March 2006 by Steven Novella, MD There are no shortage of conspiracy theories in the halls of pseudoscience and pseudohistory, not to mention pop culture mythology. According to a 1992 New York Times survey, 77 percent of Americans hold the demonstrably wrong belief that the JFK assassination was the work of a conspiracy. Others believe […]
October 1999 by Perry DeAngelis The Virgin Mary makes yet another appearance, this time in our own Hartford, Connecticut, and NESS investigators take a look. As Juan Ramon Gordils sat in his Hartford living room watching TV at two in the morning, the hot July night was suddenly broken up by a vision of the […]
April 1998 by Robert E. Bartholomew “Light Bulb” Mania of 1897, and the Great Airship Hoax of 1909-1910 Collective delusions and so-called mass hysterias take many forms, of which there are at least four common types. For a detailed discussion of each type, see my recent article in The Skeptical Inquirer (May-June, 1997). I will […]