... n the standard mode, they repeated the test
with the same acid, but no electricity. The results were the same. These results were reported at the
symposium on Integrated Methods, in Denver in May, 1993.
These tests were all quite definitive. They were clear demonstrations that the methods did not
work as claimed. It can be difficult in exploration to set up known targets, but much easier in
engineering applications of geophysics. There are a number of test ranges for subsurface detection of
ordnance and other material. It is important to test the systems over empty ground as well, to test for
false positives. As the test ranges become well used and the location of the targets becomes well
known, it may be easier for charlatans to fake their results. Retain some sections of the test ranges in
which the target locations are still secret!
Ensure that the test conditions are suitable for the instrument – get the advice of the seller. It is a
common response of the misguided scientist or charlatan, after a failed test, to claim that the weather
was too wet, or too dry, or that the sun was too bright, or whatever excuse they can find. If the weather
is blamed, include that in your report. Most people reading it will be able to judge for themselves the
truth.
While it may not be necessary to resort to tricks like those described above to test new methods,
it is important to ensure that tests are blind. Because most voodoo methods measure very close to the
detection threshold, it is easy for an operator to convince himself, and observers, that an effect is being
measured. Consider double-blind tests. It is known that some psychics are very skilled at reading the
attitudes and reactions of their customers for clues to their life, and work these clues into their
“predictions”. Langmuir (1953) described a similar case when disproving the Davis Barnes effect,
where the tester adopted a slightly different posture whether the test case was real or blank, and the
demonstrator noticed these changes.
Managers and politicians will be under in a hurry to take advantage of the “wondrous” new
technology. The seller of the voodoo method will threaten to go to the competition to pressure a
corporation. Press releases and public demonstrations will be used to apply pressure to government
agencies . Testers must realize that there will be a lot of pressure to conclude the testing quickly, and
yet the test results must still be unequivocal.
Communications To be effective, the results of these tests must become public. Charlatans use the lack of
communication to their advantage: if one client proves to be too savvy to buy, they move on to another
who is not aware of the failures. Before funding any testing of a suspect system, there must be an
agreement to publish the results – positive or negative. Journals must be prepared to publish these tests,
including the failures. The medical science publishing industry has recently announced a very
intelligent new policy – the results of new drug testing will not be published unless the testing agency
registers the test plan in advance, and agrees to publish both positive and negative results. The
geophysical industry should follow this lead. Tests of new systems should be published, whether
positive or negative, with proper description of the test conditions. It may not be necessary to express an
opinion on the viability of the system itself; if the tests were of a definitive nature, it should be clear to
the reader.
If a system marketer will not agree to publication of all results, the system should be viewed with
the greatest suspicion.
Show some compassion in publishing tests. If the voodoo method is merely misguided science,
the seller of the system should be given the opportunity to change his system, or withdraw it until the
science is improved. There is no need to pillory someone who is trying to develop new science.
However, if you are convinced that the seller is a charlatan – show no mercy!
Keep in mind that to a non-geophysicist, the arguments of the geophysicist and the charlatan may
be equally incomprehensible. Tune your report to the readers – don’t bury them with baffling science
that can be matched with equally baffling pseudo-science. Use clear examples and explanations, and
use the methods described above to ensure unequivocal test results.
Good communications are needed between management, who are the target of charlatans, and
the technological branch of the company. A charlatan once proposed selling a system to the president of
Noranda Inc. He passed the proposal to the president of Noranda Mining, who sent it to the President of
Exploration, who sent it to the director of geophysics, Roger Pemberton. Pemberton immediately
recognized it as a scam, and the charlatan had no success. It is important that management recognize the
need for technological review. It is also necessary for the technologists to recognize the need of
management for respect. A senior manager does not want to be made to feel a fool by an employee.
This would shut down communications and might perhaps be a career-limiting move. The scientist must
treat the request for an evaluation with an open mind and give a professional analysis, in terms suited to
the readers.
