SGU Episode 146

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Introduction

You're listening to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe, your escape to reality.

S: Hello and welcome to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe. Today is Wednesday, May 7th 2008, and this is your host, Steven Novella, President of the New England Skeptical Society. Joining me this evening are Bob Novella,

B: Hey, everybody.

S: Rebecca Watson,

R: Hello, everyone.

S: Jay Novella,

J: Hey, guys.

S: And Evan Bernstein.

E: Happy Radio Day to all of our listeners in Russia.

S: Happy Radio Day.

R: Happy Radio Day.

J: Radio Day. What's that celebrate?

E: In 1895, gentleman by the name of Alexander Popov successfully demonstrated his invention, called the radio, gave a public demonstration on this day. This was just around the time that, you know-- Tesla and Marconi were also tinkering with their radio devices, but Alexander Popov is recognized in Russia as being the father of radio, at least over there.

J: And then Popov's grandson then used that radio technology to be a faith healer scam artist, is that it?

E: Uh, yeah, that would be...

R&S: Peter Popoff.

E: Peter Popoff. Thank you. Let's hope not.

R: That took a depressing turn.

E: One was a scientist, the other was a con artist.

SGU 3-Year Anniversary (1:25)

S: But of course, the real anniversary we're celebrating today is... the SGU 3-year anniversary.

(light cheering)

R: What do you get for three years? That's like a clock or something, right?

J: It's the cardboard anniversary.

R: Oh, right.

S: Cardboard, right. It was three years ago that a bunch of crazy kids got together and said, "Hey, let's put on a show!" We decided--

(laughing)

R: I could play the accordion! I can be a jerk!

E: I can sew the curtain and get the barn ready.

S: We do like to, every now and then, take a step back and look at how things have been going for the SGU. We're all still perpetually amazed at our wonderful listeners, and I do think we have among the most loyal and, dare I say, erudite listeners in all of podcasting.

E: Hell yeah.

R: Oh, definitely, and good-looking, and... they all smell wonderful.

E: Our numbers reflect that, though; they really do. They listen--

R: Smell, really?

S: They reflect their good hygiene?

E: Yes, that too. They listen and they stay with us.

J: Steve, on my blog today, on Wednesday, I mentioned that Bob-- I recollect Bob as the person that came up with the name for the show, but how did-- do you remember detail on how that came about?

S: Yeah, you were wrong. I already left a comment because I found the-- Perry's email; Perry came up with the name, which was my memory. We were emailing back and forth as to what we should call it. My suggestion for the name of the show was "The Skeptical Rogues", which we kept as just the name for the panel. Perry responded, "Skeptical Rogues? No, no, no. How about this" and he came up with like a long list of things. Number three on the list was "The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe".

B: Awesome. I forgot that. That's great. Good for Perry.

S: Yeah, that was Perry's idea. Then we had an actual face-to-face meeting where we were finalizing everything and Perry was strongly in favor of "The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe" and it definitely was the one that, over time, that was the clear choice. There really was nothing else in the running.

B: If I remember it, people were coming up with suggestions; some would love a suggestion; some would hate it, and that was the one suggestion that nobody really said anything about, like hmmmm, nobody had any complaints and we didn't instantly fall in love with it, but it definitely grew on us. If memory serves, and I'm glad we picked it, it's great.

E: We threw out YouTube, but we didn't go with that one, so.

(laughing)

J: I was really surprised, though; the email that I posted on there that Steve wrote to all of us. I hadn't looked at those emails in, God-- you know--

E: Three years.

J: Three years. But Steve nailed it, he's like, "how about this" and-- the format of the show that we have today is almost identical to what Steve wrote out, I don't know if that was in lieu of many discussions or whatever but I was very surprised to see that.

S: No, that was my initial email; I was like, "Hey, let's do a podcast." But yeah, we've added segments since then; the Science or Fiction came in, you know, a few episodes after we started doing it, which remains our most popular segment.

E: Yep.

S: But yeah, the basic format of news and interviews, which was kind of obvious, was there-- one thing I noted, I said, "my sense is that we should keep the show light and entertaining but not be goofy and still cover some meat."

E: One out of two ain't bad.

R: Might not be goofy?

S: Not be goofy. Yeah, so it was pretty close to what we ended up getting to. But the basic concept was there. Entertaining and also informative, and I think that's been our guiding light throughout our podcast.

R: Witty but weighty, isn't that what--

S: "Witty but weighty" is a more witty way, if you will, of saying it.

