The Trend Continues...

June's Notices of Trustee's Sales for the Phoenix metro area topped out at 2330, continuing the trend line set a year or so ago. At this point I can't help thinking we've got nowhere to go but up. Even the scammers are saying that Phoenix is a bad market.

Olympic gold medalist abandons God, has never been happier

British Olympic gold medalist Jonathan Edwards, whose faith in Christianity led him to excel in sports, has abandoned his Christianity in his retirement. The Times Online has a very interesting interview with him, in which he says that he didn't take time to consider the philosophical foundations or evidence for Christianity when he was so focused on his sports career, but once he retired from athletics, he found the time to question, which led him to nonbelief:

“But when I retired, something happened that took me by complete surprise. I quickly realised that athletics was more important to my identity than I believed possible. I was the best in the world at what I did and suddenly that was not true any more. With one facet of my identity stripped away, I began to question the others and, from there, there was no stopping. The foundations of my world were slowly crumbling.”
...
“Once you start asking yourself questions like, ‘How do I really know there is a God?’ you are already on the path to unbelief,” Edwards says. “During my documentary on St Paul, some experts raised the possibility that his spectacular conversion on the road to Damascus might have been caused by an epileptic fit. It made me realise that I had taken things for granted that were taught to me as a child without subjecting them to any kind of analysis. When you think about it rationally, it does seem incredibly improbable that there is a God.”

Now that he has abandoned his faith, he is not unhappy about it:

The upheaval of recent months has not left Edwards emotionally scarred, at least not visibly. “I am not unhappy about the fact that there might not be a God,” he says. “I don’t feel that my life has a big, gaping hole in it. In some ways I feel more human than I ever have. There is more reality in my existence than when I was full-on as a believer. It is a completely different world to the one I inhabited for 37 years, so there are feelings of unfamiliarity.

I've posted some different quotes from the interview at the Secular Outpost.

It's my impression that Edwards was a typical Christian in that his faith was not a position he held on the basis of evidence, but one he found himself in because of his upbringing, but never challenged. Once in a position where he began to question, he found he didn't have good reasons for what he believed, and had the integrity to stop believing.

(Hat tip to Ed Babinski.)

Mitt Romney's dog

David at Blue Mass Group offers comment on the Boston Globe's story which reveals that Mitt Romney used to strap his dog's carrier to the roof of the car and put the dog in it for 12-hour trips from Boston to Ontario (the specific story takes place in the mid-1980s). In the story, the children are disgusted because the dog, Seamus, has emptied his bowels in his crate, and the animal waste is dripping off the back of the car:

As the oldest son, Tagg Romney commandeered the way-back of the wagon, keeping his eyes fixed out the rear window, where he glimpsed the first sign of trouble. ''Dad!'' he yelled. ''Gross!'' A brown liquid was dripping down the back window, payback from an Irish setter who'd been riding on the roof in the wind for hours.

As the rest of the boys joined in the howls of disgust, Romney coolly pulled off the highway and into a service station. There, he borrowed a hose, washed down Seamus and the car, then hopped back onto the highway. It was a tiny preview of a trait he would grow famous for in business: emotion-free crisis management.

David at Blue Mass Group, quoting Ana Marie Cox:

Massachusetts's animal cruelty laws specifically prohibit anyone from carrying an animal "in or upon a vehicle, or otherwise, in an unnecessarily cruel or inhuman manner or in a way and manner which might endanger the animal carried thereon." An officer for the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals responded to a description of the situation saying "it's definitely something I'd want to check out." The officer, Nadia Branca, declined to give a definitive opinion on whether Romney broke the law but did note that it's against state law to have a dog in an open bed of a pick-up truck, and "if the dog was being carried in a way that endangers it, that would be illegal." And while it appears that the statute of limitations has probably passed, Stacey Wolf, attorney and legislative director for the ASPCA, said "even if it turns out to not be against the law at the time, in the district, we'd hope that people would use common sense...Any manner of transporting a dog that places the animal in serious danger is something that we'd think is inappropriate...I can't speak to the accuracy of the case, but it raises concerns about the judgment used in this particular situation."

In the comments, several people correctly observe that a crate-trained dog won't relieve itself in its own crate unless it absolutely has to or is under extreme stress.

Not surprising from a man who wants to double the size of Guantanamo.

