Skeptical Inquirer on The Oak Island Treasure

Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports
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It appears that the board still doesn’t accept posts from the Opera browser, so here goes with IE. I hope the thread doesn’t get posted twice.

Relevant Straight Dope article: What’s the scoop on the mysterious buried treasure at Oak Island?

The Skeptical Inquirer article by Joe Nickell about the Oak Island Treasure is now available online at The Secrets of Oak Island. This article was previously discussed in http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=1717 . Nickell notes that the evidence of real treasure is pretty flimsy, and makes a surprising link to Masonic symbolism.

Not too often that Occam’s Razor indicates a conspiracy, but that looks like the case here.

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Sorry, I’m not used to the new board yet. Those links should be:

What’s the scoop on the mysterious buried treasure at Oak Island?

and

The Secrets of Oak Island.

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I found the Skeptical Inquirer article to be puzzling, and a little annoying. He goes all the way to Nova Scotia to debunk one conspiracy, and ends up finding another? “No, there’s no pirate treasure–it’s actually Freemasonry.” Everywhere he looks, he sees Masonic symbols. A bulldozer digs up a rock that “has Masonic symbols engraved on its underside.” So? Even if they were Masonic symbols, that doesn’t prove that they’re connected to the Oak Island treasure.

And he doesn’t address the basic question of why all this Masonic hugger-mugger should be taking place. What’s the motive? There’s no treasure, so why should the Nova Scotia Freemasons care? Or is there–something ELSE there? <<< Twilight Zone music up >>>

People who think that aliens perform medical experiments on humans in their UFOs also never explain exactly why aliens should be interested.

I’m sorry, this just sounds too much like “yeah, they’re all in it together!” for my taste. I don’t think the “skeptic” was quite skeptical enough.

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I am a big fan of Skeptical Inquirer (a subscriber for many years), but I too was left scratching my head after that article. What was the point of the Masonic symbolism? Did Joe Nickell feel that it was not enough to provide skeptical insight to the flimsy evidence of treasure being present, but that he also had to make a Freemason conspiracy out of it?
Good article, otherwise.

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First of all, my grandparents (deceased), were Masons. This does not make me an expert, but I did live with my grandmother for about five years after grandpa passed away, and we had many very interesting discussions. Some involved Freemasonry.

My understanding of Freemasonry is this: Freemasonry is a secret society. It is all about “hugger-muggery”. I’d certainly not go so far as to classify it as a conspiracy, since that word is suggestive of treasonous activities, cabals, and revolutionaries.

There is no doubt in my mind that Freemasonry presents two sides, one for the public, and one reserved for its members. Unofficial motto: Mysterys-R-Us.

I was fascinated by the Sceptical Inquirer link, BTW. I am satisfied with its conclusions. I have always thought about the Oak Island Treasure that to have gone to the extent of such elaborate and thorough burial, would have been beyond the resources of Pirates! For gosh sakes! why bother?