Prologue – Why Fight?
This is my fight against the Darkness. (Can I trademark “The Darkness”?) It’s been a fight I’ve been fighting more or less my entire life. This is just my latest battlefront – and, honestly, I can’t believe this domain name was open!
What is this “darkness” of which I speak? Psuedoscience, superstition, quackery, crackpot conspiracies and, yes, religion, the biggest superstition of them all.
I’ve been holding off launching this page for some time now – principally because, in the internet space, others are well entrenched in the battle, and far more established. I’ve been debating with myself long and hard about whether or not I have something to bring to the table. I’m not an evolutionary biologist, I’m not degreed in any “science” that would qualify me as “A Scientist”.
Neither am I a psychologist – I’m not qualified to tell you why people believe weird things.
In light of that, is there still room for the “man on the street”? I think the answer is, “yes”. If nothing else, we need to turn up the noise. Each voice makes it easier for others. Each point of view, disparate in their backgrounds or rationale can add something to the debate. Not every argument works for every person.
This blog stand here then, predominantly for me to cast a spotlight on the darkness. My preferred technique, at least as I envision things now, is to find things that just piss my off and bitch about them. Or, perhaps, provide a little counter-argument against them. Rarely does a week go by when I don’t see something that deserves comment.
Just a couple weeks ago, one of our local news channels was running an uncritical (and obviously unresearched) news article on magnets being placed on fuel lines to increase fuel economy. These miracle devices were being sold be a local company. Rather than running an exposé and showing these people for the scam artists they were, the article was written completely as if the device worked. It was nothing short of an advertisement for the con artists.
Just getting the word out about these kinds of things, perhaps even motivating someone to action, that’s all I can hope for.
Let’s make this a good fight.
Me, Part I – Was I a Deist or Just Too Young to Know Any Better? »