# data[].attributes.body
James Randi takes a fatal dose of homeopathic sleeping pills onstage while deconstructing irrational beliefs. Although there isn’t anything promoting paranormal or pseudoscience (quite the opposite, he is attacking those beliefs and claims), he does speak to several beliefs such as speaking or communicating with the dead, exposing hemopathy and examines how these actions are fraudulent in nature. He touches upon concepts such as simplicity, ideology, the unexplained, emotional connection as well as ancient wisdom, confirmation biases, confusion of correlation with causations and mystic energy.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
James Randi: Homeopathy, quackery and fraud

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Legendary skeptic James Randi takes a fatal dose of homeopathic sleeping pills onstage, kicking off a searing 18-minute indictment of irrational beliefs. He throws out a challenge to the world's psychics: Prove what you do is real, and I'll give you a million dollars. (No takers yet.)

# data[].attributes.body
In this video, James Randi answer’s a question from someone in the crowd about how god cannot be proven to exist and therefore cannot be proven to be fake. For the next two minutes, Randi deconstructs beliefs in religion and states that he has not found compelling evidence for a belief in god. In this video, he explores what his beliefs are regarding the origin of religion, citing simplicity, agenticity and the unexplained. He explains this by human creating supernatural elements to explain the world around them because within our history, our knowledge about the universe is limited and when we cannot met the expectations of the world, we invent god(s) for explanations and that this is “the easy way” to do it.

# data[].attributes.body
In this video, James Randi speaks about a holy man of 83 years of age that can live without food or water. He was under constant supervision by a team of 30 medial authorities. During that time, he did not eat, drink or use the toilet. Randi breaks down the appeal of authority and unexplained (a neurologist who states that they don’t know how he survives because it is a mystery). In addition to this, Randi claims that the medical staff who was supposed to be observing this man, was not actually observing him. Mystical energy is attached to this claim because the 83-year-old man stats that he received his powers when he was younger by a goddess. At the same time, you could argue that his process falls into the all-natural category; just because something is natural. The neurologist states that because he is not getting his energy from food or water, he is obtaining it from the sun.

# data[].attributes.body
Reason for Belief: Ideology. James Randi is a vocal atheist and his views on religion are rigid and not permeable. It would seem very unlikely that he would be willing to change his views on religion or the existence of a god if presented to him unlike Bill Nye, who is open to changing his views if scientific evidence is provided.

# data[].attributes.body
Dismantling of agenticity and emotional connection. In this quote, James Randi examines the existence of god, angels, demons and explains that there is no evidence for their existence. At the same time, he is using emotional connection/appeal to emotion by scapegoating god for the Holocaust, racial prejudice and the degradation of women. Examination of ideology: Randi is positing that if such a god does indeed exist, it is responsible for all the evil and harm in the world. Although he clearly does not believe in god, he puts the mirror to the faces of those who do believe is asking them how they separate their god who is all knowing and all powerful from the atrocities that humanity has faced and will continue to face.

# data[].attributes.headline
10. James Randi: Eugenics and Social Darwinism (multiple sources included)

# data[].attributes.subject
10. James Randi: Eugenics and Social Darwinism (multiple sources included)

# data[].attributes.body
http://archive.randi.org/site/index.php/swift-blog/533-following-up.html
https://www.dailygrail.com/2013/02/james-randi-let-survival-of-the-fittest-act-itself-out-on-those-with-low-iq-and-mental-aberrations/
https://www.dailygrail.com/2013/03/james-randi-responds-to-social-darwinism-controversy/

We made sure to include multiple links for this post in order to ensure that the sources were not false in their claims. Once we found the official post from James Randi himself, we obtain our confirmation the following is true: In April of 2009, James Randi wrote an article that spoke to the legalization of drug use and encouraged the death of those who abused drugs. He speaks to the concept of survival of the fittest and how natural selection would

“weed out those for whom there is no hope except through our forbearance, am I’m very, very, wear of supporting these losers with my tax dollars…any weeping and wailing over the Poor Little Kids who would perish by immediately gobbling down pills and injecting poisons, is summoning up crocodile tears, in my opinion. They would – and presently do – mature into grown-up idiots and Darwin would be appalled that his lessons were ignored”.

James Randi was not challenged by his peers on his comments. He was then interviewed by Will Storr, where Randi doubled down on his beliefs about Social Darwinism:

“I’m a believer in Social Darwinism. Not in ever case. I would do anything to stop a twelve-year-old kid from doing it. Sincerely. But in general, I think that Darwinism, survival of the fittest, should be allowed to act itself out. As long as it doesn’t interfere with me and other sensible, rational people who could be affected by it. Innocent People, in other words…These are stupid people. And if they can’t survive, they don’t have the IQ, don’t have the thinking power to be able to survive, it’s unfortunate; I would hate to see it happen, but at the same time, it would clear the air.”

