It is decidedly autumn now. Here in New England, there is no avoiding the fact that summer is over. The leaves are not yet at their peak of fiery exuberance, but it won’t be long. I have managed to keep swimming in the ocean for now, but it is unclear how long that will last. Brrrr.
This will be a brief missive. I am back from my trip to England, where I gave two talks, both in pubs. I managed to see three plays—one by Tom Stoppard and two by Shakespeare (not too shabby!)—and visit several museums. I also shared a few meals with friends while there. The weather and accommodations were all quite good. It was generally a very successful trip, and one of the results was my most recent “Behavior & Belief” column for Skeptical Inquirer, entitled “Science and Pseudoscience in London: A Skeptic’s Tour.” I have a particular interest in the history of 19th-century spiritualism, and, although the movement began in the United States, two important spiritualist organizations were established in England, both of which remain in operation today. I visited both of them—as well as a spiritualist archive at the Cambridge University library—and came across some interesting artifacts.
The November/December issue of the print edition of Skeptical Inquirer—with an election-themed cover—will be on newsstands soon, and it will include both a “Behavior & Belief” column and a feature story from me. The column is a reprint of my recent online article “How Does the Ouija Board Work?” and the feature story is a reprint of an article on the Netflix documentary, “Tell Them You Love Me,” that covers the shocking sexual abuse case of former Rutgers University philosophy professor, Anna Stubblefield. The article originally appeared on Colin Wright’s substack Reality’s Last Stand and can be found online here.
That’s it for now. Happy autumn to those who celebrate.
