The Skeptics Society & Skeptic magazine

While not going so far as arguing, as some have, that psychotherapy is always effective, I’d like to present some data and offer some contrasting considerations to Harriet Hall’s article: “Psychotherapy Reconsidered” (in Skeptic 28.1). Probably no other area within social science practice has been so inordinately and unfortunately praised and damned. Many of us […]

A pediatric neurologist at Boston Children’s Hospital diagnosed my son, Misha, with autism spectrum disorder at age three. At Massachusetts General Hospital, another pediatric neurologist answered my call for a second opinion only to rebuff my hope for a different one. “I did not find him to be very receptive to testing,” the expert sighed. […]

In episode 189, Michael speaks with Nobel Prize winning psychologist and economist Daniel Kahneman about the detrimental effects of noise and what we can do to reduce both noise and bias, and make better decisions in: medicine, law, economic forecasting, forensic science, bail, child protection, strategy, performance reviews, and personnel selection.

In episode 189, Michael speaks with Nobel Prize winning psychologist and economist Daniel Kahneman about the detrimental effects of noise and what we can do to reduce both noise and bias, and make better decisions in: medicine, law, economic forecasting, forensic science, bail, child protection, strategy, performance reviews, and personnel selection. PLUS: We present a review by Dr. Harriet Hall of Abigail Shrier’s 2020 book Irreversible Damage: The Transgender Craze Seducing Our Daughters was originally published on Science-Based Medicine’s website…

For centuries, scientists and society cast moral judgments on anyone deemed mentally ill, confining many to asylums. In episode 161 of The Michael Shermer Show, Dr. Shermer speaks with anthropologist Dr. Roy Richard Grinker about his book Nobody’s Normal: How Culture Created the Stigma of Mental Illness which chronicles the progress and setbacks in the struggle against mental-illness stigma―from the 18th century, through America’s major wars, and into today’s high-tech economy.

For centuries, scientists and society cast moral judgments on anyone deemed mentally ill, confining many to asylums. In episode 161 of The Michael Shermer Show, Dr. Shermer speaks with anthropologist Dr. Roy Richard Grinker about his book Nobody’s Normal: How Culture Created the Stigma of Mental Illness which chronicles the progress and setbacks in the struggle against mental-illness stigma―from the 18th century, through America’s major wars, and into today’s high-tech economy.

In Science Salon # 74 Michael Shermer speaks with practicing psychiatrist and trauma scientist at the National Center for PTSD Shaili Jain, M.D about her new book The Unspeakable Mind, which shines a long-overdue light on the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) epidemic affecting today’s fractured world; PLUS Chris Edwards reviews Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life by Nassim Nicholas Taleb.

Shermer speaks with practicing psychiatrist and trauma scientist at the National Center for PTSD Shaili Jain, M.D about her new book in which shines a long-overdue light on the Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) epidemic affecting today’s fractured world.

The problem of defining psychiatric disorders is a challenge, and increasingly a matter of debate. Some have argued that definitions of psychiatric diagnoses are arbitrary. Most psychiatric disorders can be very well described as existing on a continuum with normal human experience and that there is overlap between disorders. In this week’s eSkeptic, Ralph Lewis, M.D. discusses the challenges to understanding and defining complex mental disorders. This article appeared in Skeptic magazine issue 18.4 (2013).