Why do people love the taste of Umami but avoid monosodium glutamate (MSG), which is the purest form of Umami on Earth? In this episode of Point of Inquiry, Kavin Sen...
ListenPodcasts by Point of Inquiry
Point of Inquiry is the Center for Inquiry's flagship podcast, where the brightest minds of our time sound off on all the things you're not supposed to talk about at the dinner table: science, religion, and politics.
Guests have included Brian Greene, Susan Jacoby, Richard Dawkins, Ann Druyan, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Eugenie Scott, Adam Savage, Bill Nye, and Francis Collins.
Point of Inquiry is produced at the Center for Inquiry in Amherst, N.Y.
Further podcasts by Center for Inquiry
Podcast on the topic Philosophie
All episodes
To The Temple of Tranquility, and Step on It from 2023-11-22T20:02
Listen
Supreme Injustice from 2023-10-23T14:51
The U.S. Supreme Court -- that over sixty years ago ruled against state-led prayer in public schools -- has swung back the other way with a vengeance. The ultra-conservative majority on the cur...
Listen
Dr. Juhem Navarro-Rivera on the Challenge of Rallying the Nones from 2023-10-18T14:19
The Nones are on the rise! When asked about their religious affiliation, year after year, more and more Americans are choosing “none of the above.” The number of religiously unaffiliated America...
Listen
Getting to Know US Congressman Jared Huffman from 2023-08-09T15:53
Of the 535 Members of Congress, only one is an out-of-the-closet atheist. His name is Jared Huffman, and he is a U.S. Representative from Northern Cali...
Listen
The Great Australian Psychic Prediction Project from 2023-07-19T19:20
What happens when a group of skeptics from across the globe keeps score of over twenty years of psychic predictions? Any guesses?
In this episode of Po...
Listen
MG Lord on the Weird and Wonderful History of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory from 2023-05-10T20:52
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California may be the world's premiere space exploration facility. From the earliest days of rocketry, JPL has been ...
Listen
Jennifer Michael Hecht on the Power of Poetry and the Weirdness of Existence from 2023-04-14T14:31
“Many of us who are happy to live outside religion still suffer from a lack of things religion gives its members,” writes historian and poet Jennifer Michael Hecht. “It seems to me the...
Listen
New Discovery in the Chemistry of Life from 2022-11-28T10:00
Graham Cooks and his team at Purdue University have discovered a chemical process that has exciting implications for people who believe that life could have emerged spontaneously and through nat...
Listen
Broken Promises and False Prophets: Rina Raphael on the Business of Wellness from 2022-10-27T04:50
Listen
Alice Greczyn on Deconversion and Her Escape From Extremist Christianity from 2022-09-15T00:02:50
Realizing the faith you've had your entire life is wrong can be devastating for some people. The process of deconversion can lead to panic attacks, depression, and m...
Listen
Skepticism - Behind the Scenes from 2022-08-19T05:06:03
What do we do when television shows dealing with extraordinary events focus on the ridiculous to bolster views? In today's episode, we take a behind-the-scenes look at two people with experience...
Listen
Steven Pinker Discusses Rationality and Humanist Values from 2022-07-07T10:29:23
This special episode of Point of Inquiry is brought to you by our friends at Listen
Timothy Caulfield on the Infodemic and Spread of Misinformation from 2022-03-24T10:30
This week's episode is a bit different. Please enjoy a talk from Timothy Caulfield that originally aired on Skeptical Inqu...
Listen
Kelly Weill on Flat-Earthers and Why People Will Believe Anything from 2022-02-28T22:01:15
In this week's episode, we are diving into the flat-earth conspiracy theory and why people could believe such a thing with guest Kelly Weill an...
Listen
Living on Life's Edge | Carl Zimmer on The Search for What It Means to Be Alive from 2021-12-22T11:00
What does it mean to be alive? Does life have a clear definition? On this week's episode, Carl Zimmer joins host Jim Underdown to discuss his new book, Life's Ed...
Listen
The Case That Jesus Never Existed from 2021-12-02T17:06:01
Christians believe that Jesus was the son of God who walked the Earth as a human being. Some Atheists believe none of the God bits but that there was a man named Jes...
Listen
David McAfee - Hi, I'm an Atheist! from 2021-11-08T11:00
On today's episode we introduce the show's new guest host, Julia Sweeney and her interview with author David G. McAfee on his new book, Listen
Science Denial - Why It Happens and What to Do About It from 2021-09-28T17:28:38
Listen
Banachek - From the Inside of Being a Mentalist from 2021-08-12T18:41:58
It’s a rare person indeed who can trick and amaze people on one hand while reassuring them that what they are experiencing is not real. Meet Listen
How to Live a Good Life With Massimo Pigliucci and Skye Cleary from 2021-07-15T19:52:24
Have you ever been curious about what other people believe in or how they navigate the ethical challenges of life? Ancient philosophy was partly used as a w...
Listen
The Rise of the Nones with Ryan Burge from 2021-07-01T17:59:47
A question on the minds of many theists and non-theists alike is why are so many Americans leaving religion and becoming religiously unaffiliated? What are the under...
Listen
Greg Paul on the Lost Children and the Implications of Natural Evil from 2021-06-10T04:34:05
In the June/July issue of Free Inquiry, today's guest Gre...
Listen
Inside the Group Investigating Extraordinary Paranormal and Supernatural Claims from 2021-05-27T16:12:49
The Center for Inquiry Investigations Group tests extraordinary claims from anyone who believes they have paranormal or supernatural abilities like telekinesis, ...
Listen
Annabelle Gurwitch on Living Through Ups and Downs from 2021-05-13T10:00
Annabelle Gurwitch is an award-winning actress, comedian, and writer. She's also a secular humanist and a skeptic, though that hasn't always been the case -- at least not the skeptic part.
<... Listen
Interview with David Javerbaum, Daily Show Writer and host of Godcast Podcast from 2021-04-15T11:00
David Javerbaum is the guest on this week's episode of Point of Inquiry. David discusses his early writing career and his current gig as God.
Behind The Mind of a Conspiracy Theorist from 2021-03-30T17:57:47
Have you wondered what it's like to get caught up in a conspiracy theory? QAnon, the 9/11 truth movement, lizard people who want to take over the world. What does it take for rational humans to ...
Listen
An Atheist and a Christian Walk Into a Bar from 2021-02-19T19:06:03
An Atheist and a Christian Walk Into a Bar | Overcoming Differences
America is as polarized as it's been in decades a...
The Trouble with Christmas for Atheists with Tom Flynn from 2020-12-24T14:24:11
Christmas in 2020 will be unlike any other in recent history due to COVID 19. Nevertheless, Christians around the world will be finding ways to celebrate the birth of Christ.
On thi...
Listen
Revisiting The Life Of Frank Sinatra – Living A Life Of Homelessness from 2020-11-25T11:00
In 1997 Jim produced and directed a short documentary called “A Day in the Life of Frank Sinatra” that was an exploration of what it was like to be a homeless man with a famous name. Twenty thre...
Listen
The Puritan Roger Williams, Church State Separation, and The Impact on Today from 2020-11-12T11:00
What does the Puritan founder of both the state of Rhode Island and the Baptist Church have to say about modern evangelicals?
Roger Williams had certain ideas that didn...
Listen
J.R. Becker on the Annabelle and Aiden Book Series and Teaching Children Critical Thinking from 2020-10-22T10:00
Author J.R. Becker joins Leighann Lord in this episode of Point of Inquiry to speak about his book series, Annabelle & Aiden. The series is a pro-scie...
Listen
Chris Matheson on Writing Bill and Ted and his Books on God and Buddha from 2020-10-08T10:00
Screenwriter and author Chris Matheson joins Jim in this episode which touches on the recently released Bill & Ted Face the Music, then dives deeply into
Listen
Rev. Barry W. Lynn on The Supreme Court, Retirement, and His Upcoming Book from 2020-09-24T10:00
The recent passing of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has left many shaken. A few w...
Listen
Dr. Raymond Hall on Physicsfun and Teaching Critical Thinking from 2020-09-10T11:00
One professor is using social media to remind us that physics is the real magic of the universe. Through showing off his massive collection of science gadgets and physics toys, Dr. Raymond Hall ...
Listen
The Brazen Atheist Erin Louis on Countering Conspiracists With Critical Thinking from 2020-08-20T10:00
Would you rather have your children looking at QAnon conspiracy Youtubers or porn online? That's a question author Erin Louis has had to confront with her teenage son. How do you employ cr...
Listen
Steven Hassan on Breaking Down The Cult of Trump from 2020-07-23T10:00
The names Jim Jones, L.Ron Hubbard, David Koresh, and Sun Myung Moon might come to mind when someone uses the term cult leader. Many have suggested that Donald Trump falls into the ca...
Listen
Anthony Pinn on Religion, Oppression, and Humanists from 2020-07-09T10:00
In this episode of Point of Inquiry, co-host Leighann Lord talks with professor, writer, and humanist Dr. Anth...
Listen
Scientology in Hollywood | A Guided Tour from 2020-06-26T10:00
Looming over the sidewalk of Hollywood, California are tens of millions of dollars of buildings owned by the Church of Scientology. This beleaguered religion may have had a decade of bad PR, but...
Listen
Monuments to Misinformation | The Ark Experience&Creation Museum from 2020-06-09T09:30
A short drive south of Cincinnati, OH, lie two well-funded, well-executed museums dedicated to the telling of biblical "history." The Creation Museum and the Ark Experience came about through An...
Listen
The Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe and Science-Based Medicine's Steven Novella from 2020-05-21T10:00
In this episode of Point of Inquiry, cohost Leighann Lord talks with famous skeptic and Assistant Professor of Neurology, Steven Novella, MD.
Novella is also the founder and curr...
Listen
Ian Harris on Comedy, Skeptical Audiences, and Atheism from 2020-05-07T10:00
In this episode of Point of Inquiry, cohost Leighann Lord talks with fellow comic Ian Harris.
Besides being a comedian, Harris is a voice actor, writer, director, and MMA trainer...
Listen
Mandisa Thomas on Black Nonbelievers and the Atheist Community from 2020-04-23T10:00
On this week's episode, Leighann Lord speaks with Mandisa Thomas, president of Black Nonbelievers Listen
Kurt Andersen, Fantastyland, and How Irrational Thought Worsened the Pandemic from 2020-04-09T10:00
Kurt Andersen is the author of the novels Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History (2017), True Believers (2012), Heyday (2007), and
Recognizing Misinformation and Staying Safe from Coronavirusa from 2020-03-11T10:00
Coronavirus continues to infect more and more people around the world. As the number of infected grows so does the misinformation surrounding the virus and the disease ...
Listen
Professor Elizabeth Loftus on False Memories from 2020-02-20T11:30
Can our memories be trusted if they are easily manipulated by suggestions? Where is the line between repressed memories that bubble up to the surface and false memories...
Listen
Where Are We In The Battle For Church State Separation from 2020-02-06T12:00
Where does the separation of church and state stand with a conservative majority in the Supreme Court? The short answer: not great.
In this week's episode, Jim U...
Listen
Is a Good God Logically Possible? | James Sterba from 2020-01-23T11:30
James Sterba is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, USA. His book, Is a Good God Logically Possible? d...
Listen
Playwright and Actor Ian Ruskin on Thomas Paine from 2020-01-09T11:00
Ian Ruskin is a producer, writer, actor and trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. He has starred in theatre, television, and film in both the UK and the US. He has written and ...
Listen
Dawkins on his new Book Outgrowing God from 2019-12-12T12:00
Richard Dawkins is the recipient of a number of awards for his writing on science, including the Royal Society of Literature Award and the LA Times Literary Prize, he has also been awar...
Listen
Professor Chris French - Anomalistic Psychology and Conspiracy Theories in Politics from 2019-11-29T11:30
Chris French is a British psychologist and prominent skeptic focusing on the psychology of paranormal beliefs and experiences. He is currently Professor of Psychology at Goldsmiths College, Univ...
Listen
Richard Wiseman on the Skeptics Movement and Tricking People from 2019-11-14T11:30
Richard Wiseman is Professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire in England. Richard began his career as a professional magician before pursuing a career...
Listen
ECSO President, Claire Klingenberg on the State of Skepticism from 2019-10-31T10:00
How Defy Ventures Reduces Recidivism with Rehabilitation from 2019-10-17T10:00
In the second part of this two-part series on the prison system reform, Jim Underdown speaks with Andrew Glazier, president of Defy Ventures, on the high recidivism rates in prisons, how Glazier...
Listen
Former Security Guard and Atheist Activist Steve Hill on the Prison System from 2019-10-03T10:00
How humane are prisons in the U.S.? And what is their purpose – to punish or to rehabilitate?
This is part one of a two-part series that dives into the prison system, what it looks like f...
Listen
Angela Saini on the Return of Race Science from 2019-09-19T10:30
Even though there’s growing awareness that race is a social construct — it defies biological definition — it’s really hard to let go of a concept that feels so real. There’s also a tem...
Listen
Jerry Minor - From Jehovah’s Witness to Comedian from 2019-08-22T09:00
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes actor, comedian, and former Jehovah's Witness, Jerry Minor. Minor has been a cast member and writer on Saturday Night Live and appeared on HBO's Mr. Show and...
