AUTHOR
Deborah Hyde
30 Articles
Deborah Hyde is former editor of The Skeptic and is a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. She writes and lectures about belief in the malign supernatural, with special regard to the folklore, psychology and sociology behind belief.
Which is witch? How modern witches differ from the women who had the label thrust upon them
The self-labelled 'witches' of modern religious movements may a share little more than a name with the powerless victims of historic witch-hunts
The Cost of Loving: falling birthrates, and the increased role of personal choice in procreation
Jordan Peterson believes falling birthrates are part of a self-hating environmentalist genocide, but it's more likely that people are having fewer babies out of personal choice
Hilary Evans Paranormal Picture Library: We Can Dance If We Want To
From the Hilary Evans Paranormal Picture Library, Pieter Brueghel’s drawing illustrates victims of a neurological condition, then called Saint Vitus Dance, going on a pilgrimage to Echternach
Hilary Evans Paranormal Picture Library: The Amherst Poltergeist
The latest image from the Hilary Evans Paranormal Library shows us the house in Amherst, Novia Scotia, which in 1878 was the scene of reported poltergeist activity.
‘A Mystery to Ourselves’: from the Witches of Warboys, to an epidemic of Tik Tok tics
Our lives, our peers and the times we live in can have compelling effects on the afflictions we experience - whether those afflictions are physical, or psychological
Behind the times: living in a modern era doesn’t inoculate us against believing in curses
Belief in the supernatural doesn’t thrive or decline by decree - even in a technological society such as ours, superstition can take hold
Hilary Evans Paranormal Picture Library: The two ghosts of Muncaster Castle
Muncaster Castle is a great place to visit... even if you don't believe in its two ghosts: the White Lady and Tom 'Fool' Skelton.
The story of the Satanic Panic is a tale of religious and cultural paranoia in America
The Satanic Panic of the 1980s showed we don't actually need a real Satan - well-meaning, deluded and fervent people will do His work for Him.