Founding CSICOP

Paul Kurtz, a professor of philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo and a prominent secular humanist publisher, proposed forming a dedicated scientific body to investigate paranormal claims at a 1976 meeting of the American Humanist Association, arguing that claims of astrology, psychic powers and other fringe phenomena were spreading through popular media largely unchallenged by working scientists who considered the subject beneath serious attention.

The new Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal was formally launched at a conference on 30 April and 1 May 1976, structured as a standing committee that would commission and publish critical investigations rather than a general membership society, with Kurtz as chair from its founding. Its inaugural roster of fellows drew heavily on figures already known for public skepticism, including the astronomer and science communicator Carl Sagan, the professional magician James Randi, whose expertise in the techniques of deception made him valuable for evaluating claimed psychic feats, and the psychologist Ray Hyman, who would later co-author the government evaluation that helped end the CIA's remote viewing program. The Committee launched its flagship publication, then titled The Zetetic and soon renamed Skeptical Inquirer, to carry its investigations to a wider public audience, establishing from the outset a dual identity as both a working research body and a media focused advocacy organization.