Donald Simanek's Skeptical Documents and Links

The public will believe anything, so long as it is not founded on truth.—Edith Sitwell

• Creationism and Intelligent Design. Fraudulent Pseudoscience.
• Fibonacci Flim-Flam. Mystical mathematics misapplied to reality.
• Jim Lippard's Skeptical Information Links.
• The Skeptic's Dictionary A starting point for skeptical analysis of popular delusions.
• Pseudoscience/Paranormal/Skepticism Home Page for PHY105. Edward Lipson, Syracuse University. Many good links.
• The WHY-Files, newsletter of the Inquiring Skeptics of New York.
• The Straight Dope Archives. Cecil Adams answers questions on every conceivable subject.
• CSICOP. The Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal. Contents pages and selected articles from The Skeptical Inquirer and Skeptical Briefs.
• Skeptics Society Web Skeptic magazine.
• Annotated Skeptic Bibliography by Taner Edis.
• The Skeptic Tank. Fredric Rice's archive of skeptic and urban legend information and links.
• Victor J. Stenger. Critiques of new-age quantum mysticism and other abuses of science.
• Skeptic's organizations: North Texas Skeptics, Philadelphia Association for Critical Thinking, The New England Skeptical Society.
• Rube Goldberg. A cartoonist who satirized technology.

An "urban legend" is an unfounded fictional story, presented as if it were fact, widely believed because it has the trappings of plausibility and appeals to people's preconceptions, beliefs or prejudices.

• Snopes.com. Urban Legends Reference Page.
• Urban Legends Archive.
• Christian Urban Legends.
• Scientific Urban Legends.
• Internet scams and hoaxes: Internet hoaxes and frauds, Symantec Corp..
• Other frauds and scams: National Fraud Information Center.
• Quackwatch. Medical snake-oil peddlers.

• Characterization of Quack Theories by Russell Turpin. Copy.
• The Belief Engine by James Alcock.
• Richard Feynman on "Cargo Cult Science."
• Bibliography for Science/Pseudoscience Seminar.
• Extrapolation. Mark Twain. Excerpt from Life on the Mississippi.
• Books for skeptics, in e-text.

Some things need to be believed to be seen. —Guy Kawasaki

It is wrong always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence. —William Kingdon Clifford

• Creationism and Intelligent Design. Fraudulent Pseudoscience.
• Humans, Cockroaches and the Laws of Physics. Victor J. Stenger exposes the logical missing links of the Intelligent Design arguments.
• Two papers exposing the Intelligent Design deception.
• In spite of what you've read in the popular press, Leading Scientists Still Reject God.
• Evolution vs. Creationism Home Page. Edward Lipson's comprehensive collection of resources.
• The Talk.Origins Archive. Excellent, detailed documents on evolution.
• National Center for Science Education. On the frontlines of the battle to oppose attacks on teaching evolution in the schools.
• University of Ediacara. Devoted to the study of the origins of life.
• The Secular Web.
• Richard Dawkins. John Catalano's rich collection of links, documents and materials related to Dawkins' work.
• The Skeptical Review of religion.
• Christian Urban Legends.

• Frequently Encountered Criticisms in Evolution vs. Creationism. Answers to common creationist criticisms of evolution, links to more detailed answers on the net, and a good bibliography. Copy.

Pseudoscience, Weird Science, Kookiness and Quackery

It's been my policy to view the Internet not as an 'information highway,' but as an electronic asylum filled with babbling loonies. —Mike Royko

There's a rich mix of credulous pseudoscience and new-age claptrap here, along with skeptical, rational and scientific analyses of it. Some materials linked here might be classed as borderline or speculative science. You sort it out.

• What is science? What is Pseudoscience? by Donald Simanek.
• The Museum of Unnatural Mystery (The Unmuseum). An amazing site! Curator: Lee Krystek.
• The Museum of Questionable Medical Devices. Bob McCoy's collection of quack medical apparatus in Minneapolis.
• The Museum of Unworkable Devices. A collection of ingenious devices that never worked and never will. You are invited to figure out why, using only elementary physics. Curator: Donald Simanek.
• It's The End Of The World As We Know It...Again, by Alma Geddon. An incredible site. Read it now, before it's too late.
• Watching You Dot Com. Jabs at New-Age wackos and conspiricay theorists. By Scott LaRoche.
• James Randi Educational Foundation. Wizard and skeptic James Randi is the enemy of humbug peddlers, snake-oil salesmen and other purveyors of poppycock.
• National Council Against Health Fraud.
• crank dot net. Cranks, crackpots, kooks and loonies on the net.
• The Mysterious & Unexplained.
• Anomalies—the Strange & Unexplained.
• Dark Side of the Net.
• Paranormal phenomena. The web has many sites devoted to pseudoscience and paranomral phenomena. Here's one: Parapsychology Sources on the Internet.

Specific Varieties of Pseudoscience

• Immanuel Velikovsky's science-fantasy scenarios imagined a wayward planet/comet causing catastrophic events recorded in human history. If this notion has the slightest appeal to you, then you should read An Antidote to Velikovskian Delusions.
• Ignatius Donnelly and the End of the World. An illustrated field trip through the mind of an original thinker.
• The Alchemy Web site. Yes, there are still alchemists.
• Maharishi University of Management. This university proves that accreditation is a sham. One can hardly keep up with the nonsense emanating from this enclave of the Maharishi Mahesh Yoga's minions of mentally muddled meditators. The Meditation Information Network can help you sort it out.