Randi Vs. Geller (oh, for those days...)

[Nucular]

I bought Uri Geller: Magician or Mystic?* by Jonathan Margolis the other day - mostly fawning, credulous tripe and clusterbomb ad hominems, so far as I can tell, but one thing interested me.

Margolis quotes the former editor of Newsweek, Charles Patani, who claims he caught Randi in a barefaced lie while they were both on TV.

Since I've got nothing better to do (though umpteen things I should be doing), I'll type out the bit.... Randi made a claim that Newsweek had done a favourable article on psychic surgeons in the Phillipines. He claimed that he had a copy of the article, and I said, "That's ridiculous, I've been there a number of years and I know we didn't do it." After the show, the host, Maury Povich, asked to see the article because Randi said he had it with him. But Randi couldn't produce it, and there was no such article. I thought that was a very low blow. I don't like dishonesty, and he was dishonest in this case and I have had nothing more to do with him since ... Randi and his people are zealots. There is no other word for it. I believe that the good they do, they themselves trample upon with their zealotry.Does anyone know anything about this?

Is there footage of this incident?

Is there a Newsweek article of this nature?

Did Randi lie?

Clearly it doesn't defeat Randi's major points and purpose here, but I'd quite like to know what happened there.

* I know, I know, but it was reduced from £18.99 to £3.99, tellingly

[Yahweh]

Thanz created this thread (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=11231&highlight=psychic+newsweek) regarding the Newsweek article. Another member had claimed to have read the article.

Here is a vague reference on Newsweek Alt Med (http://mailman.efn.org/pipermail/skeptix/Week-of-Mon-20021125/000465.html).

I did find (what I think is) the article when I searched Newsweek. Here are the Newsweek Results (http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_multi=NWEC|&p_product=NW&p_theme=nw&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_field_label-0=Edition&s_dispstring=allfields(CAM)%20AND%20date(all)&p_field_advanced-0=&p_text_advanced-0=(%22CAM%22)&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&xcal_useweights=no). The article appears to be from December 2, 2002. Unfortunately, I need to register for Newsweek if I want to read the article, and the registrations costs about US$3.00 (I dont havet the time nor do I care that much that I would pay US$3.00 to take an excerpt from the article).

I did manage to find this article (http://www.quackwatch.org/04ConsumerEducation/newsweek.html) on QuackWatch:
Newsweek's Misleading Report
on "Alternative Medicine"
William M. London, EdD, MPH

In its December 2, 2002 issue, Newsweek published an ill-conceived special report on "The Science of Alternative Medicine." In his "Editor's Desk" column, Mark Whitaker wrote: "We're proud to be working with Harvard Health Publications and its editor in chief, Dr. Anthony Komaroff, to bring you the best wisdom that our team of veteran health journalists and Harvard's experts have to offer." Unfortunately, the best wisdom they offer is packaged with propaganda promoting false notions about so-called complementary and alternative medicine (sCAM). Here are some of the problems with Newsweek's reporting.

[Lengthy bulleted list follows... you get the idea]


You see the author of the book exploited the fact that Randi was not carrying the particular Newsweek article in his pocket, so the author formed a pretty dishonest and shallow ad hominem attack. Because Randi didnt have the article in hand at the time, the author decided that Mr. Randi fabricated the article (he relied on the fact that most readers wouldnt go through to effort to actually verify the information...).

(This post required quite an effort to research... and I feel proud :) )

To sum up quickly: Randi did not lie.

Edit to add: Smilies disabled in this post. Due the format of the "Newsweek Results" URL, the board wants to add a smilie in the middle preventing a parsing of the URL into a link (that made my post appear unusually wide as there were no breaking spaces in the URL...).

[Nucular]

Hey, good stuff Yahweh! :)

I'm confused by this turbulent book: the incident is cited in the context of Randi's The Magic of Uri Geller (1975, updated as The Truth About Uri Geller, 1982), and the book I'm reading is a 1998 book... I should have been clearer about dates.

The clear implication in the text is that the incident took place around this time in the late '70s/early '80s, but no actual date is given. Whether a misleading date or not, the latest Randi could have said that would be 1998, and so couldn't have been referring to the 2002 article... presumably?

It's also stated that Randi did claim to have the article with him, but could not produce it - though this may be completely unverifiable.