A second facet of good communication is communication across the industry. In the example
above, Roger Pemberton protected Noranda, but you can be certain the charlatans approached other
companies. One can express unguarded opinions within a company or private agreement, but doing so
in public risks litigation from the charlatans. There was another BS system that was offered to Noranda
in the 1980’s. Roger orchestrated a show-and-tell for them at the PDAC conference, renting a room and
promising them an audience. He invited all the geophysicists he could find, including many of the
senior technological people from the industry and many eminent scientists. The charlatans were not
expecting such a technically perceptive audience. The audience was very polite, but asked many
penetrating questions and chewed the presenters into little pieces. It was great fun! The advantage of
the process was that with no legal risk to Noranda, the voodoo system was exposed to a full crosssection
of the industry as a scam, and it was never seen in Canada again.
What can Agencies Do?
Large government agencies that use geophysics can help by conducting and publicizing
applications tests of many methods, and publishing the results. These tests serve not only to establish
the bona fides of geophysical systems, they provide a baseline against which to test other systems. The
BS sellers likely will not take part in such test programs, but their absence can be questioned, and new
prospective clients can ask them to conduct duplicate tests. With the larger study as a standard, the new
client does not need to fund a large test.
The Army Environmental Centre ran an exhaustive test of existing UXO detection methods over
the Jefferson Proving Ground in 1994. It was an excellent test of existing technologies: thirty-three
systems of all kinds were tested, and statistical analyses of all 33 were published. The statistics
generally speak for themselves – it was not necessary for the authors of the reports to express their own
opinions of the systems tested.
The only minor shortfall I see in the report, from the point of view of publishing voodoo
geophysics, was that approximately 12 systems were rejected for testing. A list of these systems, with a
short reason for the rejection of each would be useful.
In September of 2004 the DOE completed a test of methods to remotely detect methane
(pipeline) leaks. The results are already posted on the Rocky Mountain Oilfield Testing Centre website,
at
http://www.rmotc.com/pdfs/SwRI_Final.pdf. To ensure meaningful results, they simulated many
kinds of methane leaks, including “decoy” sites, and had the tests run and re-run on a number of
consecutive days. The leak at one site was described to the testers (for calibration), and they were
required to report on the others before being told what the leak rates (if any) were. The report also lists
special conditions required by each of the methods tested.
It is important to understand the scientific procedures (or lack of science) applied by the
government agency when posting “recommended” systems. The EPA in New England maintains a
Technology Connection website which offers access to a wide range of innovative technology
(http://www.epa.gov/region1/assistance/ceit_iti/index.html ). However, the technology posted on the
site is the responsibility of the company posting it, and the EPA states that “No attempt was made to
examine, screen or verify company or technology information.”
Carlson (2002) reported that the government TechCon website, believed by some to list
recommended technologies, also relies on the companies submitting the information to provide their
own verification. The TechCon website listed the Passive Magnetic Resonance Anomaly Mapping
system, a contaminant detection system that looks a bit like a conventional metal detector, but through
which the unique human “biosensor” can detect the magnetic resonance produced by the underground
contaminants. An assessment by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers stated that the system
provided "no useful information during the three tests" and "appeared to be implausible," (Science,
2002). The DOE has since terminated its sponsorship of the Technology Connection web site (Argonne
National Lab:
http://web.ead.anl.gov/techcon/).
Do not expect the police to help. In fact, police agencies worldwide have shown embarrassing
tendencies to invest in many kinds of BS systems that promise to detect drugs, bombs, or bodies. The
“Quadro Tracker”, described in FBI news releases (Carroll, 2002) as “a fraud”, was marketed for
detecting drugs, bombs, or anything else to which it could be tuned by inserting the appropriate card in
the device. The list of police forces, military units, and school boards that bought at least one “Quadro
Tracker” (Carroll, 2002) is frightening. Police forces might turn to geophysical consultants for help in
evidence or body searches, but not until after they’ve exhausted other avenues, like psychics (Reed,
2004).
When asked what could be done about a geophysical charlatan, the advice of the FBI in Houston
was to “get an attorney”. Civil litigation is probably the only recourse, after one has lost money to the
scam. The FBI did get involved in prosecution of the Quadro Tracker - perhaps because the sellers were
targeting police forces and the FBI itself.
