Randi's Prize: What Sceptics Say About the Paranormal, Why They Are Wrong, and Why It Matters [Paperback]

Randi's Prize is a long overdue counter argument to the ocean of "skeptical" books on the market with titles in endless variation of "Why people are a bit thick for believing stuff".

It's central conceit is one of the author recounting his own thought processes as he studied and compared the sceptics/skeptics responses - both general and specific - to reported data on psi-related phenomenon, and how these observations and comparisons have lead him personally to accept the probability of psi as a genuine and established phenomenon with convincing scientific credentials to back them up.

He acknowledges from the outset what most of us have experienced - a swaying back and forth as we read one book or another promoting or debunking strange phenomenon, each leaving us utterly convinced of their case until we read the next and finding ourselves reneging on our previous convictions. He acknowledges too that any impression his own book will leave on you may be just as temporary. With this in mind Mcluhan is meticulous in presenting the sceptical view of the issues under scrutiny. Every argument, every fraud, every suspicion, every failing - real or potential - in the scientific papers or parapsychological case studies is laid bare, before Mcluhan places them in context and asks just how rational these objections really are in relation to the actual data, and just how far removed the skeptical reconstruction of events usually is from the accounts or experiments they attempt to debunk.

While his own conclusions are known from the start - they are of course revealed in the book's title - his account of how he came to them as an intrigued layman is as objective and rational as its possible to be without staying permanently impaled upon the fence. The data says this, he argues, the skeptics respond with that, and the latter - time after time - fails to account for the former. The conclusion that the phenomena collectively called Psi are a genuine and worthy subject of continued inquiry seems unavoidable. With this in mind the author intermittently turns his attention to the psychology of the sceptical mindset, what drives it - a genuine devotion to scientific methods or pure reason being convincingly brought into question - and what makes these strange people tick. The irony of turning the tables on those commentators who like to smugly wonder aloud about the wishful thinking of credulous "believers" isn't lost on the reader.

Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of Mcluhan's writing is his apparent ability to read the reader's mind...anticipating and dealing with every objection that might occur to you before you even have time to express it. There is no "cherry picking" here, and the previous review which claimed so (along with the erroneous statement that the author is a "parapsychologist". He is not.) is littered with precisely the same kind of false and misleading claims and fixed opinions that this book describes, dissects and predicts in remarkable detail.

Finally, acknowledging his is an argument like any other, Mcluhan invites the reader to take his word for nothing, but to simply as he has done examine the published evidence - and the arguments of its detractors - for themselves, and to compare the two. There is a large bibliography, copious notes and resources included to locate all of the original material discussed and judge for yourself how far short the sceptical view of events is from the events themselves.

His own conclusions on the matter of survival and its nature are subjective, but the road that took him there is a remarkable, well written and highly recommended guide to TRUE objective thinking.

I greatly enjoyed Robert McLuhan's fine new book "Randi's Prize" - it's packed with accurate information while at the same time is surprisingly engaging and fun to read. I'd like to say I couldn't put it down but I actually did put it down late in the evening and picked it up the next morning to finish.

If you haven't investigated the scientific research regarding psychic (now generally called "psi") phenomena objectively and are curious, I assure you it's an amazing adventure and "Randi's Prize" is an excellent place to start. Incidentally, McLuhan is taking some flack because his book doesn't spend a lot of time talking about the prize per se, but because a large part of the book deals with the Skeptic vs Scientist "debate" that is symbolized by the prize, I thought the name was appropriate. (By the way, since most humans could surely be considered to be "skeptics" or we would have died out long ago, that term doesn't convey much information; we really need another name for an extreme close-minded "Skeptic" who believes that the ends (obliterating this branch of science) justify the means (including personal attacks), perhaps something more like "Antibeliever" or "Denouncer").

As it happens, I have a strong background in science (PhD Geophysics, 20 years in research with teams of nuclear physicists and other highly-qualified scientists), so I understand science and, like you no doubt, I also recognize hot air and hype when I see them. I didn't know anything about the scientific study of psi phenomena until I stumbled onto some of the scientific research three or four years ago. To my total astonishment, I learned that psi phenomena do appear to be an actual part of our reality, but they mostly tend to operate down in the background noise of consciousness and hence are extraordinarily elusive to study, like many other phenomena involving the mind. I found this fascinating, and I've read many scientifically sound books and refereed journal articles on that subject area since then.

