If Randi is right and he'll "never have to pay because psychic phenomena aren't real" then he shouldn't have any trouble with an independent body writing legitimate rules for his as of now, completely phony "million dollar challenge". A group of scientists who are experts in experimental design and evaluation should be able to come up with a test that isn't a dishonest ruse that it is now. As it is, and as I wrote, Randi's claim to fame is a complete fraud.
Kierkegaard once pointed out that you can't prove the existence of God because either you accept that God exists, and you've already assumed the outcome of the proof; or you don't accept that God exists, and you've already denied the outcome of the proof.
ReplyDeleteRandi has already denied the possibility of the very thing he claims must be proven in order to make him lose is wager; so he can't ever lose.
Not much of a wager, either. As you say.
Randi is kind of a humorous subject to me, mostly as an example of an example of how credulous and, even, superstitious the atheists can be while believing they're being all sciency and skepticalish. When you look about a half a millimeter beneath the show biz razzle dazzle the guy is a complete and utter fraud and sleaze. While I'm not really qualified to judge, some professional magicians say that, like Penn and Teller, he's not an especially good stage magician, either, having stolen just about everything he ever did in that field of entertainment.
ReplyDeleteThat such a total fraud and proven scientific incompetent can pass himself off as a figure of science, with the help of a number of actual scientists, is a good window into the atheist/"skeptical" habits of non-thought.
I'm still getting major amounts of hate-e-mail over what I've said about their Randi-god. It's some of the only hate mail I usually read because it makes me laugh at what a bunch of gullible suckers they are while they are so hilariously conceited. I need all the laughs I can get these days.