Listen
Clearing Up the Concept of Risk Assessment from 2019-08-08T10:00
How well do you think you can assess risk? The evidence is clear that humans are innately poor at assessing risk in our personal lives, in part due to how our brains are wired, and that can make...
Listen
Julia Sweeney on Atheism, Saturday Night Live, and Me Too from 2019-07-25T10:00
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes comedian, monologist, and atheist, Julia Sweeney. Many may know Sweeney from her time on Saturday Night Live, her appearances on NPR's Wait Wait...Don't Tell...
Listen
Why Do People Love Umami but Fear MSG? from 2019-07-11T10:00
Diving into the Lawsuit Against Walmart and Fraudulent Homeopathic Medicines from 2019-06-27T09:00
Meet Science for the People from 2019-06-13T08:00
Science for the People began as a group in 1969 that grew out of the anti-war movement and...
Listen
Matt Walsh On The Road To Hollywood, His Secular Wedding, and More from 2019-05-30T08:00
On this week's episode of Point of Inquiry, Jim Underdown speaks with longtime friend, actor, writer, and comedian Matt Walsh. This episode may be different from what you're used to as we take a...
Listen
Dr. Jenny Yip on OCD, Anxiety, and Mental Health from 2019-05-16T09:00
On this week's episode of Point of Inquiry, Dr. Jenny Yip discusses OCD and anxiety and the widespread impact these can have on our lives as well as how they're exhibited in different people. Ka...
Listen
Carol Tavris And Avrum Bluming On The Myth That Estrogen Causes Breast Cancer from 2019-05-02T12:00
This week’s episode of Point of Inquiry Jim Underdown speaks with Carol Tavris, social psychologist and author of Mistakes Were Made (But Not By Me) and Avrum Bluming, hematologist, med...
Listen
Massimo Pigliucci and Susan Blackmore on Scientism and Subjectivity from 2019-04-18T12:00
This week's episode of Point of Inquiry is our final episode recorded from CSICon 2018. We're closing this series of interviews with Professor Massimo Pigliucci who discusses his ideas on Listen
The Secret Sting Operation to Expose Celeb Psychics with Susan Gerbic from 2019-04-04T11:00
On this week's episode of Point of Inquiry, we are thrilled to have friend of the Center for Inquiry, Susan Gerbic to talk about the recent Listen
Mark Boslough on the Dangers of Climate Change and Destructive Asteroids from 2019-03-21T12:00
Mark Boslough is a Caltech-trained physicist and CSI Fellow who spent 34 years at Sandia National Laboratories doing research on hypervelocity impacts, energetic materials, explosions, and globa...
Listen
Carl Zimmer and Paul Offit on Genetics, Race, and Vaccinations at CSICon 2018 from 2019-03-07T13:00
We find ourselves in the information age among many who, although have the access to proper and accurate scientific information, choose not to believe it.
What causes the parents of a new...
Listen
The New Stars of Skeptical Investigation from 2019-02-21T12:00
The world of skeptical investigation is full of interesting personalities full of stories about their run-ins with ghost chasers, debunking charlatans, and dealing with "magic". Today on Point o...
Listen
Twitter’s Resident Gynecologist And The Crusher Of The Gender Binary from 2019-02-07T13:00
Dr. Jen Gunter is an OB/GYN, pain medicine physician, and Twitter's resident gynecologist. She blogs and also writes The Cycle, a column on the intersection sex, science, and society, for the Ne...
Listen
The Battle for Young Minds - Bertha Vazquez on Teaching Evolution in Schools from 2019-01-24T13:00
Listen
Adam Conover and Tim Caulified on The Algorithm, Gwyneth Paltrow, Netflix and more from 2019-01-10T13:00
The Odyssey of the Plutophiles: Alan Stern and David Grinspoon on the Voyage of New Horizons from 2018-05-17T19:34:31
In July of 2015, a spacecraft called New Horizons gave humankind its first close-up view of a small, misunderstood world called Pluto. It took almost 10 years for New Horizons to soar across mor...
Listen
Trying to Throw Science at Them: Yvette d'Entremont and Kavin Senapathy on Food, Fads, and Fear from 2017-12-30T00:22:17
We are living in a land of confusion, as the band Genesis warned us back in 1986, but even they could n...
Listen
Margaret Sullivan: Reckoning and Redemption for the Reality-Based Press from 2017-12-06T19:49:26
In the post-truth world, the mainstream media is beset on all sides. Peddlers of propaganda, misinformation, and conspiracy theories seek to strip the media of its authority by creating parallel...
Listen
Lee Billings on the Search for Life in a Silent Universe from 2017-09-27T18:47:03
It’s a big cosmos out there. It wasn’t too long ago that we couldn’t be sure that any planets existed anywhere outside of our own solar system. But in just the past handful of years, we’ve learn...
Listen
Be Not Constrained: James Croft on Humanists’ Responsibility to Fight Oppression from 2017-08-24T22:15:18
The modern conception of secular humanism arose in large part as a response to the horrors of Nazism and the Holocaust, and the evils of racism and bigotry. Humanist Manifesto II, written in 197...
Listen
Space Reporter Loren Grush: Hope and Hubris in Space Exploration from 2017-07-18T16:31:34
The U.S. space program is both beloved and neglected. It brings us breathtaking pictures from distant worlds and drives the human species to push itself farther out into the cosmos. But at the s...
Listen
Elizabeth Kolbert on Coming to Grips with a Warming Planet from 2017-06-12T16:15:33
We want to believe that climate change can be stopped, that humanity can summon the political will to take decisive and meaningful action to avert disaster and save civilization. But the difficu...
Listen
Carl Pope on Trump, Paris, and the Climate: We’re Going to Be Okay from 2017-06-02T20:40:40
On June 1, President Donald Trump declared that he was withdrawing the United States from the Paris climate accord, an international agreement meant to significantly reduce gree...
Listen
Show Update - Get Ready for Point of Inquiry: The Next Generation from 2017-05-03T19:59:37
Don’t touch that podcast!
Yes, Lindsay Beyerstein and Josh Zepps have moved on to new endeavors, but a new chapter for Point of Inquiry is about to begin...
Listen
Is Anybody Listening? Jill Tarter on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence from 2017-04-24T18:23:02
Jill Tarter holds the Bernard M. Oliver Chair for SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, CA where she also served as the former ...
Listen
Sarah Posner: How Trump Got His Hands on the Religious Right from 2017-04-11T16:48:34
How did a man living an ostensibly godless, hedonistic life become the champion of the very groups who one would expect to denounce his behavior? Being a real es...
Listen
Paul Offit: The Fate of Science in an Age of Darkness from 2017-04-04T18:24:18
While science was once the force that propelled humanity into an age of enlightenment, a pernicious fear of science and the unknown threatens to plunge society to into an age of darkn...
Listen
Phoebe Maltz Bovy: Check Your Privilege-Checking from 2017-03-28T17:05:01
Often when we talk about privilege, we’re referring to the systemic advantages some groups of people have over others, by virtue of their race, gender, or orientation. Having social ...
Listen
Mile-High Violence: Judith Matloff on Mountain Conflict from 2017-03-20T17:31:09
People living at mountainous high altitudes account for only 10 percent of the world’s population, spread out over roughly 25 percent of the Earth’s surface, and yet they also are res...
Listen
Tweaking the Travel Ban: Dahlia Lithwick on Trump’s Revised Executive Order from 2017-03-14T18:50:23
President Trump’s travel ban aimed at select Muslim-majority countries (with exceptions for Christian minorities) was first framed this past January as an urgent action to prote...
Listen
Lawrence Krauss: Accidental Origins from 2017-03-06T18:02:03
Fate. Purpose. Design. These are words that hang over many of our heads as we navigate the everyday chaos of life. Religion is often given exclusive purview over the discourse surroun...
Listen
The Pains of Justice: David M. Engel on Why Americans Don’t Sue from 2017-02-27T20:52:12
Americans have a stereotype of being somewhat lawsuit-happy. Any disagreements, no matter how small, wind up in court and we will sue the pants off our neighbors at the slightes...
Listen
James McGrath Morris on Ethel Payne, First Lady of the Black Press from 2017-02-20T18:05:11
Every significant turn towards progress has had its trailblazers, and history can easily forget these pioneering individuals who have helped get us to where we are today. One of...
Listen
Gary Taubes: The Bittersweet Truth about the Dangers of Sugar from 2017-02-13T20:09:10
Diabetes and obesity are on the rise in America in epidemic proportions, but we don’t respond to it with the urgency of an epidemic. Sugar industry lobbyists work hard to keep regulat...
Listen
Science, Stopped at the Border: Jen Golbeck on Science in Trump’s America from 2017-02-06T18:28:54
The United States leads the world in science and innovation, but there’s no guarantee that this will always be the case. The Trump administration’s orders to halt federal scienc...
Listen
Murder, Chaos, and Cover-Ups After Hurricane Katrina, with Ronnie Greene from 2017-01-30T18:02:51
Ronnie Green is a Pulitzer-winning journalist and author whose latest book is Shots on the Bridge: Police Violence and Cover-Up in the Wake of Katrina. His book ...
Listen
Extended Mileage in Someone Else’s Shoes: Ted Conover on Immersive Journalism from 2017-01-24T17:46:58
Ted Conover is an American journalist and author, known for fully immersing himself in the world of the subjects he covers. Conover writes about the people we understand the least by ...
Listen
Daniel Dennett: The Magic of Consciousness…Without the Magic from 2017-01-17T19:27:33
Daniel C. Dennett is one of the most influential philosophers of our time, perhaps best known in cognitive science for his multiple drafts (or "fame in the brain") model of human cons...
Listen
Enemies List Redux: Rick Perlstein on the Parallels between Trump and Nixon from 2017-01-09T20:30:36
With great power, comes great responsibility, so we are told by Voltaire and Peter Parker’s Uncle Ben. It’s something we learn anew with each presidency, as the person who holds...
Listen
Should Atheists Celebrate Christmas? Tom Flynn Debates Lindsay Beyerstein from 2016-12-27T18:57:13
Tom Flynn is Executive Director of Council for Secular Humanism (a program of the Center for Inquiry), as well as a novelist, journalist, and editor of Free Inquiry
Listen
Amanda Marcotte on the Trump Transition and the Reshaping of America from 2016-12-21T16:41:06
There's no question that Trump and his incoming administration have plans to take the country in a very different direction on a plethora of issues. To help us sort through what...
Listen
Embargo for America: Andrew W. Cohen on Smuggling and the Rise of a Superpower from 2016-12-12T18:20:15
From the early isolationist policies of George Washington to Thomas Jefferson’s universal embargo on foreign trade, 19th century America had no plans to become an imperial power...
Listen
Michael Berube: The Value and the Virtue of Raising a Child with Down Syndrome from 2016-12-05T20:16:51
Michael Berube is the Director of the Institute for the Arts and Humanities at Pennsylvania State University where he teaches American literature, disabilities studies, and cul...
Listen
Only as Bad as it’s Ever Been: PJ O’Rourke on American Values, Politics and Culture from 2016-11-28T18:12:52
This week we’re dusting off a favorite Point of Inquiry episode from three years ago: Josh Zepps' conversation with P.J. O'Rourke – humorist, cultural commentator and ...
Listen
The Normalization of Hate: David Neiwert on Trump and the Rise of the Alt-Right from 2016-11-21T17:37:40
There’s no getting around the fact that the alt-right has come out of the shadows to fully embrace Trump as their candidate. From Steve Bannon to David Duke, controversial support did...
Listen
Trump’s Victory and the Challenge to a Secular America, with Larry Decker from 2016-11-14T17:57:25
The religiously unaffiliated, also known as the “nones,” are currently the largest “faith” demographic in the country. Yet evangelicals beat them two to one in turnout at the po...
Listen
Comprehending the Incomprehensible: Samuel Arbesman on Rapidly Accelerating Technology from 2016-11-07T18:42:58
We live in a digital era in which science and technology have revealed new frontiers never before possible. In developing the complicated technologies that permeate our lives, is it p...
Listen
Halloween Special: Joe Nickell on the Paranormal's Origin Story from 2016-10-31T22:59:58
Joe Nickell is perhaps the world's foremost investigator of the paranormal, as well as a magician and author, and he joins us for this special Halloween episode to discuss his recent ...
Listen
Cats and the Domestication of Humans, with Abigail Tucker from 2016-10-24T20:36:17
The cat. King of the jungle, emperor of the internet, overlord of our homes? Cats are easily among the most adaptable mesopredator, able to survive and thrive everywhere from th...
Listen
Trolling Unplugged: Benjamin Radford on the Creepy Clown Craze from 2016-10-17T20:19:34
Halloween is almost here, and Target stores are pulling clown masks from their shelves. After the creepy clown craze made its way through Europe, the circus has finally arrived in the...
Listen
Godless Infidels: Leigh Eric Schmidt on Atheism in the 19th Century from 2016-10-10T19:32:25
Today the United States is the most secular and irreligious it has ever been. According to Listen
Doomsday Dread: The End of Civilization, with Phil Torres from 2016-10-04T17:59:24
Phil Torres is an author, contributing writer for the Future of Life Institute, and an Affiliate Scholar at the Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. His writing has been fe...
Listen
Editing Our Pasts: Dr. Julia Shaw on The Illusion of Memory from 2016-09-26T19:53:52
Dr. Julia Shaw is a psychological scientist and senior researcher in the Department of Law and Social Science at London South Bank University. She teaches at the undergraduate and gra...
