#582: Debby & Mark Constantino

Debby & Mark Constantino are a husband-and-wife paranormal research team based in Northern Nevada who also runs the website spirits-speak.com. It is, in fact, a bit unclear to what extent they actually believe that they are uncovering paranormal phenomena – the website is very much consistent with a joke – but at least they claim to be specializing in Electric Voice Phenomena, which they believe is not only a means to achieve closure with the dead, but that it can aid police in crime solving (by boosting confirmation bias, though the Constantinos don’t put it that way). They also work with “haunted items,” and Debby “has the gift of attracting spirits […] she also feels she vibrates on a level to glimpse into the nature realm [no idea].”

Together they lecture at paranormal conferences about EVP stuff, though when you look at the flyers for those events you wonder whether it’s all intended as a joke – and the homepage of Zak Bagans, for instance, doesn’t exactly scream “I take this stuff very seriously”). They also participate in live ghost hunts, and have appeared on “Dead Famous, “Paranormal State” and “Ghost Adventures”.

Diagnosis: Since their whole thing is as tacky as a Key West guided ghost tour, one presumes that the whole thing is a scam to get visitors to buy merchandise (which you can). Otherwise …

#580: Gene Wall Cole

Due to the untimely demise of celebrity physicist Samuel T. Cohen, whose contribution to the myth of Red Mercury cannot be exaggerated, we move on to the “visionary, author, speaker, composer, teacher, metaphysician, motivator, and musician” Gene Wall Cole, who is perhaps best known for his promotion of the Jesus Diet for a healthy, thin life (Jesus was thin, right?). His book “Jesus’ Diet for the Whole World” has been claimed to be “from deep inside the Vatican Vaults!” but it is unclear to what extent the claim is supposed to be true. From its description on Cole’s website: “If you are one of the millions of readers fascinated with the historical implications raised in The Da Vinci Code and found yourself wanting more; if you are one of the millions of people struggling with weight issues and haven't found a program that fits, […] then Jesus' Diet is a must read.” That’s the logic and generally sensitivity to evidence and reality permeating Cole’s contributions to civilization.

He’s got plenty of other tricks up his sleeve as well. His main project seems to be something called “THE awakening imagiNATION”, a “growing community that lives by Einstein’s motto: ‘Imagination is more important than knowledge.’ [which one suspects is taken slightly out of context] Using mere words to convey such a message is almost a contradiction [?], but when you have found water in a desert full of thirsty people, you have to shout – THERE IS WATER HERE!” No, I have no idea what he is talking about, but neither, it seems, does he. But then, the whole thing seems to be based on Cole having reached a higher level of wisdom: “We are learning to speak with an uncanny logic that can't be denied, but with an inner knowingness and ecstasy that portrays deeper meaning.” Motivational speakers are supposed to utter sentences devoid of content in a motivational manner, but Cole appears to have taken this principle to hitherto unexplored levels. According to his website Cole can be hired to “help prevent truth decay,” by telling people to “Follow Your Dreams.” He also seems to advocate Oprah for president, but I am not completely sure given his recurring problems with coherence.

Diagnosis: Exasperating, but probably not particularly dangerous.

#579: Richard Cohen

The absolutely marvelously insane Roger Coghill is British, and his attempts to link all sorts of ailments to cell phone use is decently discussed here – but he has to be disqualified from our Encyclopedia.

The considerably more insidious Richard A. Cohen is qualified by a relatively good margin. Cohen, a former Moonie, is one of America's best known conversion therapists. In fact, he is not actually licensed as a therapist, but avoids state licensing requirements by asking for donations to his foundation instead of payment. He also gives lectures, and runs seminars and workshops on his ideas about the causes of homosexuality – which he calls “same-sex attachment disorder” – and how to cure them. He claims to have converted even himself at one point, as well as plenty of others, and his International Healing Foundation offers commercial teleconferencing classes on his cherished topics. Cohen has also been president of Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays and Gays, and sits on Maryland’s Prince George’s County Public Schools’s for some inexplicable reason – the upshot being that some Maryland Middle Schools have been promoting ex-gay therapy to its students. (The district’s recently retired supervisor for health education, Betsy Gallun, thinks students deserve to learn about ex-gay therapy and she “feels very badly that it’s coming under scrutiny.”)

