A review of Michael Drosnin’s The Bible Code.

In 1859 John Taylor published a book entitled The Great Pyramid, in which he discovered that if you divide the height of the pyramid into twice the side of its base, you get a number close to Π. This, and other relationships he found to be deeply meaningful. Soon after, others began to turn up similar “discoveries”, such as that the base of the Great Pyramid divided by the width of a casing stone equals the number of days in the year, and that the height of the Great Pyramid multiplied by 109 approximately equals the distance from the Earth to the Sun.

Humans are pattern-seeking animals. At Skeptic magazine we routinely receive calls from people who see the Virgin Mary in the shadows of a tree, the face of Jesus in a partially burnt tortilla, Mother Teresa in a sweet roll, or a face on Mars. JFK lives in stone profile in Hawaii. Eagle Rock sports a giant winged boulder overlooking the city. Patterns are everywhere. But which patterns are meaningful and which are not? (continue reading…)

A review of Stephen Jay Gould’s Full House: The Spread of Excellence from Plato to Darwin.

For the past 15 summers I have either competed in or directed the 3,000-mile, nonstop, transcontinental bicycle Race Across America; for the first decade the transcontinental record plummeted from 12 days 3 hours to 7 days 23 hours, but for the past five years it hasn’t budged even though half the field now routinely breaks earlier records. Why? Some of the pioneers, not surprisingly, believe that they were simply better; current riders claim weather conditions and other variables. I now know that both sides are wrong, thanks to the work of paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and trend setter (and observer) Stephen Jay Gould, whose new book, Full House, explains how systems change over time — from the history of life to the history of sports. (continue reading…)