Listen
The People vs. the Planet: Barry Vann on the Consequences of Climate Change from 2016-09-19T18:35:45
Since the beginning of humankind unpredictable forces of nature have been among our most dangerous threats: volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, tornados, hurricanes, an...
Listen
Terrible Food, Small Portions: Andrew Stark on Accepting Your Inevitable Demise from 2016-09-12T19:22:04
Death is an unsettling thing to come to grips with. We know it is inevitable that it will one day happen to us. One of the first things most of us learn about death is that it happens...
Listen
In the Weeds with Emily Willingham on Medical Cannabis from 2016-09-07T20:37:23
Emily Willingham is a journalist, scientist, and award winning skeptical blogger, with much of her work centered on autism and debunking junk science controversies. Recently the autis...
Listen
Faking Your Own Death: Elizabeth Greenwood on Death Fraud from 2016-08-29T18:29:50
Elizabeth Greenwood teaches at Columbia University and like many other young professionals she has an insurmountable amount of student loan debt. With the overwhelming feeling that sh...
Listen
Getting to the Pit of the Bull: Bronwen Dickey on Canines and Conspiracies from 2016-08-23T17:39:52
Bronwen Dickey is a contributing editor at The Oxford American, and author of Pit Bull: The Battle Over an American Icon. Her writing can also be found in The New York Times...
Listen
Competitive Cupping: David Gorski on Pseudoscience at the Olympics from 2016-08-16T15:38:02
Those following the Olympics this year may have noticed Michael Phelps sporting circular bruises all over his body. That’s because Phelps, like many Olympic athletes, won’t go after t...
Listen
Faisal Saeed Al Mutar: Facebook and Social Media Silencing from 2016-08-08T17:40:05
Iraqi-born writer Faisal Saeed Al Mutar is a blogger for the Huffington Post and a columnist for the Center for Inquiry’s own Free Inquiry magazine. Having grown ...
Listen
Donald Trump's Dirty Laundry, with David Cay Johnston from 2016-08-02T19:40:04
David Cay Johnston is an award winning investigative journalist and New York Times best-selling author, as well as one of few journalists who has deeply dug into th...
Listen
Wendy Kaminer: Dangerous Spaces for Free Speech from 2016-07-26T18:44:04
Free speech on college campuses has become a topic of impassioned debate, as the lines between hate speech and harassment, or peaceful protest and public disturbance, are rather...
Listen
Ali Rizvi: Islam and Identity for an Atheist Muslim from 2016-07-18T19:02:58
Religions have always gone through transitions over time. Not only do the faiths themselves evolve, but the role they play in day-to-day life adapts to fit the needs of a...
Listen
Digitally Aware: David Levy on Mindfulness in an Information Overload from 2016-07-11T19:16:50
It was only a couple of decades ago that the most complex handheld computing system fathomable was a TI-83 graphing calculator. Technology has usually served to ma...
Listen
Surviving the Beauty Culture, with Autumn Whitefield-Mandrano from 2016-06-28T19:22:42
Autumn Whitefield-Mandrano is the author of the acclaimed new book on feminism and beauty, Face Value: The Hidden Ways Beauty Shapes Women’s Lives. Her work can ...
Listen
Invisible Asperger’s: Michelle Vines on Late-Life Diagnosis from 2016-06-20T19:45:18
Michelle Vines grew up knowing she was different from other people. She always assumed she was just a bit odd and eccentric but never in a way that suggested she wasn’t neurotyp...
Listen
Bloody Bangladesh: Michael De Dora on the Attacks on Secularists from 2016-06-13T21:33:18
Jessica Valenti: The Measure of a Woman's Worth from 2016-06-07T20:33:30
Author and Guardian US columnist Jessica Valenti is a pioneer of digital-age feminist writing, starting her blog feministin...
Listen
Susan Jacoby on Conversions, Both Profound and Practical from 2016-05-31T21:19:50
In the literature about religious conversion, embracing a new faith is usually explained as being a profound and magical experience. A flash of light, a near death experience, a...
Listen
Hooked on a Stigma: Maia Szalavitz on Understanding Addiction from 2016-05-23T22:19:16
Maia Szalavitz is an author and award-winning journalist specializing in science, public policy, and addiction treatment. Most famous of her several books was he...
Listen
An Unrecognizable Reformation: Shadi Hamid on Islamic Exceptionalism from 2016-05-17T20:16:32
This week, Josh Zepps sits down with commentator and writer Shadi Hamid. He’s a senior fellow in the Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World at the Brookings Institutio...
Listen
Lies They Told My Mother: Dr. Amy Tuteur on the Moralization of Childbirth from 2016-05-09T17:15:54
Dr. Amy Tuteur is an obstetrician-gynecologist and writer, returning to Point of Inquiry to discuss her new book, Push Back: Guilt in the Age of Natural Parenting Listen
Race Car Brains with Bicycle Brakes: Dr. Ned Hallowell on ADHD in a Distracting World from 2016-05-03T15:39:13
Dr. Ned Hallowell is a child and adult psychiatrist, a New York Times bestselling author, and among the world’s leading experts in the field of attention deficit hyper...
Listen
Single Ladies, Single Longer: Rebecca Traister on the Rise of the Unmarried Woman from 2016-04-26T16:32:21
For a very long time marriage was considered a foundation of American life. Adulthood and marriage came hand in hand, and shortly after marriage children were the next logical step. B...
Listen
The Burzynski Case and the Pitfalls of Medical Journalism, with Tamar Wilner from 2016-04-18T18:29:28
Medical doctors can hold our lives in their hands. But with great power comes great responsibility, and doctors owe it to their patients to provide accurate information and treatments...
Listen
Johann Hari: The Beginning of the End of the War on Drugs from 2016-04-13T19:36:29
This week we welcome back journalist Johann Hari, author of Chasing the Scream: The First and Last Days of the War on Drugs. Hari is a vocal advocate for ending the dr...
Listen
David Silverman: The Relentless Ascent of Atheism from 2016-04-04T20:10:44
David Silverman, president of American Atheists, was recently seen on championing the importance of the atheist vote to American conservatives on the late night comedy show, Listen
Surviving Death: Ann Neumann on the Ethical Landscape of Dying from 2016-03-28T17:19:06
Many of us picture our dying moments as being surrounded by loved ones, uttering last words of gratitude and advice before we slip off into a peaceful departure. Yet the reality...
Listen
The Odds of Life’s Oddities, with Mathematician John Allen Paulos from 2016-03-21T17:57:34
John Allen Paulos is an award winning mathematician and best selling author. A professor in mathematics at Temple University, he has written for The Guardian...
Listen
Former White Supremacist Arno Michaelis: Understanding Hate, Overcoming Fear from 2016-03-15T17:33:01
Today’s guest is former white supremacist Arno Michaelis, author of My Life After Hate. A leader within what he called a “racial holy war," Michaelis later realized hi...
Listen
The Cunning Art of Con Artistry, with Maria Konnikova from 2016-03-07T20:38:01
What is it about human behavior that allows con artists to pull off elaborate scams in which they fool thousands? Moreover what is about those thousands of people — many of them...
Listen
Censorship in the Islamic World, Through the Eyes of Journalist Jessica Davey-Quantick from 2016-02-29T21:44:46
We know more and more about how repressive attitudes about blasphemy and religious criticism in parts of the Islamic world can become explosive, as with the Charlie Hebdo attacks or t...
Listen
Can't Help Helping: Larissa MacFarquhar on Attitudes Toward Altruism from 2016-02-23T15:18:17
Most of us have no problem operating under the notion that we should do unto others as we would have others do unto us. But what do we make of people who do go well beyond that, while...
Listen
Sex and the Safely Satisfied, with Jaclyn Friedman (Valentine's Day Special) from 2016-02-14T16:55:26
Jaclyn Friedman is a writer, speaker, and sex education activist, challenging misconceptions about what it means to have consenting, satisfying sex. She’s the author of What Yo...
Listen
Robyn Blumner and Ronald A. Lindsay: A Joining of Forces, a Passing of the Torch from 2016-02-08T18:43:19
The freethought movement has seen two of its most respected and influential institutions combine into what has been called a “supergroup” for secularism. The Center for Inquiry,...
Listen
Athens' Atheists: Tim Whitmarsh on Religious Doubt in Ancient Greece from 2016-02-01T18:31:08
In ancient Greece, did everyone unquestioningly believe in the gods of Olympus? Was there no one in classical Athens to write the equivalent of “The Zeus Delusio...
Listen
Judaism for Nones: Millennials and God, with Rabbi Mark Wildes from 2016-01-25T17:52:17
The “nones” are on the rise in the U.S. with 33 million Americans identifying as having no religious affiliation. Atheists shouldn’t get too excited, though, because 68% of the unaffi...
Listen
Avoiding the TRAP: Defending Legal Abortion, with David A. Grimes, M.D. from 2016-01-19T17:57:30
This week Point of Inquiry welcomes Dr. David Grimes, a board certified physician in obstetrics and gynecology and author of the new book Every Third Woman in Am...
Listen
Religious Belief, Naturally Selected - with John C. Wathey from 2016-01-12T17:33
Throughout history, humans have looked to religion to explain why the world is the way it is. Thanks to the development of science, we now have more concrete ways of understandi...
Listen
Retconning Christmas: David Kyle Johnson on the Real Reason for the Season from 2015-12-07T19:57:48
During the perennial War on Christmas, certain Christians often feel the need to remind the rest pf us what the holiday season is really about. It’s Jesus Christ’s birthday and we’re ...
Listen
Islam, Paris, and Polarization - with Michael Brooks from 2015-11-30T16:34:48
After the Paris attacks, tensions are running higher than they have in many years over the threat posed by Islamism, how we should talk about it, and how policy should respond to it. ...
Listen
No, This Podcast is Not About You: David Laporte on the Proliferation of Paranoia from 2015-11-23T17:57:19
You don’t have to be paranoid to recognize that privacy isn’t what it used to be. The government can get access to our phone calls and emails, video surveillance is becoming a norm in...
Listen
Steve Silberman: Evolving Attitudes Toward Autism from 2015-11-17T18:46:12
It used to be that autism was considered to be the result of poor parenting, but starting in the 1930s, it was understood to be a hereditary condition, and the beha...
Listen
Mexico’s Drug Policy in Flux, with Sylvia Longmire from 2015-11-10T23:04:24
Is smoking pot a fundamental human right? On Wednesday, November 4th Mexico’s Supreme Court ruled that four individuals involved in a private cannabis club have the...
Listen
Conjuring Rose: Joe Nickell’s Annual Houdini Séance (Halloween Extra) from 2015-10-31T22:50:47
Most people know Harry Houdini as the world famous magician and illusionist, but in addition to his life as a performer, Houdini was also known to have a deep fascination with the af...
Listen
Sarah Posner: Trump, Carson, and the Religious Right in 2016 from 2015-10-27T17:55:36
This week Josh Zepps chats about the 2016 Republican presidential primaries with journalist Sarah Posner, a senior correspondent for Religion Dispatches and the author...
Listen
Taste the Science! - Serious Eats' J. Kenji López-Alt from 2015-10-19T17:35:44
Myths and pseudoscience do not only apply to the realms of religion, alternative medicine, and the paranormal. One area of our lives in which science and a little myth-busting c...
Listen
Putting Kids First: Sarah Levin and Ed Beck on Vaccine Laws from 2015-10-12T17:02:26
With misinformation about vaccines proliferating among certain groups in the U.S., diseases that had previously been thought eradicated are creeping back into American life. As far as...
Listen
The Mysteries of Parkinson’s, with Jon Palfreman from 2015-10-05T17:26:19
Brains, the means by which we scrutinize our world, are themselves inscrutable, and no more so than when things are going wrong. Just ask our guest this week, award ...
Listen
Trials and Textbooks: Jeffrey Selman on Fighting Creationism in Schools from 2015-09-29T18:23:34
When the public school board in Cobb County, Georgia, placed a disclaimer describing evolution as “just a theory” (in the non-scientific sense) and not a fact, citizen and author Jeff...
Listen
Keep ‘Em Separated: Rev. Barry Lynn on God and Government from 2015-09-21T17:16:01
One of the United States’ most prominent and respected advocates for secularism is a reverend, and that of course is our guest this week, Rev. Barry Lynn, executive director of Americ...
Listen
Craig Unger on the U.S. and Saudi Arabia: Frenemies 14 Years after 9/11 from 2015-09-14T16:51:35
Invisible Catastrophes: Erik Loomis on the Consequences of Outsourcing from 2015-09-08T20:27:41
The City is Still Drowning: Gary Rivlin on New Orleans Ten Years After Katrina from 2015-08-31T17:43:35
Ten years ag...
Listen
Dealing with Distraction in the Modern World, with Matt Crawford from 2015-08-10T16:00:19
Every year te...
Listen
Stephen M. Walt: Learning to Live with the Islamic State from 2015-07-28T19:43:32
As difficult ...
Listen
Patient Autonomy and Shifting Medical Ethics, with Dr. Barron Lerner from 2015-07-20T16:48:39
Listen
Radical Nationalism in Greece and the Romance of “No,” with Daphne Halikiopoulou from 2015-07-14T16:51:41
On July 5th, ...
Listen
Taslima Nasrin: A Woman of Courage without a Country from 2015-07-06T16:11:50
Taslima Nasri...
