Colin Hales wrote:
> A lovely little text, it catches the method so well. I remember reading
> Sitchin's _The Twelfth Planet_ when I was very young, and at first
> finding it extremely convincing. Then gradually I started to see the
> holes, and thinking of it now it fits your description perfectly (see
> http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Corridor/8148/hafernik.html for someone
> who picks it apart).
I likewise read Erich von Daniken's "Chariots of the Gods?" when I was a
youth. I actually looked in the bibliography and sought out the sources so
that I could examine them for myself. What I found was that von Daniken
deliberately misstated data and deliberately quoted items out of context.
The original quotes clearly did not say what von Daniken made them seem to
say.
My second similar experience was with a well-known science popularizer who
wrote about real science. He wrote one book that included a scientific
mystery. A particular equation fit older data, but failed with more recent
data. By working backwards from the known data, I was able to adapt the
equations to fit all known data. At the age of 14, I wrote the author
thinking I has solved some sort of scientific mystery. His response was
that the book was written for money only. He really wasn't sure if this big
mystery really existed, nor was he interested in actually trying to solve
any scientific riddles. He was a writer only, and not really a scientist.
These two events definitely shaped my later skepticism in my adult life.
-- Harvey Newstrom <www.HarveyNewstrom.com> Principal Security Consultant, Newstaff Inc. <www.Newstaff.com> Board of Directors, Extropy Institute <www.Extropy.org> Cofounder, Pro-Act <www.ProgressAction.org>
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