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carriep carriep
 
M$15 December 18, 2008 02:58 PM

Video clips that are good examples of skepticism or psudeoscience?

EDITED:

I'm starting to put together an idea for a possible blog post, or maybe an eventual presentation, about skepticism in popular culture. I'm looking less about stuff of skeptics debunking and more for examples of scenes debunking or discussing psudeoscience in television movies and other fiction. For example, this scene in The Wizard of Oz is a good example of cold reading. The guy is pretending to be psychic and read Dorothy's mind, but he's very clearly using tricks to find out what he wants to know.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvkEMO3JkXU


Looking for clips that are popular, accessible, and preferably on YouTube. Randi/Penn/Teller are good, but I'm looking for stuff in other shows that is a little more accessible to a non-skeptical audience.

Kind of a tall order, so offering a nice tip. Ask if you've got questions or are confused. Thanks in advance!
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ellavemia ellavemia
 
 December 18, 2008 03:53 PM
This was the first film I thought of when I saw your request. I believe it sums up what you're asking for, except in this movie obviously the fraudulent medium actually turns out to be a vessel for a spirit.

Asker's Rating:
• This is exactly what I was looking for. Clips from movies and TV from shows that don't directly deal with psychics, pseudoscience and debunking. The video clips were a nice touch.

Loved everyone's Randi and other traditional skeptic clips, though. Thanks to all!


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moises moises
 
December 18, 2008 03:05 PM
You can find some videos here that talks about those subjet here.

http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&resnum=0&q=skepticism%20or%20pseudoscience%3F&um=1&ie=UTF-8&sa=N&tab=wv#

Hoe you enjoy it!.
Source(s):
http://video.google.com/videosearch?hl=en&resnum=0&q=skepticism%20o...


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bugsy bugsy
 
December 18, 2008 03:06 PM
Shhhhh!

http://web.mac.com/flying8shoes/Guru_You-U/Shhhhh!_movie.html

Wait for it...wait for it...

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jonceramic jonceramic
 
December 18, 2008 03:19 PM
edit w/o weird code below. --nope, it's back. Must be some Mahalo bug as I'm pasting straight code in.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYxu_MQSTTY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKq2udn37j0

http://www.wikihow.com/Cold-Read


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carriep carriep
 
December 18, 2008 03:23 PM
Thanks for the answer, but all your html code is showing wonky.

You can just cut and paste a YouTube URL directly into your answer. You don't need to add the embed code. You have about an hour to edit after you post an answer.

Lots of good links, though, thanks!

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jonceramic jonceramic
 
December 18, 2008 03:23 PM
edit

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jonceramic jonceramic
 
December 18, 2008 03:30 PM
Seems to work with just the links. So, here's just my text.
Well, the humorous answer is this spoof of David Blaine that's been viewed a bazillion times.

If you have Netflix, I'd recommend streaming episodes of Penn and Teller's Bulls--t. While not strictly on pseudoscience, are certainly with the "debunking flair".

Now, there are other discussions of Psychic Surgery as mentioned in Penn and Teller's movie "...Get killed". Here is a lecture on the matter.

Here's a wonderful guide on Cold Reading, which, once you read it, exposes all the techniques of these fakes.

But, the classic starting spot is James Randi's debunking of Uri Geller and others. Linked below.

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carriep carriep
 
December 18, 2008 03:32 PM
They are showing up fine for me now, so I think you're right that it was a temporary bug. If you have that problem again, just send it to feedback@mahalo.com.

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exedore6 exedore6
 
December 18, 2008 03:24 PM
For skeptic/pseudoscience/woo videos, I'd recommend going to the James Randi Foundation's youtube page.

http://www.youtube.com/user/JamesRandiFoundation

Specifically regarding cold reading
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=btP_vy5cQq4


A classic from the Tonight Show, Randi debunking Uri Gellar
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNKmhv9uoiQ


More Randi vs. Gellar
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YJDh1xjSeU&feature=related


Penn and Teller did a BullS**t episode covering cold reading very well a couple of years back.
Source(s):
http://randi.org; http://www.youtube.com


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sgtoox sgtoox
 
December 18, 2008 04:12 PM
rats these were the clips i was going to use haha
well done we studied these in psychology

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powerfulma... powerfulma...
 
December 18, 2008 03:26 PM
look here

http://www.skepticalinvestigations.org/guide/field_guide.htm

http://www.skepticnews.com/pseudoscience/

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clarusvisu... clarusvisu...
 