Listen
Bangladeshi Blogger Asif Mohiuddin: Attacked, Imprisoned, and Undeterred from 2015-06-29T17:26:09
This week we ...
Listen
Anti-Abortion Terrorism and Free Speech, with David Cohen from 2015-06-08T16:45:08
Opponents of ...
Listen
The Benefits of Religion Without the Belief, with Jeff Rasely from 2015-06-01T17:43:42
Religion is a...
Listen
Michael Specter on the Gluten-Free Fad from 2015-05-26T16:39:44
This week on Point of Inquiry, Lindsay Beyerstein is joined by renowned journalis...
Listen
Clearing Up the Calorie: The Science of Nutrition, with Marion Nestle from 2015-05-11T16:22:38
When over one...
Listen
Peter Singer: Maximizing Morality with Reason from 2015-04-27T18:20:53
Peter Singer has revolutionized the way we think about morals and values. He’s lead the way in providing evide...
Listen
Bassem Youssef and Ahmed Ahmed: The Risk and Rewards of Satire from 2015-04-13T17:51:40
While Bassem Youssef’s satirical voice has made him widely known as the Egyptian Jon Stewart, merely five year...
Listen
Phil Zuckerman: Those Normal, Upstanding Nonbelievers from 2015-04-06T15:07:09
Phil Zuckerma...
Listen
Realpolitik and America's Conflict with Iran, with Joint Chiefs of Staff Advisor David Crist from 2015-03-30T18:12:23
Negotiations between Iran and the U.S. in concert with Germany and the United Nations Security Council are set...
Listen
Johann Hari: The Falsehoods of Addiction and The War on Drugs from 2015-03-23T19:42:25
Billions of d...
Listen
The World Human Extinction Will Leave Behind, with Michael Tennesen from 2015-03-16T17:03:10
As climate change progresses and takes its toll on the planet, the life forms we share ...
Listen
Eli Lake: How Islamic is 'Islamic Extremism'? from 2015-03-09T16:51:55
This week on Point of Inquiry, Josh Zep...
Listen
False Memories Creating False Criminals, with Dr. Julia Shaw from 2015-03-02T19:01:08
Memory is remarkably fallible, as we often frust...
Listen
Leighann Lord: Courageous Comedy as a Safe Space from 2015-02-23T18:26:21
This week on a special episode highligh...
Listen
Laci Green: Truths and Myths about Sex and Love from 2015-02-14T15:42:27
This week Point of Inquiry welcomes Laci Green for a special tell-all Valentine's Day episode. Green is a popular Youtube video blogger, sex education activist and feminist. In a time when sex p...
Listen
Letting Go of the Soul, with Julien Musolino from 2015-02-09T17:48:38
Intuitively, it can feel as though the essence of our thoughts and feelings exists separate from the body and brain, and ...
Listen
Paul Offit, MD, on Measles in the Magic Kingdom and the Anti-Vaccine Movement from 2015-02-02T17:10:26
Measles are the newest attraction at Disneyland this season, and unfortunately the only thing magical about them is how q...
Listen
The Women Spies of the Civil War, with Karen Abbott from 2015-01-20T18:20:56
This week on Point of inquiry, New...
Listen
Before Charlie Hebdo: The Danish Cartoons that Shook the world, with Jytte Klausen from 2015-01-12T20:13:03
The terrorist attack on Charlie Hebdo was a human atrocity, as well as an assault on free expression. Yet numerous prominent n...
Listen
Penalizing Pregnancy: Lynn Paltrow on the Fight for Reproductive Justice from 2015-01-05T18:39:52
The effort to overturn Roe v. Wade Listen
Greta Christina on Coping with Death, No Afterlife Required from 2014-12-22T18:03:30
Our Guest this week is Greta Christina, popular atheist blogger, speaker and author of several books on atheism includi...
Listen
Frank Schaeffer on Cynicism and Paranoia in the "War on Christmas" from 2014-12-16T20:51:08
Fox News’ "War on Christmas" is already in full swing, as Bill O’Reilly wasted no time jumping into battle this year to defend the holi...
Listen
Ronald A. Lindsay: Why God Can't Tell Us What to Do from 2014-12-08T19:45:26
Despite the fact that the United States was founded as a secular state, government neutrality toward religion remains a tumultuous and ...
Listen
Deciphering Alan Turing, with Andrew Hodges from 2014-12-01T20:59:32
Alan Turing was a true visionary. Foun...
Listen
Getting Over Racial Anxiety, with Rachel D. Godsil from 2014-11-24T22:03:49
As a nation, the U.S. prides itself on at least aspiring to the ideal of equality, even if it often falls short. The educational, healt...
Listen
Surviving Saddam and Confronting Islam, with Faisal Saeed Al Mutar from 2014-11-19T17:38:08
As the threat posed by radical Islamists like those of ISIS grows in popular awareness, Islam itself becomes more of a target for criti...
Listen
Steven Pinker: Using Grammar as a Tool, Not as a Weapon from 2014-11-10T20:04:42
The English language is often treated as delicate and precious, and disagreements about what is “proper English” go back as far as the ...
Listen
Ebola in the Age of Epidemics - Special Live Episode from 2014-11-03T20:10:42
There’s no doubt that Ebola is an incredibly dangerous and genuinely lethal virus, but it’s also a highly manageable one, though you’d ...
Listen
Halloween Extra: 18th Annual Houdini Séance with Joe Nickell from 2014-10-31T15:22:45
Listen
Pro-Choice Without Apology, with Katha Pollitt from 2014-10-22T15:08:31
Given the divisive nature of the debates over abortion, the subject is understandably not the best table-talk material. But despite the fact that abortion is a normal and often necessary (one in...
Listen
The Human Impact of Discovering Alien Life, with Astrobiologist Steven J. Dick from 2014-10-14T22:26:19
Our universe is made up of billions of galaxies. The cosmos is so mind-bogglingly vast, that it’s hard not to suppose that we aren’t alone, that life must exist somewhere else besides o...
Listen
The Theology of ISIS, with Dr. Adam Silverman from 2014-10-06T18:57:10
Listen
Austin Dacey from 2014-09-29T19:43:27
Josh Zepps is off, and since this week is the 5th Listen
Mark Oppenheimer on Misogyny in the Freethought Community from 2014-09-22T20:07:08
This week Point of Inquiry welcomes journalist Mark Oppenheimer. Mark writes the Beliefs column for the New York Times, and is the...
Listen
Factory Farming and the Meat Racket: Christopher Leonard on our Irrational Meat Industry from 2014-09-17T16:08:54
It’s National Chicken Month! But rather than celebrating the consumption of fowl, Point of Inquiry is asking what exact...
Listen
Ask a Mortician: Caitlin Doughty on the Death Industry's Dirty Secrets from 2014-09-08T19:30:43
Point of Inquiry welcomes Caitlin Doughty, creator of the cult classic web series Listen
Sam Harris: Seeking Transcendence Without Religion from 2014-09-02T16:54:43
It’s been ten years since the publication of Sam Harris’s book Listen
Dr. Adia Benton on The West African Ebola Outbreak from 2014-08-25T18:47:14
This week Point Of Inquiry welcomes Dr. Adia Benton
Listen
Christopher Capozzola: 100 Years After the Great War, Lessons in Reason from 2014-08-11T16:44:48
One hundred years ago, Great Britain declared war on Germany, joining in what we now refer to as World War I, a conflic...
Listen
Laurel Braitman on Animals and Mental Illness from 2014-08-04T17:18:54
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Laurel Braitman, a TED fellow with a PhD in History and Anthropology of Science from ...
Listen
David Ropeik: Airplane Disasters and the Psychology of Risk from 2014-07-29T22:08:59
How do we rationally assess risk? Following a terrible series of horrifying air travel disasters, reasonable people beg...
Listen
Jason Horowitz: Protecting the Whales from the U.S. Navy from 2014-07-21T18:04:17
On March 15, 2000, over a dozen whales beached themselves in the Bahamas in one of the largest multi-species strandings in history. Suspicion turned to U.S. Navy sonar, but at ...
Listen
The Gospel According to Hobby Lobby--With Brian Leiter from 2014-07-07T18:41:14
Montel Williams: Leading a Surge on the Veterans Administration from 2014-07-02T15:58:06
Best known for his 17 years as a talk show host, Montel Williams is now b...
Listen
Marlene Zuk: The Paleo Delusion from 2014-06-23T17:48:19
We evolved to eat berries rather than bagels, to live in caves rather than condos, to sprint barefoot rather than wear sneakers—or did we? These, along with many other question...
Listen
Howard Fineman on Eric Cantor's Defeat and the Battle for the Soul of the GOP from 2014-06-16T20:07:40
Few intra-party political battles have been as astonishing and unexpected as last week's primary loss by House Majority...
Listen
Janet Mock, Redefining Realness, Biology, Sex and Gender from 2014-06-09T21:45:37
This week POI welcomes bestselling author and trans rights activist, Janet Mock. Janet is the author of the new memoir<...
Listen
Negin Farsad: Red States and Muslim Comedy from 2014-06-03T17:05:48
This week, we welcome Negin Farsad, a groundbreaking Iranian American comedian. A TED speaker and TED Fellow, she w...
Listen
Capital Punishment in Crisis with Dahlia Lithwick from 2014-05-27T17:30:59
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Dahlia Lithwick, Senior Editor and Legal Correspondent for Slate...
Listen
Farzana Hassan on Islamic Extremism and the Boko Haram from 2014-05-20T22:46:20
Our guest this week is Farzana Hassan, a Pakistani-Canadian political scientist, a columnist for the Toronto Sun, Listen
Science Denialism with Donald Prothero from 2014-05-12T17:32:48
Our guest this week is Donald Prothero, paleontologist, geologist, and author of the new book Listen
Talking Nerdy (And Ethically) with Cara Santa Maria from 2014-05-05T21:04:48
Our guest this week is Cara Santa Maria, contributor to Al Jazeera America's science show Listen
Coming Out Atheist - Greta Christina from 2014-04-28T16:52:54
This week Point of Inquiry welcomes the well-known atheist Listen
A Trek Through Skepticism with The Amazing Randi from 2014-04-21T18:47
This week, Point of Inquiry is excited to welcome “The Amazing” James Randi: famed magician a godfather (as it were) of...
Listen
Living with a Wild God: Barbara Ehrenreich, Atheism, and Transcendence from 2014-04-14T17:19
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Barbara Ehrenreich, award-winning columnist and essayist, and author of 21 ...
Listen
Ann Druyan: Telling the Story of the Cosmos from 2014-04-07T17:24:23
This week, Point of Inquiry is delighted to welcome Ann Druyan, co-writer and co-creator of both the original
Listen
Investigating the Oldest Profession: Prostitution and Science Meet, with Meredith Dank of the Urban Institute from 2014-03-31T19:57:51
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Meredith Dank, PhD, Senior Research Associate at the Urban Institute. Dank is the co-principal investigator on several international and do...
Listen
Frank Schaeffer on Escaping Fundamentalism, and the Death of Fred Phelps from 2014-03-24T19:46:26
Listen
Cancer Quack Stanislaw Burzynski: Exposed from 2014-03-17T17:24:40
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes David Gorski, MD, PhD: cancer researcher, surgeon, and managing editor of th...
Listen
The Philosophy of Belief with Rebecca Goldstein from 2014-03-10T17:21
Rebecca Goldstein, Listen
Daniel Loxton: Bigfoot, Nessie and Other Kinds of “Abominable Science” from 2014-03-03T21:00
This we...
Listen
Gabriel Sherman - The Loudest Voice in the Room : How the Brilliant, Bombastic Roger Ailes Built Fox News--and Divided a Country from 2014-02-24T20:19
This week Point of Inquiry welcomes Gabriel Sherman, writer and contributing editor for New York Magaz...
Listen
Amy Tuteur, MD from 2014-02-17T19:27:08
Stanton Peele, PhD - Addiction and Recovery from 2014-02-10T18:10:28
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Stanton Peele, PhD., J.D.. Dr. Peele, an addiction expert and author of 12 books on the subject, discusses his views on the current ...
Listen
Greg Dworkin, MD - Founding Editor of Flu Wiki from 2014-02-04T16:45
This week, Point of Inquiry welco...
Listen
J.R. Havlan - Writer for The Daily Show from 2014-01-28T21:56
This week Point of Inquiry discusses satire in politics and American life with J.R....
Listen
Jason Stanley - Is the United States a ‘Racial Democracy? from 2014-01-21T15:18
This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Jason Stanley, professo...
Listen
Arthur Caplan, PhD - Ethics of Brain Death, end of life, the State and the Right from 2014-01-14T17:50
This week Point of Inquiry is discussing Death. Specifically, Brain death and the efforts of some areas of the reli...
Listen
Chris Emden - Hip Hop Archivist and Professor at Teachers College, Columbia University from 2014-01-06T18:35:55
This week on Point of Inquiry we welcome Chris Emden, a Columbia Professor who's helped design New York City's public s...
Listen
The War on Christmas from 2013-12-30T19:07:31
As the War on Christmas wages on, our host, Josh Zepps, interviews Rob Boston, Senior Policy Analyst for American's...
Listen
Kathryn Joyce - The Child Catchers: Rescue, Trafficking, and the New Gospel of Adoption from 2013-12-23T19:21:41
Joining Lindsay Bernstein this week is Kathryn Joyce, one of the foremost reporters chroni...
