The Brown Daily Herald published my second column today: A skeptic's response to Oscar the Cat. I do have to admit that I'm disappointed that my suggested title, "Sez LOLcat, DethCat iz fail," was replaced with the one you see. If I had known that I would have suggested another title. The other week, the BDH published an entirely credulous article on Oscar the cat, who made headlines in 2007 for supposedly being able to predict the deaths of patients in a nursing home. Unfortunately, the Brown professor who brought this story to the world has failed to provide evidence for his claims. My column criticizes the BDH for running something so poorly researched and explaining why you should be skeptical that there is any real effect going on.
I had mixed feelings when House had an episode on a similar cat. I was glad that they offered a valid explanation for the cat's supposed abilities rather than saying that the animal has anything supernatural going on. However, as I say in the column, "Before even bothering to speculate on the cause of Oscar’s ability, we should first know whether the effect is real[.]" It is ridiculous to bother coming up with an explanation for something that doesn't need explaining.
In addition to the change in title, I am also very disappointed that my favorite sentence in the whole column was changed. I was discussing what happened in 2007, when a slew of articles were published around the world that bought into the claims about Oscar. My original sentence was, "At best, the article might contain some token skepticism in an attempt to show balance—the false proxy of objectivity." At the very least, the jab of balance got in there.
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