The Skeptics Society & Skeptic magazine

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09-07-01

In this week’s eSkeptic, Robert Richard responds to Daniel Gasman’s review of The Tragic Sense of Life which ran in eSkeptic (June 10th, 2009).

09-06-24

In this week’s eSkeptic, we ask: Do you shop at Amazon.com? What if there were a way for the Skeptics Society to make a commission off every Amazon purchase you make — all without costing you a penny? There is, and it’s easy…

09-06-17

In this week’s eSkeptic, Darren Iammarino reviews Adventures in the Spirit: God, World, Divine Action, by Philip Clayton.

09-06-10

In the documentary film Expelled, Ben Stein attempted to link Darwin to Hitler and thereby condemn the scientific theory of evolution by association with the political theory of National Socialism. The film failed, but was there a historical connection between the social Darwinists of the 19th century with the National Socialists of the 20th century? Yes, through the personage of the German biologist Ernst Haeckel; but a new biography claims to rehabilitate Haeckel by disconnecting him from German social Darwinism.…

09-06-03

In 2007 Skeptic magazine ran an article debunking the myth of the connection between vaccines and autism, and we were hoping that by now this sad tale of pseudoscience would have died a slow death as researchers continue to find no link whatsoever between the two. Sadly that is not the case. In fact, thanks to Playboy model Jenny McCarthy, mother of an autistic child, the myth has gained cultural traction as never before, as she and her partner, the…

09-05-27

In Skeptic magazine (Vol. 14, No. 4), we published a skeptical analysis of the self-esteem and positive-thinking movement by investigative journalist Steve Salerno (which also appeared this eSkeptic), demonstrating that it is not enough to just say positive things, you actually have to do positive things. In response, Mark Robert Waldman and Andrew Newberg have written the following critique of Salerno’s critique, arguing that there is evidence for how thoughts influence actions. Steve Salerno’s responds.

09-05-20

So much has been written and said about the placebo effect. In this week’s eSkeptic, we thought we should put our SkepDoc on the trail of finding out what is fact and what is myth about placebos and their effects. You will be surprised by some of Dr. Hall’s findings.

09-05-13

In this week’s eSkeptic, in the midst of the gay marriage controversy sweeping across the nation (as individual states are changing their constitutional minds about what constitutes marriage), we present an interesting article by Barrett Brown that demolishes the silly notion proffered by some conservatives that gay marriage decreases straight marriage rates.

09-05-06

Beginning this week, you can share your thoughts using the new comment field at the end of every eSkeptic. PLUS, you can share eSkeptic with friends and family using the SHARE button that appears at the top and bottom of each issue.

09-04-29

Robert Wright, the author of Nonzero and The Moral Animal has been added as a new lecturer in June as part of the Skeptics Distinguished Lecture Series at Caltech. He will discuss ideas from his latest book The Evolution of God.

09-04-22

In this week’s eSkeptic, James Allan Cheyne reviews The Third Man Factor: The Secret of Survival in Extreme Environments, by John Geiger.

09-04-15

In this week’s eSkeptic, investigative journalist Steve Salerno reveals what the science says about the positive thinking and self-esteem movement, and it isn’t very positive and will not raise the self-esteem of all those self-help gurus who have been telling us for decades that we just need to think more positively about life to make things better.

09-04-08

Why do we think aliens are out there? Is Earth really being visited? Will aliens really be short, gray, and hairless? What happens if we pick up a signal from another world? These are just a few of the questions this week’s Skepticality guest tackles regularly, in his role as the senior astronomer for the SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) Institute. Dr. Seth Shostak talks with Swoopy about the ongoing search for life in the universe, as chronicled in his…

09-04-01

In this week’s eSkeptic, we reveal the behind the scenes workings of that UFO hoax that captured headlines earlier this year. People in and around the Morristown, New Jersey area saw unidentified flying objects, with many of them naturally assuming that these UFOs represented extraterrestrial space craft. As you shall see, there was a rather more terrestrial explanation. In fact, they were helium balloons with flares attached to them, lofted into the sky by Chris Russo and Joe Rudy, in…

09-03-25

In this week’s eSkeptic, Skepticality and Skeptic.com are pleased to release “What Do I Do Next?: Leading Skeptics Discuss 105 Practical Ways to Promote Science and Advance Skepticism.” — the follow-up project to last year’s essay entitled “Where Do We Go From Here?”, which called for renewed focus on classical skeptical activism.

09-03-18

In this week’s eSkeptic, Michael Shermer visits the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky, run by Answers in Genesis, and interviews Dr. Georgia Purdom, the museum’s “research scientist” who explains what type of research one can do at a young-earth creationist organization, and why she thinks Francis Collins is wrong in his evolutionary understanding of the human genome.

09-03-11

In this week’s eSkeptic, as we celebrate the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birthday and the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species, the Skeptics Society put together a list of 27 items from our catalogue to help you honor the Sage of Down with books, DVDs, CDs, and back issues of Skeptic magazine devoted to Darwin and evolution.

09-03-04

In this week’s eSkeptic, Gary J. Whittenberger shares his analysis of the debate between Michael Shermer and Hugh Ross/Fazale Rana, on whether or not creationism can be a testable science.

09-02-25

In this week’s eSkeptic, Tim Callahan critiques the movie Zeitgeist — The Greatest Story Ever Told.

09-02-18

In this week’s eSkeptic, Michael Shermer goes into the belly of the beast for creationists — Noah’s Ark — during his lecture tour of England during the Darwin celebrations the first two weeks of February, taking in Noah’s Ark Zoo Farm, a zoo dedicated to teaching the school children of England that the biblical story of creation is supported by science, or at least the science according to the zoo’s curator.