# I don't understand Peter Morris **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 8, 2013, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420 "2013-03-08T19:49:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/41 "2013-03-10T13:57:58Z")
> [@Baal\_Houtham](#): > > Jeez, guys it’s so simple. As Mr. Morris says in **Mr. Miskatonic** ’s link: > [INDENT]Mike has recently been in contact with the JREF trying to negotiate a new test. This time Mike is adamant that he wants the test to take place in California, at his favourite creek using jars filled with sand taken from the creek. Randi has refused to compromise. He demands that Mike can either be tested at the JREF offices in Florida, or at his home, but NOT at any creek in California.[/INDENT] > > Obviously, Mike the Dowser’s special, part-time, talent is dependent on using special sand and can only be sure to occasionally work in one tiny part of California, and for James Randi to not take his crew and testing apparatus cross-country in order to award Mike a million dollars is unconscionable. > > That aside, more than once while reading threads full of shoddy thinking I’ll encounter a post written by P. Morris that deals with the issue at hand in a clear, logical manner. This will make me think that maybe there are two posters with similar names, Peter Norris perhaps?, because the guy’s irrationality about Randi and woo-woo don’t carry over to everything he writes. I can use my psychic powers to predict the behavior of animals under diverse situations. But it has to be tested with my dog, in my living room, on a Saturday afternoon in the summer. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/42 "2013-03-10T14:51:06Z")
> [@Mr.Miskatonic](#): > > Yeah, that one makes me go ‘huh’? I can expect this nonsense from Peter, but from ianzin?He lost a lot of respect there. > > If I expected a magic show and got the tricks done by Geller, I would want a refund. I’ve seen magicians at parties do more interesting stuff. Ianzin is a professional magician and I’ll assume a good one. He is a great source about certain things and a good poster. But he has a few blind spots including defending all his brother magicians to the death. I also seem to remember him going batshit crazy in threads discussing how tricks are done but he seems to have calmed down a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/43 "2013-03-10T14:58:44Z")
BTW ianzin does not try to hide his identity. His home page is linked to his profile. Some of his stuff is on YouTube. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/44 "2013-03-10T15:13:49Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > Ianzin is a professional magician and I’ll assume a good one. He is a great source about certain things and a good poster. But he has a few blind spots including defending all his brother magicians to the death. I also seem to remember him going batshit crazy in threads discussing how tricks are done but he seems to have calmed down a bit. I have noticed a rather odd dichotomy with some magicians, either they defend their fellows to the death or they are all to happy to rip into them and tear them down. A few forays into the Magic Circle forum where some rather petty minor magicians were more than happy to tear into more prominent magicians who were speaking out against psychics, etc. was pathetic. I chalk the latter behavior up to professional jealousy, the former seems to be a misguided effort to protect their institution. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/45 "2013-03-10T17:33:12Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > [I started a thread about the “Randi Restriction”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=684744) in ATMB. I’ve responded to the ATMB thread and also in the Uri Geller thread. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/46 "2013-03-10T18:07:16Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > I’ve responded to the ATMB thread and also in the Uri Geller thread. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/47 "2013-03-10T18:19:38Z")
Side note: there are “challenges” with monetary prizes offered by advocates on the woo spectrum, for instance [challenges to supporters of vaccination](http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/index.php/the-150000-vaccine-challenge/). Apparently none of this money has been paid out either, not for lack of contestants but due to the unreasonable and bizarre demands placed on them (for instance, in the Jock Doubleday vaccine challenge contestants are supposed to _drink_ additives to vaccines to prove they’re non-toxic, but first must undergo two separate psychiatric evaluations at their own expense to prove they’re not crazy for taking the test). By contrast, I don’t get the impression that Randi is stacking the deck by making contestants jump through idiotic and costly hoops to meet challenge criteria. Their real problem is that their woo won’t stand up to close scrutiny. