Swift September 5, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT September 5, 2008
Written by James Randi   

Absurd, Shermer's Event, Some Heavy Comments, Alarming Acceptance of Quackery, A Huge Step Backward, Stupid Answers, Some Hope, In Closing…

A certain Vince Fenech, Evangelist pastor and director of the fully-licensed, state-approved "Accelerated Christian Academy Creationist institution" in Malta, has achieved a new level of fantasy that rivals most of what we encounter these days, even on the US political scene. Says this student of mythological science, dinosaurs helped build the pyramids of Egypt. This is a little-known aspect of archaeology, even as taught in Egypt or to Scientologists.

While some of us have the quaint notion that dinosaurs – we're talking BIG ones here – became extinct some 65 million years ago, Fenech reveals to us that they actually co-existed with early humans, and even helped in the construction of the pyramids. He tells us that the beasts are mentioned in the Book of Job, but cautions that his observation about their being used for pyramid construction is only "his personal belief." The curriculum of the Academy is not exactly free of such fanciful reinventions of history. They insist the basic Evangelist tenet that the entire universe was created in 4004 BPE, is true, and Fenech supplies "proof" of the notion:

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Swift August 29, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT August 29, 2008
Written by James Randi   

Lying Ain't a Sin!, Unnoticed Amit the Laughter, More Mitchell, A Delicious Hoax, A Request, Ban on Oxygen Bars Circumvented, From Cananda, Verbatim Editorial, Data Input Requested, 2008 Scholarship Awards, The Enchanted Islands, Signs of Progress, In Closing...

We've heard from reader Chris Wayne in Brisbane, Australia, who tipped us to this next item.

The Australian Christian Church [ACC] is a group of Pentecostal Churches formerly known as the Assemblies of God in Australia. It was formed in 1937 and adopted the new name in 2007. It currently consists of more than 1,120 churches with over 215,000 constituents, making it the largest Pentecostal movement in Australia. A prominent figure in this group is Michael Guglielmucci, whose parents established the Edge Church International, an ACC church, at O'Halloran Hill in Adelaide's southern suburbs. He's become a pastor with one of Australia's biggest youth churches, Planetshakers.

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Swift August 22, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT August 22, 2008
Written by James Randi   

Hairy Chap in the News Again, I Sniff Desperation, At Last, Perhaps a Doubt?, Bentley in a Bind, The ADE651 Detector, Please, and In Closing…

When some folks get themselves revved up on a specific farce, they can't stop. One such unfortunate, a former Las Vegas promoter named Tom Biscardi, is currently wondering whatever happened to his two "partners" who accepted from him a $50,000 advance on future earnings that were to be earned from exhibiting the frozen body of a bogus Bigfoot. Matthew Whitton and Rick Dyer, the genuine bipeds from Georgia who claimed to have found and chilled the Bigfoot body, are now being pursued by Biscardi, whose money they seem to have absconded with once the frozen "corpse" was revealed to be a hoax. Really? Wow!

Biscardi hired an investigator, Steve Kulls, to look into the matter. Now, he won't confirm where the "body" is, but it was apparently moved from Georgia to Indiana. Upon examining the object, Kulls discovered that the proposed expensive DNA tests were not needed; you see, a rubber monkey-suit would not properly respond to such advanced techniques. To provide a transitory impression of authenticity, the Georgia bipeds had stuffed the suit with various body-parts that gave off impressive olfactory evidence that might have deterred a less zealous investigator than Mr. Kulls.

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Galapagos & Lancaster News
Category: Life

Galapagos & Lancaster News
Written by Jeff Wagg   

Hello, Jeff Wagg here...

As I write this, we are in the Galapagos, having just come back from a trip ashore to investigate marine iguanas, Galapagos sea lions, and Sally Lightfoot crabs. You'll be hearing a lot more about your adventures in the near future, but let's just say this up front.. it appears Darwin was right. And this is truly an AMAZING adventure.

Randi asked me to tell you all that due to his adventures below the equator, he will not be writing a SWIFT this week. Instead, he will be taking in the wonders of this unique place so that he might regale you with tales of vampire finches and lava lizards in future editions.

However, we do have one important piece of business to discuss. Robert S. Lancaster, creator of www.stopkaz.com and www.stopsylviabrowne.com has recently had a stroke and is recovering in the hospital. His prognosis is good, but he has a long road ahead of him both physically and financially. The JREF has promised to help spread the word and try to garner as much support as possible from the skeptic community. 

Please visist http://www.skepticsunite.com/ if you would like to help. We know Robert will be extremely grateful.

Robert is one of those people that rings true every time. He really is the kind of guy he seems to be. He shows us all that one man can make a big difference, and we need him. Please be as generous as you can so that he might be back on the front lines as soon as possible.

Thank you,

Jeff Wagg

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Swift August 8, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT August 8, 2008
Written by James Randi   

Announcement, Fearsom Portents, Birds of a Feather, "The One" - One More Time, This Is Getting Boring, Feedback, Update, Correction, Who's Better Off?, The Same Old Argument, Another Non-Homeopathic Swindle, In Closing...

