{"id":81,"date":"2006-11-03T07:16:27","date_gmt":"2006-11-03T11:16:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.flascience.org\/wp\/?p=81"},"modified":"2008-08-05T11:18:34","modified_gmt":"2008-08-05T15:18:34","slug":"physics-against-psychics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=81","title":{"rendered":"Physics against psychics"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here’s a fun column about a physics professor applying reason and science to debunk ghosts and vampires<\/a>. And, of course, he apparently gets hated for it.<\/p>\n

Efthimiou, a University of Central Florida physics professor, has concocted a witches brew of applied logic and physics that debunks myths about ghosts, ghouls and vampires.<\/p>\n

He has received hundreds of e-mails and phone calls during the past 10 days. Most of them are angry rebuttals to a paper Efthimiou and UCF colleague Ralph Llewellyn posted on the school’s physics archives in August.<\/p>\n

“The believers don’t want to accept reality,” Efthimiou said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here’s a fun column about a physics professor applying reason and science to debunk ghosts and vampires. And, of course, he apparently gets hated for it. Efthimiou, a University of Central Florida physics professor, has concocted a witches brew of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pcZNLl-1j","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":269,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=269","url_meta":{"origin":81,"position":0},"title":"Everything I needed to know about physics I learned from Hollywood","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"August 27, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"No, not really. But that does seem to be the case for many people. Of course, there are plenty of areas where audiences can draw a clear line between entertainment and reality. Superman shooting heat rays from his eyes? I think everyone would agree that is fantasy. But there is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "On the Web"","block_context":{"text":"On the Web","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?cat=9"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":971,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=971","url_meta":{"origin":81,"position":1},"title":"Professors Fight to Keep Physics in the Curriculum","author":"Jonathan Smith","date":"March 25, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Five professors who all sat on the state's science standards committee, worry that three bills supported by the Florida Department of Education make no mention of physics in proposed high school graduation requirements. The group has implored\u00c2\u00a0Commissioner Eric J. Smith (himself a science teacher) in a letter\u00c2\u00a0sent this morning to\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=971#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":994,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=994","url_meta":{"origin":81,"position":2},"title":"Failing Physics","author":"Jonathan Smith","date":"April 10, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Paul Cottle, a professor of physics at Florida State University and a member of the committee that drafted Florida\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s new science standards has just offered this update on the situation regarding the \"down grading\" of Physics in the school curriculum. Paul has learned that\u00c2\u00a0only 16% of Florida's high school graduates\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1148,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1148","url_meta":{"origin":81,"position":3},"title":"Commissioner responds","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"December 20, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"FSU physics professor Paul Cottle had sounded the alarm in the Tallahassee Democrat concerning Florida's leadership's unimpressive \"plans\" -- or lack thereof -- for improving our \"pretty much last in the nation\" standing in science education. Eric Smith, Florida commissioner of education, responded. I do commend Smith for taking the\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=1148#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":991,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=991","url_meta":{"origin":81,"position":4},"title":"High School science concerns","author":"Brandon Haught","date":"April 7, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Paul Cottle, a professor of physics at Florida State University and a member of the committee that drafted Florida's new science standards, has been busy writing articles in defense of science education. Here is his latest one: Two bills put high-school physics at risk in Florida. However, the legislation that\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 2 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 2 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=991#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":687,"url":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=687","url_meta":{"origin":81,"position":5},"title":"Discovery Institute Opens A Second Front With “Supernatural Cosmology”","author":"Jonathan Smith","date":"August 14, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"I recived this e-mail today from Dr Paul D Cottle, a noted\u00c2\u00a0Professor of nuclear physics at FSU and a member of the Florida Citizens for Science. http:\/\/www.physics.fsu.edu\/Faculty\/CottlePaul.htm.\u00c2\u00a0He raises many interesting and valid points,so I have posted the letter in its entirety. \u00c2\u00a0It appears the Discovery Institute folks are opening a\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 5 comments","block_context":{"text":"With 5 comments","link":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/?p=687#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=81"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=81"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=81"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.flascience.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=81"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}