Bottled Water – Healthy or a con job?

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For some reason, water appears to draw a lot of woo these days. The prime example is of course the concept of bottled water. Despite having the stuff on tap, we now have a thriving industry worth about $60 Billion per year; we are awash with brands that promise us both spring water and also purified healthier tap water. In fact, this entire industry is described as  the great con of the century here where it says within a UK Independent newspaper report …

Bottled water is “one of the greatest cons of the 20th century”, due to it being “vastly overpriced” with little to “differentiate it from tap water” according to water companies.

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First-ever demo of a 3-D invisibility cloak for visible light

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Joachim Fischer of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Germany will present the first-ever demonstration of a three-dimensional invisibility cloak that works for visible light at at 10:15 a.m. Monday, May 2 at the Conference on Lasers and Electro-Optics (CLEO: 2011), which runs May 1–6 at the Baltimore Convention Center.

Wow … Harry Potter reality here I come … this sounds amazing. So here are some details.

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Why do Americans still dislike atheists?

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Gregory Paul and Phil Zuckerman published an article in yesterdays Washington Post ….

Long after blacks and Jews have made great strides, and even as homosexuals gain respect, acceptance and new rights, there is still a group that lots of Americans just don’t like much: atheists. Those who don’t believe in God are widely considered to be immoral, wicked and angry. They can’t join the Boy Scouts. Atheist soldiers are rated potentially deficient when they do not score as sufficiently “spiritual” in military psychological evaluations. Surveys find that most Americans refuse or are reluctant to marry or vote for nontheists; in other words, nonbelievers are one minority still commonly denied in practical terms the right to assume office despite the constitutional ban on religious tests.

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The “Arguing from Authority” fallacy

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I suspect that perhaps most are familiar with the fallacy of arguing from authority, but just in case not, then in essence, this is the basis for it.

A claim is correct because the claim has been made by somebody who is authoritative.

OK, if it is a well known fallacy, then why write about it? Well, I’d like to take a look at three real-world examples to illustrate that there are multiple variations of this, and that no variation is an exception. This includes:

  • Fake Credentials – A supposed expert making claims, but their Ph.D. is fake
  • Out-Of-Context Credentials – A supposed expert making claims, but the subject of their degree has nothing to do with the claim
  • Real Credentials, but a bullshit claim – An true expert, with a real claim, but no actual evidence for the claim

So lets take a look at each of these it turn.

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Taking on the Faith Healers – “Miracles for Sale”

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The famous illusionist, Darren Brown, has taken on faith healers with a new show called “Miracles for Sale”. He was interviewed about it in the Guardian here prior to broadcast. It reads …

Brown grew up Christian and saw faith healers as “worrisome” but not to be taken too seriously – a view he didn’t change until he abandoned his faith. “Coming out of Christianity altogether and having a slightly clearer sense in my own mind of what I believed and what I didn’t believe … it was much clearer to me: no, no, this is just a scam,” he says.

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