Listen
P.J. O'Rourke - American Satirist, Journalist and Author from 2013-12-16T20:06:32
This week on Point of Inquiry, Josh Zepps welcomes P.J. O’Rourke, humorist, cultural commentator, and best selling author of sixteen books. An early proponent of “gonzo journalism” and is a self...
Listen
Barry W. Lynn - Executive Director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State from 2013-12-10T14:00:33
Gadadhara Pandit Dasa - First Hindu Chaplain for Columbia University from 2013-12-02T21:03:24
This week's Point of Inquiry features Gadadhara Pandit Dasa, first ever Hindu Chaplain for
Columbia University and New York University, the interfaith chaplain at Union Theological <...
Paul Offit, MD - Do You Believe in Magic?: The Sense and Nonsense of Alternative Medicine from 2013-11-25T18:07:28
Katherine Stewart: The Good News Club: The Christian Right's Stealth Assault on America's Children from 2013-11-11T19:31
Point of Inquiry, the flagship podcast for the Center for Inquiry, presents a special episode recorded before a live audience at the 2013 CFI Summit in Tacoma, Washington, with new co-h...
Listen
Leonard Mlodinow: Subliminal: How Your Unconscious Mind Rules Your Behavior from 2013-11-05T21:20
Point of Inquiry, the flagship podcast of the Center for Inquiry, relaunches with a special episode recorded before a live audience at the ...
Listen
Ethan Zuckerman - Digital Cosmopolitans in the Age of Connection from 2013-06-24T19:44:45
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is an inspiring thinker whom we've wanted to get on the show for a long, long time: Ethan Zuckerman.
He's the director of th...
Listen
Mario Livio - Brilliant Blunders From Darwin to Einstein from 2013-06-20T01:44:17
Host: Chris Mooney
One thing we often forget about great scientists, especially as they are lionized and mythologized: they made mistakes. Sometimes big ones. Sometimes, even, brilliant o...
Listen
Daniel Dennett - Tools for Thinking from 2013-06-11T20:26:47
Host: Indre Viskontas
Having spent 50 years as an influential thinker, Daniel Dennett has earned the right to tell us how to think. His latest book is a collection of 77 tools for thinkin...
Listen
Stephan Lewandowsky - The Mind of the Conspiracy Theorist from 2013-06-04T16:48:55
Host: Chris Mooney
From 9-11, to the death of Osama bin Laden, to the Boston Bombings, there's been a consistently bizarre and troubling reaction by some members of the public.
We'...
Listen
Katha Pollitt - Is Religion Inherently Sexist? from 2013-05-23T03:37:54
Host: Chris Mooney
Over the weekend, the Center for Inquiry's Women in Secularism II conference unfolded in Washington, D.C.—and we caught ...
Listen
Michael Levi - Fracking, Pipelines, and Science from 2013-05-14T16:29
Host: Chris Mooney
A few months back on this show, we heard from Bill McKibben, the c...
Listen
Jared Diamond - The World Until Yesterday from 2013-05-08T04:17:26
Note: You can watch this episode on Youtube.
In this special episode of Point of Inquiry, Chris and Indr...
Listen
Mary Roach - Adventures on the Alimentary Canal from 2013-05-01T01:19:22
Host: Indre Viskontas
In the science section at your local bookstore, you'll find plenty of books on everything from the brain, to the climate, to the cosmos.
But how many books wi...
Listen
Scott Atran - What Makes a Terrorist? from 2013-04-23T15:03:28
Host: Chris Mooney
Back in the summer of 2011—just before the 10 year anniversary of 9/11—this show welcomed on Scott Atran, an anthropologist who is a leading expert on terrorism and vio...
Listen
Neil Gross - Why Are Professors (and Scientists) So Liberal? from 2013-04-16T16:58:54
Host: Chris Mooney
We've all heard the claim: Academia is liberal. And it indoctrinates students.
It kills their religious faith and basically—or at least, so the allegation goes—t...
Listen
A.C. Grayling - The God Argument from 2013-04-09T12:14:39
Host: Chris Mooney
Remember all the greatest hits of religious apologists—the ontological, cosmological, and teleological arguments for God's existence?
You may have learned how to...
Listen
Frans de Waal - The Bonobo and the Atheist from 2013-04-02T07:27
Host: Chris Mooney
You hear it a lot from religious believers: Faith is about doing good works, bringing about good in the world, and showing compassion.
In fact, some go further a...
Listen
Carol Tavris - The Science of Sex and Gender from 2013-03-26T07:18
Host: Indre Viskontas
Back in February, Yahoo! President and CEO Marissa Mayer made a decision that pushed gender issues and the work/life balance back into the headlines: she mandated th...
Listen
Amanda Marcotte - Skepticism Needs Feminism from 2013-03-19T06:22:52
Host: Chris Mooney
Later this year, May 17 to 19 in Washington, D.C., the Center for Inquiry will convene its second "Women in Secularism" confe...
Listen
Mark Lynas - Science and the Left from 2013-03-05T06:12:53
Host: Chris Mooney
I'm a big defender of the proposition that when it comes to abusing science, the political left and the political right are very different beasts.
But that doesn...
Listen
Matthew Hutson - The 7 Laws of Magical Thinking from 2013-02-28T10:04:03
Host: Indre Viskontas
Even the hard-core skeptics believe in magic, says Matthew Hutson in his new book The 7 Laws of Magical Thinking: How Irrational Beliefs Keep us Happy, Healthy a...
Listen
Point of Inquiry Live | Steven Pinker - The Decline of Violence from 2013-02-20T16:03:55
Note: You can watch this episode on Youtube.
Since the horrendous massacre of children and teachers in Newtown, ...
Listen
Susan Jacoby - Freethought’s Forgotten Hero from 2013-02-12T19:31:53
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Susan Jacoby.
She's the bestselling author of a number of books about secularism and American culture, including Free...
Listen
Carl Zimmer - Viruses and Other Little Things from 2013-02-05T19:14:37
This year's flu season has been dubbed the worst in recent history, despite the fact that the flu vaccine is fairly effective and readily available. But of course, not everyone experiencing flu-...
Listen
Paul Krugman - Science and Pseudoscience in Economics from 2013-01-28T22:10:27
Host: Chris Mooney
We are thrilled by our guest this week, who is not only one of the world's most famous economists and economics commentators, but also a Nobel Laureate in his field:
Sean Carroll - The Particle at the End of the Universe from 2013-01-22T23:31
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Sean Carroll—theoretical physicist at CalTech, and skilled science communicator.
I've known Sean and his work for almost a decade, and I'v...
Listen
Maria Konnikova - How to Think Like Sherlock Holmes from 2013-01-15T01:43
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Maria Konnikova, who is the author of a simply fascinating new book about training your mind so you're as sharp as the fictional...
Listen
Phil Plait - #Notpocalypse! from 2013-01-08T02:17:16
Host: Chris Mooney
This is our first show of 2013, and notably, we're still here.
A lot of people actually thought the world was going to end at the end of last ye...
Listen
Scott Sigler - Encouraging Critical Thinking Through Science Fiction from 2013-01-02T01:48:31
Host: Indre Viskontas
It's become almost a truism that in their spare time, skeptics tend to gravitate towards TV shows, novels and games that portray the very monsters, myths and conspir...
Listen
Ronald A. Lindsay and Michael De Dora - Mr. Science Goes to Washington from 2012-12-27T07:57:49
Host: Chris Mooney
We usually record Point of Inquiry at a distance. Over the phone. Skyping.
But for this show, I packed up my gear and hailed a cab—to the Center for Inq...
Listen
David Brin - Uplifting Existence from 2012-12-20T05:12:09
Host: Chris Mooney
It's rare that I can say about a guest that, I read his books when I was a kid.
But David Brin is just such a guest. He's the celebrated science...
Listen
Bill McKibben - Do the Math from 2012-12-13T15:20:38
Host: Chris Mooney
When we last had Bill McKibben on this show in 2010, I was mainly treating him as anot...
Listen
Samuel Arbesman - The Half-Life of Facts from 2012-12-04T09:42:47
Host: Indre Viskontas
Because we live in an uncertain world, we arm ourselves with facts to gain a sense of control and therefore some modicum of comfort. We know that the sun will rise t...
Listen
Steven Novella - Exposing Medical Nonsense from 2012-11-27T13:36:14
Host: Chris Mooney
One of the first people I ever got to know in skepticism was Steven Novella.
He was a professor at Yale, just starting out as an organized skeptic—I was a studen...
Listen
Michael Gordin - The Pseudoscience Wars from 2012-11-20T05:47
Host: Chris Mooney
Before the "complementary and alternative medicine" fad, and before UFO craze, lived a man whom you might call the first modern pseudoscientist.
His name was Imm...
Listen
Jacques Berlinerblau - How to Be Secular from 2012-11-13T05:45:31
Host: Chris Mooney
On this show, we often debate the state of American secularism—covering topics like the rise of the so-called "nones," or the unending battle to rescue the country from...
Listen
Oliver Sacks - Hallucinations from 2012-11-06T03:43:51
Host: Indre Viskotnas
Despite our individual differences, highlighted especially during an election, much of what we see, hear, smell or feel is shareable: that is, when standing in front...
Listen
Special Double Episode: Jon Ronson and Richard Wiseman, with Indre Viskontas and Chris Mooney from 2012-10-31T20:44:57
Hosts: Indre Viskontas and Chris Mooney
At the 2012 CSICON conference in Nashville, Tennessee, your Point of Inquiry hosts Indre Viskontas and Chris Mooney finally actually found...
Listen
Bruce Hood - Superstitions in Baseball from 2012-10-23T03:25:07
Host: Indre Viskontas
The month of October is associated with falling leaves, autumn winds and hallowe'en. But for sports fans in the US, it also signals a high point in America's nationa...
Listen
Science and the 2012 Election - Shawn Otto and Matthew Chapman from 2012-10-16T01:00:24
Host: Chris Mooney
In this show, we talk to two founders of ScienceDebate, a nonprofit organization that in the last two election cycles has pushed to get the presidential candidates to t...
Listen
Lisa Randall - Knocking on Heaven’s Door from 2012-10-08T22:47:47
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Lisa Randall, the Harvard theoretical physicist and one of the most heavily cited and influential researchers in her field. She'...
Listen
Massimo Pigliucci - Living Philosophically from 2012-10-02T02:56:33
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is a return guest of the show, Massimo Pigliucci.
Listen
Dan Ariely - The Honest Truth about Dishonesty from 2012-09-25T05:22:12
Host: Indre Viskontas
There is no doubt that our world is populated with cheats and liars. Most of us, slaves to the availability heuristic, think of major cheaters like Bernie Madoff, Ti...
Listen
Phil Zuckerman - The Sociology of Irreligion from 2012-09-18T06:03:58
Host: Chris Mooney
How many atheists are there in the world? Where do they live? What kind of people are they, and how do they get that way?
Are they happy? Are they prosperous? Do...
Listen
Rick Hayes-Roth - TruthMarket from 2012-09-10T22:26:22
Host: Chris Mooney
Wouldn't it be nice if there were a way to make American politics just a little more rational, just a little more evidence based?
Wouldn't it be even nicer if th...
Listen
Peter Ditto - Morals, Facts, and Libertarians from 2012-09-04T23:37:56
Host: Chris Mooney
Several times on this show, we've discussed the topic of ideological asymmetry. In other words, are people of all political persuasions equally biased, equally prone to...
Listen
Temple Grandin - The Science of Livestock Animal Welfare from 2012-08-28T17:31
Host: Indre Viskontas
According to the USDA, Americans produce and consume more beef, veal, and chicken than any other nation in the world. As a result, the status of animal welfare in th...
Listen
Arie Kruglanski - The Science of Closed-Mindedness from 2012-08-21T21:07:48
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Arie Kruglanski. He's a Distinguished University Professor of Psychology at the University of Maryland College Park, and has bee...
Listen
Joe Romm - Language Intelligence from 2012-08-13T21:13
Host: Chris Mooney
This week's guest is Joe Romm. You may know him as a top blogger on global warming and energy—but that's not why we're having him on.
In an impressive show of ve...
Listen
Peter Montgomery - 12 Rules for Mixing Religion and Politics from 2012-08-07T19:38:39
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Peter Montgomery, senior fellow with People for the American Way and author of a new report entitled Listen
Christopher diCarlo - How to Become a Really Good Pain in the Ass from 2012-08-01T23:39:55
Host: Indre Viskontas
In an election year, it is especially important that our critical thinking skills be sharply honed. We have to sift through facts, fiction, and hyperbole in order to...
Listen
Kerry Emanuel - Conservative for Climate Science from 2012-07-24T19:18:45
Kerry Emanuel is a leading atmospheric scientist and a self-described conservative. As a result, lately he's been at the forefront of trying to convince his ideological brethren that the science...
Listen
David Niose - Nonbeliever Nation from 2012-07-16T21:19:45
Host: Chris Mooney
Can people who care about secularism take America back from the religious right?
Of all the questions that concern us on this show, this is perhaps the most impo...
Listen
Tina Dupuy - Skepticism Meets Comedy from 2012-07-10T05:25
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest is Tina Dupuy—the reporter, comedian, skeptic, and editor-in-chief of the startup publication SoapBlox.
Dupuy appears frequently on MS...
