Using multi-media and basic atmospheric physics, students investigate contrails and chemtrails. Students apply previous learning about pseudoscience, and couple that with an understanding of the atmosphere to reach a decision about chemtrails. Students write an analysis paper on the issue of chemtrails, followed by a decision paper about whether society should be concerned about chemtrails.

This book is designed to introduce non-science majors to the nature of science as a reliable method of acquiring knowledge about the natural world. Interdisciplinary content will draw together diverse physical and life sciences to increase scientific literacy and critical thinking skills for introductory-level students.

In this guide, you will find books, articles, and websites that help teachers of astronomy address some of the weird topics on the fringes of science that students sometimes hear about and want to have clarification for. Included are astrology, UFOs as alien spaceships, crop circles, denial of evolution and the big bang, the “face” on Mars, claims that NASA never landed astronauts on the Moon, and others.

For decades, the media have given enormous attention to sensational claims that vague lights in the sky are actually extra-terrestrial spacecraft. Recently, there has been a flurry of misleading publicity about UFOs on military photographs. A sober examination of these claims reveals that there is a lot LESS to them than first meets the eye: when there is enough evidence, UFO claims can be explained by terrestrial or celestial phenomena (including lights from human craft and re-entering space junk). This up-to-date guide provides key resources available free on the Web, to help scientists, educators, students, and journalists learn about the skeptical perspective (and the background stories) behind these claims.

In the fall of 2021, students in Pseudoscience courses started creating this open educational resource (OER), which has been built upon by subsequent classes. Our intention is to create a free textbook for this course that might also be used by students of critical thinking elsewhere and of all ages, whether in a classroom or not. Our growing, interactive textbook employs the Paul-Elder Model and other critical-thinking resources, and is freely available to all, learners and educators alike.

The topic of pseudoscience offers a rewarding way for students to learn the value of thinking critically, even as they get to argue things, like Flat Earth Theory and astrology, that may seem trivial at first. At a time when truth is understood as largely subjective, we have, not surprisingly, seen a resurgence in the popularity of pseudosciences and conspiracy theories, which many consider to hold significant truth value, just as valid as physical evidence. It is our aim here to demonstrate the reasoned analysis process — weighing truth, belief, opinion, and fact — so that others may be able to replicate this process and reason through their own questions about vaccines, extra-terrestrials, genetic modification, or the first people to arrive in the Americas.