MAR 14, 2011 - SuperMoon or SuperHype is as timely and on-target as anything I've seen on SuperMoon yet, in the midst of all the media buzz that has surrounded my "brain-child" in the last week or so. Author Tammy Plotner is one of very few science writers ever to treat an astrological topic with healthy skepticism and an open mind all at once. If this rare combination has found a home at the Universe Today online popular science magazine, I'll be spending a lot more time exploring over there in future. Seriously, so many self-appointed "skeptics" start out with the premise that anything that doesn't fall within their expertise and experience is by nature unscientific - and therefore, simple-minded superstition. Starting from that premise, they can't be bothered to understand the object of their criticism. They just crank out the misstatements one after the other. I'm reminded of my grad school Department Chairman, who scoffed when I said I'd like to do my history of science work on astrology. "You can't do that," he said, "everybody knows astrology is not a science." When I asked if he'd ever studied the subject so as to have an informed opinion about it, he said "Everybody knows astrology is a superstition, so there's no need to study it." To this day, I still wonder if he wasn't peeved more over the fact that I was living with his daughter than he was at astrology . . .
