Dutch newspaper Trouw set out a poll, in collaboration with Kieskompas, to investigate the belief in several conspiracy theories. One of the results they reported is that ‘almost one per cent of the Dutch, 0.9 per cent to be exact, think that the Earth is not round, but flat.’ This would amount to about 150.000 […]
Conspiracy Playlist on Spotify
A playlist on Spotify with all kinds of songs that have a link with conspiracy theories. Suggestion are welcome!
The Dunning-Kruger effect among chess players
The Dunning-Kruger effect is said to exist among chess players. This is however based on a single study on a small one-day open Swiss tournament. And did the authors of that study fully grasp the effect of that particular pairing system?
Rhus tox: poison ivy or Atlantic poison oak?
A controversial study with the homeopathic remedy Rhus tox got retracted. But what is the remedy actually made from according to the authors?
Pilot study on new malaria drug ATC Malachlorite in Cameroon raises lots of questions
My attention was drawn to a study via Twitter by a guy named Sam Little who is involved in some dubious test with the well known and dangerous quack product MMS [23/5/2019 see update below]. He recently performed a test in Uganda which is very similar to the test that was performed in Uganda several […]
Sued by Willem Middelkoop over a review of his book Patronen van Bedrog (‘Patterns of Deception’)
On 12 June 2018, I published a book review of Patronen van Bedrog, a book written by Willem Middelkoop and Tim Dollee. The title translates into Patterns of Deception. In this review (published on Kloptdatwel.nl) I argue that this is not a very good book, to say the least. It repeats conspiracy theories thrown up […]
Did WTC7 on 9/11 really descend in free fall for 2.25 seconds? A closer look at the NIST calculation.
According to truthers NIST had to admit reluctantly that WTC7 came down at free fall. My analysis shows that the calculation of NIST is questionable and that an argument can be made that the acceleration was a bit lower than the free fall acceleration.
The exceptional accurate experimental approximation of pi by Lazzarini was a joke, not fraud
It is possible to approximate pi with throwing needles on a grid, but the result Italian mathematician Mario Lazzarini published in 1901 seems too good to be true. But was it fraud? A close look into his original paper sheds some new light on this issue.
Settlement in Santilli vs. Van Erp and Israel
Two years ago Ruggero Santilli sued me for defamation. He was not pleased by some sentences in a post I wrote about one of his inventions, the Santilli Telescope. This telescope with concave lenses can detect ‘anti-matter light’, which is something completely different from ordinary light according to the genius from Florida. He also sued professor Frank Israel, chairman of the board of Stichting Skepsis, and my web host, Hosting2Go. The lawsuit has now been settled. I’ll give you an update on what happened in those two years.
Subtle Difference Between FAO and EU Regulations on the use of Alternative Medicine in Organic Farming
Organic farming has quite some influences from pseudoscientific ideas as can be seen in the preference for alternative medicine in treating livestock. Surprisingly, EU regulations for the organic food label are slightly different and worse than those from the FAO, looked upon from the perspective of animal well-being.