New: CNN for morons

CNN has updated its website so that stories are accompanied by a set of simplified bullet points, suitable for PowerPoint presentations, even if the stories themselves are only seven sentences long.

For example, here are the "story highlights" for the seven-sentence story, "Man pummels 'vampire' peacock":

• A man beat up a peacock that had wandered into a Burger King parking lot
  
• The peacock was beaten so badly it had to be euthanized
  
• Witnesses said the man claimed to be killing a "vampire"

At least there's the benefit that sometimes individual bullet points can be unintentionally amusing, such as this one from a story about Jenna Bush traveling to Africa, which suggests some inappropriate behavior:

• She lit up when interacting with children, CNN correspondent says

Hobra or zerse?

"A photo provided by the Zoo Safari and Hollywoodpark Stukenbrock shows the zebra and horse crossbreed 'Eclyse' during its presentation to the public in Schloss Holte, Germany, on Wednesday, June 27, 2007. The father of 'Eclyse' is a horse from Italy, where the crossbreed filly was born in 2006, her mother is a zebra from the Safari park." (Yahoo, via jwz's blog.)

Internet Infidels "Great Debate" Project

I've been given the OK to pre-announce the Internet Infidels' "Great Debate" project, which will publish four sets of exchanges between prominent philosophers about arguments and evidence for and against naturalism and theism. For the first month each debate is posted, readers will be able to submit questions which will be responded to by the debaters.

Check out the announcement I've posted at the Secular Outpost.

ASU, UA, and NAU salaries

The Arizona Republic's website has posted a search page for the 2006 salaries of faculty and staff at Arizona State University, the University of Arizona, and Northern Arizona University.

I took a quick look at UA and ASU's philosophy departments, both of which have several professors making well over $100,000/year, and was struck at the oddness of some of the salaries--there are some excellent professors who have been teaching for a long time making less money than some who haven't been around nearly as long, and an administrative assistant who makes more than most assistant and associate professors.

UA has 28 people making over $300,000 (most at the medical school, whose salaries mostly come from non-state funds) and three making over $500,000--two of which are football and basketball coaches and one who is a professor of surgery at the medical school (only 17.4% of his salary is state-paid). Robert Shelton, president of UA, made $420,000. ASU has twelve people making over $300,000, and four making over $500,000--all of which are coaches for football and basketball. ASU president Michael Crow made $442,970. NAU has only one employee making over $200,000, which is NAU's president John Haeger, who made $260,000.

I suspect it's still the case that professors at Arizona universities, on the average, make well above median salaries for Arizona's major cities and occupations. Further, I suspect there may be quite a few ASU professors making six-figure salaries who are among Maricopa County's 106,210 millionaire households.

But they don't compare to compensation for Arizona-based CEOs of publicly-traded companies, where the search engine options for salaries are "any amount," "$1 million or more," "$5 million or more," and "$10 million or more."

Barry Beyerstein, RIP

Barry Beyerstein, professor of psychology and member of the Brain Behavior Laboratory at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, a Fellow and member of the Committee of Skeptical Inquiry's executive council, author of numerous skeptical articles and books, a contributing editor of the Scientific Review of Alternative Medicine, member of the advisory board of the Drug Policy Foundation and advocate for decriminalization of drugs, brother of philosopher and skeptic Dale Beyerstein, and father of prominent blogger Lindsey Beyerstein, died on Tuesday at the age of 60.

His daughter describes him as "among the most ethical people I have ever known" and "also one of the most fulfilled people I've had occasion to meet."

I had the pleasure of meeting him on multiple occasions at CSICOP conferences and found him to be very friendly and generous with his time; he was the only member of the CSICOP executive council who took me seriously regarding an ethical issue I brought up regarding a prominent skeptic who regularly published in the Skeptical Inquirer.

His death is a significant loss to skepticism and advocates for sensible drug policies. He is remembered on the front page of the CSI website. CSI Executive Director Barry Karr sent out the following:

Subject: Barry L. Beyerstein (1946-2007)

We all lost a true hero yesterday. I am stunned and saddened and I have been searching the internet for an hour this morning looking for news because I just can't believe it. Barry Beyerstein died. Barry Beyerstein. I don't have enough words to tell you what this loss will mean to the skeptical and rationalist world. Barry was a tireless defender of science. An activist who has been a staple in the media, television, newspapers, public forums for decades. I searched in the Skeptical Inquirer CD-ROM and found 311 mentions of his name. He is scheduled to teach a workshop for the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry in Oregon later this summer - and represent us at a conference in Ireland in the fall. He traveled and lectured
all over the world for us, Australia, Belgium, England, Germany, Italy, and he was part of our delegation to China.

