https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss468_Pinker_Ridley_2024_09_13.mp3 Download MP3 From the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic to the rise of DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) initiatives and Artificial Intelligence, in this episode Steven Pinker, Matt Ridley, and Michael Shermer challenge conventional narratives and explore how we c…

From the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic to the rise of DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) initiatives and Artificial Intelligence, in this episode Steven Pinker, Matt Ridley, and Michael Shermer challenge conventional narratives and explore how we can continue to move forward. They discuss the state of democracy, autocracy, and the lessons lea…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss467_Matthew_Stewart_2024_09_10.mp3 Download MP3 Matthew Stewart is an independent philosopher and historian who has written extensively about the philosophical origins of the American republic, the history of philosophy, management theory, and the culture of inequality. His work has appeared in The …

Michael Shermer and Matthew Stewart explore the heretical philosophical roots of the American Republic, including Enlightenment influences and the Founding Fathers’ religious beliefs. They discuss Epicurean and ancient Greek ideas, slavery’s moral contradictions, and its role in causing the Civil War, with figures like John Brown and Frederick Doug…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss466_Jeff_Kripal_2024_09_08.mp3 Download MP3 From precognitive dreams and telepathic visions to near-death experiences, UFO encounters, and beyond, so-called impossible phenomena are not supposed to happen. But they do happen—all the time. Jeffrey J. Kripal asserts that the impossible is a function n…

From precognitive dreams and telepathic visions to near-death experiences, UFO encounters, and beyond, so-called impossible phenomena are not supposed to happen. But they do happen—all the time. Jeffrey J. Kripal asserts that the impossible is a function not of reality but of our everchanging assumptions about what is real. How to Think Impossibly …

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss465_Michael_Shermer_2024_09_06.mp3 Download MP3 During a two-hour interview with Tucker Carlson, Darryl Cooper made sensational claims about the Holocaust and World War II, with Carlson calling him “the best and most honest popular historian in the United States.” In this solo episode, Michael Sherm…

During a two-hour interview with Tucker Carlson, Darryl Cooper made sensational claims about the Holocaust and World War II, with Carlson calling him "the best and most honest popular historian in the United States." In this solo episode, Michael Shermer takes a critical look at the pseudohistory and historical revisionism presented by Cooper on Ca…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss464_Will_Gervais_2024_09_03.mp3 Download MP3 In his new book Disbelief: The Origins of Atheism in a Religious Species, Will Gervais, PhD., a global leader in the psychological study of atheism, shows that the ubiquity of religious belief and the peculiarities of atheism are connected pieces in the p…

In Disbelief: The Origins of Atheism in a Religious Species, Will Gervais explores the interconnected nature of religious belief and atheism in human psychology. Gervais proposes that understanding religion requires solving two evolutionary puzzles: the Puzzle of Faith, examining how Homo sapiens became uniquely religious, and the Puzzle of Atheism…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss463_Ben_Goertzel_2024_09_01.mp3 Download MP3 Dr. Ben Goertzel is a cross-disciplinary scientist, entrepreneur and author. Born in Brazil to American parents, in 2020 after a long stretch living in Hong Kong he relocated his primary base of operations to a rural island near Seattle. He leads the Sing…

Dr. Ben Goertzel is a multidisciplinary scientist, entrepreneur, and author, originally from Brazil. He currently resides on an island near Seattle after living in Hong Kong. He leads prominent AI organizations like the SingularityNET Foundation, OpenCog Foundation, and the AGI Society, which hosts an annual Artificial General Intelligence conferen…

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. It’s no different when it comes to UFO frenzy. There is a need to separate fact from fiction in UAP claims. In this episode, Shermer delves into the growing interest in UAPs (formerly UFOs), especially in light of UFOlogist Lue Elizondo’s book Imminent. Elizondo claims the U.S. government has long b…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss462_Michael_Shermer_2024_08_30.mp3 Download MP3 Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. It’s no different when it comes to UFO frenzy. There is a need to separate fact from fiction in UAP claims. In this episode, Shermer delves into the growing interest in UAPs (formerly UFOs), especially …

The stated goals of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs are often reasonable, if not noble—to create a more welcoming and inclusive environment for all. Yet, as more and more people are discovering, DEI as commonly practiced isn’t a natural extension of past civil rights movements or an ethical framework for opposing discrimination on the gro…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss461_Helen_Pluckrose_2024_08_27.mp3 Download MP3 The stated goals of diversity, equity, and inclusion programs are often reasonable, if not noble—to create a more welcoming and inclusive environment for all. Yet, as more and more people are discovering, DEI as commonly practiced isn’t a natural exten…