Both incidents include a clear set of ideological beliefs that are disgusting and situated on harming others by inaction or apathy. In addition to this, his emotional connection to the issue blurred his rational thought and empathy. Finally, and there is a clear suppression by authorities but not in the traditional sense that we have learned about in this course. Its almost an inverse in the sense that those within the same community of Randi, his peers and fellow scientific cohorts, did not acknowledge nor challenge his views.

# data[].attributes.body
Dismantling of mystical energy. Uri Geller has and continues to make many claims of his psychic and supernatural abilities.  He speaks about energy in a sense that it allows him to perform works of supernatural feats. With this image and the quote, James Randi is expressing that Uri Geller is a charlatan. The quote is also poking fun at the idea that using divine powers would take more effort to bend a spoon than using regular parlor tricks. It also does not help that Uri Geller has been exposed for being a fraud by James Randi in the past.

# data[].attributes.headline
8. About the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry

# data[].attributes.subject
8. About the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry

# data[].attributes.body
The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry is a website dedicated to promoting scientific inquiry, critical investigation, and the use of reason in examining controversial and extraordinary claims. Some of the founding members of CSI include scientists, academics and science writers such as Carl Sagan, Isaac Asimov, James Randi, etc. The website in of its self noes not promote paranormal beliefs or pseudoscience and makes attempts to deconstruct it. However, you could argue that ideology plays a major factor into how it operates; they utilize a set of political, social and scientific set of ideas to determine their benchmark goals and expectations for those that claim supernatural beliefs have to met and for those that do possess those beliefs, they may feel that the benchmarks that the CSI set for proof may be unattainable or far too rigid.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry promotes science and scientific inquiry, critical thinking, science education, and the use of reason in examining important issues. It encourages the critical investigation of controversial or extraordinary claims from a responsible, scientific point of view and disseminates factual information about the results of such inquiries to the scientific community, the media, and the public.

# data[].attributes.body
This article, written by James Randi in December 2009, speaks to (at an ignorant level) the assumption that Global Warming may not be man-made. Although James Randi is seen as a paragon for rational thought, inquiry and skepticism, he is “just as human as the rest of us” and is not infallible. During the publishing of this article, James Randi used the argument that science has been wrong in the past, and cites the Oregon Petition, a project developed by individuals whose goals were to reject policies based on concerns over global warming. James Randi demonstrates both reasons for belief and red flags with this troubling article. His ideology about science, perception and observation and confirmation bias all pertain to his beliefs that science was been wrong before in the past, therefore the scientific research conducted on global warming is wrong now. He also uses appeals to authority, that being the few scientists that signed the petition who have PhDs, and he uses proof by verbosity by muddying the waters with his limited knowledge on climate change. The petition has unverifiable signatures by scientists with PhDs, but the majority of those who signed had limited or no expertise in the filed at all. James Randi openly admits he has a rudimentary understanding of global climates as well.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Though this subject is not one that directly concerns the JREF, I'm very frequently asked if I'll turn my skeptical eye to it. As a year-end fling, I'll give it a try. To wit:

An unfortunate fact is that scientists are just as human as the rest of us, in that they are strongly influenced by the need to be accepted, to kowtow to peer opinion, and to "belong" in the scientific community. Why do I find this "unfortunate"? Because the media and the hoi polloi increasingly depend upon and accept ideas or principles that are proclaimed loudly enough by academics who are often more driven by "politically correct" survival principles than by those given them by Galileo, Newton, Einstein, and Bohr. (Granted, it's reassuring that they're listening to academics at all -- but how to tell the competent from the incompetent?) Religious and other emotional convictions drive scientists, despite what they may think their motivations are.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) -- a group of thousands of scientists in 194 countries around the world, and recipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize -- has issued several comprehensive reports in which they indicate that they have become convinced that "global warming" is and will be seriously destructive to life as we know it, and that Man is the chief cause of it. They say that there is a consensus of scientists who believe we are headed for disaster if we do not stop burning fossil fuels, but a growing number of prominent scientists disagree. Meanwhile, some 32,000 scientists, 9,000 of them PhDs, have signed The Petition Project statement proclaiming that Man is not necessarily the chief cause of warming, that the phenomenon may not exist at all, and that, in any case, warming would not be disastrous.

Happily, science does not depend on consensus. Conclusions are either reached or not, but only after an analysis of evidence as found in nature. It's often been said that once a conclusion is reached, proper scientists set about trying to prove themselves wrong. Failing in that, they arrive at a statement that appears -- based on all available data -- to describe a limited aspect about how the world appears to work. And not all scientists are willing to follow this path. My most excellent friend Martin Gardner once asked a parapsychologist just what sort of evidence would convince him he had erred in coming to a certain conclusion. The parascientist replied that he could not imagine any such situation, thus -- in my opinion -- removing him from the ranks of the scientific discipline rather decidedly.