Listen
Special In Studio Episode: Jamie Kilstein, Ed Brayton, and More from 2012-07-04T12:00:35
Host: Chris Mooney
For this episode of Point of Inquiry, we tried something a little different. At Center for Inquiry headquarters in Amherst, NY, we filmed Listen
Stuart Firestein - How Ignorance Drives Science from 2012-06-25T23:44:18
Host: Indre Viskontas
The idea that science moves forward by carefully peeling back layers of the onion of truth, one by one, in a deliberate fashion, is so prevalent that it borders on c...
Listen
Chris Hayes - Twilight of the Elites from 2012-06-19T00:02:38
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Chris Hayes, host of MSNBC's Up With Chris Hayes and editor at large of The Nation.
Hayes has come out...
Listen
Cara Santa Maria - Talk Nerdy to Us from 2012-06-12T02:12
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Cara Santa Maria, the senior science correspondent for the Huffington Post and the personage behind its "Talk Nerdy to ...
Listen
Will Gervais - This is Your Brain on Religion from 2012-06-04T21:54
Host: Chris Mooney
In late April, a study came out in Science that really got the secular blogosphere h...
Listen
Christof Koch - Consciousness and Free Will from 2012-05-29T21:17:11
Host: Indre Viskontas
Recently, there has been a flurry of neuroscientists declaring that free will is an illusion in the popular press. But before we can assess the extent to which we ar...
Listen
Johan Braeckman - The Rise of Islamic Creationism from 2012-05-22T01:37:54
Host: Chris Mooney
Over the weekend, I was fortunate enough to attend the 2012 World Skeptics Conference in Berlin.
It's important to keep tabs on our skeptical and freethinking co...
Listen
Greta Christina - Why Are You Atheists So Angry? from 2012-05-15T03:59
Our guest this week is Greta Christina, a leading atheist blogger, speaker, and commentator, and a regular contributor to AlterNet.org.
M.G. Lord - The Accidental Feminist from 2012-04-30T16:46
Host: Indre Viskontas
In developed countries at least, the status of women has improved considerably in the last century. But in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM), they rem...
Listen
Naomi Oreskes - Neoliberalism and the Denial of Global Warming from 2012-04-24T23:45:50
Host: Chris Mooney
This week at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a conference convened entitled "Science Writing in the Age of Denial." The keynote speaker was a former Point of I...
Listen
Austin Dacey - The Future of Blasphemy from 2012-04-16T21:34:02
Host: Chris Mooney
This week, our guest is a return one: Austin Dacey. He's a philosopher, a writer, and a human rights activist, and the creator of the Listen
Chris Mooney - The Republican Brain from 2012-04-10T00:09:48
Guest Host: John Shook
In this special episode of Point of Inquiry, we interview our host himself—about his new book, The Republican Brain: The Science of W...
Listen
Neil deGrasse Tyson - Space Chronicles from 2012-04-02T20:11:21
Host: Chris Mooney
This week, Point of Inquiry is thrilled to welcome back one of our most popular guests: Neil deGrasse Tyson, the famed astrophysicist and Frederick P. Rose Dir...
Listen
David Morrison - Cosmic Impact Hazard from 2012-03-26T23:19:28
Host: Indre Viskontas
The end is nigh. 2012 is a banner year for doomsday prophecies, though there still seems to be debate concerning precisely how life as we know it will be snuffed out...
Listen
Jonathan Haidt - The Righteous Mind from 2012-03-19T21:25:07
Host: Chris Mooney
Why is it that some of us are religious, some of us not... some of us liberal, some of us not?
If you've been paying attention, then by now you might have notice...
Listen
Ari Rabin-Havt - The Fox Effect from 2012-03-12T19:51:11
Host: Chris Mooney
If there's one thing Point of Inquiry is concerned about, it's ensuring a rational, sensible conversation in politics, in public life. And you simply can't hav...
Listen
Sean Faircloth - Attack of the Theocrats from 2012-03-06T15:57:37
Host: Chris Mooney
A common goal of freethinkers, humanists, skeptics, and atheists is to preserve Thomas Jefferson's "wall of separation" between church and state. But we haven't always ...
Listen
Gerald Woerlee and Susan Blackmore - Near-Death Experiences and Consciousness from 2012-02-28T03:56
Host: Indre Viskontas
One of the costs of being conscious is that, once in a while, we are forced to contemplate the fact that we are mortal. Ironically, a close brush with the grim reape...
Listen
Michael Mann - The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars from 2012-02-20T22:22:30
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Michael Mann, the prominent climatologist and, above all, leading defender of his field—and himself—against political attacks.
Mann is out...
Listen
Dan Kahan - The Great Ideological Asymmetry Debate from 2012-02-14T02:44:08
Host: Chris Mooney
So who's right, factually, about politics and science? Who speaks truth, and who's just spinning?
It's kind of the million dollar question. If we could ...
Listen
Lawrence Krauss - A Universe from Nothing from 2012-02-07T00:01
Host: Chris Mooney
We had Lawrence Krauss on Point of Inquiry less than a year ago, to discuss his recent book on the scientific works of Richard Feynman.
But in order to ...
Listen
Brian Malow - The Science Comedian from 2012-01-30T18:31:27
Host: Chris Mooney
Earlier this month, Point of Inquiry host Chris Mooney attended Science Online, the premiere science blogging conference, in the research triangle area.
Eugenie Scott - Defending Climate Education from 2012-01-17T01:23:34
Host: Chris Mooney
Eugenie Scott is no stranger to Point of Inquiry, or to the secular community. Her endless travails to defend the teaching of evolution have won her immense re...
Listen
Brian Greene - The Fabric of the Cosmos from 2012-01-03T01:22:43
Host: Chris Mooney
It's the beginning of a new year here at Point of Inquiry, and we've got a pretty good guest to kick it off.
He needs no introduction. He's Brian Greene...
Listen
Stuart Robbins - The End of the World as We Know It from 2011-12-27T04:31:27
Host: Karen Stollznow
Dr. Stuart Robbins is a postdoctoral researcher in astronomy at the University of Colorado, Boulder. His work focuses on planetary geophysics, and he’s currently res...
Listen
John Cook - The Debunking Handbook from 2011-12-20T00:57:16
Host: Chris Mooney
How do you successfully debunk misinformation?
The question is a deceptively simple one—which is precisely the problem.
Debunking is easy—just refute fals...
Listen
Daniel Dennett - The Scientific Study of Religion from 2011-12-13T03:05:41
Guest Host: John Shook
Recently, the Center for Inquiry held a conference titled "Daniel Dennett and the Scientific Study of Religion: A Celebration of the Fifth Anniversary of Breaki...
Listen
Robert McCauley - Why Religion is Natural (And Science is Not) from 2011-12-05T21:22:31
Host: Chris Mooney
Over the last decade, there have been many calls in the secular community for increased criticism of religion, and increased activism to help loosen its grip on the pub...
Listen
Scott Gavura - Dispensing Skepticism from 2011-11-29T01:24:58
Host: Karen Stollznow
Scott Gavura is a registered pharmacist in Ontario with a personal and professional interest in improving the way we use medication. Scott started the Listen
Jonathan Weiler - Authoritarians Versus Reality from 2011-11-21T19:45
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Jonathan Weiler, a political scientist and director of global studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
Weiler is co-autho...
Listen
Tom Flynn - The Trouble With Christmas from 2011-11-17T22:32:19
Host: Robert Price
Ebenezer Scrooge once called Christmas "a false and commercial holiday." Is it? Should Humanists refuse to observe it? Should they wage war on it? Should they celebrate...
Listen
Bill Nye - In Praise of Reason (and Skepticism) from 2011-11-08T04:51:21
Host: Chris Mooney
Recently in New Orleans, the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry held the very first CSICON—the conference dedicated to scientific inquiry and critical thinking.
The...
Listen
Seth Shostak - ET, Call SETI from 2011-11-01T05:43
Host: Karen Stollznow
Dr. Seth Shostak is the Senior Astronomer at the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute (SETI). Seth is the author of Confessions of an Alien Hunter:...
Listen
Jonathan Moreno - Our New Biopolitics from 2011-10-24T20:41
Host: Chris Mooney
Human cloning. Synthetic biology. Mood (and mind) altering drugs. Personalized medicine.
Such topics are rarely at the top of the political agenda. Yet the chang...
Listen
Richard C. Johnson - Religion: The Failed Narrative from 2011-10-19T21:35
Host: Robert Price
Richard C. Johnson Ph.D. is a retired chemist and serves as Treasurer for Freethought Arizona.
For some 25 years, the company he founded worked with scientists a...
Listen
Shawn Otto - The Assault on Science from 2011-10-11T00:41:43
Host: Chris Mooney
In recent months, political attacks on science have been back in the news.
Republican presidential candidate Jon Huntsman even Listen
CSICon - The Conference Dedicated To Scientific Inquiry And Critical Thinking from 2011-10-06T16:22:59
Host: Adam Isaak
This October-on Halloween weekend-the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry is holding a conference: CSICon. It's th...
Listen
Indre Viskontas - The Miracle Detective from 2011-10-04T03:17:20
Host: Karen Stollznow
Indre Viskontas is a neuroscientist, a soprano, and a skeptic. She is a host of the television show The Miracle Detectives that recently aired on the Oprah ...
Listen
Austin Dacey - Rock the Theocrats from 2011-09-27T01:28
Host: Chris Mooney
This coming October, in Kabul, Afghanistan—on a date, and in a location, that remain undisclosed—there will be a rock concert that's billed as the world's "Listen
Lee Salisbury - From Faith to Critical Thinking from 2011-09-20T03:25:43
Host: Robert Price
Lee Salisbury was at one time an up-and-coming Charismatic Christian pastor, even a healer! Then how did he wind up actively involved in the ranks of Minnesota Atheists...
Listen
Rachel Tabachnick - Exposing Dominionism from 2011-09-12T20:02
Host: Chris Mooney
We've heard a lot in the news lately about Dominionists—Christians who believe, basically, that they ought to be running this country.
Dominionism has different ...
Listen
John Dodes - The Tooth About Dentistry from 2011-09-07T03:28:06
Host: Karen Stollznow
John Dodes is a dentist with a special interest in dentistry and pseudoscience. He is one of the founding fellows of the Institute for Science in Medicine, a former ...
Listen
Scott Atran - Violent Extremism and Sacred Values from 2011-08-30T03:50:19
Host: Chris Mooney
In less than two weeks, the ten year anniversary of the deadliest terror attack on U.S. soil—9/11—will be upon us.
In the past decade, there has been much debate...
Listen
Dan Barker - U-Turn on the Road to Damascus from 2011-08-23T00:18
Host: Robert Price
Host Robert M. Price felt uncannily as if he were talking to himself when he interviewed Dan Barker, the two share so much in common. But then their story is not so unu...
Listen
Did Reason Evolve For Arguing? - Hugo Mercier from 2011-08-15T23:49:27
Host: Chris Mooney
Why are human beings simultaneously capable of reasoning, and yet so bad at it? Why do we have such faulty mechanisms as the "confirmation bias" embedded in our brains,...
Listen
Donald Prothero - The Psychology of Cryptozoologists from 2011-08-08T19:59:06
My guest this week is Donald Prothero, Professor of Geology at Occidental College, and Lecturer in Geobiology at the California Institute of Technology. Don is a distinguished academic; a Fellow...
Listen
David Frum and Kenneth Silber - Conservatives and Science from 2011-08-01T23:47:48
Host: Chris Mooney
When it comes to the U.S. political right, it often appears that the opposition to science-and reason in general-is everywhere. From climate change denial to anti-evolu...
Listen
Jaco Gericke - Confessions of a Died-Again Christian from 2011-07-25T21:36:32
Host: Robert Price
A couple of student hecklers once reproved Marlowe's Dr. Faustus: "Faustus! Plumb the depths of that which you profess!" Many evangelical Christians have buckled down t...
Listen
Rebecca Watson - Skepticism and Feminism from 2011-07-19T19:24:53
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Rebecca Watson, the founder of the Skepchick blog. Recently, she's been at the center of a...
Listen
Richard Wiseman - Paranormality from 2011-07-11T18:28:23
Host: Karen Stollznow
Richard Wiseman is Professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire in England. Richard began his career as a professional magi...
Listen
Matthew Chapman - The Ledge from 2011-07-05T00:30:07
Host: Chris Mooney
It's not often that Hollywood takes up the subject of atheism directly—much less sympathetically.
Even rarer is finding this in a film starring major names like ...
Listen
D.M. Murdock - The Christ Conspiracy from 2011-06-28T21:57
Host: Robert Price
D.M. Murdock, who also goes by the pen name "Acharya S.," is the author of The Christ Conspiracy, the most controversial of modern treatments of the Christ Myt...
Listen
Rick Perlstein - Is There a Republican War on History? from 2011-06-20T21:43
Host: Chris Mooney
Recently, we've seen a spate of news stories—and news incidents—involving conservative politicians and activists getting details wrong about American history.
Th...
Listen
Jean Mercer - Child Development: Myths and Misunderstandings from 2011-06-14T18:39:16
Host: Karen Stollznow
This week’s guest is Jean Mercer, a Developmental Psychologist and Professor Emerita at Richard Stockton College. She is the author of the new book Child Develop...
Listen
Michael Shermer - The Believing Brain from 2011-06-06T22:53
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Michael Shermer, the publisher of Skeptic magazine and head of the Skeptics Society, and a longtime commentator on issues relating to sc...
