the material appended below comes from martin gardner s book _fads and fallacies in the name of science_ revised and expanded edition published in NUMBER by dover publications inc new york city bill bennetta _________________________________________________ m ost pseudo scientists have a number of characteristics in common first and most important of these traits is that cranks work in almost total isolation in the sense of having no fruitful contacts with fellow researchers the modern crank insists that his isolation is not desired on his part it is due he claims to the prejudice of established scientific groups against new ideas the modern pseudo scientist stands entirely outside the closely integrated channels through which new ideas are introduced and evaluated he works in isolation he does not send his findings to the recognized journals or if he does they are rejected for reasons which in the vast majority of cases are excellent in most cases the crank is not well enough informed to write a paper with even a surface resemblance to a significant study as a consequence he finds himself excluded the journals and societies and almost universally ignored by the competent workers in his field in fact the reputable scientist does not even know of the crank s existence unless his work is given widespread publicity through non academic channels or unless the scientist makes a hobby of collecting crank literature the eccentric is forced therefore to tread a lonely way he speaks before organizations he himself has founded contributes to journals he himself may edit and until recently publishes books only when he or his followers can raise sufficient funds to have them printed privately a second characteristic of the pseudo scientist which greatly strengthens his isolation is a tendency toward paranoia there are five ways in which the sincere pseudo scientist s paranoid tendencies are likely to be exhibited NUMBER he considers himself a genius NUMBER he regards his colleagues without exception as ignorant blockheads everyone is out of step except himself frequently he insults his opponents by accusing them of stupidity dishonesty or other base motives if they ignore him he takes this to mean his arguments are unanswerable if they retaliate in kind this strengthens his delusion that he is battling scoundrels NUMBER he believes himself unjustly persecuted and discriminated against NUMBER he has a strong compulsion to focus his attacks on the greatest scientists and the best established theories when newton was the outstanding name in physics eccentric works in that science were violently anti newton today with einstein the father symbol of authority a crank theory of physics is likely to attack einstein in the name of newton NUMBER he often has a tendency to write in a complex jargon in many cases making use of terms and phrases he himself has coined terry w colvin sierra vista arizona usa forteanNUMBER URL alternate forteanNUMBER URL home page URL sites fortean times mystic s haven tlcb u s message text formatting usmtf program member thailand laos cambodia brotherhood tlcb mailing list tlcb web site URL vietnam veterans allies cia nsa and steenkeen contractors are welcome to unsubscribe from this group send an email to forteana unsubscribe URL your use of yahoo groups is subject to URL 