J: Even though Rebecca wasn't there from the beginning, I think Rebecca has dramatically affected the quality of the show and everything like-- that's when we hit our-- our sweet spot.

B: Regardless, we keep her with us!

R: Aw, shucks. It's good to be a part of the team.

B: Oh, you meant positively impact.

S: Rebecca was that piece that we were missing from the very beginning but just didn't realize it.

R: Oh, like that story about the missing piece.

S: It's true, and then when we-- after we interviewed you, I tell ya, we all independently--

B: All of us.

S: --and simultaneously came up with the idea of "we have to ask her to be on the show" because it was just so obvious to all of us. We didn't even have to talk about it with each other.

B: No, no. That was great.

E: Five minutes after we were done, yep.

R: It was really cute because you guys said, "Oh, you know"-- after we did the interview, you said "oh, we should have you on again sometime," and I'm like, "yeah, this was a lot of fun, I would like to come on again sometime."

E: How's next week?

R: And then it was like, two days later, it's like, "so we'd like to have you on again next week."

S: Every week.

R: And maybe the one after that.

J: What'd you think of that interview, Rebecca; were you like, "these guys are geek lords", or...?

R: "Geek lords"?

E: No, we didn't reveal ourselves totally to you at that point.

S: Only a geek lord would use the term "geek lords", of course.

R: Yeah, that was maybe in fact the geekiest thing you've ever said. No, I thought-- I don't know-- I thought you guys were really funny and sweet and had a good show, and I hadn't heard the show before you asked me to come on. Something that I felt bad about. But I didn't listen to any podcast before I came on the show, and I did listen to one show before I came on.

S: You did your homework?

R: I did. I always do. But yeah, I remember thinking, "hey, you know, this podcast idea isn't so bad." So yeah, you guys were my introduction to podcasts in general, and you know, I was very pleased that you guys wanted to have me on.

S: Well, now it wouldn't be the show without you.

R: Well, that was part of my evil plan.

S: Yes, your evil plot.

J: There's not that many women out there that could really deal with this room anyway, you know?

S: That's true.

R: Yeah, well, sometimes I wonder if I can.

S: You've survived; you've survived for a couple of years so that has some value right there.

R: It does. But yeah, happy third anniversary, fellas.

S: Thank you, Rebecca, and thanks to all of our listeners out there. Just to review some stats, we've exceeded 35,000 regular weekly listeners; we're on schedule, we're hoping to break 50,000 regular weekly listeners by the end of the year. That was the goal, the completely arbitrary goal that we've set for ourselves.

J: To celebrate our three years, Mike has created a little sound file for us of some of the highlights for-- some of his favorite bits that we've done over the past three years. So--

S: Mike's favorite bits.

J: So here we go.

S: You have to be cautious before you send a really critical email to us because we just might use it in our Name that Logical Fallacy segment.

(all laughing)

---

S: We've been over this exhaustively; search for the thread on the forums, don't send us any emails; we're right, you're wrong.

S: That was the Monty Hall Problem.

E: OK.

S: Studies show that carbon nanotubes can-- (breaks down laughing)

(hysterical laughter)

---

J: Steve Novella!

---

B: There's no biological basis to claim that fasting, or enemas for that matter, can cleanse your body of toxins.

S: Not even coffee enemas?

B: It's gotta be decaf.

---

B: If they've won the linguistic battle, then f(bleep) them.

---

J: Bob Novella!

---

S: Does anybody know how long it takes for an electron to circle the nucleus of an atom?

E: Four foot one.

---

E: Mmm, I'm going to get me a handful of them salted monkey nuts.

J: Oh my God.

---

R: You know, I'd like to take this moment to speak on behalf of the non-birding population of our listeners and say: "we don't care."

E: That was the monkey vote right there.

---

J: Evan Bernstein!

---

R: So long as there's hot bonobo-on-bonobo action, I'm fine.

---

R: Skeptic team activate!

B: I love that.

---

R: We need a control-Z for this podcast.

---

R: You know, you guys are one unitard away from living the dream, aren't ya?

---

J: Rebecca Watson!

---

J: A lonely man.

---

J: The molecular man!

---

J: (bad Indian accent) You must pull on my penis for me to make sure it does not slip inside my body while I sleep. Thank you.

Mike Lacelle: Jay Novella!