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [March 10, 2013, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/48 "2013-03-10T18:23:14Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Side note: there are “challenges” with monetary prizes offered by advocates on the woo spectrum, for instance [challenges to supporters of vaccination](http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/index.php/the-150000-vaccine-challenge/). Apparently none of this money has been paid out either, not for lack of contestants but due to the unreasonable and bizarre demands placed on them (for instance, in the Jock Doubleday vaccine challenge contestants are supposed to _drink_ additives to vaccines to prove they’re non-toxic, but first must undergo two separate psychiatric evaluations at their own expense to prove they’re not crazy for taking the test). > > By contrast, I don’t get the impression that Randi is stacking the deck by making contestants jump through idiotic and costly hoops to meet challenge criteria. Their real problem is that their woo won’t stand up to close scrutiny. My favorite of these was creationist Kent Hovind, whose ‘challenge’ basically required you to create a universe in a Petri Dish. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2013, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/49 "2013-03-11T15:59:07Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > BTW ianzin does not try to hide his identity. His home page is linked to his profile. Some of his stuff is on YouTube. I prefer to picture GOB from Arrested Development when thinking of **ianzin**. Mostly based on his ridiculous claim that a webpage explaining how to do some trick with a rubber band was violating copyright, leading to the amusing result of Mods having to explain why they were taking his word for it, when Cecil Adams has a few articles explaining exactly how some magic tricks are done. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2013, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/50 "2013-03-11T16:20:16Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > Mostly based on his ridiculous claim that a webpage explaining how to do some trick with a rubber band was violating copyright, leading to the amusing result of Mods having to explain why they were taking his word for it, when Cecil Adams has a few articles explaining exactly how some magic tricks are done. What!?!? ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2013, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/51 "2013-03-11T16:28:02Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > What!?!? [Original thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=266080&highlight=copyright), closed then reopened by mods. [Thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=266110&highlight=copyright) started in ATMB, later moved to Pit, where everyone else pointed out how ridiculous the thread closure was. Best post was by Jayrot, listing multiple threads and Straight Dope articles explaining how tricks are done, and asking for an explanation why this case was different. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2013, 8:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/52 "2013-03-11T20:53:29Z")
> [@Mr.Miskatonic](#): > > [“Is this hate speech”](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=567685) Haha that was awesome. BTW Urban dickinary still says in definition 4: > [@](#): > > A derisive word used by skepdicks to describe the solemn beliefs of various New-Age adherents. A term of hate speech on the SDMB as propounded by Peter Morris, the SDMB user not the Welsh baseball player. > > My guess is that the woowoos posting in the MPSIMS greenzone will not be willing to enage this subject in a GD context, but here’s hoping anyway. That is so beautiful it brought a tear to my eye. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [March 11, 2013, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/53 "2013-03-11T23:56:51Z")
There is a lot of misinformation here. > [@Czarcasm](#): > > [How it all started.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=394028&highlight=Morris+Randi) Wrong. [This is PM’s first post](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=3271936&postcount=87)on these boards, in which he alleges that dowsers don’t - and don’t claim to - dowse by using anything paranormal but by using landscape clues, and that Randi is a fraud and we are all “putzes”\* for believing otherwise. Naturally, PM got totally owned on his post. He came in calling everyone a putz, and ended up being made to look a putz. PM is a smart, proud guy. Was this embarrassing episode the start of his obsession with proving Randi wrong and vindicating his rash post? Who knows. I’m not about to start scouring the internet looking to see if someone called Peter Morris or with his posting style ever evidenced this obsession prior to April 12 2003. > [@Trepa\_Mayfield](#): > > Peter Morris has a grudge against James Randi, because Peter Morris claims to have a method for water-dousing(?) that works, and he feels that Randi has cheated him out of the million-dollar challenge because Randi won’t see him or won’t set up the conditions correctly or