Undercurrent

...as featured in James Randi's <a href="http://www.randi.org/jr/08-24-01.html" target="_blank">weekly commentary</a> as an example of snake-oil salesmen who for some reason won't prove their claims, is now available for sale in Santa Fe.

Being the socially concious boy I am, I am in a somewhat militant mood about this. Considering that the "gather up a posse chase the huckster out of town with pitchforks and torches while banjo music plays" motif is somewhat passe, are there any sensible actions that can be taken here to express my discontent?

m.

Coragyps

As long as only the overly rich Anglo Texan grande dames hock their Indian jewelry to get hydrated faster, I wouldn't worry about it too much. They can probably afford it. But if it spreads to the non-drone classes....
I don't know what to suggest that wouldn't possibly leave you open to legal retaliation, but maybe if you bought Wal Mart's cheapest bottled water, stuck on labels calling it "decawater" or even "eicosawater" (FOUR TIMES as unclustered as Penta Water!), and sold them for only $5.50 each you could make a point.

Veil of Fire

"(c) what goes on in their heads is probably a malfunction that calls for professional evaluation and treatment."

He should still allow them to perform the test, tho! I mean, if you automatically disqualified everyone whose claim sounded "crazy", you'd never have to give away the million dollars!


.....oh. nevermind.

Liquidrage

I'm a little confused by the Randi article.

If Penta were to prove that they were able to hydrate the body better, why would they win the prize?

They don't claim it's magic from what I can see.
Example claim:
" That's because its [sic] been affected by air, heat, and modern civilization. PentaTM is water that, through physics, has been reduced to its purest state in nature — smaller clusters of H2O [sic] molecules. These smaller clusters move through your body more quickly than other water, penetrating your cell membranes more easily. This means PentaTM is absorbed into your system faster and more completely"

Even if it were true, should they really win the prize for making a better Gatoraide?

Even if they claimed it was magic, and it was shown to work, if science could explain it, wouldn't that mean they don't win the prize?

Corona688

Did you miss this part? They are more than welcome to attempt to claim the $1M dollar prize. They haven't even tried, because they -know- they're only selling ordinary hydroxyl acid.

Veil of Fire

What do your quote and my quote have to do with each other?

MY quote shows Randi admitting that he refused to allow some people to take the challenge because he thought they were insane.

Jeremy Pallant

Talk about taking a quote out of context. I submit the quote Veil of Fire is referring to in its original context:

"For those who do negotiate the rules and get a notarized statement to us — that's only about 10% of the initial applicants — we have to begin the arduous task of getting them to actually state, clearly, just what they think they can do, under what circumstances, and with what accuracy. I won't go into the many hours that we waste just explaining to them that (a) what they claim is not at all paranormal, (b) what they claim already has a ready explanation, or (c) what goes on in their heads is probably a malfunction that calls for professional evaluation and treatment. Others, we argue with up to a certain point, then we have to abandon the confrontation because they have so little understanding of the real world."

From this one can determine that those who qualify for option (c) were unable to "actually state, clearly, just what they think they can do, under what circumstances, and with what accuracy".

Actually reminds me of Christian claims regarding the efficacy of prayer.

[ June 01, 2002: Message edited by: Jeremy Pallant ]</p>

Veil of Fire

"From this one can determine that those who qualify for option (c) were unable to "actually state, clearly, just what they think they can do, under what circumstances, and with what accuracy"."

I've re-read that paragraph six times, and I still can't for the life of me figure out how you get that interpretation.

seebs

I don't see that at all. Randi's claim that the observed phenomenon does not exist outside the mind of the observer doesn't mean you couldn't *test* for it existing outside the mind of the observer.

Personally, I think he's a fraud himself; I believe he has carefully constructed the claim on precisely the lines that are used by the people with the unfalsifiable claims. If real, verifiable, magic existed, I don't think it would be possible to claim Randi's reward using it; I think he's too careful, and that the whole thing is a publicity stunt.

(Which isn't to say that I believe in the stuff he generally debunks.)

Corona688

Where? He just says HE thinks they're nuts. He also admits that he's biased against them, and takes measures to ensure his bias doesn't influence the test: