James Randi Speaks: Why Do We Still Believe

hello i'm james randy with another video exhortation to deliver in this remarkable book of 1843 extraordinary popular delusions and the madness of crowds this is a reprint i hasten to add author charles mckay described in detail a variety of strange ideas and obsessions that had seized the people of his time he began excuse me in reading the history of nations we find that like individuals they have their whims and their peculiarities their seasons of excitement and recklessness when they care not what they do we find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object and go mad in its pursuit that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion and run after it till their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first we see one nation suddenly seized from its highest to its lowest members with a fierce desire of military glory another as suddenly becoming crazed upon a religious scruple and neither of them recovering its chances until it has shed rivers of blood and sowed a harvest of groans and tears to be reaped by its posterity for generations mckay's readers have charted at the naivete of those who chose to accept so many bizarre notions and who in many cases were very willing to invest money and trust in them much to their subsequent sorrow my next book a magician in the laboratory will deal with some of those similar subjects claims ideas notions reports news items and downright scams that i have encountered in actual lab scenarios all over the world those who laughed at the dukes of generations long gone described by mckay are now aware of how a very modern populace can as easily believe this sort of misinformation even though we now have the internet and other technological advances that should keep us from falling headlong into our rational convictions there are swindlers out there who have a variety of reasons for wanting to deceive us some want to sell us spurious products or services others literally want to steal from us by one means or another and some want to gain access to our private lives however a great deal of misinformation is created and disseminated by mirror pranksters who want to create some excitement so that they can stand back and be amused at those of us who should have been a little more alert by checking out sources today more than ever we find perpetual motion machines free energy schemes and strange little devices that we're told to place at strategic spots around internal combustion engines in order to obtain better performance and economy these are sold via mail order and even through in-person public lectures sometimes we even get to see videos that appear to establish the validity of these claims inventions though you'd think we would be a bit smarter than to accept special effects that any teenager can now create on a computer screen by means of easily available software programs apparently we aren't at our jref offices here in fort lauderdale florida we can show you a huge library that long ago overflowed its shelves and continued on into the hall outside at least 80 percent of this collection is sure nonsense every sort of crackpot idea every possible conspiracy theory all sorts of scientific theories are represented here we maintain this library for reference purposes of students researchers the media and just curious people who want to have a better view of how easily we can be deceived and how easily we deceive ourselves publishers adore what we call woo-woo books because they know they can sell several printings of them public taste being what it is as soon as a would-be author shows up in an editor's doorway and outlines a ridiculous impossible illogical idea you can almost hear the trees begin to fall in nearby forests in preparation for the paper that will be wasted again on yet another silly book in this office at least we know the contents of our library and we warn readers well in advance that they should be very careful about accepting what they find on our shelves as being true except of course for my books i recall that many years ago during the time that i did my late night radio show out of new york city i was invited to attend the broadway opening of the believe it or not museum containing many of the original artifacts that belong to that cartoonist turned columnist robert ripley and upon which he based many of his highly popular illustrated articles describing various wonders of nature and of man now some of these were obviously spurious and i suppose that we were expected to filter those out as amusements rather than actual discoveries as with many of those who began with good intentions ripley tended in his later articles to rather over exaggerate this might have been due to a shortage of material i can't say in any case i was willing to tour that facility and form an opinion for the media i did as i exited i was met by a crowd of media people who were doubtless anxious to hear what the great skeptic might have to say so what do you think mr randy asked a chap who stuck a microphone in my face i put my hand to my chin in a contemplative mode posture a few seconds and gave him a quotation that evidently delighted him concerning the believe it or not exhibit not i said there is always a place in our lives for fantasy and no one enjoys that luxury more than i after all for half a century i made my living traveling the world as a professional magician and a magician deals in that commodity every moment that he's on stage the art of course lies in recognizing reality and carefully separating it from fiction professionals certainly know how that's done years ago i toured the usa and several foreign markets as part of the alice cooper rock show my job was to chop his head off with a guillotine every night without actually doing him any harm it worked for three months and during that period of time i had the opportunity of seeing a rather unique phenomenon you see alice and i were always the last to leave the dressing room to begin the show because i had to equip him with two handheld mechanisms that enabled him to throw long flames from his fingertips these were semi-dangerous devices which he'd only take into his hands at the very last moment when the stage manager would poke his head in the door and announce two minutes i could watch vincent fernier coop's original name rapidly and magically changing from a reasonably normal young man into the showbiz monster that his audience expected him to be he adopted the character by simply putting it on like a pullover his walk his facial expression his entire demeanor changed and a moment later he would totter frankenstein monster-like into the spotlight vincent would become alice two hours later when he retired from the stage dressed in white satin tails and top hat he became vincent as soon as he hit the lights of the dressing room i always admired him for that his ability to step into fantasy and then shed it so easily it's a talent we might all try to acquire just think we rapidly watch star wars but we don't really believe we're seeing space warriors firing ray guns at one another gone with the wind charms us but we know we're still in the 21st century and we didn't really watch atlanta burning engrossed in moby dick we can empathize with ahab but we're still aware that we're reading fiction why then do so many of us suspend our judgment so that we can be scammed by people who would sell us felt insoles with embedded magnets merchandisers who will prescribe a gel stick with no active ingredients in it that we rub on our foreheads because we're told that headaches can thus be relieved or a guru who says that if we take his course we'll be able to fly just by thinking deeply about it it's time to return to the likes of the dressing room to return to the real world in summary enjoy the fantasy the fun the stories but make sure that there's a clear sharp line drawn on the floor so that you can step back behind that mark and re-embrace reality to do otherwise is to embrace madness we thank you for watching this latest episode of james randy speaks for more of james randy and the educational foundation make sure you visit randy.org

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Keywords: james, randi, jref, paranormal, million, dollar, challenge, alice, cooper, beliefe

Id: uZyvg75iP3U

Length: 9min 18sec (558 seconds)

Published: Thu Mar 26 2009