Skepticality - The Official Podcast of Skeptic Magazine

Skepticality RETURNS! Meet Derek's new wife...  Hear Susan Gerbic and Bob again! Derek interviews Patricia Churchland about her new book Consciousness.

Derek sits down with Bob Nygaard, a retired police officer from New York City who moved to Florida and now has a second career helping victims of Psychic fraud. Find out what it takes to help victims of a crime often ignored by law enforcement.

After a long break, Derek comes back just in time for Christmas. This time he sits down with Henry Jay Przybylo, (Dr. Jay), to discuss his new book 'Counting Backwards'. Dr. Jay is an associate professor of anesthesiology at Northwestern University School of Medicine, specializing in infants and children. The book is his 'Doctor's Notes on Anesthesia', find out more about one of the great mysteries of modern medicine

Fighting post-truth politics, promoting rational thinking and wise decision-making in the political sphere seems like it has become harder in the past couple years or so. Gleb Tsipursky, founder of 'Intentional Insights', which unites reason-oriented people to popularize science-based strategies for wise decision-making and rational thinking in politics and other life areas. Gleb is a tenure-track professor at Ohio State in the Decision Sciences Collaborative and History Department. Derek got to steal some of Gleb's time to chat more about his work, and his 'Pro-Truth Pledge', whose purpose is to change the incentive structure for public figures.

This episode Derek talks with Bob Loomis, librarian at the Magic Circle, and scholar of the history of stage illusion. His latest work is the book "Houdini's Final Incredible Secret", which is a detailed account of Bob's obsession with figuring out how one trick was performed.

This episode Derek sits down with Peter Buffett, the son of the famous investor, Warren Buffett. Peter became famous not for his investing and banking skills but for his work in music and composing. He and his wife now run a non-profit charity, NoVo, which works to empower women and girls as the primary agents of change throughout the world. Find out more about what it was like to grow up as a Buffett, and more about how he and his wife decided to spend so much of their time, money, and effort focusing on the rights and conditions for women around the world.

This week Derek has a conversation with returning guest, Dr. Bo Bennett. In the past few months Bo has been working on his latest book, 'Uncomfortable Ideas'. In the book, Bennett discusses many of the 'hot button' topics which even the most rational of us tend to shy away from discussing, or thinking about critically. As Bo says in the book, "Facts don't care about feelings. Science isn't concerned about sensibilities. And reality couldn't care less about rage." Find out why it is important to push through discomfort, and engage even the hardest issues with rational thought.

For the new year episode of Skepticality, Derek presents an interview he recorded with Britt Hermes, a former Naturopath turned evidence based medicine advocate. Find out what happens when you go from licensed alt-med practitioner to evidence based medicine champion.

This episode Derek has another conversation with Jonathan Tweet, game designer, book author, and past Skepticality guest. After the success of his last book, 'Grandmother Fish', a book aimed at teaching pre-school children about Evolution, his follow up is a card game, Clades. Clades is a kids card matching game which centers around the evolutionary concept of Clades. Find out more about the new game, and maybe some updates on the status of Grandmother Fish.

This episode Derek has a conversation with Tini Howard, writer of graphic novels and former comics contributor for Paste Magazine and Teen Vogue. Just a couple weeks ago Tini released her newest comic book series 'The Skeptics'. The series is a political adventure about a pair of hip, clever, teens who fool the world into believing they have superpowers. Loosely based on the real events surrounding 'Project Alpha' and other skeptical investigation tales.