Thursday, April 29, 2010

TED: James Randi's fiery takedown of psychic fraud

Legendary skeptic James Randi takes a fatal dose of homeopathic sleeping pills onstage, kicking off a searing 18-minute indictment of irrational beliefs. He throws out a challenge to the world's psychics:

Prove what you do is real, and I'll give you a million dollars.

(No takers yet.)

James Randi has an international reputation as a magician and escape artist, but he is perhaps best known as the world's most tireless investigator and demystifier of paranormal and pseudoscientific claims.

Randi has pursued "psychic" spoonbenders, exposed the dirty tricks of faith healers, investigated homeopathic water "with a memory," and generally been a thorn in the sides of those who try to pull the wool over the public's eyes in the name of the supernatural. He has received numerous awards and recognitions, including a MacArthur "genius" grant in 1986. He's the author of numerous books, including The Truth About Uri Geller, The Faith Healers, Flim-Flam!, and An Encyclopedia of Claims, Frauds, and Hoaxes of the Occult and Supernatural.

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