Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

A Dim View: Group meets monthly to share in skepticism

For more information, go to www.skepticslv.org

"Do we have any Aries here?" Dr. Mark Chambers asked the group seated before him. "Taurus? Any Taurus? How about a Gemini? Any Cancers?"

With eyebrows raised, the clean-cut psychologist scanned the group, then flipped through a stack of papers.

As Tauruses and Cancers dutifully raised their arms, Chambers handed them a zodiac definition of their personalities.

But Chambers is no astrological forecaster. He's vice president of the Skeptics of Las Vegas, a group of dedicated debunkers who meet monthly to analyze and disprove the paranormal and astrological.

With a mission to promote science and skepticism through critical and rational thinking, members strive to make the distinction between science, non-science, pseudo-science and "nonsense."

You won't find them shopping at Psychic Eye. They won't be praying in churches, reading your thoughts over the telephone or buying magnets for any reason other than to stick on refrigerators.

They are sure the Earth is 4.5 billion years old, rather than 6,000. And their birthdays are simply the days they were born, not maps to their personalities. So break a mirror, step on a crack, walk under a ladder, they say. There are no powers asserting your day will be different if you do.

"Our real interest is to promote science and reason," said Thane Webb, a founding member of the club and a science teacher at Green Valley High School.

"We're taking a look at these kind of claims. We hope to be here locally to say, 'Hey let's contend that point.'"

Since their first meeting more than a year ago on a rainy night above a car dealership, the group of 25 has hosted lectures and open forums and invited those with opposing viewpoints to speak at their meetings.

A Superstition Bash, held at Galleria at Sunset, invited people to challenge 13 superstitions by breaking mirrors, stepping on cracks and flirting with other superstitious beliefs.

"The skeptics get a bad rap being naysayers and pooh-poohing everybody's fun," said Robert Anderson, founder and president of the Skeptics of Las Vegas.

"But we're out to save people time and emotional interest. We see ourselves providing a service to people. Being science teachers at the high school level, we see things pop up all the time."

Anderson is dean of students at Green Valley High School, where he has taught chemistry and biology, and says, "In my classroom, I'm dealing with students and science kids who bring a lot of misconceptions to class. The full moon. A lot of kids thinking the Earth is 6,000 years old (which is a belief of creationists). And they have a strong belief in astrology, ESP and psychics.

"It's kind of hard to weed out the facts from the fiction."

Modern skeptics

Skepticism dates back thousands of years. But the modern skeptics movement began nearly 30 years ago as a way to counter the claims made by such paranormalists as Uri Geller and to lobby for better media representation of science, said Pat Linse, co-founder of the national Skeptics Society and editor of Jr. Skeptics magazine.

Based in Altadena, Calif., the Skeptics Society publishes Skeptics magazine and has more than 35,000 members. Its predecessor, the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP), formed in 1976 and also has a large membership, along with links to international skeptics' organizations.

Several skeptics have published books that include scientific explanations for paranormal claims.

"These people on TV, it's just old carnival tricks," Linse said. "Take fire walking. People are so astonished by this gimmick that they'll buy whatever the guru is saying. But I've done it. The secret is wood ash and letting it burn a long time. It's an excellent insulator. It's over 1,000 degrees, yet you can walk across."

On the contrary

Locally, Chambers, clinical director of the Sleep Clinic of Nevada, demonstrates paranormal activities with presentations that could land him his own infomercial.

Last week he moved an object across a table under the premise that it moved by energy evoked from an audience member's deceased loved one.

That same evening, feigning psychic ability, Chambers had read aloud a number sequence someone had privately circled in a telephone book. He later told the group that the feats were "simply tricks."

The zodiac readings Chambers had provided the group? Each member said their readings were surprisingly similar to their personalities.

Astonishing, it seemed, until Chambers had the group compare the definitions. Each reading was the same, regardless of the signs.

"Irrational thinking has impeded our progress as a species," Chambers said. "There's rampant examples of illogical thinking in our society that are harmful in many ways."

Referring to a Wisconsin minister charged last month with killing an 8-year-old boy during an exorcism, Chambers said, "Where do you draw the line? Where does it go from being innocent to being harmful?

"Being a psychologist I have a particular interest in the way people come to have a lot of beliefs they have. One of the reasons people are drawn to these sorts of things (is) we have, as a species, the desire to have an order of predictability of the universe.

"We like to have a control over our own destinies. Astrology, ESP, after-life communication, all of those things tend to remove some of the randomness in the universe."

The unseen

Michelene Bell, editor and owner of In Light Times magazine, a local metaphysical, spiritual and holistic publication, asks of the skeptics, "What does it matter? Skeptics, they try to do away with something they are not open to understand. I can't prove there's a God, but does it really matter?

"Do they believe in love? Is it something they can touch, taste and smell? When I rebelled, when I did not believe in God, it was the loneliest place because my soul, which you cannot see, felt that disconnection."

Bell asserts a "live and let live" attitude, but is skeptical of the skeptics.

"They can be skeptical, but I think that in that skepticism, it removes that hope of the people," Bell said. "To me that is more of a disservice."

For skeptics, it all comes down to scientific proof, whether it's mythology, folklore or urban legends. And paranormal nonbelievers are just as passionate as believers. The contentions between creationists and skeptics abound.

The James Randi Educational Foundation, based in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., offers $1 million to anyone who can present evidence supporting the paranormal, supernatural or occult.

Dr. Kent Hovind, founder of Creation Science Evangelism, which believes the Bible is literal and "scientifically accurate," offers $250,000 to anyone who "can give empirical evidence for evolution."

Even if both sides had proof, it probably wouldn't matter.

"Once people made up their minds, it's hard to change," Chambers said. "Some people say, 'OK, he did a trick, but just because he did a trick doesn't discount other psychics.' "

But Chambers added, "It's kind of hard to even make the argument why you should be rational than irrational because it's so self-evident.

"It's a totally illogical belief that we're being visited by UFOs; nobody stops to think, 'How did they find us?' The chances are so astronomical on that, they couldn't happen by chance."

Making sense

In addressing beliefs, Chambers asks, "What is the claim? What is the theory behind the claim and what is the evidence that supports the claim?"

Astrology, psychics, Bigfoot, aliens, religion and areas of chiropractics are all under the same microscope of the skeptics.

"It's to help us from deluding ourselves," Webb said. "If you didn't have an open mind, science would never progress."

"This sort of thinking is mainstream in America," Chambers explains. "The vast majority of Americans believe in ESP, believe in aliens, they believe in heaven and hell, miracles. This is not the working of a fringe group."

Group member Duane Zook has lived both sides. Zook was once a believer in Ancient Astronauts, a group of aliens believed by some to have landed their spacecrafts on earth years ago and began the human race.

In high school he read books on the subject written by Erich von Daniken.

"After reading enough of these books, I realized they had tidbits of information, but didn't lead to conclusive evidence that we'd been visited by anyone," Zook said. "It was just a collection of stuff that was interesting."

After being introduced to Skeptics magazine, Zook crossed over and began to explore why people people believe in the paranormal.

"The mindset is interesting," said Zook, a chief financial officer with Boardwalk casino. "You fall for financial fraud and you're not going to get your money back."

Everything, Zook said, comes down to rational thinking. People should ask, "Does what this person is telling you make sense?"

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