Virus
4/28/2008 1:11pm,
From the lastest SWIFT newsletter.
I enjoyed an excellent break from my JREF duties from the 16th to the 22nd of this month, in the United Kingdom to discuss contract possibilities with a leading TV production company. Prospects for beginning a series there appear to be excellent, and I’ll report as things move along. I got to confer with old friends such as Sid Rodrigues, Richard Wiseman, Sue Blackmore, Chris French, Wendy Grossman, Mike Hutchinson, and many others, and I dropped in on the new and exciting headquarters of The Magic Circle, as well.
The JREF million-dollar prize will be a part of the eventual TV presentation, but the producers want to keep the format well away from any possible “game show” aspect, a decision that met with my hearty approval. Already, on the last day of my brief stay there, we did a preliminary examination of a chap who actually thinks he has a diagnostic method whereby the subject is asked questions about his/her color preferences, and a computer then generates what he fondly thinks is a diagnosis of the subject’s state of health. Rather, it is designed to indicate whether the subject either has a specific ailment, or is susceptible to developing that ailment – a claim which simply cannot be tested until, obviously, the subject has lived out his/her life span. The claims of this system are just not falsifiable; there is no way the claims can be wrong, so the assessment was not definitive, I’d say… However, the applicant is adamant in still wanting to be tested.
We’ll see…
http://www.randi.org/joom/content/view/189/27/
I enjoyed an excellent break from my JREF duties from the 16th to the 22nd of this month, in the United Kingdom to discuss contract possibilities with a leading TV production company. Prospects for beginning a series there appear to be excellent, and I’ll report as things move along. I got to confer with old friends such as Sid Rodrigues, Richard Wiseman, Sue Blackmore, Chris French, Wendy Grossman, Mike Hutchinson, and many others, and I dropped in on the new and exciting headquarters of The Magic Circle, as well.
The JREF million-dollar prize will be a part of the eventual TV presentation, but the producers want to keep the format well away from any possible “game show” aspect, a decision that met with my hearty approval. Already, on the last day of my brief stay there, we did a preliminary examination of a chap who actually thinks he has a diagnostic method whereby the subject is asked questions about his/her color preferences, and a computer then generates what he fondly thinks is a diagnosis of the subject’s state of health. Rather, it is designed to indicate whether the subject either has a specific ailment, or is susceptible to developing that ailment – a claim which simply cannot be tested until, obviously, the subject has lived out his/her life span. The claims of this system are just not falsifiable; there is no way the claims can be wrong, so the assessment was not definitive, I’d say… However, the applicant is adamant in still wanting to be tested.
We’ll see…
http://www.randi.org/joom/content/view/189/27/