SIUE Professor Releases First Skeptical Book for Kids on April Fool’s Day
If there’s ever a day to be skeptical, it’s April Fool’s Day. To help promote skeptical thinking, Stephen Hupp, PhD, professor of psychology at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, is releasing a fun book for kids called Dr. Huckleberry’s TRUE or MALARKEY? Superhuman Abilities.
The game book offers 50 astonishing claims about human abilities. Some of the claims are true, others are malarkey. Can some people see the future with a crystal ball? Can some people use their mind to bend spoons? Can some people control their own dreams?
Dr. Huckleberry’s TRUE or MALARKEY? Superhuman Abilities answers these questions and more, and provides activities that encourage children to use their intuition and imagination. It even includes ways to test claims through investigation.
“There’s so much malarkey in the world,” said Hupp. “We need to increase our efforts toward educating kids about how to think critically. Malarkey matters. People are getting fooled every day by psychic predictions, quack medicine and other forms of pseudoscience.”
A fictional character, Dr. Huckleberry, keeps this active read fun for everyone. As a game book, the pages encourage drawing and writing in ways that will help create a permanent keepsake for parents. For example, children are encouraged to draw themselves demonstrating amazing abilities.
Hupp dedicates the book to “The Amazing Randi, who promoted skeptical thinking by being an honest liar and by creating the One Million Dollar Challenge to test anyone who could demonstrate a supernatural ability under controlled conditions,” adding that, “Nobody ever claimed the prize.”
Hupp’s published work includes books for parents and college students. This is his first aimed at children.
Dr. Huckleberry’s TRUE or MALARKEY? Superhuman Abilities is now available on Amazon.
Photos: Stephen Hupp, PhD, professor of psychology at SIUE, and author of Dr. Huckleberry’s TRUE or MALARKEY? Superhuman Abilities.
Dr. Huckleberry’s TRUE or MALARKEY? Superhuman Abilities will be available soon on Amazon.
