Committee for Skeptical Inquiry

Why Bogus Therapies Seem to Work
At least ten kinds of errors and biases can convince intelligent, honest people that cures have been achieved when they have not.
Barry L. Beyerstein

Inconsistencies and Errors in Alternative Medicine Research
Faulty research purporting to show the effectiveness of 'alternative' therapies is making its way into the literature, while studies showing negative results for these therapies go unpublished.
Wallace Sampson

Pseudoscience in Alternative Medicine
Many alternative treatments are said to work because they are based on science, and consumers who are not scientifically literate believe this. A critical review of the publications of alternative medical proponents in three selected areas -- chelation therapy, antineoplastons, and coffee enemas -- quickly exposes the fiction.
Saul Green

Skewing the Scientific Worldview
Ursula W. Goodenough

Taking a Bite out of Shark Cartilage
A tremendous amount of marketing has accompanied the sale of shark cartilage as a preventive and cure for cancer. Do the claims far outstrip the evidence?
Lynn McCutcheon

News and Comment

• World Survives Roswell Hysteria
• Roswell Report Executive Summary
• AIAA Honors Scientist Who Says He Caused Roswell Incident
• News Accounts of UFOs Affect Beliefs
• Skeptical Simpsons Episode Spoofs Aliens, Pseudoscience
• The Electronic Poltergeist
• Religious Belief Among Scientists Stable for Eighty Years
• Bending the Mind, Bending the Data?
• The San Luis Valley Crystal Skull
• `Miracle' Priest Suspended

Articles of Note

Letters to the Editor

Investigative Files
Extraterrestrial Iconography
Joe Nickell

Media Watch
Dark Skies Uses Pseudo-Sagan to Recast Astronomer's Motives
C. Eugene Emery Jr.

Psychic Vibrations
The Truth Is, They Never Were `Saucers'
Robert Sheaffer

Conference Report
Medical School Faith Healing: Report on a Spirituality Conference
Bryant Furlow

Announcement
New Journal Defends Scientific Medicine

Hystories: Hysterical Epidemics and Modern Culture
by Elaine Showalter

Taner Edis and Amy Sue Bix

In Search of the Light: The Adventures of a Parapsychologist
by Susan Blackmore

Robert A. Baker

Scams from the Great Beyond: How to Make Easy Money off of ESP, Astrology, UFOs, Crop Circles, Cattle Mutilations, Alien Abductions, Atlantis, Channeling, and Other New Age Nonsense
by Peter Huston

David Bloomberg