The Third Skeptics' Circle

It is with great pleasure that I introduce the third Skeptics' Circle, a collection of skeptical writing from across the blogosphere. For those unfamiliar with the idea, read through St. Nate's first Skeptics' Circle, and Orac's most enjoyable second Skeptics' Circle.

Orac wove his version of the Skeptics' Circle into a compelling narrative; I pondered doing the same (trying to weave elements of Tolkien throughout the tale), but nothing really clicked, and what I did write seemed like a cheap ripoff of Orac. So, rather than having elves and Maiar wandering around, I've decided on a clean, crisp presentation that focuses all the attention right where it should be: on the 21 excellent articles that were submitted for this edition.

Medicine

• In See Clearly Method, Paige briefly looks at the physiological and anatomical errors in the promotion of an advertised eyesight improvement technique.


• In So called weight loss pills, WolverineTom posts "about the dubious nature of weight loss pills and how the weight loss is really occurring," and also "talks about how the companies that make the pills are fooling customers."


• In Organon Critique #1, Quackblog peruses Samuel Hahnemann's Organon (a book on homeopathy) and finds it to be "nonsense, superstition and some of the craziest stuff I've read in a long time."


• In D.D. Palmer's Religion of Chiropractic: D.D. Palmer letter, May 4, 1911, Confessions of a Quackbuster posts a letter from one of the founders the founder of chiropractic.


• In Argh! Alties are mailing pitches to my office! and Satisfaction, Orac of Respectful Insolence discusses alternative medicine's use of chelation therapy. The first post is an extremely detailed discussion of what chelation therapy is (and is not), and the second covers the response Orac received after he confronted a facility sponsoring a talk on chelation therapy as alternative medicine.


• In I am born naturally skeptical against pseudoscience, Anne at Anne's Anti-Quackery & Science Blog constructs a dialogue between herself and a friend who is a believer in alternative medicine.
  


• In A Piece of Our Mind - About Ten Percent, The Two Percent Company discusses "the common myth often used to promote ******** paranormal claims: that we only use 10% of our brains."


• In Modern Day Alchemists Part II: Immortal Begrudged, St. Nate, founder of the Skeptics' Circle, examines the pseudoscience of the immortality movement.


• In Is Avian Influenza THAT deadly?, GrrlScientist at Living the Scientific Life dives into a recent Nature article relevant to the avian influenza media storm.
  

Biology and evolution

• In An empirical argument against the reality of psi phenomena, The Socratic Gadfly argues "from evolutionary biology against the existence of psi phenomena."


• In Let's Evolve, Dr. Stuart Henochowicz of Medviews calls for a truce between science and religion.


• In The dangers of creationism, Joshua at Thoughts from Kansas discusses how creationist-inspired thinking may be leading to social and economic problems in Kansas.


• In Gabler gone, but it makes no difference, PZ Myers of Pharyngula details "the legacy of a wicked man who corrupted a few decades worth of biology textbooks."


• In Lysenko Gets A D-Minus On My Genetics Test, Bora at Science and Politics explores science history through the politically influenced writings of a Russian scientist in the late 1940's.

Reasoning in daily life

• In Sock Gnomes?, Mark at Lambic explores both the scientific method and what happens to the socks that get lost in his laundry.


• In I Believe Because They Believe and Vice Versa, Ophelia at Butterflies and Wheels discusses the circular reasoning behind commonly held beliefs.


• In How Not to Pull a Marketing Hoax, St. Nate looks at a recent marketing hoax perpetrated by the NBA.


• In You Call This "Journalism"?, Paige wonders at the skill of a reporter who asks a psychic to predict the weather two days in advance.

Ones that didn't fit anywhere else

• In The Truth, The Absolute Truth, Peter Fredson analyzes the use of the phrase "absolute truth" in online works, and sees if absolute truth can be found through Google.


• In a response to Orac's Skeptics' Circle II, Tim at Deltoid argues that Penn and Teller are not heroes of the skeptical movement.

That's it! The next Skeptics' Circle will be hosted on Thursday, March 17 by The Two Percent Company; their call for posts is here.

[updated March 3, 2005 based on an e-mail correction from Paul Lee (author of Confessions of a Quackbuster), and to include a link to The Two Percent Company's request for posts.]