New series "American Paranormal" on NatGeo channel tonight

[csziggy]

Despite the name, it looks a good skeptical inquiry program. The first two episodes explored the Patterson Big Foot movie and the 'haunting' of Eastern States Penitentiary. It will be interesting to see how the series progresses.

[lazarus]

1. thanks

I hadn't seen any commercials for it, just the name on the DVR guide, and was afraid that NatGeo had gone the woo route like History and Discovery did.

[csziggy]

2. I had hopes since their other series was good

I forget the name of it, but it also was more investigative with a skeptical bent.

I loved the end of the episode about Eastern States - they really kept the suspense up! :evilgrin:

[lazarus]

3. well, that was crap

Their big research team was all believers. I think there was about 30 seconds of a skeptic on there somewhere, but it was hard to tell.

I weep for NatGeo. The Bible stuff was bad enough (could be explained, I guess, as some sort of history or interesting anthropology), but this was terrible.

For instance, they made a big deal about setting that trap to catch some bigfoot hair. Why not a motion activated camera? Because there are a bunch of them set out by bigfoot hunters, and none of them have ever spotted one. And they completely dropped it, never went back to the snare at all. Why? It must not have gotten anything, but then, why put the trap setting out in the first place?



My daughter is making me watch the ghost one, I'll report back.

[redqueen]

4. Ah well.

I figured when I saw the thread title that NatGeo had gone bananas like the History and Discovery channels. Disappointing to find out the skepticism wasn't really skepticism. But then I guess if it was, there'd be no bigfoot show, so... at least there's still the Science channel. :)

[Warpy]

8. Yeah, I skipped the Bigfoot one

Too many bored drunks making phony footprints have fessed up for anybody to take that one very seriously.

[onager]

5. NatGeo's "Is It Real?" series was excellent.

Every show was a very skeptical look at one woo obsession - ghosts, Bigfoot, alien cattle mutilations, Bermuda Triangle, etc. etc.

The format was perfect. The show let the goofballs spout off all their nonsense, then brought in real experts to demolish their claims.

One of the best: a rural Western sheriff got tired of hearing about aliens mutilating cattle, so he devised his own scientifical experiment. He parked a dead cow in a field and aimed a video camera at it. After a short while, the cow exhibited all the traditional marks of a classic alien cow desecration. But the videotape showed it was all due to nature.

It's sad to hear that NatGeo seems to be heading down the same path as the History/Discovery woo-woo-shows.

[plcdude]

6. are these

on the internet to be viewed yet?

[Warpy]

7. National Geographic channel has been pretty good

about not going all woohead on us. I'll probably give this one a try, see if it's a good one in the same style as their 9/11 conspiracy theory debunking.