That's the key question, isn't it. I used to think the answer was easily "no". But I'm changing my mind. Realistically, in the current environment, a skeptic isn't just someone who scientifically assesses information. She/he is someone who promotes the use of scientific assessment instead of faith and who concerns her/himself with accurately representing the results of that assessment. And this has become a political issue, particularly in the US.
Are moderate beliefs deserving of this activism just because radical beliefs can be harmful? I have watched as what I originally saw as inconsequential beliefs have led to countless deaths and a waste of resources sorely needed for other areas. The inconsequential fringe use of 'alternative' medicine has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry that now uses our tax dollars (through NCCAM) to perform research that is pre-selected to be a waste of time (research that is unlikely to be a waste of time is picked up through conventional channels). And while a few people die from taking toxic therapies or by foregoing effective treatment in developed countries, of more concern to me is the patina of respect given to these therapies which allows them to be adopted systematically, leading to far more deaths, in less developed countries (I'm thinking of the treatment of AIDS in some African countries as an example). The anti-vaccination movement which originally consisted of a small number of easily dismissed radicals has now become relatively mainstream and has led to millions of deaths - not just from outbreaks of vaccine-preventable disease in developed countries, but from the millions of deaths in less developed countries from measles and polio when the eradication goals were derailed.
Sam Harris makes a case for these consequences with respect to religion.
I wasn't aware that there is a causal link between belief in unproven therapeutic methods and and the death toll taken by epidemic diseases in underdeveloped countries. To me the reasons seemed to be predominantly poverty, general lack of education, underestimation of the actual threat and negligence.
The delays in actions against AIDS in southafrica for example looked more like a political decision by Mbeki's governement to use an incorrectly estimated danger as a leverage to further a program to fight poverty. It may have been guided by an understandable sentiment against pharmaceutic bussiness interrests.
The most vocal critic of the NCCAM seems to be a certain Stephen Barret who claims to be a consumer-protection-activist and runs a network of websites with a strong anti-CAM-bias. From the information on Quackwatch about himself and from information from the sites of his detractors, he is at least controversial as an objective evaluator of methods outside his immeadiate expertise.
From
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NCCAM:
Critics attest that despite the publicized intentions at its founding, NCCAM and its predecessor, the Office of Alternative Medicine, have spent more than $800 million on such research since 1991 but have neither succeeded in scientifically demonstrating the efficacy of a single alternative method nor declared any alternative medicine treatment effective.
I would consider research into and evaluation of a phenomenon that apparently gained widespread public acceptance (CAM) actually a good use of money.
But while $800 million over the course of 16 years doesn't sound like that much, compared with the top line for accepted pharmaceuticals like prozac, the funding of a research institution which produces no result for that long is likely in dire need of a review.
And now we are discussing these consequences with respect to psychics. It seems the results are less dire than in other areas. But would it really be wise to assume that if we ignore them, they will go away rather than expand to the point where heads of state depend upon their advice?
Which poses a problem in it's own. Most psychics don't actually work as health practicioners. Those that do should be scrutinized to the same degree as practicioners of more accepted therapeutic methods.
A psychic who claims to solve criminal cases should be evaluated according to the same standards which are applied to any any professional investigator and I wholeheartedly agree that, given their miserable track record, they can be called frauds in most cases.
The rest seems to provide a similar service to that provided by a priest, which is a rather fuzzy area that could be characterised as interpersonal counseling. It deals mainly with the clients beliefs and tries to utilize them (hopefully) to the clients advantage. Since this involves rather complex personal interactions, has to be adapted to the client, and is hard to isolate from environmental factors the testability is limited. Specific claims, like help in smoking cessation can be statistically evaluated, but studies of this kind can't for example be blinded.
I admit that the scientific method is the best we have to determine whether a specific treatment is effective. The efficacy of many treatments in this area can only evaluated subjectively though and ocassionaly even scientifically accepted opinions have to be revised, as exemplified by the latest SSRI-study.
This makes most of the field of therapeutic counseling virtually unfalsifiable. I don't think it should be labeled superstitious, ineffective or dangerous on this ground.
What worries me about the drawn paralell between religion and psi-research, and the stated need for activism, is where you would be willing to draw the line. I got from other threads on this board that exposing a psychic in front of a group of comforting-seeking clients ( thereby spoiling their experience and possibly their sense of closure ) is considered by many here a laudable action. Similar flooding the comment area of a website that promotes Sylvia Brown seems to be regarded by many here as a kind of civil duty. Her fans might consider it to be harrasment. Such things make me wonder how far some skeptics would go in their effort to promote THE TRUTH. What would be the stance on Phelps-style picketings of christian masses or christian funerals, if christianity as a religion has to be denounced? Would people here be in support of a legislation that would outlaw all counseling that isn't restricted to specific cases that could statistically be proven to be effective?
Pointing out methodical errors in Radin's reserach is part of the normal scientific process. Trying to discredit the man for ideological reasons is not. The freedom of research should, in my opinion, be worth more than interim opinions of an interrest group about what is worthy of research.
I don't really know how important it is for these movements to adopt the patina of respect that science provides. They all seem to make a point of referring to science, even if they grossly misuse it. But I don't know if they would get fewer converts if skeptics made a more concerted effort to prevent that misuse, or whether it would turn out not to be important after all.
I would think it is not very important. For selling a mass product perceived credibility is more important than actual results to backup your claims. Being rigorously and successfully tested is good if you want to sell to skeptics. For the general population it is sufficient to be associated with the current woo-words, which in more christian times might have included 'sacred virgin' or 'holy spirit', in the 60's and 70's of the last century included 'psychedelic','cosmic' and 'space' and currently seem to include 'quantum', 'superstring' and 'double-blind'.
The 'scientific patina' seems to come more from half understood or misunderstood concepts than from actual research. An example of this is quantum theory, which sprouted a whole lot of ideas about consciousness influencing reality. Blaming Radin's research, regardless of whether he actually has a case, for the exploits of Sylvia Browne looks to me like blaming the late Heisenberg for Ramtha and 'The Secret'.
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