Charles Fort, a maverick writer, fascinated by bizarre occurrences like flying saucers, Bigfoot, and frogs raining from the sky, scanned newspapers and magazines for reports of anomalies, advancing a philosophy that saw science as a small part of a larger system where truth and falsehood constantly transformed. His work found a following of skeptic…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss460_Joshua_Blu_Buhs_2024_08_25.mp3 Download MP3 Flying saucers. Bigfoot. Frogs raining from the sky. Such phenomena fascinated Charles Fort, the maverick writer who scanned newspapers, journals, and magazines for reports of bizarre occurrences: dogs that talked, vampires, strange visions in the sky,…

As if 2024 couldn't get any weirder, tensions in the Middle East have escalated with the United States sending one of our nuclear submarines to the Mediterranean as a deterrent signal to Iran that they better think twice about attacking Israel. That sub, the Ohio-class USS Georgia, carries non-nuclear cruise missiles. But 14 of our 18 Ohio-class su…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss459_Michael_Shermer_2024_08_23.mp3 Download MP3 As if 2024 couldn’t get any weirder, tensions in the Middle East have escalated with the United States sending one of our nuclear submarines to the Mediterranean as a deterrent signal to Iran that they better think twice about attacking Israel. That su…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss458_Richard_Reeves_2024_08_20.mp3 Download MP3 What’s wrong with boys and men these days? Boys and men are struggling. Profound economic and social changes of recent decades have many losing ground in the classroom, the workplace, and in the family. While the lives of women have changed, the lives o…

In his book Of Boys and Men and through his work at the American Institute for Boys and Men, Richard V. Reeves addresses the growing crisis facing boys and men in modern society. He argues that economic and social changes have left many males struggling in education, work, and family life, while institutions and laws have failed to adapt. Reeves cr…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss457_Elizabeth_Weiss_2024_08_17.mp3 Download MP3 Archaeologist Elizabeth Weiss’s new book, On the Warpath, is an autobiographical account of her storied career on the front lines of the culture war in our colleges and universities. Her opposition to the reburial of Native American skeletal remains, h…

In her autobiographical book On the Warpath, archaeologist Elizabeth Weiss recounts her battles on the front lines of the culture war in academia. Her opposition to the reburial of Native American remains, her insistence that indigenous knowledge is not science, and her fight against political correctness have exposed her to numerous controversies,…

Life as No One Knows It by Sara Imari Walker tackles the challenging question of defining life, a problem as complex as understanding consciousness or matter’s existence. Walker argues that current definitions are inadequate for comprehending life’s origins or potential extraterrestrial forms. She proposes that solving this puzzle requires revoluti…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss456_Sara_Walker_2024_08_13.mp3 Download MP3 What is life? This is among the most difficult open problems in science, right up there with the nature of consciousness and the existence of matter. All the definitions we have fall short. None help us understand how life originates or the full range of p…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss455_Andrew_Chow_2024_08_10.mp3 Download MP3 As cryptocurrency rose in popularity during the pandemic, new converts bought into the idea that crypto would not only make them rich, but would usher in imminent revolutions across art, finance, politics, and gaming. Cryptocurrency caught the zeitgeist th…

As cryptocurrency surged in popularity during the pandemic, many were drawn by the promise of wealth and revolutionizing sectors like finance, art, and politics. Figures like FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried became emblematic of this new era, but his meteoric rise was marred by scandal as his aggressive, profit-driven tactics led to one of the biggest fin…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss454_Richard_Dawkins_2024_08_06.mp3 Download MP3 An exquisitely camouflaged lizard has a desiccated landscape of sand and stones “painted” on its back. Its skin can be read as a description of an ancient desert, a world in which its ancestors survived. Such descriptions are more than skin deep, howev…

Evolutionary biologist and author, Richard Dawkins, explores how the body, behavior, and genes of every living creature serve as a record of their ancestors’ worlds, similar to how a lizard’s skin reflects its desert origins. In his new book, Dawkins shows that these genetic “books of the dead” offer insights into the history of life, revealing how…

After the Flying Saucers Came explores the global fascination with UFOs, tracing its origins to the summer of 1947 when a pilot’s sighting in Washington State sparked widespread reports of “flying saucers.” This phenomenon, fueled by Cold War anxieties and space age aspirations, captivated the world, leading to disputed government inquiries, sensat…

https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/sciencesalon/mss453_Greg_Eghigian_2024_08_03.mp3 Download MP3 Roswell, 1947. Washington, DC, 1952. Quarouble, 1954. New Hampshire, 1961. Pascagoula, 1973. Petrozavodsk, 1977. Copley Woods, 1983. Explore how sightings of UFOs and aliens seized the world’s attention and discover what the fascination with flying sauce…

Psychologist Joshua Coleman, PhD, explores the complex issue of estrangement between parents and adult children, which he terms a “silent epidemic.” He attributes this phenomenon to factors such as increasing individualism, emphasis on personal happiness, economic insecurity, and changing perceptions of parental roles. Drawing from his professional…