Anti-science Television

There’s a new show, The Othersiders, on Cartoon Network, in which some teenagers take night-vision goggles, video cameras, and thermal-sensitive cameras into a suspected haunted house. They go into dark rooms while scary background music plays, gasp at “unexplainable” sights, and generally try to scare themselves and the viewers. At the end of the show, they discuss what they saw, and whether they think the house is, in fact, haunted.

My kids were watching an episode yesterday. As they were wrapping up the show, all but one of the show’s cast members were sure the house was haunted. As “proof” and “evidence”, some of them said they “felt weird” when entering certain rooms. The initials of the woman who died in the house were written on a wall and a mirror. A door that was once closed was now open. They saw something through a thermal-sensitive camera that looked like heat, but when they touched the area that was showing heat, it was cool to the touch. At least two of the kids said they couldn’t imagine any way to explain these things, outside of the house being haunted.

When the show was over, I asked my kids what they thought about it. They said they were sure the house was haunted. I asked them why. They repeated the things the kids on the show had said. I told them that just because you don’t know why something happened doesn’t automatically mean a house is haunted. They protested: “But – the initials were written on the wall! There was something floating in the air! The door was closed, and when they went back, the door was open again!”

I told them that cameras working in the dark don’t see the same things as our eyes see. Lights on video cameras and pictures taken through night-vision goggles show different things. We’re not used to seeing the world in the dark, or through man-made lenses, or only with flashlights. The appearance of floating “orbs” captured by flashes in dark rooms is a very common occurrence – it’s dust reflecting the light from the flash.

They're not the first people to be in this house, and they came in when it was dark, so all their discoveries were presented as if it was the first time anyone had ever seen them.

The biggest issue I have with the conclusions from this show is that it’s OK to explain things you don’t understand as supernatural or other-worldly.

If you see something flying through the air, and you cannot immediately identify it as a plane or helicopter or bird, then it must be a spaceship from Mars, right? It's ok to jump directly to that conclusion without considering any other possibilities, right? If I hear a noise on St. Patrick’s day that I can’t identify, it couldn’t possibly be anything other than a leprechaun trying to find his way back to his pot of gold. It’s so easy (and lazy) to assign some supernatural explanation to everything we can’t immediately understand.

I would like to see The Othersiders show bring in someone who knows something about thermal cameras, photography, and so on, to explain to these teenagers WHY they were seeing the things they saw. Someone could easily debunk all the “evidence” and “proof” that was found in the house.

Next time, I'll have the kids watch something good, like How It's Made or Deconstructed. At least they'll learn something useful.