Geophone (musical instrument) Geophone (musical instrument) The geophone is a percussion instrument, invented by the French composer Olivier Messiaen for use in his large composition for piano and orchestra entitled "Des canyons aux étoiles…" ("From the canyons to the stars…"). It consists of a drum filled with thousands of small lead pellets, and is played by swirling it around slowly so that the noise of the pellets resembles the sound of dry shifting earth. Messiaen commissioned a Parisian instrument maker to construct one to his design, and he carried this instrument worldwide to early performances of the piece (which was given its first
Flim-Flam! and enlighten the listener, especially one unable to distinguish between genuine scientific research and the pseudoscientific nonsense that results in fantastic theories and fallacies. The "Lodi News-Sentinel" stated "Flim Flam!" succeeds in discrediting the supernatural. In 2001 "Skeptic" magazine listed "Flim Flam!" at number three in its "Top Ten Recommended Skeptics' Books". Novelist Christopher Brookmyre listed "Flim Flam!" among four of the best, "works evincing a vivid, clear and entertaining rationalism." In a 2010 interview the magician Teller listed it as one of four books "In My Library." "Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions" has been cited in newspapers,