As noted above, industry journals must be willing to publish the results of testing, even when the
results are negative. Journals should also report the completion of government tests, and the list sources
for test reports.
Societies like EEGS can help define standards and conditions for testing, independent
consultants, blind conditions, target and blank areas, etc. In the test of the PMRAM, the DOE’s Office
of Science and Technology asked the American Society of Mechanical Engineers to perform the tests.
EEGS could provide a similar service, recommending geophysical consultants to conduct and interpret
the tests.
Conclusions Geophysicists need to realize that voodoo systems are more than quaint amusements; they cost
our industry both credibility and money. It is in everyone’s best interest to keep charlatans out of the
market. Professional societies need to commit to cleaning up their field, proactively offering expertise
to government agencies needing unbiased, expert advice.
A healthy cynicism in evaluating new methods is important, and familiarity with key
characteristics of voodoo geophysics can help. Effective scientific testing, conducted with an open
mind is the key to determining what, if any capabilities a system truly has. The open mind ensures that
truly novel, but effective technologies will not be ignored. The tests must be controlled by the
investigator, not the seller, and should include a blind or double-blind component. Government
agencies can help most by arranging multiple system tests and publishing the results, to set standards
and provide for comparison. The test conditions need to be reported, and have to be scientifically
rigorous.
Communication is, perhaps, the most important aspect to ensuring that the industry benefits from
the testing. Non-scientists, including managers and police, must be encouraged to involve
geophysicists in evaluation of new technologies. They must be patient in allowing time for proper
testing. Geophysicists must be fair in their assessment; and open, clear, and definitive in their reporting.
Secrecy is commonly employed by charlatans to hide their systems from technical evaluation.
Professional journals need to commit to this communication, publishing test results, both positive and
negative, and ensuring accuracy in commercial advertising as well as technical publications.
The most obvious conclusion is that pseudo-scientific charlatans existed long before the science
of geophysics became known by that name, and will probably continue long into the future, when the
geophysics is being demonstrated in museums along with wagon-wheel making. We can, however,
limit the damage done by charlatans and misguided scientists, by exposing the former and re-educating
the latter.
References Blau, L.W. 1936, Black Magic in Geophysical Prospecting, Geophysics, Volume 1, Number 1, pp 1-8
Carlson, N.2002, Breakthrough, Scam, or just Bad Geophysics? Fast Times, August, 2002, pp 6-7
Carroll, R.T., 2002, Skepdic.com (Excerpts from Carroll’s “The Skeptic’s Dictionary”)
Discover, 1984, The Great Oil Sniffer Hoax, The Skeptical Eye Column, Discover Magazine, March,
1984 (Author unknown)
Langmuir, I, 1953, Colloquim on Pathological Science, Knolls Research Laboratory, Transcribed and
edited by R.N. Hall.
Park, Robert L, (2000) Voodoo Science, The Road from Foolishness to Fraud, Oxford University Press
PRC Inc. 1994, Unexploded Ordnance Advanced Technology Demonstration Program at Jefferson
Proving Ground, Phase 1. Report No. SFIM-AEC-ET-CR-94120.
Reed, J, 2002, personal commnication.
Science, 2002, DOE’s Losing Gamble, in Science, Volume 295, Number 5556, Issue of 1 Feb 2002, p.
795.
Turro, Nicholas J. 1998, Toward a general theory of pathological science. An essay taken from a series
of addresses at the Max Planck institute, and published on www.columbia.edu/cu/21stC/issue-
3.4/turro.html .
Interesting Web Sites:
www.skepdic.com Excerpts and discussions around the Skeptic’s Dictionary, by Robert Todd Carroll
http://www.sniggle.net/science.php A listing of many pseudo-scientific errors and scams, with many
links to many other websites.
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Оригинал на английском (ссылка)
http://www.fugroairborne.com/resources/technical_papers/general/pdfs/voodoo_methods.pdf
Отправлено: 09.06.08 02:25. Заголовок: Google помог (оригинал на английском)