something. This is not really correct. I’ve participated in a lot of dowsing threads that PM has also participated in, both here and on Randi’s forums. As far as I know, PM has never said he can perform any paranormal act or that he believes in the paranormal. He has never said that dowsing works except in non-paranormal ways (ie by dowsers consciously or subconsciously reading the landscape). His challenge to Randi about dry spots was not based on the idea that he could dowse (at least in any paranormal sense). Randi’s oft stated premise is that there’s water everywhere below ground and that this is the secret to dowsers’ success. This is obviously correct, at least as a generalised proposition. There probably are some spots where water wouldn’t exist below ground, but that is glossed over in Randi’s [essentially correct] summation. Randi has (more than once I think) rhetorically said something along the lines that - given that water is pretty much everywhere underground - the hard thing to do would be to choose a spot where there _wasn’t_ water. “Find me a dry spot!” is a rhetorical challenge Randi has thrown out to his audience, several times I think. PM - quite cleverly at one level - decided he would try to challenge Randi by taking his “Find me a dry spot!” challenge literally. He built a “proverandiwrong” website and made his challenge. Negotiations didn’t last long because, IIRC, PM made it clear that he wasn’t actually attempting to prove the paranormal, because he planned on finding his dry spot using standard geologic maps ie all he was trying to do was prove that Randi’s statement about underground water wasn’t perfectly true, using scientific data. Which is clearly not a paranormal ability, so the challenge was rejected. My view is that PM is mentally ill. He is an otherwise functioning poster who is obsessed beyond all reason with proving that Randi is not all that others think he is. I don’t really debate with him in any serious way any more for this reason. It’s sad really, and somewhat entertaining in a train wreck kind of way. His obsession causes him to devote vast amounts of mental energy to twisting posts and logic and facts to try desperately to cling to the view that he’s right and Randi [and “Randi fans”] are wrong. This leads him to post the most bizarre things. \*PM opened his account on the SDMB by insulting people. He is himself however almost pathologically allergic to insults. Gross hypocrisy is one of his trademarks when the Randi Fever is upon him. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/54 "2013-03-12T18:18:07Z")
Now the Woo-Meister is [favorably equating Uri Geller with Harry Houdini](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=16089589&postcount=195). If Harry were alive today he’d be exposing Geller, not sharing a stage with him. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/55 "2013-03-12T18:26:35Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Now the Woo-Meister is [favorably equating Uri Geller with Harry Houdini](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=16089589&postcount=195). If Harry were alive today he’d be exposing Geller, not sharing a stage with him. Peter loves speaking for other when they are unable to reply, and he will insist he knows what a person meant or said better than the person themselves. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/56 "2013-03-12T18:36:28Z")
Q\> What does he call lying to people about their loved ones, lying about assisting police and lying about working with the goverment? A\> Publicity! ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/57 "2013-03-12T18:46:37Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Q\> What does he call lying to people about their loved ones, lying about assisting police and lying about working with the goverment? > A\> Publicity! Q\> What does he call a person who fights & argues against irrational nonsense, faith healers, and other scams. A\> A scumbag attention whore! ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/58 "2013-03-12T20:07:28Z")
Oh, guys! Don’t argue with him! He’s an \*amateur \*magician! ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/59 "2013-03-12T20:09:36Z")
> [@Mr.Miskatonic](#): > > Oh, guys! Don’t argue with him! He’s an \*amateur \*magician! He’s the only amateur magician I’ve ever come across that thinks that Houdini wasn’t a expert lock picker. ---
**Author:** ![Drunky\_Smurf](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drunky_smurf/32/449_2.png) [@Drunky\_Smurf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drunky_Smurf)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2013, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420/60 "2013-03-12T20:15:52Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > He’s the only amateur magician I’ve ever come across that thinks that Houdini wasn’t a expert lock picker. Were 100% of his tricks about lock picking? No? Then he was no expert lock picker. That’s supposed to be sarcastic. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-dont-understand-peter-morris/652420.md?page=4)