Silly New-Age Pseudo Science Gets a Sound Thrashing. A review of “veteran
science writer and playful gadfly” Martin Gardner’s Did Adam and Eve Have Navels? ‘Most of the essays…are “attacks on far-out cases of
pseudoscience.” Gardner’s targets are generally not the religious notions or
superstitions of people swept along by their ancient cultures but phony science
promulgated by, and believed in, by people who should know better. Thus he does
not attack the pious millions who, in Brazil, are devoted to the cult of the Virgin
Mary that they celebrate in Belen on the Amazon every October. Rather, he
skewers such “preposterous” claims that “positions of stars correlate with character
and future events.” ‘ LA Times