Last week we sent out notices that Bad Astronomer Phil Plait is replacing me as President of the JREF. Just to make sure we're all on the same frequency, here: Yes, our excellent friend Phil Plait is now the President of JREF. No, I'm not abandoning the JREF; I'm moving up-and-sideways to occupy the position of "Founder & Chairman of the Board." I have nothing but total confidence in Phil and his ability to fill this position, and I will now have the time and opportunity to finish my next two books: "A Magician in the Laboratory," and "Wrong!" – at long last...! When those emerge, watch the fur fly...!

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Swift August 1, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT August 1, 2008
Written by James Randi

Lunar Astronaut Still Deluded and Spaced-Out, The State of Homequackery, Yet More on Homeopathy, What's Sauce for the Goose..., Help Wanted, Another Superstitious Horror, "The One": Episode 4, More Sniffex, The USPTO Again, and In Closing...

I first refer you to --link--, where you'll read Phil Plait's overly-kind but honest reference to the latest nonsense to come from former astronaut Edgar Mitchell, one of the only twelve persons ever to actually walk on the Moon – that we know of, that is. Mitchell is now insisting that he's privy to firm evidence that UFO-nauts exist, and that the truth has been – you guessed it! – suppressed by those People in Charge.

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Swift July 25, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT July 25, 2008
Written by James Randi

An Encouraging Development, The Netherlands Scene, Tattoo Time, Tantric Tantrum, Next Episode Down Under, I'm Shaking in My Boots, and In Conclusion…

Our readers will recall a tedious matter that occupied this site for several months. It was yet another "dowsing stick" farce, this one headed up by a Paul B. Johnson, CEO of the "Sniffex" company. Johnson eagerly sued the JREF when we published the facts about the fraudulent toy he was marketing as a bomb detection device, obviously hoping to benefit from the growing public concern with security. In fact, in September of 2006, he actually changed the name of his company to "Homeland Safety International Inc.," keeping up to date with the latest media headlines, and perhaps hoping to imply connections with federal government agencies. He issued a series of 33 news releases that contained mostly false information about the product and about the company's financial situation. This maneuver drove the share price of the stock from 80 cents to about $6, earning a combined $32 million in illegal profits.

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Swift July 18, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT July 18, 2007
Written by James Randi

Another Loud Bellow Is Heard, A Follow-Up, From Bob's Page, Will the Delegate From Sirius Please Stand?, But It's Only Art…, Remember Takahashi?, A McQuarie Query, Wild Web Too Wild?, Clever…, More Love Notes, and In Closing…

The currently-most-popular religious "healer" to infest the lecture venues of America is a 32-year-old Canadian decorated with tattoos, plus a pierced eyebrow and chin. As if this isn't ugly enough, he appears before his gullible audiences nightly wearing a t-shirt so that his illustrations can more easily be appreciated – rather like the scribblings on the back fence of a grade school, but making less sense.

In his current "Lakeland Revival," Todd Bentley preaches that some god or other acts through him to cure cancer, heal the deaf, and raise the dead. Really? Well, The Illustrated Man can snap up a million dollars that's available right here at the JREF – as if he didn't already know that – as soon as he produces the evidence for any healing he's invoked by his rantings. Now, Bentley claims that he has medical proof of many healings he's brought about – the same story we regularly hear from all these liars – but he's somehow not able to produce it! For the Associated Press, when asked, his "ministry" came up with a list of fifteen persons it said were cured, and who they said they'd checked out. Bentley's people said that all but three of their stories had been "medically verified." That sounded good – though it was a rather slim number, given the thousands upon thousands of cures for which they say they can show proof.

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Swift July 11, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT July 11, 2008
Written by James Randi

A Premiere Report, The Opposition Revealed, Dr. Tyson Again, Same Old Routine, A Pleasant Surprise, and In Closing…

Reader Robert Matic of Melbourne, Australia, reports to us on the Tuesday, 8 July, 2008, premiere of what has been advertised there as "a search for Australia's most gifted psychic." That's much like saying, "a search for the least incompetent guesser," in my opinion. It's titled "The One," and has now emerged on prime-time commercial television. This is the show we mentioned at http://www.randi.org/joom/commentary/swift/swift-july-4-2008.htmli3. Robert writes:

We were promised from the outset, by host Andrew Daddo, to receive a balanced program with one of the two judges being a believer (Stacey Demarco – Witch) and the other a skeptic (Richard Saunders – Australian Skeptics). Although the judges were given equal time to comment on the results of the tests – approximately ten seconds each per test! – the editing of the show heavily and predictably leaned towards the believer's point of view. After introducing the seven psychics competing for the title – with loads of anecdotal evidence from clients, of course – the first episode went through one "controlled" test and, later, an open display of the psychics' powers in front of the live studio audience.

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Swift July 4, 2008
Category: Life

SWIFT July 4, 2008
Written by James Randi   

How Ridiculous Can You Get?, More Needles-in-Your-Face, Saunders Is In Action, TAM6 Preview, Giggle Time, In Closing.

We may have an answer to this simple, basic, question, taken directly from the very interesting SkepticWiki site at http://www.skepticwiki.org/index.php, which I recommend you visit often, especially since one of the hilarious and very effective Richard Wiseman videos is currently featured. Please, since you'll be convulsed with laughter at the truly incredible naivety of the Comfort/Cameron team, read this in private. SkepicWiki tells us:

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