On 15 Mar 2009 at 5:29, Allen Esterson wrote: > Re Peter Birkenhead's article on Oprah's role in promoting *The Secret*, > > "Of course, magnets do exactly the opposite - *positively charged magnets > attract negatively charged particles*." (My emphasis.) > > I think Birkenhead must have conflated his memories of school magnet > experiments with his teacher's demonstrations of electrostatic phenomena. > In those seven words he gets wrong just about everything it is possible to > get wrong in so few words!
Boy, these physics types are picky. Perhaps Birkenhead did confuse electricity and magnetism. So what? After all, aren't these linked at a fundamental level? Ever hear of _electromagnetism_, dude? I think we have to give Birkenhead credit for recognizing the absurdity of the analogy used in _The Secret_ , that thoughts are like magnets because for both, like attracts like when, for magnets at least, the opposite is true. So do thoughts, like magnets, really attract their opposite? Sounds good to me. Maybe this post is an example. And I must explain why you received two slightly different copies of my original post. Mistakes were made but not by me. It was my mailer's fault. It crashed just as I sent the post out the first time. Stephen ----------------------------------------------------------------- Stephen L. Black, Ph.D. Professor of Psychology, Emeritus Bishop's University e-mail: sbl...@ubishops.ca 2600 College St. Sherbrooke QC J1M 1Z7 Canada Subscribe to discussion list (TIPS) for the teaching of psychology at http://flightline.highline.edu/sfrantz/tips/ ----------------------------------------------------------------------- --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly (bsouthe...@frostburg.edu)
