Listen Now

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.

This week Skepticality starts out with a touching message about friend of the show and past contributor to Skepticality, Bob Carroll. Then Derek talks with comedian, talk show host, and political commentator, John Fugelsang about 'Dream On', a PBS Documentary about the American Dream, and a road trip across the country to find out if it still is alive.

This episode Derek plays one of the lectures from this past Dragon Con. There is a lot of misconceptions about what can actually heal, and what is *actually* medicine. Find out what some of the most common, and sometimes funny, treatments that seem to crop up in doctors offices and Emergency Rooms. ER Doctor Angie Feazel Mattke gives a talk aimed at explaining just how far reaching some of these 'unscientific' medical ideas can go.

This week Derek talks with Illustrator/Author Rachel Ignotofsky. Once a illustrator for Hallmark Greeting cards, she now focuses her talent for creating easy to understand and attractive art on creating works that inform others about science and history. Her first book is just now out, "Women In Science", a illustrated encyclopedia of historical women who made significant contributions to science who are both well known, and those who more people should know. Find out more about Rachael, and what drove her to shift her career to focusing on education, and the history of science.

This episode Derek hands over most of the episode to Swoopy who conducts an in-depth interview with Hal Bidlack, a Hamiltonian scholar and performer who gives Chautauqua performances as Hamilton himself. They discuss how Hal ended up living a double life as Hamilton, and his importance in American history. As well as a bit about the resurgence of Hamilton's popularity due to the smash-hit Broadway play named after the founder. Bet you didn't know there are even folks who are 'skeptical' of Hamilton!

This episode Derek has a chat with David Person and Chuck Miller about their new documentary project, 'Exodus', a feature-length documentary about the growing number of African-Americans leaving religion. Chuck is a regional director for the American Atheists, and David is a journalist, radio host and a Christian. Find out how two unlikely friends came together to work on a project which looks into the rejection of religion by one of the most religious demographics in the United States.

kppn2u3r Derek has discussion with artist/writer, Darryl Cunningham, about his work and how a health care assistant/cartoonist decided to take on the job of educating the public about misconceptions surrounding psychiatry, science, and even world financial affairs.

Derek does a quick update discussion with Jonathan Tweet, the author of 'Grandmother Fish - a child's first book of Evolution'. Since last Jonathan was on Skepticality to discuss his Kickstarter project to create a book which appeals to the youngest of us that also teaches about the scientific theory of evolution, his book has been finished and is now in the hands of many families. Find out if the story was a success in getting kids more interested in evolution and how all life on Earth is interconnected.

Derek grabs some time with Professor of History, David Wootton, to talk about his latest book 'The Invention of Science: A New History of the Scientific Revolution', a book about the early years where the modern methods of inquiry and scientific thinking came to be. Find out about how a teacher who once focused on historical topics about politics and atheism ended up writing books about science and medicine.

Derek nabs some time with Dr. Micheal Shermer, the man in charge of Skeptic Magazine and the Skeptics Society for a little update and chat about his new book highlighting his fifteen years writing a regular column for Scientific American magazine, followed by some discussion about how science factors into the current United States presidential election.

This episode Derek has a discussion with Dr. Ivan Oransky, MD. Dr. Oransky is the global editorial editor for MedPage Today, and co-founder of Retraction Watch, a site which reports on scientific integrity, fraud, and other issues. He previously was executive editor of Reuters Health and held an editorial position at Scientific American and The Scientist. His main passion is the promotion of science based medicine and encouraging those in the medical field to use a more common sense approach to diagnosis and focus less on 'pre-conditions' and possible symptoms of less-than-certain diseases.