History supplies us with many examples where scientists were just plain wrong about certain matters, but ultimately discovered the truth through continued research. Science recovers from such situations quite well, though sometimes with minor wounds.

I strongly suspect that The Petition Project may be valid. I base this on my admittedly rudimentary knowledge of the facts about planet Earth. This ball of hot rock and salt water spins on its axis and rotates about the Sun with the expected regularity, though we're aware that lunar tides, solar wind, galactic space dust and geomagnetic storms have cooled the planet by about one centigrade degree in the past 150 years. The myriad of influences that act upon Earth are so many and so variable -- though not capricious -- that I believe we simply cannot formulate an equation into which we enter variables and come up with an answer. A living planet will continually belch, vibrate, fracture, and crumble a bit, and thus defeat an accurate equation. Please note that this my amateur opinion, based on probably insufficient data.

It appears that the Earth is warming, and has continued to warm since the last Ice Age, which ended some 10,000 to 20,000 years ago. But that has not been an even warming. Years of warming followed by years of cooling have left us just a bit warmer than before. This conclusion has been arrived at from data collected at some 1,200+ weather stations in the USA, though bear in mind that there are very few weather stations over the vast oceans that cover 70% of our planet, or on the continents Africa, South America, and especially Antarctica.

We can now record temperatures with much better than the former fraction-of-a-degree accuracy we had just a decade ago, but that temperature change appears to be just about half a degree Centigrade.

Our Earth's atmosphere is approximately 80% nitrogen, 20% oxygen. Just .04% is carbon dioxide -- a "trace" amount. But from that tiny percentage is built all the plants we have on Earth. CO2 is a natural molecule absolutely required for plant life to survive, and in the process of growing, those plants give off oxygen. We -- and all animal life -- consume that oxygen and give off CO2. (No, this is not an example of Intelligent Design.) If that balance is sufficiently disturbed, species either adapt or perish. And the world turns...

Incidentally, we have a convenient phenomenon that contributes to our survival. Doubling the amount of CO2 in our atmosphere will not double the temperature rise, small though it is. The basic principle of what's known as the "greenhouse effect" is quite simple: in a glass-enclosed environment, sunlight enters through the glass and strikes a surface, where it is transformed into longer infrared rays which do not easily reflect back through the glass; they're trapped. and raise the temperature. However, the greenhouse effect as applied to our planet is more complicated. The infrared rays that are reflected back from the Earth are trapped by the greenhouse gases, water vapor and CO2 -- a process that warms those gases and heats the Earth. This effect makes Earth habitable, preventing extremes of temperature. The limit of the influence of CO2 is dictated, not by the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, but by the amount of solar radiation reflected back from the Earth. Once all the infrared rays have been "captured" by the greenhouse gases there is no additional increase in carbon dioxide.

Yes, we produce CO2, by burning "fossil fuels" and by simply breathing. And every fossil fuel produces CO2. Some products produce more than others, varying with their chemical composition. Methane gas produces less CO2, wood produces more. But almost paradoxically, when wood burns it produces CO2, and when a tree dies and rots it produces yet more CO2. Oceans are huge storage tanks for CO2, but as they warm up, they hold less of the dissolved gas. They release it into the atmosphere, then more of it is absorbed back into the oceans. And as far as humans are concerned, ten times more people die each year from the effects of cold than die from the heat. This a hugely complex set of variables we are trying to reduce to an equation...

It's easy enough to believe that drought, floods, hurricanes, and earthquakes are signs of a coming catastrophe from global warming, but these are normal variations of any climate that we -- and other forms of life -- have survived. Earth has undergone many serious changes in climate, from the Ice Ages to periods of heavily increased plant growth from their high levels of CO2, yet the biosphere has survived. We're adaptable, stubborn, and persistent -- and we have what other life forms don't have: we can manipulate our environment. Show me an Inuit who can survive in his habitat without warm clothing... Humans will continue to infest Earth because we're smart.

In my amateur opinion, more attention to disease control, better hygienic conditions for food production and clean water supplies, as well as controlling the filth that we breathe from fossil fuel use, are problems that should distract us from fretting about baking in Global Warming. From Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's 1891 A Scandal in Bohemia, I quote:

Watson: "This is indeed a mystery," I remarked. "What do you imagine that it means?"

Holmes: I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts...

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
Though this subject is not one that directly concerns the JREF, I'm very frequently asked if I'll turn my skeptical eye to it. As a year-end fling, I'll give it a try.