Listen
Scott Lohman - Star Trek and Humanism from 2011-05-31T19:16:42
Host: Robert Price
Do you often wish you lived in the far future? Or on a different planet? Do your friends and family think you belong there, too?
Cheer up! This may not be just b...
Listen
Jonathan Kay - Among the Truthers from 2011-05-24T04:35:13
Host: Chris Mooney
From Birthers, to Truthers, to Deathers—to occasional Liars—America seems to be crawling right now with fevered conspiracy mongers. What's up with that?
To find ...
Listen
Robert Sheaffer - It's a Conspiracy from 2011-05-18T02:03:09
Host: Karen Stollznow
Robert Sheaffer is a Committee for Skeptical Inquiry fellow and author of the "Psychic Vibrations" column for Skeptical Inquirer magazine. He writes the "Ba...
Listen
Chris Mooney - Accommodationism and the Psychology of Belief from 2011-05-11T15:41
Special Guest Host: Ronald A. Lindsay
In this special episode, Chris Mooney changes places and becomes the interviewee—and then finds himself facing some probing questions from CFI Presid...
Listen
Bo Bennett - Christian Nontheism from 2011-05-03T02:11
Host: Robert Price
Robert "Bo" Bennett wears many hats (author, motivational speaker, black belt Karate master, businessman, etc.) but manages not to have a swelled head to accommodate th...
Listen
George Lakoff - Enlightenments, Old and New from 2011-04-25T19:21:29
Host: Chris Mooney
George Lakoff is a cognitive linguist at the University of California at Berkeley. But unlike many of his scientific peers, he's known as much for his work on politics ...
Listen
Josh Rosenau - The Evolution Revolution from 2011-04-20T01:15:15
Host: Karen Stollznow
Our guest this week is Josh Rosenau, the Programs and Policy Director of the National Center for Science Education (NCSE), and writer of the blog Listen
Nuclear Risk and Reason - David Brenner and David Ropeik from 2011-04-11T23:05:08
Host: Chris Mooney
When the devastating earthquake and tsunami struck Japan last month, it left behind not only mass destruction, but also a nuclear crisis that was covered 24-7 by the in...
Listen
August Berkshire - Minnesota Atheist from 2011-04-05T01:56
Host: Robert Price
One of the outstanding leaders of organized atheism in our day is a man named August Berkshire. He is a non-believer of broad sympathies, having served as an officer an...
Listen
Lawrence Krauss - Quantum Man from 2011-03-28T18:07:19
Host: Chris Mooney
Physicist Lawrence Krauss has written numerous popular books about science, including the bestselling The Physics of Star Trek.
But now he's tried somet...
Listen
Cheryl Russell - Society, Statistics and Skepticism from 2011-03-21T23:53:47
Host: Karen Stollznow
My guest this week is Cheryl Russell, a recognized authority on statistics and demographics.
Cheryl is the editorial director of New Strategist Publications a...
Listen
Spirituality: Friend or Foe? - Adam Frank and Tom Flynn from 2011-03-15T01:46
Host: Chris Mooney
Recently, it has come to light that many scientists—scientists who don't believe in God--nevertheless claim to be "spiritual but not religious." Some in the secular mov...
Listen
Frank Zindler - The Christ Myth from 2011-03-07T23:19:36
Host: Robert Price
One of the most effective (not to mention hilarious) speakers for atheism and secular humanism today is Frank Zindler, author, linguist, translator, Bible scholar, and ...
Listen
Neil deGrasse Tyson - Communicating Science from 2011-02-28T20:59:26
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week needs little introduction—he may be our most famous public communicator of science.
He's Neil DeGrasse Tyson, renowned American astrophysicis...
Listen
Michael Cicchini - Myths, Misconceptions, and the Law from 2011-02-21T18:59:01
Host: Karen Stollznow
Michael Cicchini is a criminal defense attorney and a skeptic.
Through extensive research and writing in the field of criminal law he has advocated for defend...
Listen
Dan Kahan - The American Culture War of Fact from 2011-02-14T16:18
Host: Chris Mooney
Why do Americans claim to love science, but then selectively reject its findings when they're inconvenient? And why do some cultural groups reject certain types of scie...
Listen
Don Webb - Devil's Advocate from 2011-02-07T16:54:32
Host: Robert Price
The nineties witnessed an outbreak of "Satanic Panic," with psychologists dredging up false memories of "Satanic ritual abuse" which landed innocent parents in jail and...
Listen
Art Caplan - Bioethics Comes of Age from 2011-01-31T20:18:47
Host: Chris Mooney
Our guest this week is Arthur Caplan, sometimes called the country's "most quoted bioethicist" and director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvani...
Listen
Joe Nickell - The Other Side from 2011-01-22T05:59:36
Host: Karen Stollznow
Joe Nickell is one of the world's most prominent skeptical investigators of the paranormal. He has researched numerous historical, paranormal, and forensic mysteries...
Listen
The Irrationality Vaccine - Seth Mnookin from 2011-01-15T04:17:46
Host: Chris Mooney
Recently the British Medical Journal dealt yet another blow to 1998 scientific study that first terrified the public about the possibility that vaccines might ...
Listen
Hector Avalos - The End of Biblical Studies from 2011-01-08T00:22:34
Host: Robert Price
Robert Price interviews fellow Bible Geek and secular Bible scholar Hector Avalos on a wide range of topics, from the increasingly devotional character of the Society o...
Listen
Barry Kosmin - One Nation, Losing God from 2011-01-01T21:33:08
Host: Chris Mooney
By now you've probably heard the finding-the United States is growing less godly. More precisely, more and more Americans in surveys report that they lack a religious i...
Listen
Reed Esau - SkeptiCamp: The Unconference from 2010-12-25T09:33:14
Host: Karen Stollznow
Reed Esau is a skeptical activist and one of the founders of SkeptiCamp. Also known as Open Events, these are informal, community-organized conference where speakers...
Listen
Why Facts Fail - Brendan Nyhan from 2010-12-18T03:10:49
Ever been in an argument with someone and felt massively frustrated, because nothing you can say seems to change the person's mind?
Maybe that's what you should expect to happen. Maybe yo...
Listen
Roger Nygard - The Nature of Existence from 2010-12-11T00:25:23
Host: Robert Price
Roger Nygard recently produced and directed a feature documentary called The Nature of Existence. In it, he asks some of the biggest of questions to "the wides...
Listen
The Future of Atheism: Beyond the Question of God from 2010-12-04T02:28
Host: Chris Mooney
Recently at Pomona College in California, three atheists—one of them a Point of Inquiry host—got together to debate the future of the movement.
And some...
Listen
James Randi and D.J. Grothe - Amaz!ng Skepticism from 2010-11-27T19:24:42
Host: Karen Stollznow
This week is a special episode featuring interviews with two guests, James Randi and D.J. Grothe.
James Randi is a world-renowned magician and the modern-day ...
Listen
John Abraham and Scott Mandia - Climate Science Strikes Back from 2010-11-20T04:53:48
Host: Chris Mooney
For the community of scientists who study the Earth’s climate, these are bewildering times.
They've seen wave upon wave of political attacks. They're getting acc...
Listen
Ronald A. Lindsay - Observations on Ethics, Law, and CFI from 2010-11-15T19:40:48
Host: Robert Price
How did his studies at Catholic Georgetown University set CFI President and CEO Ronald A. Lindsay on the primrose path to atheism? Does he now count himself a lawyer or...
Listen
Massimo Pigliucci - Nonsense on Stilts from 2010-11-06T00:11:46
Host: Chris Mooney
It’s a longstanding debate in the philosophy of science: Is "demarcation" possible? Can we really draw firm lines between science and pseudoscience?
Massimo Pigl...
Listen
Warren Bonett - Down Under Reason from 2010-10-29T18:32:12
Host: Karen Stollznow
Warren Bonett is a skeptic, author and an independent bookseller. Warren wanted to become actively involved in critical thinking without joining an organization or b...
Listen
Carl Zimmer - This is Your Brain on iPad from 2010-10-23T00:32:26
Host: Chris Mooney
On the show this week, Point of Inquiry features one of our most distinguished science writers—Carl Zimmer. He's the author of many acclaimed books, including ...
Listen
John Shook - The God Debates from 2010-10-17T04:24:52
Host: Robert Price
Our guest is philosopher and author John Shook, discussing his experiences debating religious believers and whether such debates are a good idea.
Some say no, th...
Listen
PZ Myers, Jennifer Michael Hecht, and Chris Mooney - New Atheism or Accommodation? from 2010-10-11T05:52
Recently at the 30th anniversary conference of the Council for Secular Humanism in Los Angeles, leading science blogger PZ Myers and Point of Inquiry host Chris Mooney appeared together...
Listen
Steve Spangler - Hands-on Science from 2010-10-02T03:08:20
Host: Karen Stollznow
Steve Spangler is a science educator, inventor, and an Emmy Award winning TV personality. He is the author of Fizz Factor: 50 Amazing Experiments With Soda Pop Listen
Jennifer Ouellette - Calculus, Las Vegas, and the Zombie Apocalypse from 2010-09-24T17:40:52
Host: Chris Mooney
Ever wonder about the mathematical basis for battling a zombie infestation? Jennifer Ouellette has. In her new book The Calculus Diaries, the English major tur...
Listen
Jen Roth - Atheist Against Abortion from 2010-09-18T01:37
Host: Robert Price
In this episode of Point of Inquiry, Robert Price interviews Jen Roth, co-founder of All Our Lives, a secular organization committed to advocating for women's right to ...
Listen
S. Jay Olshansky - Can Science Extend Human Life? from 2010-09-11T00:01
Host: Chris Mooney
At a recent conference in Lake Tahoe, demographer S. Jay Olshansky presented a roomful of technologists with an exciting prospect. Through a concerted scientific attack...
Listen
Brian Brushwood - Scams, Swindles and Skepticism from 2010-09-03T22:46:53
Host: Karen Stollznow
Brian Brushwood began his career in magic "To get free drinks at bars and impress friends," but ended up becoming a science communicator and skeptic.
The auth...
Listen
Richard Wrangham - Rediscovering Fire from 2010-08-27T23:24:12
This is a show about evolution—but not, for once, about the evolution wars. Instead, it concerns one of the most intriguing ideas to emerge in quite some time about the evolution of humans.
... Listen
Robert M. Price - Is the Bible Mein Kampf? from 2010-08-21T00:40
Robert Price being off for the week, today we present a lecture given by Dr. Price at the Center for Inquiry's annual Student Leadership Conferece titled "Is the Bible Mein Kampf?"
In h...
Listen
Alexander Zaitchik - Glenn Beck’s War on Reason from 2010-08-14T00:02:37
This week, the scope of Point of Inquiry expands to include politics and more particularly, the fount of misinformation that is Glenn Beck of Fox News. This TV and radio personality is ...
Listen
Andrew Mayne - Magic, Mischief and Mayhem from 2010-08-07T01:45:42
Andrew Mayne is a magician, paranormal illusionist, inventor, TV producer and skeptic.
One of the most creative and innovative minds in magic, Andrew has written and produced over 40 book...
Listen
Francesca Grifo - Science Under Obama from 2010-07-30T17:43:09
When President Obama was inaugurated in January of 2009, he pledged to “restore science to its rightful place” in the U.S. government. And true to his word, the president promptly staffed his ...
Listen
Tom Quinn - O Sweet Jesus from 2010-07-24T01:40:52
Tom Quinn has spent the past 15 years as a documentary TV writer and producer for Discovery Channel, History Channel, National Geographic and others. He has traveled the world producing progra...
Listen
Phil Plait - Death from the Skies from 2010-07-16T20:34:29
Our guest this week needs no introduction for those in the skeptical and secular world. After all, he has a frakkin' asteroid named after him.
He’s Phil Plait—science blogger extraordina...
Listen
Adam Savage - Skeptic (Confirmed) from 2010-07-10T04:14
Adam Savage is an artist, actor, educator, special effects designer and co-host of the Discovery Channel's TV show Mythbusters.
Robert Price&Chris Mooney - Must Atheists Also Be Liberals? from 2010-07-03T00:21:15
Recently in Amherst, New York, two of Point of Inquiry’s hosts sat down for a special in-studio episode of the show. One was a conservative (Robert Price), one a liberal (Chris Mooney)—...
Listen
Tom Flynn - In Like Flynn from 2010-06-25T21:45:17
Tom Flynn is Executive Director of The Council for Secular Humanism, Editor of Free Inquiry magazine, Director of Inquiry Media Productions, and Director of the Robert Green Ingersoll Birt...
Listen
Bill McKibben - Our Strange New Eaarth from 2010-06-18T16:59:56
Global warming, we're often told, is an issue we must address for the sake of our grandchildren. We need to cut carbon because of our moral obligation to future generations.
But acco...
Listen
Tim Farley - What’s the Harm? from 2010-06-12T00:47:33
Tim Farley is a computer software engineer, skeptic, and creator of the popular website What’s the Harm? His site answers this salient question with over 670,000 stories of people who ...
Listen
Naomi Oreskes - Merchants of Doubt from 2010-06-04T17:32:31
This week’s guest is Naomi Oreskes, co-author with historian Eric Conway of the new book Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Gl...