Yes, psi effects are elusive but, as the book "Randi's Prize" makes clear, they HAVE been studied in painstaking detail for 150 years by highly qualified scientists, including in recent decades some of the most carefully executed scientific experiments ever conducted with multi-layered experimental controls that put other fields of science to shame. Because researchers in this field are under unrelenting, often vicious assault, they control even against absurdly improbable and unrealistic forms of cheating and fraud among other things, problems that most scientists don't have to think about at all (imagine trying to work in that environment). Statistically and taken as a vast body of work, their results are rock solid with odds against chance of a quintillion to one in some cases, yet the elusive nature of the phenomenon is what gives the million dollar prize offered by entertainer and famed trickster James Randi its power. The terms of the prize demand a single demonstration of psi resulting in immediate, absolute "proof." Since that's not how psi manifests in our world, this prize stunt achieves its goal of "disproving" something that almost certainly is real but not simple.

McLuhan's book "Randi's Prize" is paced like a good novel, yet is solidly factual. He describes his experiences as he delves deeply into the vast body of published work currently available on psi phenomena, carefully studies what the "skeptics" say about each subtopic, and then puzzles out the baffling disconnect, in the process occasionally laying bare his soul - oops - heart, as he struggles to make sense of it. But make sense of it he does, and he clearly distinguishes between known facts (which I found to be accurate according to current understanding) and his own speculations (which I found to be interesting and useful, if not always the same as mine).

If you are new to the topic of psi as understood through science this is a fascinating overview of a noisy controversy that has largely been manufactured by a relatively small number of extreme "skeptics". Both sides of this polarizing issue are treated sympathetically and fairly -- in my view McLuhan shows amazing restraint and civility when dealing with examples of seemingly blatant intellectual dishonesty -- but after careful consideration he does find many of the "skeptics'" arguments unconvincing and he explains his reasoning in detail so you can form your own conclusions.

If you already have a good grasp on the facts about psi I think you're likely to enjoy this book and learn a few things, and probably will find the unobtrusive yet comprehensive end notes and references useful as I did.

If you are an extreme "skeptic" you may still profit from reading this book. It might help you sharpen up your game and avoid pitfalls like posting 1-star, single paragraph book reviews that denounce the book while making it obvious the reviewer hasn't read and thought about the material.

The scientific facts are in; they're well-proven and extensively documented - many tens of thousands of pages of detailed studies. The demand for more proof is simply a ploy. Robert McLuhan's book makes it clear that what has largely been missing for the past century is a FAIR AND CIVIL DEBATE on the ACTUAL, UNDISTORTED, SCIENTIFICALLY DEMONSTRABLE FACTS. This book sets a good example; let's now see a similarly honest, ethical, and fact-based treatment of the topic from the extreme "skeptics".

Randi's Prize by Robert McLuhan joins the also excellent Parapsychology and the Skeptics by Chris Carter, in what could be the start of a long overdue response in book form to the free ride that organised, militant `skepticism' has had in the media for too long now. It is superbly researched and written in a gently humorous, thoughtful and penetrating style that manages to carry the considerable weight of the complex issues it discusses extremely well. The issues in question are, of course, the way in which skeptics have either polemicised in opposition to serious scientific research into `paranormal' (psi) phenomena when this has suggested that `there might be something in it'. Or, have simply not mentioned such work at all in their more public pronouncements, being content to give the impression that `science', or that which they like, has actually shown that psi cannot exist.

As others have remarked, the book is very even-handed in the way that it handles the issues involved. Yet despite this, according to precedent, I suspect that the eminently `sceptical' McLuhan will be subjected to hectoring, knee-jerk accusations by skeptics that he is a `believer', merely because he has dared to question the skeptical oeuvre.

Now we've got the synopsis out of the way, in the spirit of its last sentence, you might like to try the following: -

1) Read the one star reviews of this book. 2) Read some of the five star reviews. 3) Read the book. 4) Reflect for a while as to which set of reviewers show the most evidence of actually having read it - at all, let alone `properly'.