(laughing)

J: So last week, Mike says, "Jay, you know that stupid thing you do with the quotes?" I'm like, "yeah". He goes, "can you say everybody's name like that and record it for me and send it to me?" And I'm like, "Mike, of course I'm going to ask you why, you know?" He's like, "no, no, no, it's no big deal. I just thought it'd be funny" and he's trying to totally play it off like I don't get it, you know.

S: Right.

J: I figured something like this was coming, but...

S: And then he did your name.

J: He did my name.

E: That was funny.

B: Good job, Mike!

S: Thanks, Mike.

J: Thanks, Mike, that was good.

E: Well done.

J: So, how about this: In everybody's opinion, how many more years do you think we're going to do this?

E: Ummmmm

R: Twenty? Thirty?

B: Point five.

R: At least until we transplant our brains into robots.

S: Right. I think the answer is--

B: 15 years, then.

S: --unless and until something better comes along. You know, always-- once we decided to start the New England Skeptical Society, we decided skepticism, promoting that and promoting science and promoting science education was our thing, right? This is the thing, the cause that we were going to dedicate our spare time to, and I don't think that's ever going to change. How we go about doing that, we'll decide as it comes. As long as the whole podcasting thing works out as well as it does and there's nothing better that we could be spending our time doing, I think we're going to continue to do it.

E: That's right, podcasting is the vehicle now that we're all driving in; if a better, sharper, larger, with better exposure vehicle comes along, we'll jump on that. Let's hope it happens.

S: Right.

J: Yeah, like "bodcasting". You know, we'll get into that.

R: "Bodcasting", really?

S: And we are constantly experimenting with new media; you know, we have two podcasts and three blogs, and we're working on producing other kinds of content. The great thing about Web 2.0 and the new media and the Internet is that it gives us the opportunity to experiment, with the only investment up front really being our investment of time and effort, you know? But there's really no limit to what we could do within that context, so--

R: I think the next step is you guys moving to Boston and doing a vodcast.

E: Oooh.

S: Think so?

R: Yeah, all together.

E: Well, I don't know about the "moving to Boston" part, but, the vodka...

R: It's kind of necessary to be in the same-- you know.

S: Yeah. Definitely video is in our future; I forsee that in some form or another.

J: Another thing I've been promising on the boards: As you listen to this episode, if you go to the SGU-- sorry theskepticsguide.org, you can see our brand-new logo. It's not going to replace the existing one until we redo the website, but I'm hoping that Steve's going to put that in the picture for this week's show. We're very, very happy with it and it's going to shape the look and feel of the Skeptics' Guide for the next five or so years.

S: Yeah, so for our-- our present to ourselves for our third anniversary is a brand-new logo, so take a look at it on the website.

E: Nice.

R: I was hoping for jewelry, but OK.

S: You'll have to settle for that.

E: We'll make some jewelry with the logo for you.

News Items

Florida Academic Freedom Law Follow up (12:47)

Anti-evolution Bills Dead in Florida

S: Well, let's move on to some science news. The first-- some follow-up on last week we discussed the Florida Academic Freedom Law. This is one of proposed bills in several states that, under the guise of academic freedom, are looking to protect teachers and students who want to profess belief in creationism or intelligent design or introduce pseudoscientific criticisms of evolution. So it's just another way of undermining evolution teaching. The law had passed the Florida state senate and now we can report that it has failed the pass the Florida house. So the bill is dead and this was also the end of the legislative session, so it's dead for now, until a new session and a new bill is proposed. So that's a good thing, although this fight is not over; this is just getting started. As I said, this law-- similar laws are being proposed in many states. Also, apparently, the law didn't pass more because of bureaucratic infighting about the language and exactly how far the bill should go; it wasn't that there was a backlash or a strong ideological opposition to the concept of this bill, it was more just the legislative bureaucratic stuff that got in the way. So, you know, even in Florida, this fight is not over. But I think, as we've been saying, this is the next phase of the creationist attack on the teaching of evolution. Unfortunately, it's very marketing-savvy; you know, hooking onto the whole "academic freedom" thing. This is kind of like the "equal time" strategy that creation science took in the 1970s and then going into the 1980s; it's kind of just a rebranding of that whole strategy. But they'll get another cycle out of this; this-- we're going to have to fight this for a while.

E: You're right, Steve, I mean, we will always be fighting this battle, I fear, for the rest of our lives. Creationism will always take some kind of form; ID, whatever it is, they will always continue to press it and we will have to constantly be vigilant in helping fight back against it. It's going to be a never-ending battle.

