| Bogus Science - or, Some People Really Believe These Things |
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| by John Grant |
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In this companion volume to John Grant's highly successful Discarded Science - Ideas That Seemed Good at the Time and Corrupted Science - Fraud, Ideology and Politics in Science, the concern is far more with the stuff that walks vaguely like science, quacks vaguely like science, but in fact isn't science at all: it's bogus science, or pseudoscience. This isn't to say that there's not a lot of genuine science within these pages – there is – but it's there in the context of illuminating the bogus. We pride ourselves on the scientific culture in which we live, but is it really so scientific? Is it not the truth that large parts of our society are awash with ideas and preconceptions that could not be farther divorced from science, even though often they're wrongly or fraudulently described as "scientific"? In this new book John Grant considers why it matters that our culture is being drowned in an ocean of the irrational, from pyramidology to beliefs that the earth is stationary, hollow or flat, from the widespread but misplaced certainty that establishment science is suppressing antigravity research to the quest for Bigfoot, Atlantis, perpetual-motion machines and humanoid features on the surface of Mars. In a text full of witty observation, delightful asides and delft skewerings, he is unafraid to speak truth to some of our most powerful false beliefs. About The AuthorFor his nonfiction, John Grant has twice been the winner of the Hugo Award, science fiction's highest honour, and has received various other international awards. He was a Contributing Editor to The Phaidon Concise Encyclopedia of Science & Technology and was Co-Editor of Planet Earth: An Encyclopedia of Geology. Scottish-born, he lives in New Jersey, USA.
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