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Pseudoskepticism

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Pseudoskepticism (or pseudoscepticism) or pathological skepticism denotes thinking that appears to be skeptical but is not. The term is most commonly encountered in the form popularised by Marcello Truzzi, where he defined pseudoskeptics as those who take "the negative rather than an agnostic position but still call themselves 'skeptics'".[1] Generally the term is used for somebody who declares an idea to be wrong without inquiry into the field or doing experimentation and thus commiting an a priori fallacy.

Truzzi's characterisation of pseudoskeptics

The term pseudoskepticism was popularised and characterised by Truzzi, in response to the skeptic groups who applied the label of "pseudoscientists" to fields which Truzzi preferred to describe as protoscience.[1]

While a Professor of Sociology at Eastern Michigan University in 1987, Truzzi gave the following description of pseudoskeptics in the journal Zetetic Scholar which he founded:

Over the years, I have decried the misuse of the term "skeptic" when used to refer to all critics of anomaly claims. Alas, the label has been thus misapplied by both proponents and critics of the paranormal. Sometimes users of the term have distinguished between so-called "soft" versus "hard" skeptics, and I in part revived the term "zetetic" because of the term's misuse. But I now think the problems created go beyond mere terminology and matters need to be set right. Since "skepticism" properly refers to doubt rather than denial—nonbelief rather than belief—critics who take the negative rather than an agnostic position but still call themselves "skeptics" are actually pseudo-skeptics and have, I believed, gained a false advantage by usurping that label."[1]

Truzzi attributed the following characteristics to pseudoskeptics:[1]

  • The tendency to deny, rather than doubt
  • Double standards in the application of criticism
  • The making of judgments without full inquiry
  • Tendency to discredit, rather than investigate
  • Use of ridicule or ad hominem attacks in lieu of arguments
  • Pejorative labeling of proponents as 'promoters', 'pseudoscientists' or practitioners of 'pathological science.'
  • Presenting insufficient evidence or proof
  • Assuming criticism requires no burden of proof
  • Making unsubstantiated counter-claims
  • Counter-claims based on plausibility rather than empirical evidence
  • Suggesting that unconvincing evidence is grounds for dismissing it

Pseudo-skepticism and scientific method

Truzzi's argument begins with the premise that if a phenomenon has not been proven, this does not imply that it has been disproven. But Truzzi went further, holding that if a phenomenon had not been disproven, this implies that it is plausible, and that anyone who does not consider both options equally, is a pseudoskeptic. Truzzi wrote:[1]

In science, the burden of proof falls upon the claimant; and the more extraordinary a claim, the heavier is the burden of proof demanded. The true skeptic takes an agnostic position, one that says the claim is not proved rather than disproved. He asserts that the claimant has not borne the burden of proof and that science must continue to build its cognitive map of reality without incorporating the extraordinary claim as a new "fact." Since the true skeptic does not assert a claim, he has no burden to prove anything. He just goes on using the established theories of "conventional science" as usual. But if a critic asserts that there is evidence for disproof, that he has a negative hypothesis—saying, for instance, that a seeming psi result was actually due to an artifact—he is making a claim and therefore also has to bear a burden of proof. Sometimes, such negative claims by critics are also quite extraordinary—for example, that a UFO was actually a giant plasma, or that someone in a psi experiment was cued via an abnormal ability to hear a high pitch others with normal ears would fail to notice. In such cases the negative claimant also may have to bear a heavier burden of proof than might normally be expected.

It is common for fringe theorists and practitioners to apply the label pseudoskeptic to anyone who is prepared neither to investigate a claim nor to accept its conclusion. This is a misunderstanding of the scientific method. Consider, for example, a test that is performed showing apparent evidence for extrasensory perception (ESP). Based on experience of similar 'results', most scientists will suspect a flaw in the test. Scientific practice does not require every scientist to fully vet every experiment performed by every other scientist. Rather, scientific reports are reviewed by a number of peers, and where an experiment has produced interesting results, other scientists will try to reproduce it. If their results match, the evidence is accepted. If not, the original result is agreed to be an anomaly and it does not affect the acceptance of the dominant theory. To state that there must be a flaw in a test without relying on other tests would be pseudoskepticism; taking a position on the validity of the test does require accepting a burden of proof. But simply choosing to ignore the test or declaring it to be an anomalous result due to a contradiction to other tests is not pseudoskepticism, however frustrating it can be to those who welcome the apparent result of a test.

