This Popular Science Writer who is the Founder of Skeptic magazine had witnessed a Strangely Terrifying Incident With 1978 Philip Radio That He Could Not Explain; One That Can Shake One’s skepticism to the core.
Man who had invested time debunking supernatural phenomena experienced an incident that shook his core belief in things science cannot explain.
Michael Shermer is an American science writer, executive director of The Skeptics Society, and founding publisher of Skeptic magazine, a publication focused on investigating pseudoscientific and supernatural claims.
Shermer is known for engaging in debates on pseudoscience and religion in which he emphasizes scientific skepticism.
He is the author of New York Times bestsellers Why People Believe Weird Things and The Believing Brain, Why Darwin Matters, The Science of Good and Evil, The Moral Arc, Heavens on Earth, Giving the Devil His Due: Reflections of a Scientific Humanist and Conspiracy: Why the Rational Believe the Irrational.
A thread to all skeptics!
Man who had invested time debunking supernatural phenomena experienced an incident that shook his core belief in things science cannot explain.
Michael Shermer is an American science writer, executive director of The Skeptics Society, and founding publisher of Skeptic magazine, a publication focused on investigating pseudoscientific and supernatural claims.
Shermer is known for engaging in debates on pseudoscience and religion in which he emphasizes scientific skepticism.
He is the author of New York Times bestsellers Why People Believe Weird Things and The Believing Brain, Why Darwin Matters, The Science of Good and Evil, The Moral Arc, Heavens on Earth, Giving the Devil His Due: Reflections of a Scientific Humanist and Conspiracy: Why the Rational Believe the Irrational.
A thread to all skeptics!
Michael Shermer doesn’t believe in ghosts, spirits, or supernatural events. He believes that most things have a logical, scientific explanation. However, he shares an experience that made him question his skepticism.
He often gets asked if he's encountered something he couldn’t explain, particularly relating to the paranormal. He usually answers no, but one event on June 25, 2014, changed that.
Jennifer Graf, Michael’s wife, grew up in Köln, Germany. She had been raised by her mom; her grandfather, Walter, who was a very important figure in her life because he was like a father to her. Sadly, he passed away when she was 16 years old.
He often gets asked if he's encountered something he couldn’t explain, particularly relating to the paranormal. He usually answers no, but one event on June 25, 2014, changed that.
Jennifer Graf, Michael’s wife, grew up in Köln, Germany. She had been raised by her mom; her grandfather, Walter, who was a very important figure in her life because he was like a father to her. Sadly, he passed away when she was 16 years old.
Before the wedding, Jennifer shipped her belongings to Michael's home, but many of her items were damaged or lost. One item that arrived safely was her grandfather’s old Philips 070 transistor radio from 1978.
However, this radio didn’t work anymore. He tried everything to fix it—changing the batteries, checking the connections, even hitting it (a technique sometimes humorously called “percussive maintenance”)—but nothing worked.
I set out to bring it back to life after decades of muteness. I put in new batteries and opened it up to see if there were any loose connections to solder. I even tried “percussive maintenance,” said to work on such devices—smacking it sharply against a hard surface. Silence. We gave up and put it at the back of a desk drawer in our bedroom.
However, this radio didn’t work anymore. He tried everything to fix it—changing the batteries, checking the connections, even hitting it (a technique sometimes humorously called “percussive maintenance”)—but nothing worked.
I set out to bring it back to life after decades of muteness. I put in new batteries and opened it up to see if there were any loose connections to solder. I even tried “percussive maintenance,” said to work on such devices—smacking it sharply against a hard surface. Silence. We gave up and put it at the back of a desk drawer in our bedroom.
On June 25, 2014, Michael and Jennifer got married. The ceremony was small, and because they were in the U.S., far from Jennifer’s home in Germany, she felt lonely and wished her grandfather could be there.
After the ceremony, they went to a quiet part of the house to be alone for a moment. Suddenly, they heard music playing from the bedroom. This was strange because they didn’t have any music devices in that room.
They searched for the source of the music, checking laptops, phones, and even thinking the printer might somehow be playing music. Nothing made sense.
Eventually, they discovered that the music was coming from the old radio in the drawer—the same radio that hadn’t worked in years, even after multiple attempts to fix it. The radio was playing a romantic love song.
At that moment Jennifer shot me a look I haven't seen since the supernatural thriller The Exorcist startled audiences. “That can't be what I think it is, can it?” she said. She opened the desk drawer and pulled out her grandfather's transistor radio, out of which a romantic love song wafted. We sat in stunned silence for minutes. “My grandfather is here with us,” Jennifer said, tearfully. “I'm not alone.”
After the ceremony, they went to a quiet part of the house to be alone for a moment. Suddenly, they heard music playing from the bedroom. This was strange because they didn’t have any music devices in that room.
They searched for the source of the music, checking laptops, phones, and even thinking the printer might somehow be playing music. Nothing made sense.
