I could show quite a few unflattering articles about Randi’s controversies but I feel his supporters insist that the fact that the challenge existed was the end all be all. In and of itself.

When one must realize that Randi’s big claim to fame was the million dollar challenge and without that he had nothing.

Critical thinking should tell you quite simply that JREF’s donations required appealing to skeptics. If Randi went to bat for anything that seemed supernatural his fans would turn on him, and if his big claim to fame was an unwinnable contest then his bread and butter demanded that he never allowed the contest to be won.

It’s that simple.

Now one could say that he’d get famous and rich for confirming Magick exists but… why would he? The papers would talk about the psychic not the foundation and further studies couldn’t be done at JREF because it wasn’t a scientific research facility and James had no training in science at all…

It merely had people who were trained to look out for things like cold reading and the like.

There’s nothing to gain and everything to lose and the fact that 99% of people who applied to challenge were turned down and 0% of those who did even got past so much as a preliminary round. Well it’s a little sus.

Now I’m not saying magic is out there and JREF is hiding it. If it were then JREF wouldn’t have the means to hide it.

What I am saying is JREF and James Randi were not scientists they were showmen and that’s very important to keep in mind.

Sharing The idea that you can debunk a phenomenon by yelling “FAKE!” And doing a smug dance is something that offers more harm than good imho. Especially when you get people like Anti-Vaxxers who Mimic this behavior though rallying against medicine instead of faith and folklore.

I can get unbanned by using a VPN? I heard those get shadowbanned

Yeah but Apple really is a fuck.

Fuck Apple. Fuck Epic too but one thing at a time.

I prefer… Any technology indistinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced

There are sadly leftists who have embraced censorship as a virtue.

But I am one socialist who never will.

Reminder: The Big Beautiful Bill makes it illegal to legislate restrictions for AI and more importantly it bans transgender healthcare

It wasn’t anything specific, it’s just… the idea of this guy being the real life Tony Stark didn’t pass the smell test. Not because he didn’t seem bright, but because I couldn’t believe ANYONE lived up to the hype that Elon had.

That and… well… the idea of the Private Corporation coming to save the day and guide us into a Utopia sounded way too much like a Libertarian Fantasy.

If I were the conspiratorial type, I’d say it’s about police language

Ah yes James Randi, a man I have very mixed feelings on. He was a climate skeptic who would claim to have debunked people who never signed up for his challenge. A real scum bag in general. He was also a high School drop out with no training in the sciences.

Admittedly he called himself an “Honest Liar” and was motivated not by money but out of fear that people believed he had magic back when he was a magician.

Still given his character I tend not to take JREF too seriously.

Bro you didn’t make up that word. You heard it on an episode of Always Sunny and forgot. I’d say it but honestly it’s so close to a racial slur that I’d rather not risk it.

You have said it before, it was the last thing you said to Brian before he went out that night and… well I can sense there’s a lot of unresolved drama there so I’ll stop talking now

Anyway don’t worry about Brian, in the great hereafter he became really good at Sudoku and is considering reincarnation on a planet in the Crab nebula. Interesting choice considering the people of that world are all female. Humanity won’t discover them for about two weeks but first contact will be surprisingly underwhelming

Naw I’m messing with you. This was all stream of conciousness… but maybe I freaked someone out who thought I was serious.

When I used to be New Age I believed that not believing in magic gave you a resistance to it because Quantum…

Accepting the truth that magic ain’t real was tough

Between him.and Jordan Peterson it looks like Ketamine

Right? I’m tired of the euphemism treadmill telling me what I can and can’t say. Especially if we are coming up with childish phrases like “unalived”

I used to call myself a <transgender slur> until woke cispeople got on my case about it.

Ahh… I guess it’s better than the old internet where the N-Word was your fast pass to being seen as funny and cool?

Oh I fully expect the DNC to try to rehabilitate him

My head canon is that in universe Musk Jr. High isn’t a real school and it’s just an edgy joke… the space version of saying you went to the “Adolf Hitler School for Tolerance and Friendship”

You say it for a laugh when you’re 14 or acting like it on Space 4Chan

I knew it was a grift from the start because people who are kind and wise don’t spend millions purely to make sure I know how kind and wise they are.

A friend of mine has head canoned that the guy from Star Trek was joking about being from Elon Musk University and that it’s the old “Adolf Hitler School for Friendship and Tolerance” gag but in space.

I’m just gonna go with that because fuck it’s the equivalent of listing Deepak Chopra as one of the greatest philosophers of the 21st century in your hard sci-fi setting.

And I am proud to have called bullshit on it from day one.

Whoever leads us to the promised land isn’t going to have a for profit LLC

Not even. He started on home, he just claimed he ran there and for some reason people believed him even though he still had a bat in his hand.

Elon has had “Penisdick” written all over him since day one