I propose a new Internet Law aimed specifically at the claims of paranormal believers.

Lou’s Law: One cannot invoke Quantum Mechanics in an argument or explanation unless one can show at least a basic, layman’s understanding of Quantum Mechanics. For example, one might explain what Planck’s Constant describes or the idea behind the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle or even list the “flavors” of Quarks.

This comes from hearing Quantum Mechanics mentioned in The Secret, bizarre explanations of how Astrology works, and a host of other paranormal crap. Specifically, I came across it again in reading this interesting article on the paranormal radio/phone called Frank’s Box.

Arwin John, a 20 year old in Malaysia, made the local news with a rather long story about his ghost hunting club and activities.  The kid talks about seeing his first ghost at 10 years old and being hooked on paranormal investigation from then on. His parents finally buckled to his whining and got him some “equipment” and now let him stay out in local cemeteries. He has the usual tools for detecting dust, random noise, and nothing at all:

His research gear include thermal cameras, motion detectors, voice recorders – cassette and digital – and video-cams.

Dealing with news stories about hauntings is difficult. There is an ongoing complaint from skeptics that I think is true; reporters and editors will do stories about hauntings with no critical treatment at all because they view the stories as fun, human interest entertainment. The problem is that this gives an air of fact to the stories and makes them seem to be real.

I think this trend is worsening because of the prevalence of the ghost hunter TV shows. Those are seen to be entertainment, but still “reality TV”. It’s very misleading and it encourages the public to accept stories of hauntings and ghosts as fact without applying any critical thinking at all.