Supposed Skeptics?

[Faith No More]

I've never met anyone that calls themselves a skeptic but still believes in woo. But I don't meet too many people that label themselves as skeptics as it is.

It takes time and effort to truly be a skeptic towards everything. As human beings, we have too much emotional attachment to our ideas and values, and it can be hard to cut throught that.

[Confused Ape]

That's pretty surprising. And forgive my ignorance of the healthcare system in the UK, but if it's offered by the NHS, does that mean that your tax money is being used to promote/administer these kinds of 'treatments'?

Yes, it's tax money used to fund these treatments. The thing is, if they make people feel a lot better through a placebo effect they're worth it and they are a lot cheaper than drugs.

There's an interesting article on the Harvard Magazine website - The Placebo Phenomenon - An ingenious researcher finds the real ingredients of “fake” medicine.

[Cato]

Skepticism is a hijacked term these days. The only way to tell the difference is in behavior. Traditional skeptics will doubt, understanding that most of the work is still ahead of them; i.e., evaluating evidence to determine the veracity of the claim. Some people throw around the term to simply refer to a new brand of denialism without considering evidence.

It's gotten so bad that woo masters now call traditional skepticism 'pseudo-skepticism' in order to avoid providing evidence for claims and dismiss actual scientific studies that show they're full of shit. This is largely due to the fact that skeptics have concluded that woo masters are pseudo-scientists.

In short, the only way to tell is if the self described skeptic does the homework. If so, engage them. If not, tell them to fuck off.

[Dystopia]

Haven't you met the skeptical atheists that is crazy about zodiac signs? I've met, and worse yet the guy had an IQ of 125 and was an expert student in biology, he was in the first year and was already invited to be a professor.

My opinion is that skepticism prevents you to believe in something without inductive or deductive evidence. Let me explain this better - I don't need real physical proof for everything if my deduction allows me to reach a conclusion, taking skepticism too far would be stupid and result in absurdities. An easy example, why do I believe you are all humans if I have never seen you in real life? After all, you could all be dogs or cats in the internet... I believe because my deduction tells me only humans can physically write on a keyboard, therefore you guys are humans. Another good example, I could say evolution doesn't exist because I have never observed it directly, after all why can't evolution be all masonry propaganda to control the world? It could be brainwashing by the media. I have never seen the brains of people I know in real life, do they have brains?

I think this ought to explain, skepticism is nice, but shouldn't be taken to the extreme (nothing should actually)

As for alternative medicine, it depends if it works or not, some traditional remedies have worked for some people, I used the classic bread + milk with a bandage to release pus from an infection and it worked for 3 days in a row, I guess it was not a myth, I literally released all the pus in my infection (finger), and when I was a kid a doctor came to visit me and he used the same bread + milk + bandage method.

[The Grand Nudger]

Yes, it's tax money used to fund these treatments. The thing is, if they make people feel a lot better through a placebo effect they're worth it and they are a lot cheaper than drugs.

Uh, yeah, sounds legit...lets spend money -not solving anyone's problems-....because it's cheaper.

Fine example of gov logic at work.

[ThomM]

Nope. It depends on your experiences and the information you have. I could see it as easily leading to agnostic theism or deism, or even Christian Lite, if it's 'lite' enough. I have trouble seeing how skepticism could be reconciled with any form of fundamentalism, though.

I'm kinda on the fence about it myself. If skepticism is withholding belief in something as true without sufficient evidence, then I don't see how anyone could take any religious doctrine as true. But, on the other hand, there are tons of people that genuinely and honestly believe they have personally seen direct evidence or had direct experiences with their God(s), so I guess that's evidence for them. I dunno.

The next time an Xtian tells you to prove a god does not exist - respond -
On the contrary - there have been Thousands of god of thousands of religions. PROVE god is not ALLAH - or Isis - or Rah - or Vishnu - or ........
And worse - you can also say that many of the gods as defined by their relgions actually exist - or existed. I can - without question - prove that the SUN exists. Prove it doesn't!

I can prove that dozens of Egyptian , Mayan , and Incan "gods" - actually lived - we have their remains - and writings from their times. Show me ALL the actual documents that can be dated from the supposed time of the christ that WE HAVE - that even mentions his name.

AND YES - I can say that there never was a person named "Jesus" on earth at that supposed time. No language that existed at that time had a letter "J" - and in proper English - you do not Translate proper names!

[Mr Greene]

I had acupuncture in the physiotherapy department of a National Health hospital some years ago. I found this on the website for NHS careers - Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM)

That's pretty surprising. And forgive my ignorance of the healthcare system in the UK, but if it's offered by the NHS, does that mean that your tax money is being used to promote/administer these kinds of 'treatments'?

In addition to this a number of charities offer similar complimentary therapies at no cost to the client, principally for the purpose of helping them to relax. The main opponents of this are the fundies who want to have everyone signed up for 'xtian counselling'...
The main danger is when people start proclaiming this as the only treatment rather than an addition to conventional treatment.

[FatAndFaithless]

That's pretty surprising. And forgive my ignorance of the healthcare system in the UK, but if it's offered by the NHS, does that mean that your tax money is being used to promote/administer these kinds of 'treatments'?

In addition to this a number of charities offer similar complimentary therapies at no cost to the client, principally for the purpose of helping them to relax. The main opponents of this are the fundies who want to have everyone signed up for 'xtian counselling'...
The main danger is when people start proclaiming this as the only treatment rather than an addition to conventional treatment.

But it's not even a supplemenatry treatment, these woo woo new-age alternative 'medicines' are totally bunk beyond the placebo effect, and funding something with public money just because of the placebo effect doesn't really sound sensible to me.

[Jenny A]

It isn't just a religious/supernatural or medical issue. The people who have driven me the battiest while claiming to be skeptics are the ones with a conspiracy theory (or more usually a dozen of them). They will tell me that it's being skeptical that caused them to see that the conspiracy theory is right. Then they accept the wackiest evidence in support of the theory while dismissing all evidence against it as fraudulent. What they are doing is mistaking cynicism about the government, a racial group, scientists, or something else, for skepticism.

My current favs are chemtrails and FEMA death camps.

[FatAndFaithless]

It isn't just a religious/supernatural or medical issue. The people who have driven me the battiest while claiming to be skeptics are the ones with a conspiracy theory (or more usually a dozen of them). They will tell that it's being skeptical that caused them to see that the conspiracy theory is right. Then they accept the wackiest evidence in support of the theory while dismissing all evidence against it as fraudulent. What they are doing is mistaking cynicism about the government, a racial group, scientists, or something else, for skepticism.

My current favs are chemtrails and FEMA death camps.

The biggest thing that strikes me about conspriacy theorists is the arrogance of it that they don't seem to see. "Everyone else is blind and sheepishly accepting the fake story, but I know the truth, and hardly anyone believes me because they're too weak to see the truth that I know!"