Disclaimer: All ideas and opinions on this site are my own and have nothing to do with any employer or organisation.

 

Follow Mike Sutton on twitter (he's only funny in certain places)

 

Welcome to Disology, home of the scholarly study of criticism and disrespect through the virtual medium of Sit-Down Comedy.

 

 

If you're drunk, can't type, spell or don't understand simple Latin and the root of made-up sciences from obscure ancient Greek words then it is possible that you arrived here because you meant to type Dysology. In which case you could do worse than go to Dysology.org.

 

Breaking News - click the links:

 

 

 

Think about it - unskeptical skepticism:

 

What is the most effective way to challenge orthodoxy, knowledge consensus, pseudoscience, junk science and apparently simple claptrap?

 

Michael Shermer is the founder and Editor in Chief of the Skeptic magazine. Shermer’s position has long been that the most effective way to challenge fallacies and myths is to publish from a position of seeking to understand rather than ridicule (Shermer 1997). The same conclusions have been put forward by Hyman (2001) and Loxton (2011). But how do they know they are right? This is a strangely unexplored area and it is surely perverse that these leading and acknowledged healthy sceptics should accept their own intuitive and appealing beliefs in this area albeit supported in part by anecdotal evidence possibly gathered from an unintentional position of confirmation bias. For all we know, sceptics in their aim to be effective myth busters have created another braced myth. Because ridicule, done the right way, might turn out to be the most effective way to spread the word that certain myths are busted and to stop others from publishing claptrap. More research is needed. And from that cause I have created Disology.com as a sibling site to Dysology.org.

 

 

 

References

 

Hyman, R. (2001) Proper Criticism. The Skeptical Inquirer. Volume 24. 4th July. Available free online from The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. http://www.csicop.org/si/show/proper_criticism/

 

Loxton, D. (2011) What Is the Most Effective Way To Be A Skeptic: The Great Debate Between Confrontational Activism v. Educational Outreach. Skeptic. Vol 16. N0 4. pp.  13-17.

 

Shermer, M. (1997) Why People Believe Weird Things: Pseudoscience, Superstition and other confusions of our time. London. Souvenir Press.

 

 

Our First Sit Down Comedy Routine on Video

 

 

Since Routine Activity Theory's (RAT) notion of opportunity causing crime misunderstands that RAT's three components of opportunity are in fact a truism for every successful crime in commission 'opportunity' cannot be a cause of crime because it is an irrefutable and infinitely easy to vary truism. RAT opportunity is merely a precise description of the core components present at the successful crime scene in commission. This makes it the essential data of the crime. And data should not be confused with explanations for it. Religions typically confuse data with explanations. The tautological argument that the messages in the Christian Bible are all true because they are the word of God because the Bible is the word of God is a good example. Because, absurdly, the Bible is both the data and the only explanation required for the presence of the data. And so in this clip a hamster in a wheel gives us a lecture on the illogical circularity of RAT and Crime Science's unshaken belief in it. The mechanical, battery operated, Professor, Reverend Hammy Wheel of the University of Perversity’s Department of Junk Science, Division of Tautology, gives us The Church of Crime Science's Explanation of the miracle of the Advent of Routine Activities Theory (RAT) and why, if we follow the unscientific reasoning of RAT theory every crime must be a cause of itself. The seemingly insane Reverend Wheel then explains how this reasoning can be applied to RAT theory itself to explain how the theory caused itself to come into being.

 

Can a mad mechanical hamster set the world straight via YouTube?

 

An example of tautological reasoning (a logical fallacy)

 

Healthy Sceptic:   Why do you think that the written Bible contains truth that the world was made in seven days?

Believer:   Because the Bible is the written truth.

Healthy Sceptic:   But how do you know that?

Believer:   Because the Bible is the written word of God.

Healthy Sceptic:   But you are not explaining why you think you know that it is the word of God.

Believer:   In the Bible it is written that it is the word of God.

Healthy Sceptic:   But how can you think you know that those words are true?

Believer:   Because the Bible is the written truth.

 

Some serious discussion on the mad RAT issue can be had here . Anyone interested in reading in-depth arguments for why crime as opportunity theory (opportunity is cause of crime) is a fallacy may wish to go to my sibling site dysology.org and read the On Opportunity and Crime page.

 

 

 

What do crime scientists believe in? Click here to find out on their weird officialsite.

 

The 11 principles of Crime Opportunity Theory and Crime Science plus the top-secret "Golden Rule"

 

 

 

 

Statistics as of 28th April 2012

 

A mere 2,237 visits - so well done for finding this deservedly obscure site