Science or Pseudoscience: Magnetic healing, psychic phenomena, and other
heterodoxies by Henry Bauer, University of Illinois Press, $29.95, ISBN
0252026012
HENRY BAUER prefers the term “anomalistics” to pseudoscience. That’s his case
in a nutshell. Pseudoscience implies a rushed judgement. He makes the point by
asking a few questions. For example, how does a placebo work? He maintains that
the answer from science is no better than that from alternative medicine. In
other words, neither can answer satisfactorily. We do not understand the placebo
effect.
But in Science or Pseudoscience, he isn’t out to disparage
science—he is, after all, a professor…
