Randi published his 2008 Pigasus Awards today, and I must say, some of them had me scratching my head a bit. Here are the awards and the winners – see what you think:
1. To the Scientist who said or did the silliest thing relating to parapsychology in the preceding twelve months.
- Dr. Colin Ross, who can shoot electromagnetic radiation from his eyes
Hum, well OK, I guess he qualifies. What he’s claiming is very silly. I’m not sure if it’s strictly “parapsychology”, but he apparently is a scientist and seems like a nut.
I’m afraid the rest are not so good, though.
2. To the Funding Organization that supports the most useless parapsychological study during the year.
- The Producers of the movie "Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed
Huh? The movie Expelled could not any way be called a “study”. It was a film pushing creationism. Certainly not a study and nothing “parapsychological” about it either. Plus, the producers of Expelled are not a “funding organization”. It was certainly a piece of crap, but a “parapsychological study”? No. And yet there were several actual parapsychological studies he could have picked from 2008. For example, this one. So why didn’t he?
3. To the Media outlet that reported as fact the most outrageous paranormal claim.
- Late night cable TV stations
This seems a bit of a cop out to me. If Randi wants to shame the makers of Enzyte then OK, but then he's criticizing phony advertising and not a media outlet per se. They hardly even seem that outrageous either. Unlike (for example) this.
The next one makes no sense at all:
4. To the "Psychic" performer who fools the greatest number of people with the least effort in that twelve-month period.
- Jenny McCarthy; who has written books and appeared on countless TV shows promoting measles
Jenny McCarthy is certainly a bubble head anti-science moron who deserves to be shamed more than just about anyone else I can think of, but “psychic”? When did she ever claim to be psychic? And there are plenty of real (ie pretend) psychics out there who could have been named. McCarthy could perhaps have been named in the next award - the most persistent refusal to face reality – that she certainly would qualify for. But psychic? It just makes no sense. Couldn’t Randi think of one actual pretend psychic to shame? Not one? In the whole year?
5. For the most persistent refusal to face reality.
- Kevin Trudeau; who sold quack books even after the government fined him for it
Actually, I think Trudeau has a pretty good grip on reality. He knows he’s selling crap, and he knows exactly how to keep making money at it despite numerous attempts to shut him down. No, the people with the most persistent refusal to face reality are the ones who continue to buy Trudeau’s books and videos, despite the fact that they are complete crap. But certainly not Trudeau himself. Douchebag? Yes. Refusal to face reality? Not really.
I hate to say this, but I think this years Pigasus’s are a fail. The purpose if these awards, I imagine, is to ridicule these bozos and have a laugh at them ourselves. But that only works if the things the awards are for, are for things the person actually did. If they are about a straw man version (eg Jenny McCarthy – psychic), then they fall flat. In fact, the recipient could easily laugh back at these rather absurd categorizations. I’m afraid this list just looks like Randi picked five people who had done stupid things in the year, and then randomly assigned them to one of his five categories. Which doesn’t seem to make much sense.
Read my Golden Woo awards from January – in my totally unbiased view, much better suited candidates.
April 2 - edited to add:
Well Randi edited some of the category descriptions - the main one being to remove the "psychic" label from the Jenny McCarthy award (see Phil Plait's comment below). That's certainly an improvement. But I still think it doesn't make any sense to call McCarthy a "performer", and I still think none of the awards (apart from #1) fit the category descriptions. Admittedly it's not a major issue in the grand scheme of things, but if a thing's worth doing it's worth doing right.
I thought much the same thing when I read those this morning.
Posted by: Paul | April 01, 2009 at 09:37 PM
I know McCarthy promoted her Indigo Child with his super powers, so maybe there is something in that for her award. I'm guessing Expelled fits more in line with the Discovery Institute, but since they do absolutely no science or studies beyond focus groups for their propaganda...it doesn't work. Trudeau is a fraud who needs to be put in prison for continually breaking the law and defrauding people. The people for his award need to be those who buy his books.
Posted by: Badger3k | April 01, 2009 at 10:52 PM
Paul, just a little nit pick about the categories you say the JREF used.
1. To the Scientist who said or did the silliest thing relating to occult, supernatural, or paranormal subjects in the preceding twelve months.
Yep you recorded this category correctly.
2. To the Funding Organization that supports the most useless study related to the occult, supernatural, or paranormal during the year.
No you misrepresented this one. Parapsychology isn't equivalent to the headings used by JREF. And I think it's perfectly OK to describe Producers as a "Funding Organization". Producers organize themselves to secure funding.
3. To the Media outlet that reported as fact the most outrageous occult, supernatural, or paranormal claim.
Again you didn't accurately report the category headings. You may disagree with JREF making a generic award but such an award is perfectly in tune with their use of the plural Media in the category heading. It doesn't seem a cop out to me, unless you have some evidence to point to this?
4. To the Performer who fooled the greatest number of people with the least effort in that twelve-month period.
You really misrepresented this one. The category doesn't imply and you can't infer "psychic" performer from the words used. You can't hope that the use of quote marks makes any difference. The award category says straight out that it's for THE PERFORMER...You may only disagree with the award going to Jenny on the grounds that other performers fooled more people with less effort.
5. For the most persistent refusal to face reality.
Yep, you correctly recorded this category.
Posted by: the chiggler | April 01, 2009 at 10:59 PM
Not sure why you’re replying to “Paul”. Still:
Don’t really get your point. I agree that “Parapsychology isn't equivalent to the headings used by JREF” – so how did I misrepresent this? Also this is most certainly not a study, it is a film.
I copy and pasted the exact words used by Randi in his original post. Randi has changed the words since yesterday. It originally said “the "Psychic" performer” exactly as I wrote. Randi removed the word “psychic” between last night and this morning. Good – it was correct to remove it because it was wrong.
Posted by: Skeptico | April 02, 2009 at 07:10 AM
Folks, part of the problem here is that a draft of the article was initially posted by accident on Swift, which was then replaced with the final version. The category descriptions changed slightly, since we wanted to broaden the playing field beyond just psychics. I suspect that accounts for a lot of the confusion here. Apologies for that!
-Phil Plait
President, JREF
Posted by: Phil Plait | April 02, 2009 at 11:09 AM
That would explain it.
Posted by: King of Ferrets | April 02, 2009 at 03:25 PM
I don't know. I've taken a look at the updated article and I think most of Skeptico's original criticisms still stand. Particularly for the last two categories. Although McCarthy is indeed fooling people, I've always gotten the sense that she sincerely believes the crap she's peddling. I've never really gotten that from Trudeau. He just seems like a run-of-the-mill (though disturbingly successful and resilient) conman.
Posted by: Lazy Mox | April 02, 2009 at 04:12 PM