Contemporary usage

Pennsylvania State University Folklorist David J. Hufford[2] uses the term "radical skepticism" to describe the unexamined prejudices and preconceptions which he argues are embraced by many — perhaps most — academic scientists. After reading and analysing the works of many skeptics and debunkers, Hufford argues that one can readily find:

appeals to authority, post hoc fallacies, ad hominem arguments and a whole host of other informal errors. Nonetheless, because this inductive dimension of scholarship is often less implicitly presented for scrutiny, and because so much of the work of framing questions and establishing boundaries of scholarly discourse about 'the supernatural' were largely set anywhere from several generations ago … to a number of centuries ago ... the systematic bias of this tradition operates almost invisibly today.

L. David Leiter, a member of the fringe Society for Scientific Exploration, uses the terms 'pseudo-skepticism' and 'pathological skepticism' to refer to "organized skepticism", specifically the "Philadelphia Association for Critical Thinking" (PhACT),[3] "[i]nstead of becoming scientifically minded, they become adherents of scientism, the belief system in which science and only science has all the answers to everything" and that even many pseudoskeptics are unwilling to spend the time to "read significantly into the literature on the subjects about which they are most skeptical".

Prof. Hugo Meynell from Department of Religious Studies at the University of Calgary, labels as 'pseudo-skepticism' the "extreme position that all significant evidence supporting paranormal phenomena is a result of deception or lies".[4] Psychiatrist Dr. Richard P. Kluft, MD has noted that:[5]

".. today genuine skepticism of the benign sort that looks evenly in all directions and encourages the advancement of knowledge seems vanishingly rare. Instead, we find a prevalence of pseudo-skepticism consisting of harsh and invidious skepticism toward one's opponents' points of view and observations, and egregious self-congratulatory confirmatory bias toward one's own stances and findings misrepresented as the earnest and dispassionate pursuit of clinical, scholarly, and scientific truth."

Parapsychologist Susan Blackmore described the "worst kind of pseudoskepticism":

"a variety of pseudoscience: the behavior of highly biased 'sneering scoffers' who try to legitimize their prejudice by donning the mantle of science and proper skepticism. They claim to support reason/logic while in fact filling their arguments with plenty of ad-hominems, straw-man, poisoning-the-well, and numerous other emotion-enflaming fallacies and debating tactics."[6]


See also

Notes and references

  1. ^ a b c d e Truzzi, Marcello (1987). "On Pseudo-Skepticism". Zetetic Scholar (12/13): 3–4. Retrieved 2008-10-10.
  2. ^ "Reason, Rhetoric, and Religion: Academic Ideology versus Folk Belief", from New York Folklore, Vol. 11, Nos. 1-4, 1985 40th Anniversary Issue" quoted in part in Clark, Jerome, Unexplained! 347 Strange Sightings, Incredible Occurrences, and Puzzling Physical Phenomena; Detroit, Visible Ink Press; 1993, ISBN 0810394367; page 117
  3. ^ Leiter, L. David (2002). "The Pathology of Organized Skepticism" (PDF). Journal of Scientific Exploration. Society for Scientific Exploration.
  4. ^ Michael Stoeber, Hugo Anthony Meynell, Critical Reflections on the Paranormal, SUNY Press, 1996, ISBN 0791430634, 9780791430637 page 16
  5. ^ Kluft, Richard P., "Editorial: Building upon our foundations" (June 1994) in Dissociation, Vol. 7, No. 2, p. 079-080, publ. Ridgeview Institute and the International Society for the Study of Dissociation
  6. ^ JE Kennedy, "The Capricious, Actively Evasive, Unsustainable Nature of Psi: A Summary and Hypotheses", The Journal of Parapsychology, Volume 67, pp. 53–74, 2003. See Note 1 page 64 quoting Blackmore, S. J. (1994). Women skeptics. In L. Coly & R. White (Eds.), Women and parapsychology (pp. 234–236). New York: Parapsychology Foundation.
Wikiquote has quotations related to Pathological skepticism.
  • Skeptic's pages - Quotes and links to articles about skepticism and pseudoskepticism.
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