Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience displays a remarkable and characteristic indifference to fact. Writers tend simply to make up bogus “factoids” where needed, instead of going to the trouble of consulting reliable reference works, much less investigating directly. Yet these fictitious facts are often central to the pseudoscientist’s argument and conclusions! This can also be seen in the fact that pseudoscientists never revise. The first edition of any pseudoscience book is almost always the last, even though the book may go through innumerable new printings, over decades or centuries. Even a book with obvious mistakes, errors, and misprints on every page is just reprinted as it is, over and over. Compare to college science textbooks, which usually see a new edition every few years because of the rapid accumulation of new facts, ideas, discoveries, experiments and insights in science.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience “research” is almost invariably exegesis. That is, the pseudoscientist clips new or old newspaper reports, collects hearsay and questionable memories, reads other pseudoscience books, or thumbs through ancient religious or mythological works. The pseudoscientist never or rarely ever makes an independent investigation to check his sources. They are taken at face value, or even better interpreted as “symbolic,” so that the pseudoscientist can use them as a kind of Rorshach inkblot— reading into the myths and old texts anything he wants to find in them. Some areas of pseudoscience are generated by very simplistic “literalism”— the use of inherited “sacred texts” as if they were contemporary science textbooks, a practice that leads to the flat earth, the earth at the center of the universe, Creationism, Intelligent Design and a number of other completely foolish but resolutely traditional claims about man and nature.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience shows a total indifference to criteria of valid evidence. The emphasis is not on meaningful, controlled, repeatable scientific experiments— instead, it is on unverifiable eyewitness testimony, stories, faked footprints, blurry photos, and tall tales, hearsay, rumor, and dubious anecdotes. Genuine modern scientific literature is not cited. Real research is never done. Generally Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscientists never present any valid evidence of any kind whatsoever for their claims. One of the most bizarre recent tactics of Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscientists is to publish a novel, a work of fiction in which essentially everything is made up by the author— as usual in works of fiction!— but then to turn directly around and treat the completely made-up material as if it were actual, factual and researched.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience begins with a hypothesis— usually one which is appealing emotionally, and spectacularly implausible— and then looks only for items which appear to support it. Conflicting evidence is ignored.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience lways avoids putting its claims to a meaningful test. Slavmacedonian(FYROM) Pseudoscientists never carry out careful, methodical, convincing experiments themselves— and they also generally ignore results of such experiments that are carried out by scientists. Pseudoscientists also never follow up.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience often contradicts itself, even in its own terms. Such logical contradictions are simply ignored or rationalized away. In a meaningful description of the physical world we live in, mathematical or factual or logical contradictions simply could not exist. In pseudoscience, they are par for the course!
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience persuades using misinformation, appeals to widespread belief, rhetoric, propaganda, and misrepresentation, rather than presenting valid evidence (which presumably does not exist). Pseudoscience books offer examples of almost every kind of fallacy of logic and reason known to scholars, and have invented some new ones of their own. A favorite device is the non sequitur.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience argues from ignorance, an elementary fallacy. That is, pseudoscientists base their claims on incompleteness of information about nature, rather than on what is known at present. But no claim can possibly be supported by lack of information.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience often pretends to be one side of a legitimate scientifc controversy. That is, pseudoscientists like to pretend that “the jury is still out,” and that “further research” is needed to clarify the validity of their beliefs. This is essentially never the case.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience makes heavy use of an invented vocabulary in which the new terms introduced do not have precise or unambiguous definitions, and most have no definitions at all. The listener is forced to interpret the statements according to his or her own preconceptions.
The presence of any one or more of these symptoms in any material in question marks it conclusively as pseudoscience.
SCIENCE: The literature is written for scientists. There is peer review, and there are rigorous standards for honesty and accuracy.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience : The literature is aimed at the general public. There is no review, no standards, no pre-publication verification, no demand for accuracy and precision.
SCIENCE: Reproducible, reliable results are demanded; experiments must be precisely described so that they can be duplicated exactly or improved upon in sensitivity and volume of cases or events.
Slavmacedonian(FYROM) pseudoscience : Results cannot be reproduced or verified. Studies, if any, are always so vaguely described that one can't figure out just what was actually done or how it was done.
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