Skeptoid is a weekly podcast dedicated to furthering knowledge by blasting away the widespread pseudosciences that infect popular culture.
Each weekly episode focuses on a single phenomenon — an urban legend, a paranormal claim, alternative therapy, or something just plain stupid — that you've heard of, and that you probably believe in. Skeptoid attempts to expose the folly of belief in non-evidence based phenomena, and more importantly, explains the factual scientific reality.
From the sublime to the startling, no topic is sacred, politically incorrect though that may be. 64,600 weekly downloads.
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1/9/2009 - Many UFO enthusiasts consider the Rendlesham Forest UFO Incident to be the most frightening. Imagine an alien spacecraft floating through the woods outside a US Air Force base in England, for three nights in a row, in full view of military security, with no official response. Or is that perhaps not the true and complete story?
12/30/2008 - When discussing "true believers", skeptics often use dismissive language like calling them "closed minded". And believers use the exact same language when they are dismissive of skeptics. Both groups could probably use a bit of a reality check, and realize that neither is endemically closed minded. Thinking that you're the only one who's not an idiot should be the first red flag.
12/23/2008 - In the channel country of Australia we find the Min Min Light, a mysterious hovering orb that has lured travelers across the desert for nearly two centuries. Skeptoid points the skeptical eye at the Min Min Light and examines some of the possible explanations.
12/16/2008 - The Atlantic is home to the Sargasso Sea, and the Pacific is said to be the domain of the Pacific Trash Vortex, vast floating hazards to navigation. Are they real? Are they as hazardous as the tall tales tell?
12/9/2008 - What are the members of San Francisco's Bohemian Club really doing when they retreat to their Bohemian Grove? Are they really making mock human sacrifices to the pagan god Moloch? Are they really a tribe of Illuminati plotting global domination? We point our skeptical eye at the redwoods to find out.
12/2/2008 - Got a few spare dollars you want to throw away? Name a star after someone? Buy a plot on the Moon? Then you need to be brought back to reality with this episode about space properties. Can you imagine -- someone on the Internet might be trying to rip you off! I never would have guessed it.
11/25/2008 - Buried deep within the Oak Island Money Pit is said to be a pirate treasure from Captain Kidd, worth millions of pounds. Six men have died over the centuries trying to extract it. What's really in this mysterious pit?
11/18/2008 - Skeptoid answers more student questions, this time on the "Mozart Effect", the use of the term "quantum physics" by peddlers of pseudoscience, alkaline diets as a treatment for gastric reflux disease, the relationship between HIV and AIDS, and whether recycling makes economic and/or environment sense.
11/14/2008 - "Inspired by Brian Dunning's Skeptoid podcast," a science classroom at the Grand Prairie 9th Grade Center,
Integrated Physics and Chemistry, has put up this poster encouraging students to BE SKEPTICAL. The students write their questions and skeptical comments on the poster. I think it's a great idea! Well worth emulating in other classrooms. Any student who spends one minute looking at this poster is likely to be challenged in a dozens ways he has never thought of before.
11/11/2008 - Despite any plausible evidence, activists blame the artificial sweetener aspartame for nearly every disease, and in fact blame it for millions of deaths. I guess somewhere there's a gigantic pile of bodies that nobody has noticed yet.
11/4/2008 - When we hear about the incorruptibles, we usually think of Catholic saints; a collection of obviously mummified corpses disingenuously regarded as "incorrupt" perfectly preserved bodies. But other cultures have their incorruptibles too. Upon closer examination, not many of them (in fact, none) pass the test of true miraculous incorruptibility.
10/28/2008 - A look at the Ten Most Wanted: Celebrities Who Promote Harmful Pseudoscience. Read all about your favorite celebs: Oprah Winfrey, Jenny McCarthy, Prince Charles, Bill Maher, Larry King, Pamela Anderson, Ben Stein, Joe Rogan, Chuck Norris, and Montel Williams. And just for fun, there's also a blurb about why Tom Cruise is not on the list.
10/24/2008 - Check out the new SkepticBlog - the newest, biggest, grooviest blog in the critical thinking community, featuring the cast of The Skeptologists: Michael Shermer, Phil Plait, Steven Novella, Kirsten Sanford, Mark Edward, Yau-Man Chan, myself, and director of The Skeptologists Ryan Johnson. I will be posting every Thursday. Please come by and check it out, and send us your comments!
10/21/2008 - Were Betty and Barney Hill really the first people to be abducted by aliens in 1961, or is there a simpler explanation for what happened? We examine the credibility of the hypnosis sessions, where and when the stories were written, and take a good look at the alleged radar evidence of UFOs that night.
10/14/2008 - This week is Listener Feedback Reloaded, yet more fun with listener emails.
10/13/2008 - Here is a cool interview with me on Leart Shaka's Skepfeeds blog.
10/8/2008 - Watch my interview with Ann Althouse on Bloggingheads.tv. We talk about all sorts of groovy stuff, the Skeptoid podcast and some favorite episodes, and lots of other groovy things.
10/7/2008 - You may think YouTube star "the crazy sprinkler lady" is alone in blaming HAARP for virtually every bad thing that happens in the world, but a lot of others agree with her. To find out, I actually took the trouble to learn what HAARP is, what it's for, and whether it actually can cause earthquakes, tsunamis, and hurricanes. The truth may surprise you...
9/30/2008 - Proponents of hypothesized "scalar weapons" claim that they are a real class of atmospheric superweapons actually in use by major governments and clandestine crime organizations to cause natural disasters and other attacks worldwide. They also like to throw around the name of Nikola Tesla to give their claims the appearance of credibility.
9/23/2008 - Conservapedia is a new online encyclopedia that describes itself as an unbiased knowledge resource in contrast to the "extreme liberal" Wikipedia. In fact, Conservapedia is nothing less than a Young Earth anti-knowledge source, committed to the destruction of evidence based physical sciences and rationality.
9/16/2008 - Some more student questions are answered: this time on body searches at airports, theta healing, dreams coming true, marijuana use, and the physiological causes of homosexuality. If you're a student, come to this page to send me your question.
9/9/2008 - Hide your children and shutter the windows — the Bell Witch is on the loose! Does this American ghost legend have a basis in fact, or is it all merely the elaborate invention of author Martin Ingram?
9/2/2008 - Peddlers of cell phone accessories and news agencies that love "scare stories" love to promote the pop-culture myth that cell phone radiation is dangerous. The truth, in fact, is that there is no good evidence that it can cause harm of any kind, and also no plausible hypothesized mechanism by which it could, even if it wanted to.
8/26/2008 - Ever wonder how to be a skeptic and still have friends? Speaking up on the skeptical perspective among friends and coworkers can easily make you the outcast. In this episode, I present my experience in trying to make a skeptical conversation with non-skeptics into a bridge building experience, rather than a bridge burning.
8/19/2008 - In 1961, two Italian brothers, amateur radio enthusiasts, recorded transmissions from Soviet spaceflights that appear to indicate cosmonauts dying in space, and then never making it into the history books. These supposedly dead heroes have become known as the Missing Cosmonauts.
8/12/2008 - Don't worry, the tongue-in-cheek "homeopathic podcast" did not replace any regularly scheduled episodes. This week I answer some student questions on fish oil, charity fraud, rumors, and more. Keep those questions coming, students!
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