December 18, 2008 03:38 PM
Looking at James Randi's clips on YouTube is a fantastic source for this, as he is famous for doing exactly what you're talking about. He's 'done' things like spoon-bending, psychic surgery, etc., in front of large audiences just to show them how charlatans pull things like that off.

The new TV show The Mentalist is also a good source of this, as you could probably guess from the title. The main character is a man who used to feign psychic ability, but now helps police work by using what he freely admits is nothing more than advanced perception, "paying attention" in his words. Several people perceive his abilities as psychic, but the show makes a point of him telling them there is nothing supernatural about his abilities. The first few episodes do this more than the others (it would get boring otherwise, so that's not a bad thing once the audience 'gets it'); I'll link you to the pilot and you can check it out.

Also, there isn't much about it yet, but there is a TV show in the works that aims to do precisely this called The Skeptologists. You can see the teaser trailer on my blog; the post is linked below.

Hope that helps.
Source(s):
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=james+randi&search_type=&am...
http://www.watchthementalist.info/index.php?action=season&id=1&epis...
http://clarusvisum.blogspot.com/2008/04/skeptologists.html


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cherman cherman
 
December 18, 2008 03:39 PM
This is a great video explaining pseudoscience. It is one of the most seen on Youtube.


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mrnemo mrnemo
 
December 18, 2008 03:47 PM
My apologies - I should've read your question more thoroughly. Regardless, hopefully these links of debunking will help you with your research, and you may choose to add them to your eventual blog post.

1. Carl Sagan, wonderful interview (about his last book, The Demon Haunted World which you should suggest to your readers) -

2. Penn & Teller's BS! - entertaining clip of "doctor" letting unsuspecting shoppers try out ridiculous "magnet therapies" and, best yet, a "snail mucus facial." (may have some adult language)

3. Penn & Teller: UFOs

4. Penn & Teller: Bigfoot

You can easily find the Penn & Teller episode "Alternative Medicine" on videos.google.com and it has the PERFECT example of pseudoscience - a hilarious reflexologist. The video is 30 minutes long, but you could cut the reflexologist part and use it -
Let me know if you have additional requests or questions.


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mmoore mmoore
 
December 18, 2008 04:22 PM
www.rationalresponders.com/forum/sapient/philosophy_and_psychology_with_chaoslord_and_todangst/8283

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marcel m marcel m
 
December 18, 2008 04:22 PM
The following series on YouTube, Michael Shermer On Charlie Rose Seem Interesting.There is also the following series by Carl Sagan the renowned Theoretical Physicist on his new book ,The Demon Haunted World. These series might provide a better sounding board for your future blog. Plus,I have included a couple more i found on YouTube. I hope this Information will be of help. The URL's for the other Videos are indicated below.Good Luck.

Source(s):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IZz0hxBGX8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_IO7V8kz3I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qodOwQ-U1oQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB88HnlLgZ8


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imacgian imacgian
 
December 19, 2008 02:16 PM
One of the things I've always observed is about how people attribute success to prayer. There is a notion that if one prays hard, then he or she will be successful, i.e. in a sports match.

This can be observed in traditional religious societies. In a current world title boxing match for example, it is mentioned that Manny Pacquiao vanquished his foes (the latest of which is Oscar de la Hoya) because of hard prayer coming from him and from the Filipinos as can be seen in the following videos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNtZxbvV574


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObEycb_E098


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDR4EIjrwu0


You could also check the articles and comments around the internet regarding Manny and prayer.

http://www.google.com.ph/search?q=pray+pacquiao&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a

http://news.google.com.ph/news?q=pray%20pacquiao&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&sa=N&tab=wn

It's current and I hope this helps.

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carriep carriep
 
December 19, 2008 02:24 PM
Very helpful, thank you. It reminds me of a comedian, Jeff Stilson, who had the joke about people thanking god for winning sports games, but not blaming him when they didn't. The punch line was "yeah, the game was going great until Jesus made me fumble." Unfortunately i can't find the video anywhere online. Alas.

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malkara malkara
 
December 19, 2008 09:02 PM
This clip has James Randi utterly destroying Homeopathy. He actually also produced a film wherein he describes how he debunked all manner of pseudosciences.

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elly2222 elly2222
 
December 20, 2008 03:57 AM
"Psych" (Episodes at the USA TV website) has a fake psychic that uses observational clues.

If kid's vids are okay, Scooby Doo has this debunkings all the time.

The show MythBusters takes on pseudoscience frequently as well.

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