I always love to dispell myths and scams.  Here is one I wanted to post in today’s blog.

• People like Tony Robbins, the self-help guru, has his people do the fire walk across hot coals.  He has them say cool moss, like it was supposed to show that the mind can stop the coals from burning their feet.  Now I don’t dispell the power of the mind, it does work (see the placebo effect). The reason why we can walk on hot coals is three fold – First, our calloused feet protect us to some degree, second, people walk across the coals like their in the midst of a track race and third, coal is a poor conductor of heat.  It’s like touching a cake in a 400 degree oven.  You can do it without burning your fingers but touch the metal pan and ouch!!!

I’d like to thank the journal Scientific American (May 2006) for the info on coal walking.