Florida Teacher Fired for Wizardry (15:00)

Teacher Fired for Wizardry (link broken)

S: Yeah, I think so. Speaking of Florida, did you guys hear about the teacher who was fired for practicing wizardry?

B: I did not; tell me all about it.

R: Yes, Harry Potter got fired. Sad.

S: This is also in Florida, from Land-O'-Lakes, I didn't realize that was an actual place.

J: They make butter there.

S: This actually-- a substitute teacher, Jim Piculas, he did a 30-second magic trick in the classroom where he makes a toothpick appear to disappear and then reappear. So, you know, pretty standard sleight of hand, prestidigitation-type of trick, and he was called in to his supervisors who was told there was an issue with his teaching. Jim said to the supervisor, "well can you explain this to me?" and he said "you've been accused of wizardry." "Wizardry?", he asked. So, Piculas thinks that, for whatever reason, this all has to do with him casting a magic trick, doing a magic trick.

J: "Casting" a magic trick?

S: Performing a magic trick. Afterwards, the school district said that he was not following lesson plans and that he was allowing students to play on unapproved computers, which Piculas says that that was just after-the-fact, trumped-up stuff just to justify their actions.

R: You know... I'm skeptical.

S: Yeah, the whole thing doesn't make sense. This is the story as it's being reported, but there's some stupidity in there somewhere.

R: It certainly sounds-- there have been a couple of cases kind of like this, where someone accuses another body of discriminating against them because of their lack of beliefs or whatever, and I always examine these really carefully, and oftentimes it turns out that the person was just being a jerk. There are a ton of other reasons why they get fired or kicked out of school or, you know, things like that. So, I'm kind of thinking that this might be a case where the whole wizardry thing just got blown out of proportion by the media.

E: Or is a red herring entirely.

S: Yeah, I think you may be right. Clearly, the story doesn't make sense as it's being told, and I agree with you; I get the feeling that we're missing something, although the school district did not come up with a good explanation for their behavior, and those do sound like lame excuses: "He was allowing students to play on unapproved computers". Come on. You're going to let a substitute teacher go because of that? It doesn't make any sense. Maybe they didn't like him for whatever reason and this was just an excuse to get rid of him.

E: Sounds right.

R: Yeah, could be.

J: Well, definitely something that needs to be looked into further, because if it's true, he only performed a 30-second magic trick and he's generally a good substitute teacher and everything. Then you have to question--

R: Yeah, I mean, has anybody tried weighing him yet?

(chuckling)

S: See if he floats?

R: Yeah.

E: I know what you're saying, Jay, but--

J: On a serious note, though, let's go under the idea, real quick, that it's true the way that it's reflected here in the article. Then there's some serious problems with the people making decisions at that school.

R: I think we can agree on that.

S: Yes. It's not out of consideration that someone involved in that decision, because of their religious beliefs, thinks that performing magic tricks is, whatever, evil or demonic or wizardry. There are people who believe that.

R: Yeah, and I have to say, I know teachers who have been-- who've gotten a lot of crap from parents just for doing what you think might just be kind of cool lessons and ways to make learning more interesting, you know, parents can suddenly out of nowhere yell about, like I have a friend who does an Ouija board demonstration in his science class for seventh graders to get them thinking critically about "why does this work", then he teaches them about the ideomotor effect that's happening, things like that. And there are actually parents every year who won't allow their kids to participate in that lesson because they believe that the Ouija board is witchcraft. Like, they literally, they pull their child out of the class. So, I mean, it is within the realm of possibility.

S: Yeah. It'd be nice to get some follow-up; if anybody locally or otherwise sees any follow-up news on this, let us know. Usually after the splashy headline, you know, "teacher fired for wizardry", you don't get the details in the later follow-up stories; they're buried somewhere or nobody bothers following up on it.

E: Ms. Porter wrote, "Now Piculas believes the incident may have bewitched his ability to get a job anywhere else." (mockingly) Ha, ha, ha, well done.

(laughing)

S: That article basically writes itself.

Skeptical Quote of the Week (1:14:31)

It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.

S: The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe is produced by the New England Skeptical Society in association with the James Randi Educational Foundation and skepchick.org. For more information on this and other episodes, please visit our website at www.theskepticsguide.org. For questions, suggestions, and other feedback, please use the "Contact Us" form on the website, or send an email to info@theskepticsguide.org. If you enjoyed this episode, then please help us spread the word by voting for us on Digg, or leaving us a review on iTunes. You can find links to these sites and others through our homepage. 'Theorem' is produced by Kineto, and is used with permission.

References