CHAPTER 1

STANDING TALL ON A FANTASY-PRONE PLANET

Generally I like to assume that it's not smart to generalize andmake assumptions. Too many things fall somewhere into thatbroad abyss between black and white. Since you are reading this book,however, I'm going to go out on a limb and make two guesses. One, I'mwilling to bet that you are a human being and, two, you live on Earth.If I'm right, too bad for you. Whether or not you have realized it, youraddress and your membership to the human species have condemnedyou to a life sentence atop the crust of a spherical madhouse. Throughno fault of your own, you have been born into a world teeming withgood people who mean well but to one degree or another are deranged,deluded, and just plain wrong. And most of them are eager to lure youinto the fog with them. But wait, there's more.

There is also no shortage of bad people who don't mean well. Theytrade in lies. Their goals may include harming you, exploiting you,taking your money, or all three. Unfortunately, you can't hide from anyof these people. Some days it's the dishonest ones who come for you,and other days it's the sincere but mistaken ones. Sooner or later theywill find you; they always find you. In fact, many of them are in your liferight now, no doubt. They live in your neighborhood. You go to schoolwith them. You work with them. Sometimes they are close friends.Every family has at least a few. You could try to run, but to where? Noplace is safe because they are everywhere. No city, no society, is free ofthem. Again and again they will reach out to you. They have a millionmethods and a trillion techniques. Their ideas can be like microbialparasites, requiring only the smallest crack or opening to squirm inand take over your brain. Join us. Pay us. Give us your time. Buy this.Trust this cure. Pay us now, please. Think like us. Be one of us. Believeus. And don't forget to pay us.

When they come for you, the easiest thing to do in the short termmay be to hand over your brain or your wallet, and then march quietlyinto the swamp of muddy thinking like a good little drone. The long-termconsequences for you may be harsh, however. Perhaps somepeople are so weak and so passive that assimilation really is their onlyoption. Fortunately, this is not the case with you, I'm guessing. Youwould probably like to hold onto your brain, money, health, and dignity.Am I right?

I wish this book were absolutely universal in appeal, but it mightnot be the best fit for everyone. Therefore, let's address a few basicpoints early to make sure that this book is right for you:

• If you like the idea of spending a lifetime stumbling back andforth between a variety of unproven claims and strange beliefsthat are almost certainly not true, then stop reading this booknow.

• If you think it would be really cool to waste thousands of dollarsover your lifetime on bogus miracle cures and absurd productshawked on infomercials, then you need to immediately put thisbook down and step away from it.

• If worrying about things that don't exist and cannot harm yousounds smart, then run as far away from this book as you can.Hurry, it might attack you!

• If being intellectually smothered within a group or organizationthat discourages thinking and forbids asking meaningfulquestions sounds comforting and reasonable, then buy as manycopies of this book that you can afford and then burn them all.As they are burning, be sure to chant something. The words don'tmatter, anything will do.

I'm sorry if you now feel that this book is not for you. But at leastyour path in life is clear: Trust everything anyone tells you. Live by acreed that says any claim that feels good and sounds good must be true.Forget reason and always go with your heart. Who needs facts whenyour gut speaks to you? Never second-guess anything. Never doubt,never question, and never worry about things like evidence, proof,logic, or that obnoxious thing called science. That's it; you are ready tolive a dream life. Before you begin your journey, however, please closethis book and slam it against your forehead ten times. This will giveyou good luck. Trust me.

Still here? Then it can only mean one thing: You are ready to think!You must be the kind of person who likes the idea of standing tall onPlanet Crazy with eyes wide open and a revved-up thinking machine,just like a twenty-first-century human should. You want to be goodat spotting scams and recognizing worthless products for sale. Youwant the ability to see through hollow words and dishonest promisesvirtually every time. A safer and more efficient life sounds good to you.You are ready to put up a fight against all those barbarians at the gatewho are determined to invade your skull. Their mission is to use andabuse you with counterfeit claims and fake philosophies, but you aregoing to be ready for them.

THINK LIKE A SCIENTIST

The most effective antidote for bad thinking is good thinking. The bestway to make con artists vanish is to see them. The best way to silencecrazy claims is simply to listen to them with a sharp brain and thenask the right questions. It is important to look at wild claims and hearincredible sales pitches with deliberate effort. You can't be passive aboutthis. Crooks and kooks love finding a brain with a wide-open doorwayand nobody standing guard. Respond to extraordinary claims in a waythat is similar, in spirit at least, to how a scientist would investigate anew, exotic illness found in redwood trees or newly discovered microbialcolonies in the bellybuttons of Latvian fishermen: observe, research,hypothesize (think up ideas), ask questions, experiment, and share yourideas and conclusions about it with sensible people. Rinse and repeat.

Thinking like a scientist is not that difficult. Young children cando it. Old people can do it. High-school dropouts can do it. It doesn'trequire you to memorize the periodic table of elements or to understandquantum physics. Thinking like a scientist in this context onlymeans that you maintain a healthy level of curiosity and doubt. Youaren't afraid to ask questions and request evidence, and you don't drawconclusions about things until you have very good reasons to do so....