ic Battalion
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TATE & LOCAL
Wednesday, April 25,1990
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PAM MOOMAN
(The Battalion Staff
Science is not just dry calculations — it’s fun,
0.
Dr. Tom Adair, a professor in Texas A&M’s
lysics department, talked about “UFOs, Horo-
opes and Other Nonsense.” Scientists can have
in disproving claims of paranormal phenome-
on, Adair told members of Students for the Ex
oration and Development of Space Tuesday
ght.
“It’s a shame,(though),” he said. “It’s a lot
ore fun believing them than not believing
em.”
Adair said Albert Einstein’s Special Relativity
rmulas state that length, mass and passage of
me depend on the speed of an object. In other
ords, they are relative to how fast the object is
aveling.
"(These are) all things you must surely find
fficult to believe,” Adair said. “I believe these
lings because I can test the concepts of Einstein
the laboratory.”
However, many people believe in things that
mnot be tested as easily, and Adair warned
ainst this.
“Ask the right questions,” he said. He said his
urpose in this talk was to get people to consider
both sides
and not just
accept one
view as the
answer.
The Ber
muda Tri
angle is a
popular.:
subject in £•/ y ,<y / /
the realm S/s
of the su- ‘ ,
pernatural,
Adair said.
“They’ve
got some
great stories,” he said. “I just love ’em!” But the
sensationalistic books only give half of the truth,
he said.
“The rest of the story, as Paul Harvey would
say, is this,” he said. “They stretch the Bermuda
Triangle quite a bit.”
A favorite story for those who believe in the
powers of the Bermuda Triangle, Adair said, is
about five U.S. Navy pilots who disappeared in
the late 1940s. But it was not made public that
one pilot was an instructor and four pilots were
students, who were following the instructor. The
instructor got confused, flew north and then
turned east, thipking he was over the Florida
peninsula. The pilots ran out of gas somewhere
over the Atlantic Ocean.
“If you’ll look at a globe, the Atlantic Ocean is
very big out there,” Adair said. There is no doubt
that the pilots went down somewhere over it, he
added.
Being a pilot himself, Adair knows firsthand
that it is easy to get confused sometimes. Pilots
have to sit down and think about what they are
doing and where they are, he said.
“And that’s over Texas, and no one claims it’s
mysterious,” he said.
Horoscopes are also popular among some.
“We have the president of the United States
controlled by some weird woman in California
through his wife,” Adair said. But he added that
Nancy Reagan is not having too much influence
on the rest of the country as true belief in horo
scopes is not too common among the general
population.
UFOs are another common paranormal phe
nomenon.
“There are many, many cases of people seeing
UFOs,” Adair said. “I believe in UFOs.” He
added smiling, “There are lots of objects up
there people can’t identify.”
Most of these objects are atmospheric things,
See Scientist/Page 4
ril 17,1
“s of an
pectful.
I proud
ue they
ue.
Institu-
No. 2,
out lit-
'ed and
student
igroom
)uld be
any of
knows
urn on
Symposium will examine group conflicts
y SUZANNE CALDERON
tflhe Battalion Staff
The 1990 Symposium On Group
lynamics — Conflict Within and
tmong Groups, sponsored by Texas
i&M’s Department of Psychology
n April 26 and 27 at the College
tation Hilton, will examine all fac
ts of group conflicts.
Topics ranging from conflicts in
lating relationships to large-scale
lolitical controversies will be ad-
Iressed during the symposium by
eading political scientists and social
ind political psychologists.
The purpose of the symposium is
o look at conflict broadly defined,
aid Dr. Jeff Simpson, assistant pro-
essor of psychology and symposium
vordinator.
Among the speakers will be Jan-
usz Reykowski, a lead negotiator for
the Communist Party in Poland and
David Sears, a leading political psy
chologist from University of Califor-
nia-Los Angeles.
Reykowski will present ‘Resolving
of a Large Scale Political Conflict:
The Case of the Round Table Nego
tiations in Poland’, and Sears will
E resent ‘Language Conflict as Sym-
olic Politics: The Role of Symbolic
Meaning.’
The conference is free for A&M
faculty and students.
Schedule for 1990 Symposium On
Group Dynamics:
THURSDAY, APRIL 26
• 8:30 - 9:00 a.m. — Introduc
tion, Stephen Worchel, Texas A&M
University
• 9:00 - 10:00 a.m. — Dean G.
Pruitt, SUNY-B uffalo, Long-Run
Success in Third Party Intervention.
• 10:30 - 11:30 a.m. — Myron
Rothbart, University of Oregon, In
tergroup Perception and Social Con
flict.
• 11:30 - 12:30 — James M.
Jones, University of Delaware and
American Psychological Association,
Individual vs. Group Identification
as a Factor in Intergroup Racial
Conflict.
• 2:00 - 3:00 —- Cecilia L.
Ridgeway, University of Iowa, Legiti
macy, Status and Dominance Behav
ior in Task Groups.
• 3:00 - 4:00 — Gary P. Latha-
m,University of Washington, Sensi
tizing the Individual to the Group
and the Group to the Individual.
FRIDAY, APRIL 27
• 9:00 - 10:00 a.m. — Herbert
Kelman, Harvard University, Form
ing Coalitions Across International
Conflict Lines: The Interplay of
Conflicts Within and Between the Is
raeli and Palestinian Communities.
• 10:00 - 1 1:00 a.m. — David O.
Sears, University of California-Los
Angeles, Language Conflict as Sym
bolic Politics: The Role of Symbolic
Meaning.
• 11:30 - 12:30 — Janusz
Reykowski,Po/i'sh Academy of Sci
ence, Resolving of a Large Scale Po
litical Conflict: The Case of the
Round Table Negotiations in Po
land.
• 2:00 - 3:00 — Caryl E. Rusbul-
t,University of North Carolina, Re
actions to Conflict in Close
Relationships: Exit, Voice, Loyalty
and Neglect.
• 3:00 - 4:00 — Donald H. Bau-
com, University of North Carolina,
Marital Distress: A Cognitive/Beha-
vioral Formulation.
Photo by Eric H. Roalson
Horticulture graduate student Kim Poff checks the stalk elonga
tion on the plant Vinca Major Tuesday afternoon in a horticulture
lab on the west side of campus. These plants have been treated
with the growth hormone known as G.A. Poff hopes to have her
thesis finished by November.
ilicita-
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i Uni
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