Forgive me if `1' to `3' seem a little obvious. However, there is a point to this and it relates specifically to `4', and one of journalist McLuhan's central contentions: that `skeptics' tend to play rather fast and loose with the facts in a number of ways when assessing evidence for psi. Yes, I know `true believers' do that in spades also. But McLuhan is asking whether those from the other end of the belief scale are any more trustworthy. Moreover he demonstrates that skeptical arguments, whilst superficially impressive at first glance, are often revealed to be shallow and misleading, perhaps disingenuously so sometimes, if you have the time to dig beneath the surface of the rhetoric.

For many I'm sure this would be quite surprising. However most people, when they catch an item about a paranormal issue on TV, for example, do not have the time or the resources to check whether a `skeptic' who has been wheeled in to comment on the matter in the interests of `balance' actually knows what he or she is talking about, and is approaching the issue from a balanced point of view ideologically.

The pertinence of the (largely metaphorical) main part of the book's title, is that it takes a great deal of time to dig beneath the surface of the rhetorical devices, including James Randi's `Million Dollar Challenge', that are routinely used by skeptics to denigrate `belief' in the paranormal. Indeed it takes much longer than it takes a media skeptic to trot out one of the movement's handy range of standard-issue sound bites: `...extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence', `...there's not a shred of scientific evidence for the paranormal' or, indeed, `...if any of this were real then surely someone would have won James Randi's Million Dollar Challenge by now?'

Randi's Prize effectively saves you the trouble of doing all that digging yourself, although it is meticulously referenced for those who decide to carry on burrowing on their own.

McLuhan examines a number of core issues (including mediumship, ESP, and near death experiences) and some of the considerable amount of scientific research suggestive that the phenomena are not totally illusory since around 1882 when The Society for Psychical Research (SPR) was formed. Although, as he points out, you would not guess that much of this work had been carried out at all, or would be extremely doubtful as to its quality, if you just took skeptical claims at face value. He examines the original source material and compares this to the often virulent criticism of the research contained in the skeptical literature. He gives a blow by blow account of his personal journey from an initial position of finding the skeptical arguments persuasive, through his increasing doubts about them as he carried out his own inquiries.

A major effect of the book is to show skeptics, in general, as being a rather gullible lot who will swallow any claim about serious `psi' research or its subject matter, as long as this is made by a skeptical commentator. In other words they are guilty of `confirmation bias' or the habit of seeking the emotional security that comes from feeling that one's own cherished prejudices have been validated, by hastily embracing the opinions of others when they confirm those views - merely because they do. Of course, here, the accuracy of any confirmatory information may not be an overriding psychological requirement. This is ironic indeed given that this malady is something that skeptics seem to think only `believers' suffer from.

I guess that deals with the first part of the book's subtitle `Why They Are Wrong'. Although it is important to emphasise that McLuhan does not claim that, just because he believes that skeptics are being mislead by their own psychological/emotional need to disbelieve in many respects, that the beliefs about psi that skeptics decry are necessarily right.

`...& Why It Matters'?

A condensed version of McLuhan's answer to his own question is that it matters because psi research could help to increase our understanding of our own nature and that of reality itself. It is therefore hardly appropriate, from the point of view of `science' (or what, ideally, the scientific process is held to be), that a subtly powerful advocacy movement that claims to be `scientific' has been allowed to influence this debate, using arguments that are largely rhetorical.

Tacit in the foregoing is that skeptical commentators are, for the most part, unwittingly, I'm sure, propounding about paranormal subjects having formed their opinions largely from a database of information (the skeptical literature) that is highly inaccurate in many respects.

McLuhan could have added, perhaps, that the media and wider public for the most part, seem to have little clue that the organised skeptical movement, as such, exists at all. It is all very well and good that we have media personalities, who just happen to be skeptics, leaders from many different fields, who are allowed to encourage us with quasi-religious zeal to be aware of the `wonders' of science at every opportunity. But surely, as far as psi research is concerned, awareness needs to be raised of the possibility that figures such as Professors Cox, Wiseman and Dawkins, humorists Dara O Briain and Steven Fry, journalist Simon Hoggart, mentalist Derren Brown etc. may not be rowing with both oars in the water when they tell us, or merely imply by omission, that `science' has found `no evidence' for the `paranormal'?