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Skeptics & Critics | 2026-10-15 |
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Martin Gardner (1914–2010) was an American science writer and a key figure in jump-starting the modern scientific skepticism movement. | 1914-10-21 | 2010-05-22 | Tulsa, Oklahoma |
Martin Gardner (1914–2010) was an American science writer and a key figure in jump-starting the modern scientific skepticism movement. His 1952 book, Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science, aimed to expose cranks, crackpots, and charlatans in the modern age1.
Gardner praised science, noting that after the atomic bomb, its prestige had "mushroomed like an atomic cloud." However, he lamented that the "less informed general public" was falling for pseudoscience, drawing a parallel to "German quasi science paralleled the rise of Hitler"1.
His book surveyed popular beliefs parading as science, including the Flat Earth Doctrine, the World Ice Theory, and Dianetics. He reintroduced the term "pseudoscience" to describe beliefs not based on the scientific method, emphasizing that if an experiment is not repeatable, the original hypothesis must be refined or rejected1.
Gardner devoted the last chapter of Fads and Fallacies to debunking J. B. Rhine's work, concluding it was the product of "an enormous self-deception." He leveled three main criticisms against Rhine's and general Extrasensory Perception research: loose laboratory controls, skewing of data, and the premise that the attitude of the scientist could negatively influence the subject or psychic1. Gardner argued that ESP and Psychokinesis were only found when experiments were careless and supervised by believers, asserting, "This is not science... It is merely a scientist convincing himself of a deeply held, quasi-science belief"1.
Gardner, along with Carl Sagan, Ray Hyman, Paul Kurtz, and James Randi, co-founded the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP). This organization aimed to promote scientific inquiry and combat pseudoscience, superstition, and irrational beliefs1.
Towards the end of his life, Gardner experienced a religious epiphany, openly discussing his belief in a supernatural being or God. He asserted that this belief was not pseudoscience because it could neither be confirmed nor disproved by science or reason, calling it "philosophical theism"1.
Psychic research, 1974
In March 1974 the magazine Time (magazine) published a cover story on psychic research in which Gardner, identified in the article as its science and mathematics analyst, commented on the field. He listed "Uri Geller, The Secret Life of Plants, telepathy, ESP, the incomplete conclusions of Arthur Koestler" and wrote that these "all seem part of a new uncritical enthusiasm for pseudo science." He added: "The claims are immense, the proof nonexistent."2
Publications
- Fads and Fallacies in the Name of Science (1952)