Corrigendum: the guy's name is Panati, not Patani, sorry

Addendum: Through my flicking, I just noticed my book is signed by the author! That means I have a ticket signed by Geller, and a book signed by a staunch supporter, and no prominent sceptic autographs! Maybe I should switch sides...

[!Xx+-Rational-+xX!]

Randi wins by default because he is the skeptic!

[Yahweh]

Originally posted by Nucular
Hey, good stuff Yahweh! :)

I'm confused by this turbulent book: the incident is cited in the context of Randi's The Magic of Uri Geller (1975, updated as The Truth About Uri Geller, 1982), and the book I'm reading is a 1998 book... I should have been clearer about dates.

The clear implication in the text is that the incident took place around this time in the late '70s/early '80s, but no actual date is given. Whether a misleading date or not, the latest Randi could have said that would be 1998, and so couldn't have been referring to the 2002 article... presumably?

It's also stated that Randi did claim to have the article with him, but could not produce it - though this may be completely unverifiable.

Corrigendum: the guy's name is Panati, not Patani, sorry

Addendum: Through my flicking, I just noticed my book is signed by the author! That means I have a ticket signed by Geller, and a book signed by a staunch supporter, and no prominent sceptic autographs! Maybe I should switch sides...

And from the original context of the book:
He claimed that he had a copy of the article, and I said, "That's ridiculous, I've been there a number of years and I know we didn't do it." After the show, the host, Maury Povich, asked to see the article because Randi said he had it with him. But Randi couldn't produce it, and there was no such article.
I'll grant that the author is using a clever trick with words. Mr. Randi may in fact have a copy of the article (i.e. the part where he "claimed that he had a copy of the article"), however the author may be semantics-izing up the context of "had a copy of the article" to change it into "said he had it on him" (the author was obviously exploiting the fact that Maury asked to see the article, that does not imply Mr. Randi had the article with him at the time). I dont think Mr. Randi had planned to bring the article with him, so I'll still maintain that the author is constructing an unfair ad hominem.

Finding the information was exceptionally difficult, but here's what turned up:

A source for Journal of Occult Studies - A Mass Public Experiment in Psychokinesis and Telepathy at a Distance with Uri Geller as Agent (http://66.221.71.68/content/research/joos.htm) turns up this interesting source: Newsweek, No Guesswork, October 28, 1974, p.72. Here is the transcript to the article: No Guesswork (http://66.221.71.68/nw.htm).


Here is some additional information if it serves any relevance at all:

From Andy Kaufman (http://andykaufman.jvlnet.com/bible.htm): Written by Brian Haugh, an article titled "Andy Kaufman's Final Bizarre Bid to Beat Cancer with Psychic Surgery," Star Magazine, June 5, 1984, p. 5.... Newsweek Magazine, Transition (Obituary), May 28, 1984, p. 90. (the Newsweed article may have contained information about Kaufman's Psychic Surgery...)

From Skepticfiles.org (http://www.skepticfiles.org/skeptic/basjul89.htm):
KNOWING WHEN NOT TO BELIEVE THE UNBELIEVABLE
by Wallace Sampson, MD

In early July, 1988, a "Newsweek" reporter me called to write an
analysis of the "Nature" article titled "When To Believe the
Unbelievable," in which Benveniste and associates claimed to have
demonstrated the validity of homeopathy.

It wouldnt be hard to believe that any of these mid-80s Psychic Surgery "miracle cases" would have been romanticized by Newsweek: Psychic Surgery Cases - 1980's (http://bulletin.ninemsn.com.au/bulletin/EdDesk.nsf/All/E0D265CC799E79BECA256BC600239753) (scroll down a bit...).

The Maury Povich show has been airing since 1996 (http://www.jumptheshark.com/m/maurypovich.htm).


Chapter 13 - Uri Gellar: Magician or Mystic (http://www.uri-geller.com/books/magician-or-mystic/chapter13.htm), at least I managed to find this. I see the chapter does nothing but undermine and belittle Mr. Randi with personal insults rather than demonstrating how he is supposedly a fraud...

It is very hard to find information on just one specific (name unknown, publish date unknown, authenticity unknown) 1974-75/1984-85 article on Psychic Surgery purpotedly published by Newsweek...