Cohen was permanently expelled from the American Counseling Association in 2002 after six violations of its ethics code, which bars members from actions that “seek to meet their personal needs at the expense of clients, those that exploit the trust and dependency of clients, and soliciting testimonials or promoting products in a deceptive manner.” He still got an opportunity to advance his theories on Penn & Teller, which may not have helped his cause. Neither, presumably, did his appearance on Rachel Maddow.

Since heterosexuality is the natural state, according to Cohen, same-sex attraction is caused by traumatic experiences and the lack of male role models. His (unresearched) theories to this effect have become popular for instance in Uganda, though back in the US even Exodus is slightly wary of him (though the relationship seems to be a little back and forth).To achieve his results as a therapist, Cohen employs (among other things) Wilhelm Reich’s bioenergetics, which is, of course, pure vitalist woo, and holding/touch therapy, which isn’t better supported than bioenergetics as a treatment for anything. In other words, even if Cohen’s theories about homosexuality had been correct, he wouldn’t have had the faintest chance of curing it. His theories and methods are described in a series of books, including the children’s book “Alfie’s Home”, possibly the most disturbing children’s book of all time.

One ex-gay activist disciple of Cohen is Alan Downing of the organization JONAH (run by convicted felon Arthur Abba Goldberg). Downing is portrayed here and here, portrayals that should be illuminating with regard to the efficacy of gay therapy.

There is a hilarious post on the strange world of gay-to-straight conversion therapy here.

Cohen should not be mistaken for the liberal columnist for the Washington post and ardent advocate for ignorance, Richard Cohen, who is also a serious loon, and has aptly been described as “a 21st century man insisting that an 18th century education is too much for our poor students.”

Diagnosis: Bigotry combined with altmed crankery is always charming, and Cohen is no exception. Monster.

#578: Harold G. Coffin

Harold G. Coffin is a palaentologist and creationist (and signatory to the CMI list of living scientists who accept the Biblical Accountof Creation). He has some publications in regular journals, none of which support creationism, but has also written a slew of creationist articles for creationist journals, for instance on how the origin of coal may support a Catastrophic Flood theory. The argument consists pretty much of identifying a potentially unanswered question in modern geology and inferring from this that Flood geology must be better. His creationist ad hoc interpretation of polystrate fossils has not been accepted by mainstream scientists either, to put it mildly, though Conservapedia is apparently impressed.

Coffin witnessed during the McLean vs. Arkansas Board ofEducation trial, where – among other things – he admitted that were it not for the Bible he would have believed that the earth was very old, which is (though creationists may deny it) a straightforward admission of how much creationism has to do with science (also here).

Diagnosis: One of a frighteningly huge number of influential figures in the fight against reason, Coffin is neither the most aggressive nor the loudest. That doesn’t entail that he is not dangerous, however.

#577: Chip Coffey & Lisa Miller

Chip Coffey is a psychic from Elmira, New York, who has appeared as a medium on various television programs dealing with the paranormal, primarily “Paranormal State” and the revolting “Psychic Kids”. The latter show, among the most cynically exploitative ever aired on television, is discussed here and here. Coffey’s role is to be a mentor for children who have allegedly experienced psychic abilities (primarily seeing ghosts), which strongly suggests that he is not a particularly good person. Coffey is, among other things, also the proud recipient of a JREF Pigasus Award for 2009 for being “the psychic who tricked the most people with the least effort.” There is some background for the award here, and some rather stunning examples of why Coffey heartily deserved it.

Lisa J. Miller is the co-host of Psychic Kids. She is in fact Associate Professor of Psychology and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University, and she justifies the show thusly: “this is an opportunity to share more broadly with our culture the psychic experiences of children and to understand what their experience says about our own daily lived reality.” More sanity-oriented people may reasonably ask some questions about how on earth someone notionally related to anything having to do with science could end up where Miller does without compromising one’s personal integrity, but we’ll leave that question open here (it’s discussed here). “What I’m concerned about is that clients who come in with psychic experiences are wrongly diagnosed as being psychotic,” says Miller. She does seem to think that we (Westerners) are deficient as a culture because we don't follow the example of advanced spiritual societies like China and Mexico, where psychic experiences are apparently more widely accepted.

Here’s a discussion of Examiner.com’s Elizabeth Costanza’s endorsement of the show.

Diagnosis: Coffey is a creepy skeevo; Miller a staunchly deluded (POMO seems to feature prominently) scientific alibi. Together they form a not insignificant threat to sanity, truth, civilization, and the well-being of real people. Appalling.