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Discussions with Skeptics I used to have email discussions with skeptics. When I started doing this I worked on the assumption that I was dealing with intelligent, if misguided, people who would at least acknowledge that their simplistic views were just that – simplistic. I realised I was wrong when I was having a discussion with a member of the Australian Skeptics who was quite prominently featured on their web site. He stated that science must be correct because peer review guaranteed it. Stunned by what I assumed to be his simplistic view of the world I returned with a long a detailed email pointing out the logical error in this and then referring him to a number of web sites where scientists themselves discussed the flaws in the peer review system. What I got back was a terse email pointing out a spelling mistake and then launching into another, totally different, supposed flaw in the reasoning of those who supported clairvoyants and similar mystic ideas. I realised that the person was not in the least interested in learning about the world, of exploring different ways of seeing things and finding things out. He simply wanted to win arguments. I should have got wise to this some time earlier when I used an analogy and was told, “You can’t win arguments with analogies”. I told him I was not interested in winning argument, I was interested in getting him to see the information he had in a different light. This is, sadly, very typical of skeptics thinking. Many of their web sites are filled with examples of arguing techniques. Some of this is supposed to illustrate how non-skeptics use these techniques to win arguments, but it is usually only the skeptics who are interested in winning arguments. It is a meaningless pursuit. Another theme that fills the pages of these sites is ridicule and sarcasm. If you can make people who disagree with you appear stupid then this, to them, is a valid technique. The aim here is win because by doing so you don’t have to change your worldview. If you believe that the established view of scientists is correct, and any alternative view is faulty then you really don’t need to apply much brainpower to new information. If it comes from a valid source, for example Nature, New Scientist or Scientific American, then you can pass it through your filter with little analysis. If you read it in a non-approved publication, or it is by someone who has been non-approved, then you can reject it, also using little analysis. Richard Wiseman (a particularly dishonest skeptic) said that if we were to accept such phenomena [as Natasha Demkina's] as being true, we would have to throw out all our current scientific theories. Of course this is nonsense. The sun would still rise, the moon would still follow its path and water would still boil at 100 degrees C. What would happen, though, is people such as him would no longer be able to reject out of hand phenomena that hadn’t been pre-approved. People will go to great lengths to avoid having to question things. This has been the history of the world since the beginning of time.