couch, and we both heard somebody say, 'Mommy,' Nobody was there. We've had company come and they've seen and heard things, too. We've opened our house to a lot of friends who don't believe it," Dolski said. "After they spend the night, they believe."

Sally tends to appear weekly at the Dolski household, sometimes moving items around in the house, he said.

He discovered that years ago, a young girl died in a well on his house's property.

"We think because it was a tragic death, she doesn't know that she's dead. She's looking for her parents, a place to call her own. Since we recognize that spirits are real, we have accommodated her and allowed her into our family," Dolski said.

He and his wife would like her to leave.

"But she refuses to move on," he said.

Bob Jensen, who started Ghostland Paranormal in 1990 in Gurnee, said he's less of a skeptic than he used to be.

Ghostland Paranormal consists of open-minded people, he said, adding that the members are, "well-respected members of the community, including teachers, professors and federal agents."

Recently, he investigated a tattoo parlor in Antioch that had a painted glass door. "There's the story about a man who has been seen peering through the glass, looking at the girls at work there," he said.

Jensen said he has recorded a little girl's voice in the parlor, saying, "He's coming up the stairs."

"Another time, we saw a figure, a translucent individual that was squatting down by an infrared light I had set up," he said, adding that the basement is just creepy.

Jensen said he heard a story about the basement once being occupied by a man who had committed crimes in the neighborhood.

"There's always truth behind folklore," Jensen said. "There's always some form of truth."

Both Jensen and Tony Olszewski, founder of McHenry County Paranormal Research Group, have been asked to investigate the Mother Rudd House in Gurnee over the years.

The home, built in 1841 on what became Old Grand Avenue, now houses a museum for the Warren Township Historical Society. It was once a stop along the Underground Railroad, where slaves were given sanctuary on their way to freedom.

Jensen and Olszewksi said they've documented paranormal events at the home, but none were threatening.

"We heard voices of a young child - it sounded like the child was comfortable in the house," Jensen said.

But Mary Worth, a woman who lived nearby during that era, is not a benign spirit.

Legend says during the time of the Underground Railroad, Worth was murdering slaves instead of helping them. Some claim she was a witch.

"The townspeople took justice into their own hands," Jensen said. "They hung her on her property. If you walk along Dilleys Road on the west side, you'll find a huge tree stump down to the ground. That is the tree that allegedly she was hung from."

In the past few years, developers have moved an old stone that likely marked her grave, Jensen said, adding that they began losing money until they put the stone back.

Ty Rohrer, supervisor of the Waukegan History Museum, said he's heard and researched a plethora of stories of hauntings in Waukegan. Residents have told him about the haunted house on Washington Street.

"It was the home of Dr. Roberts. He was a dentist - a rather eccentric dentist," he said. "The stories are that he built his house (in 1891) in such a way as to attract spirits."

After he died, Rohrer added, the family living there reported a piano playing on its own and a figure in the attic.

"They eventually had to move out of the house," which was later razed, Rohrer said.

An apartment building on Franklin and North avenues in Waukegan is the site of the old Jane McAlister Hospital. At one time, it was a dormitory for Shimer College where two ghosts allegedly lived.

The good nurse ghost took care of students, putting her cool hands on foreheads when they had fevers. But an evil janitor ghost lived in the basement. Students felt him standing behind them, breathing down their necks, and were sometimes pushed or tripped, Rohrer said.

Older buildings with interesting histories seem to harbor the most spirits in Waukegan, Rohrer said.

That includes the 90-year-old Genesee Theatre in Waukegan, where the most famous ghost is a dog, said Larry Frievalt, patron services manager.

"When people are in the theater, they sometimes hear barking in the duct work of the heating and air conditioning," Frievalt said. Recently one of the facilities workers was in the basement and heard the sound of the dog running up behind him. He high-tailed it out of there."

Frievalt added he's heard stories that long ago, when the Genesee was used as an apartment building, a dog was left alone in an apartment for several days after his master passed away.

"The other story most people know about is the story of a young girl who likes to cause pranks in the Genesee Theatre," Frievalt said. "Every now and then, while people are in the theater, they feel a cold gust of wind running down the aisle."

Other times, he added, while staff are working at their desks, they'll find their shoes untied.

"It hasn't happened to me in a while now that I double tie my shoes," he said.

Paranormal investigators like Jensen don't believe all the tales they're told, and they don't always find signs of spirits when they visit public and private places thought to be haunted.

Years ago, for example, Jensen interviewed teenagers who drove down River Road in Libertyville at night and stopped to shine lights at a huge, tall, old wooden gate near Independence Grove Forest Preserve. "They told me there were horrible things that happened there that they never wanted to repeat or witness again," Jensen said.

According to legend, there was an old schoolhouse on the property in the 1940s, and an old janitor who worked there went insane. Jensen added that the tale goes on to report that, "he decapitated kids and put the heads on the gate. Now on moonlit nights, you can see the heads."
Sheryl DeVore is a freelance reporter for the News-Sun.

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Haunted Lake County: Unexplained phenomena often linked to traumatic events

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A college student standing in the hallway of an old dormitory in Waukegan feels someone behind her, breathing on her neck. She turns around. No one is there. Suddenly someone pushes her down the stairs. It gets scarier. On a moonlit night, several teenagers shine a flashlight on an old wooden gate along River Road in Libertyville.

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Definition
Simplicity - a simple answer is made because there is no other easy explanation

Connection
Crop circles have been an unexplained phenomenon for a very long time now and it seems like most people automatically assume that they are made by aliens. The easy explanation would be to say they are alien-made instead of coming up with a more logical explanation. This article states that scientists agree crop circles are actually man-made.

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While the first accounts of crop formations start in the 16th century, when they were attributed to fairies or the Devil, the creation of modern crop circles still remains a closely guarded secret.

According to cereologists, who study the origins of circles, creators use tools such as ropes, ladders and planks of wood to flatten out their design.

Here we attempt to demystify how crop circles are created:

1. Find a field

This is a key first step - many crop artists now seek permission of the farmer and landowner to enter the field due to the harm these designs cause to crops and so yields from a field.

The damage caused by crop circles can cost farmers up to £1,000 in lost revenue, depending the size of the area flattened.

Some farmers have begun charging visitors to look at crop circles to offset any losses they incur.

The right kind of crop also makes a difference - wheat, barley and rapeseed oils are seen as being best.

The plants need to be at the right stage of development. If they are too old and dry, they can break easily, leaving a tell tale path of the artist's passage through the field.

Too young and they won't bend down enough and the design will be hard to spot.

2. Plan the pattern

Some designs that have appeared are fiendishly complicated, but this makes it harder to create them.

Crop artists tend to use a map and computers to plot their circles out beforehand and some use GPS devices to help them create large patterns.

Some also use more traditional techniques such as dowsing rods to identify prime locations.

Siting a crop circle above underground streams or in magnetic fields is thought to add authenticity to the circle while also helping to baffle those who want to unravel their mystery.

3. Getting some help

Making crop circles is labour intensive so most crop circles tend to have been created by small teams of people.

The right equipment is also important - a length of tape or string to provide a guide; a garden roller can help with flattening, but a 3-6ft piece of wooden board with ropes attached to each end is the traditional choice for stalk stomping.

4. Waiting for the cover of darkness

Venturing out in broad daylight can ruin the mystery of how a crop circle appeared so they tend to be created at night, away from the prying eyes of unsuspecting locals.

Torches can attract attention, so instead the crop circle creators prefer to work by the light provided by the stars or moon after allowing time for their eyes to become accustomed to the dark.

They will also park several miles away from the intended site and walk there to further avoid suspicion.

5. Carefully does it

By entering fields on existing tractor tracks and paths, crop circle creators can help to disguise how the crop circle got there.

Sticking to hard ground also avoids leaving foot prints while careful movement through the growing plants helps to minimise signs that they were there.

Once at the location for the pattern, they try to only walk in areas where the crop will be flattened so their presence can go undetected, helping to add to the mystery.

6. Measuring out the design

Using tape or string, most crop artists will measure out the design. Some crop circle creators use surveying equipment to help ensure their shapes are perfectly geometric and to keep lines straight.

7. Flattening the crop

This is when the damage is done. Traditionally, the rope attached to the plank is looped over the shoulders and a foot is pressed onto the wood, pressing it forward and down.

This folds the stems and bends them in a regular pattern. By advancing in a shuffling gait they can bend all of the plants in the same, regular way.

The difference between the way light is reflected off the bent stems compared to the upright plants is what creates the pattern.

To make a perfect circle, one end of the plank is anchored to the ground and rotated around that point.

Other crop circles have been made using garden rollers which speeds up the process.

8. Making super natural additions

Many famous human-made crop circles feature "grapeshots" or "signatures" - smaller, disjointed circles, or raised sections inside of the main circles.

By shaping stems and unflattening portions, the crop circles take on an air of mystery and carry some artistic flare.

9. Be away by dawn

Getting caught as the sun comes up is an embarrassing situation, so most crop circle creators time their pattern creations to be finished before dawn.

Once complete, sneak they sneak out the way came in and wait for the conspiracy theories to start flying.

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Crop circles demystified: how the patterns are created

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While the first accounts of crop formations start in the 16th century, when they were attributed to fairies or the Devil, the creation of modern crop circles still remains a closely guarded secret. According to cereologists, who study the origins of circles, creators use tools such as ropes, ladders and planks of wood to flatten out their design.