Recommended Reading

Here's a long profile of James Randi, a man in whom I find much to admire. He doesn't like the term "debunker." I don't like the term "skeptic" as it's currently applied. (Most people I encounter who describe themselves as "skeptics" in the Randi sense tend to be too skeptical, usually starting with the presumption that the conventional wisdom about anything must be wrong merely because it is widely believed.)

I've met and spoken to Randi a few times and find him fascinating and generally heroic. I don't always agree with what he says but do get the impression that he is quite prepared to disagree with what he said last week if he encounters better data. I am of the belief that there's no such thing as E.S.P. or talking with the dead or psychic healing or ghosts or mystic powers or people who like cole slaw or…well, ignore that last one. But I believe what I believe about the other stuff and think it's great that someone is out there exposing the Sylvia Brownes and Peter Popoffs among us who swindle the gullible.

The article spends a bit too much time on Randi's personal problems and it neatly skirts his devout atheism…but it's a pretty good read about a pretty "amazing" man.