Eventually, they discovered that the music was coming from the old radio in the drawer—the same radio that hadn’t worked in years, even after multiple attempts to fix it. The radio was playing a romantic love song.
At that moment Jennifer shot me a look I haven't seen since the supernatural thriller The Exorcist startled audiences. “That can't be what I think it is, can it?” she said. She opened the desk drawer and pulled out her grandfather's transistor radio, out of which a romantic love song wafted. We sat in stunned silence for minutes. “My grandfather is here with us,” Jennifer said, tearfully. “I'm not alone.”
Michael who is usually skeptical of such things, was also deeply affected. He realized that if someone else had told him this story, he would have dismissed it as a coincidence or some kind of technical glitch. But because it happened to him, he couldn’t help but feel that it was special and meaningful.
Michael writes,"Shortly thereafter we returned to our guests with the radio playing as I recounted the backstory. My daughter, Devin, who came out of her bedroom just before the ceremony began, added, “I heard the music coming from your room just as you were about to start.” The odd thing is that we were there getting ready just minutes before that time, sans music."
Interestingly, the radio continued to play music for the rest of the night, but the next day it stopped working again and has been silent ever since.
Michael writes,"Shortly thereafter we returned to our guests with the radio playing as I recounted the backstory. My daughter, Devin, who came out of her bedroom just before the ceremony began, added, “I heard the music coming from your room just as you were about to start.” The odd thing is that we were there getting ready just minutes before that time, sans music."
Interestingly, the radio continued to play music for the rest of the night, but the next day it stopped working again and has been silent ever since.
Michael acknowledges that from a scientific perspective, there could be a rational explanation. Perhaps it was an electrical anomaly—something random that caused the radio to work just at that moment, even though it hadn’t worked before and didn’t work afterward.
He mentions the “law of large numbers,” which is a concept in statistics that says with so many people having so many experiences every day, it’s inevitable that some of them will seem highly unusual or meaningful by pure chance.
He mentions the “law of large numbers,” which is a concept in statistics that says with so many people having so many experiences every day, it’s inevitable that some of them will seem highly unusual or meaningful by pure chance.
Despite these rational explanations, the emotional impact of the event cannot be ignored. For Jennifer, the experience felt like a message from her grandfather, giving her comfort and making her feel connected to him during an important moment in her life.
For Michael, this experience was powerful enough to shake his skepticism. Even though he couldn’t prove that the event was supernatural, the timing and emotional resonance made it feel significant. It made him open to the possibility that there are mysteries in life that can’t always be easily explained.
This incident was personally written by Michael in "Scientific American magazine." Many scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it, with more than 150 Nobel Prize-winners being featured since its inception. []scientificamerican.com/article/anomal…
For Michael, this experience was powerful enough to shake his skepticism. Even though he couldn’t prove that the event was supernatural, the timing and emotional resonance made it feel significant. It made him open to the possibility that there are mysteries in life that can’t always be easily explained.
This incident was personally written by Michael in "Scientific American magazine." Many scientists, including Albert Einstein and Nikola Tesla, have contributed articles to it, with more than 150 Nobel Prize-winners being featured since its inception. []scientificamerican.com/article/anomal…
What’s troubling is not so much that Michael took notice of anomalous phenomena when he did, but that he never did so before, even while millions of others were reporting identical experiences; that Shermer only opened his mind to the reality of the paranormal when it happened to him directly, and not when it when happened to anyone else.
"Jennifer is as skeptical as I am when it comes to paranormal and supernatural phenomena. Yet the eerie conjunction of these deeply evocative events gave her the distinct feeling that her grandfather was there and that the music was his gift of approval. I have to admit, it rocked me back on my heels and shook my skepticism to its core as well. I savored the experience more than the explanation."
"The emotional interpretations of such anomalous events grant them significance regardless of their causal account. And if we are to take seriously the scientific credo to keep an open mind and remain agnostic when the evidence is indecisive or the riddle unsolved, we should not shut the doors of perception when they may be opened to us to marvel in the mysterious."
"Jennifer is as skeptical as I am when it comes to paranormal and supernatural phenomena. Yet the eerie conjunction of these deeply evocative events gave her the distinct feeling that her grandfather was there and that the music was his gift of approval. I have to admit, it rocked me back on my heels and shook my skepticism to its core as well. I savored the experience more than the explanation."
"The emotional interpretations of such anomalous events grant them significance regardless of their causal account. And if we are to take seriously the scientific credo to keep an open mind and remain agnostic when the evidence is indecisive or the riddle unsolved, we should not shut the doors of perception when they may be opened to us to marvel in the mysterious."
This is a TED Talk video by Michael Shermer from 16 years ago, which was recorded six years before he wrote about his personal supernatural incident.
I think now he believes in things that millions of people around the world have witnessed, but which have been dismissed by debunkers and regarded as ridiculous.
I think now he believes in things that millions of people around the world have witnessed, but which have been dismissed by debunkers and regarded as ridiculous.
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