The God of Skeptics

C. Stiles

James Randi

Bill Hughes

Randi (left), Penn, and Teller pose in thought during a panel discussion on magic and skepticism.

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Although the future is up in the air for the Amazing Randi, what keeps him going are the men and women who approach him every day with stories of their skeptical conversions. "That means I've changed someone's life," he says. "I get emotional. I say to myself: 'Damn! That's why I'm in business.' The people here, they're going to follow me. The movement's going to go on."

Randi jokes that after he passes, his fans need not bother with grandiose gestures such as establishing a museum of magic or burying him in an elaborate tomb. He has something more Amazing in mind. "I want to be cremated," he says with his signature dry, knowing charm. "And I want my ashes blown in Uri Geller's eyes."