He was one of our first people on a number of topics we deal with. Graphology, Psychic Powers, Why People Believe, Near Death Experiences, Critical Thinking, Alternative Medicine, Neuropathology of Spiritual Possession, Brain States, Dowsing, The Sins of Big Pharma, and the list goes on and on. The thing is, he didn't have to do any of this. He was a volunteer, but he worked just as hard for this organization as he did for his full-time faculty job at Simon Fraser University. But he had talents, wisdom and knowledge and he saw the need and he used those talents. And we are far better for that.

And Barry was one of the most charming, wittiest, and nicest people you could ever meet. He was kind and funny, yet strong in his convictions. My heart goes out to his family, his wife and children and brother Dale. and I can't believe that he is gone.

You should do a google search on Barry today, just to get an idea as to the kind of person we have lost. Here is a good place to start: http://majikthise.typepad.com/majikthise_/2007/06/barry-l-beyerst.html

Barry Karr
Committee for Skeptical Inquiry

He will be missed.

UPDATE (July 13, 2007): Drug policy reform advocate Arnold Trebach gives tribute to Barry Beyerstein.

UPDATE (July 3, 2008): Daniel Loxton, editor of Junior Skeptic, gives a tribute to Barry Beyerstein at the BC Skeptics' Rational Enquirer blog.

SkeptiCamp

Reed Esau, the originator of the celebrity atheists list, has put together a video introducing SkeptiCamp, an "un-conference" where all of the attendees provide the content, based on BarCamp. There will be a SkeptiCamp on August 3-4, 2007 in Denver, Colorado.

Fingerprint-matching pseudoscience

Fingerprint matching has been used as an investigative tool by law enforcement and as a key piece of evidence to convict criminals in courts for over a century, but its accuracy has not actually been scientifically tested until recently. It turns out that claims of its accuracy have been exaggerated, and fingerprint matching is often more art than science.

In 2004, the FBI claimed that a fingerprint found on a bag at the sign of a terrorist bombing in Madrid, Spain on March 11 was a match to the left index finger of Brandon Mayfield, an attorney in Beaverton, Oregon who converted to Islam and married to a Muslim woman from Egypt. Despite the fact that Spanish police disagreed, claiming that there was no match to Mayfield, the FBI insisted they had a "one hundred percent identification" with fifteen separate points of agreement between the latent print from Spain and Mayfield's fingerprint, validated by at least three FBI fingerprint examiners. Mayfield was arrested and detained on May 6, 2004. On May 20, Spanish police announced that they had matched the fingerprint to Ouhnane Daoud of Algeria, who--unlike Mayfield--had actually been in Spain. Mayfield was released and the FBI ended up apologizing.

This case has resulted in scientific scrutiny of fingerprint evidence that has been long overdue. A decade ago, Tucson printer and publisher of the anarchist periodical The Match!, Fred Woodworth, published "A Printer Looks at Fingerprints," in which he pointed out pseudoscientific reasoning in fingerprint matching methodology as described in fingerprint textbooks. Subsequently, Simon Cole authored the book Suspect Identities: A History of Fingerprinting and Criminal Identification (2002, Harvard University Press), and has just authored an article on the subject in the July/August 2007 issue of Skeptical Inquirer, titled "The Fingerprint Controversy."

In Cole's Skeptical Inquirer article, he states that "The very first study containing accuracy data was finally published just recently, finding very high accuracy rates in a class of trainees on latent prints of unknown difficulty; but the study contains some methodological flaws (Haber and Haver 2006). Moreover, the authors again argue strongly against inferring accuracy rates from their own data (Wertheim, Langenburg, and Moenssens 2006)."

No doubt scientific investigation will demonstrate that proper use of fingerprint analysis is a reliable method of identification, but more importantly, it will find its limits and weaknesses so that it does not continue to be pressed beyond its capabilities and result in false judgments of guilt in criminal cases. Unfortunately, law enforcement and prosecutors have a vested interest in the flexibility of techniques that can be used to produce the judgment they want, as demonstrated by the difficulty in getting police departments to modify their procedures of eyewitness identification of suspects to correct for well-known cognitive biases.