Jonathan C. Smith

Pseudoscience Extraordinary Claims

• Gebundenes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Pseudoscience and Extraordinary Claims of the Paranormal: A Critical Thinker s Toolkit provides readers with a variety of "reality-checking" tools to analyze extraordinary claims and to determine their validity.

Integrates simple yet powerful evaluative tools used by both paranormal believers and skeptics alike

Introduces innovations such as a continuum for ranking paranormal claims and evaluating their implications

Includes an innovative "Critical Thinker's Toolkit," a systematic approach for performing reality checks on paranormal claims related to astrology, psychics, spiritualism, parapsychology, dream telepathy , mind-over-matter, prayer, life after death, creationism, and more

Explores the five alternative hypotheses to consider when confronting a paranormal claim
Reality Check boxes, integrated into the text, invite students to engage in further discussion and examination of claims

Written in a lively, engaging style for students and general readers alike
Ancillaries: Testbank and PowerPoint slides available at www.wiley.com/go/pseudoscience

Produktdetails

• Wiley Desktop Editions
• Verlag: Wiley & Sons / Wiley-Blackwell
• 1. Auflage
• Seitenzahl: 432
• Erscheinungstermin: 4. September 2009
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 235mm x 157mm x 28mm
• Gewicht: 732g
• ISBN-13: 9781405181235
• ISBN-10: 1405181230
• Artikelnr.: 27696117

Autorenporträt

Jonathan C. Smith, Ph.D., is a Licensed Clinical Psychologist, Professor of Psychology at Roosevelt University, Founding Director of the Roosevelt University Stress Institute, and Head of the Pseudoscience and Paranormal Laboratory. Dr. Smith has published 17 books and has written numerous articles on stress, relaxation, meditation, mindfulness as well as spirituality and skepticism. In 1984 he founded the Roosevelt University Stress Institute primarily to combat pseudoscience in the field. He has created classroom and online classes specifically designed to teach critical thinking skills and evaluate extraordinary claims of the paranormal.

Inhaltsangabe

PART 1: INTRODUCTION. Chapter 1: The Continuum Mysteriosum. Chapter 2: Why
Study These Things?. PART II: THE CRITICAL THINKER'S TOOLKIT. Chapter 3:
Reality Check: Are the Sources Credible?. Chapter 4: Reality Check: Is the
Logic Valid and Sound?. Chapter 5: Reality Check: Are Claims Based on
Science: (Observations, Tests, and Theories)?. Chapter 6: Reality Checking
for Oddities of Nature and the World of Numbers. Chapter 7: Reality
Checking for Perceptual Error and Trickery. Chapter 8: Reality Checking for
Memory Errors. Chapter 9: Reality Checking for the Placebo Effect. Chapter
10: Reality Checking for Sensory Anomalies and Hallucinations. PART 3: THE
PARANORMAL FILES. Chapter 11: Spiritualism and the Survival Hypothesis .
Chapter 12: Parapsychology. Chapter 13: Energy Treatments and Complementary
and Alternative Medicine (CAM). Chapter 14: Supernatural Cures and Faith
Healing. Chapter 15: Creationism, Intelligent Design, and God. Chapter 16:
The Reality Checkup: Using your Toolkit.