Skeptics and True Believers

Skeptics and True Believers

In the first chapter, Raymo, opens with talk of his childhood. He brings to the

surface the fact that children will believe just about anything they are told. In this chapter Raymo explains how people grow frm children into grown sdluts, peolpe somehow retain some of a child’s ability to believe in the unbelievable. It is the True Believer that retains “an absolute in some forms of empirically unverifiable make-belive...” (13), wheras the Skeptic always “keeps a wary eye even on firmly established facts.”(14) For an example, Raymo uses the Shroud of Turin, which simplly a linen cloth that has the likeness of a man on it ( some belive this man to be Christ). He tells of a time when the Roman Catholic authorities allowed scientists to radiocarbon date the Shroud. Small samples of the Shroud where sent with three samples controls of known age, to three independant labs. All three properly dated the controls and dated the Shroud to medieval time. Raymo conclueded that a Skeptic would have taken the evidence and belived it, while the True Beliver would find no truth in what was found. In fact, he said that the True Beliver would come up with explainations as to why the Shroud seems younger than it really is.

In the next chapter, Raymo explains the main difference between Skeptics and

True Believers is the opposite of what most people would think. He explains how

“scientific concepts can be extraordinarily bizarre...” (27), wheras the True Believer

believe what may seem much more sensible and somewhat down to earth. The example

Raymo uses for this is DNA and its ability to reproduce itself. This tiny double-helix

somehow manages to spilt and make a copy of its self from chemical components from

whatever is surrounding it. It may seem easier for one to believe in a Shroud with a man’s face in it, or the picture of God in the Sistine Chapel, but it is the Skeptics who believe in the hard to concieve DNA. It is this DNA that contains the blueprints of what we are to look, talk, and act like.

In chapter four, Raymo again brings up his childhood. He tells how he was forced

into religion. The Church would not allow doubts to be spoken. For if it where to be

questioned the whole religious system may fall apart. The only sources of information

were the nuns, priest, and all other authorities that were ‘chosen’ by God.