Listen
S.T. Joshi - Fright and Freethought from 2010-05-28T21:35:10
S. T. Joshi is a leading authority on H. P. Lovecraft, Ambrose Bierce, H. L. Mencken, and other writers, mostly in the realms of supernatural and fantasy fiction. He has edited corrected editions...
Listen
Michael Specter - The Menace of Denialism from 2010-05-21T17:47
This week, we learned that J. Craig Venter has at long last created a synthetic organism—a simple life form constructed, for the first time, by man. Let the controversy begin—and if New Yo...
Listen
George Hrab - Soundtrack to Skepticism from 2010-05-14T19:20
George Hrab is a composer, professional musician, singer, songwriter, podcaster, and skeptic. George is the Host and Producer of the Geologic Podcast, a popular weekly show about mus...
Listen
Elaine Howard Ecklund - How Religious Are Scientists? from 2010-05-07T18:23
It’s hard to think of an issue more contentious these days than the relationship between faith and science. If you have any doubt, just flip over to the science blogosphere: You’ll see the arg...
Listen
Lois Schadewald - The Schadewald Legacy: Nemesis of Pseudo-Science from 2010-04-30T16:21
Lois Schadewald's interest in both science and pseudoscience rubbed off on her from her brilliant brother Robert J. Schadewald, a prolific author and debater. When Bob died a decade ago he lef...
Listen
Deborah Blum - Murder and Chemistry in Jazz Age New York from 2010-04-23T14:11
For many of us, chemistry is something we remember with groans from high school. Periodic Table of the Elements—what a pain to memorize, and what was the point, anyway?
So how do you ta...
Listen
Bob Carroll - Defining Skepticism from 2010-04-16T16:54
Dr. Robert Todd Carroll is a Fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, and author of The Skeptic's Dictionary: A Collection of Strange Beliefs, Amusing Deceptions, and Dangerous Delusio...
Listen
Eli Kintisch - Is Planet-Hacking Inevitable? from 2010-04-09T17:01
For two decades now, we’ve failed to seriously address climate change. So the planet just keeps warming—and it could get very bad. Picture major droughts, calving of gigantic ice sheets, incre...
Listen
Thomas J.J. Altizer - The Death of God from 2010-04-02T15:56
Thomas J.J. Altizer burst onto the religious scene in the 1960s with his book The Gospel of Christian Atheism. He was one of the "Death of God" theologians discussed in the famous TIM...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - John Dewey and the Real Point of Inquiry from 2010-03-26T15:25
Paul Kurtz is founder and chair emeritus of the Center for Inquiry and founder of a number of other organizations. A Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, he is Pr...
Listen
Scott Lilienfeld - Real Self-Help from 2010-03-19T17:05
Dr. Scott Lilienfeld is Professor of Psychology at Emory University in Atlanta. Scott is a Fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, a Consulting Editor for Skeptical Inquirer an...
Listen
Victor Stenger - Taking a Stand for Science and Reason from 2010-03-16T14:13
Victor Stenger is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Hawaii and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Colorado. He is also founder of Colorado Citizens for Scien...
Listen
Andrew Revkin - The Death of Science Writing, and the Future of Catastrophe from 2010-03-12T18:18
We live in a science centered age—a time of private spaceflight and personalized medicine, amid path-breaking advances in biotechnology and nanotechnology. And we face science centered risks: ...
Listen
Robert J. Miller - The Jesus Seminar from 2010-03-05T17:53
Robert J. Miller is Rosenberger Chair of Christian and Religious Studies at Juniata College in Pennsylvania. A Fellow of the Jesus Seminar since 1986, he was Scholar-in-Residence at Westar In...
Listen
Michael Mann - Unprecedented Attacks on Climate Research from 2010-02-26T20:24
For the scientists who study global warming, now is the winter of their despair.
In the news, it has been climate scandal after alleged climate scandal. First came “ClimateGat...
Listen
Victor Stenger - The New Atheists from 2010-02-24T23:29
Victor Stenger is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Hawaii and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Colorado. He is also founder of Colorado Citizens for Scie...
Listen
Ian Rowland - The Cold Hard Facts of Cold Reading from 2010-02-19T17:31
Ian Rowland is a Mentalist and Mind Reader living near London, UK. The world’s foremost authority on cold reading, he is the author of the Full Facts Book of Cold Reading. In this b...
Listen
Paul Offit - The Costs of Vaccine Denialism from 2010-02-12T17:06
Recently, there was another nail in the coffin for vaccine skeptics. The British medical journal The Lancet took the dramatic step of retracting a 1998 paper that lies at the root of modern vacc...
Listen
Banachek - Mentalism and Skepticism from 2010-01-25T15:20
Banachek is an American mentalist and skeptic. He has written numerous books and invented various magic and mentalism effects, and is often sought out by top entertainers such as David Blaine, L...
Listen
Frank Schaeffer - Crazy for God from 2009-11-06T07:01
Frank Schaeffer is New York Times best selling author whose books include three semi-biographical novels about life in a strict, fundamentalist household: Portofino, Zermatt, and <...
Listen
The 13th Annual CFI Houdini Seance from 2009-10-31T03:19
Harry Houdini, the world-famous magician and debunker of mediums, earnestly explored the religion of spiritualism and communication with the dead after his beloved mother’s death in 1913. In this ...
Listen
Randy Olson - Dont Be Such a Scientist from 2009-10-24T01:39
Randy Olson is a marine biologist and filmmaker who holds a PhD in biology from Harvard University. A graduate of the U.S.C. Cinema School in 1997, he wrote and directed the movies Flock of D...
Listen
Darrel Ray - The God Virus from 2009-10-16T07:03
Dr. Darrel W. Ray is author of three books, two on organizational psychology. He has been a psychologist for over 30 years. After practicing counseling and clinical psychology for 10 years, his foc...
Listen
Chris Mooney - Unscientific America from 2009-10-10T04:34
Chris Mooney is a 2009-2010 Knight Science Journalism Fellow at MIT and author of three books, including the New York Times bestselling The Republican War on Science, Storm World, and Unscientific ...
Listen
Russell Blackford - 50 Voices of Disbelief from 2009-10-03T03:45
Russell Blackford is an Australian writer, philosopher, and critic, and editor-in-chief of The Journal of Evolution and Technology. His new book, edited with Udo Schuklenk, is 50 Voices of Disbelie...
Listen
Ben Radford - Skepticism 2.0 from 2009-09-26T01:50
Ben Radford is is one of the world's few science-based paranormal investigators, and has done first-hand research into psychics, ghosts and haunted houses, exorcisms, Bigfoot, lake monsters, UFO si...
Listen
Greg Craven - What is the Worst That Could Happen? from 2009-09-19T01:46
Greg Craven is a high school science teacher and climate change activist from Oregon. His new book is What's the Worst That Could Happen? A Rational Response to the Climate Change Debate. In this...
Listen
J.D. Trout - The Science of the Good Society from 2009-09-11T04:15
J.D. Trout is a professor of philosophy at Loyola University Chicago, and an adjunct professor at the Parmly Sensory Sciences Institute. He writes on the nature of scientific and intellectual pr...
Listen
J.D. Trout - The Empathy Gap from 2009-09-04T04:10
J.D. Trout is a professor of philosophy at Loyola University Chicago, and an adjunct professor at the Parmly Sensory Sciences Institute. He writes on the nature of scientific and intellectual pr...
Listen
Jeff Sharlet - The Family from 2009-08-29T00:33
Jeff Sharlet is a contributing editor for Harper's and Rolling Stone, and a visiting research scholar at New York University's Center for Religion and Media, where he has taught journalism and reli...
Listen
William Little - The Psychic Tourist from 2009-08-21T14:49
William Little is a freelance journalist based in London, England. He has written for the Saturday Telegraph magazine, Weekend Telegraph, the Guardian, The Times and the Financial Times. He has als...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - A Kinder, Gentler Secularism from 2009-08-14T14:47
Paul Kurtz is founder and chair emeritus of the Center for Inquiry and founder of a number of other organizations. A Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, he is Profess...
Listen
Benjamin Wiker - The Darwin Myth from 2009-08-07T04:15
Benjamin Wiker, Ph.D., is a senior fellow at the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology and is also a senior fellow with the Discovery Institute. His books include Answering the New Atheism and Ten ...
Listen
Ron Lindsay - International Blasphemy Day from 2009-07-31T20:26
Ronald A. Lindsay is a bioethicist, lawyer, and chief executive officer of the Center for Inquiry. For many years he practiced law in Washington, DC, and was an adjunct professor at Georgetown Univ...
Listen
Mark Blumberg - Freaks of Nature from 2009-07-24T14:23
Mark S. Blumberg is Professor and Starch Faculty Fellow at the University of Iowa. His books include The Oxford Handbook of Developmental Behavioral Neuroscience, Body Heat: Temperatur...
Listen
Zachary Shore - Blunder from 2009-07-17T04:11
Zachary Shore is Associate Professor of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School, and a Senior Fellow at the Institute of European Studies, University of California, Berkeley. He ...
Listen
James Randi - The Faith Healers from 2009-07-10T20:39
James "The Amazing" Randi is a world-renowned magician, skeptic and investigator of paranormal claims and is a central figure in the founding of the world-wide skeptical movement. Perhaps best know...
Listen
Ayaan Hirsi Ali - The Caged Virgin from 2009-07-03T05:11
Ayaan Hirsi Ali was born in Mogadishu, Somalia, was raised Muslim, and spent her childhood and young adulthood in Africa and Saudi Arabia. In 1992, Hirsi Ali came to the Netherlands as a refugee. S...
Listen
Tom Flynn - Secular Humanism versus . . . Atheism? from 2009-06-26T14:23
Tom Flynn is Executive Director of the Council for Secular Humanism, and the Editor of Free Inquiry magazine. A journalist, novelist, entertainer, and folklorist, Flynn is the author of numerous ar...
Listen
Peter Singer - The Life You Can Save from 2009-06-19T23:42
Peter Singer has been called "the world’s most influential living philosopher," by The New Yorker and Time Magazine listed him in “The Time 100,” their annual listing of the world’...
Listen
Tom Clark - Scientific Naturalism and the Illusion of Free Will from 2009-06-12T04:15
Tom Clark is director of the non-profit Center for Naturalism and author of Encountering Naturalism: A Worldview and Its Uses. He writes on science, free will, consciousness, addiction an...
Listen
Ray Hyman - The Elusive Quarry from 2009-06-05T05:50
Ray Hyman is Professor Emeritus of Psychology at the University of Oregon and one of the leading figures of modern skepticism. He was a founding member of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (fo...
Listen
Susan Sackett - The Secular Humanism of Star Trek from 2009-05-30T03:18
Susan Sackett began an association with Gene Roddenberry, creator of the television legend “Star Trek,” serving as his personal executive assistant for over 17 years until his death in October 1991...
Listen
Michael Shermer - Science, Skepticism and Libertarianism from 2009-05-23T03:17
Michael Shermer is one of the most well-known skeptics in America, working for decades to advance the scientific outlook in society. He is a contributing editor and monthly columnist for Scientific...
Listen
Dale McGowan - Raising Freethinkers from 2009-05-15T05:21
Dale McGowan has edited and co-authored Parenting Beyond Belief and Raising Freethinkers, the first comprehensive resources for nonreligious parents. He writes the secular parentin...
Listen
David Koepsell - Who Owns You? from 2009-05-09T02:31
David Koepsell is an author, philosopher, and attorney whose recent research focuses on the nexus of science, technology, ethics, and public policy. He is Assistant Professor, Philosophy Section, F...
Listen
Jeff Schweitzer - Beyond Cosmic Dice: Moral Life in a Random World from 2009-05-01T04:45
Dr. Jeffrey Schweitzer is an author, scientist and public speaker who has traveled widely speaking to varied groups about the application of the scientific worldview to public policy and ethical qu...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - Science and the Limits of the New Skepticism from 2009-04-24T06:51
Paul Kurtz is founder and chair of the Center for Inquiry and a number of other organizations. A Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, he is Professor Emeritus of Ph...
Listen
Bruce M. Hood - Supersense: Why We Believe in the Unbelievable from 2009-04-17T05:49
Bruce M. Hood is chair of the Cognitive Development Center in the Experimental Psychology Department at the University of Bristol. He was a research fellow at Cambridge and has been a visiting s...
Listen
Mary Roach - Bonk: The Curious Coupling of Science and Sex from 2009-04-10T04:56
Mary Roach is the author of Stiff: The curious Lives of Human Cadavers and Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife. Her writing has appeared in Salon, Wired, National Geographic, New Scientist, and th...
Listen
Dacher Keltner - Born to Be Good from 2009-04-04T03:42
Dacher Keltner is professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, director of the Greater Good Science Center, and coeditor of Greater Good magazine. His research focuses on the ...
Listen
Austin Dacey - The U.N. and Defamation of Religions from 2009-03-28T00:48
Austin Dacey serves as a respresentative to the United Nations for CFI, and is also on the editorial staff of Skeptical Inquirer and Free Inquiry magazines. His writings have appea...
Listen
Neil deGrasse Tyson - The Pluto Files from 2009-03-20T18:35
Neil deGrasse Tyson is an astrophysicist with the American Museum of Natural History, director of the world-famous Hayden Planetarium, a monthly columnist for Natural History, and an award-winning ...
Listen
Angie McQuaig - Camp Inquiry from 2009-03-13T18:34
Angie McQuaig is a distinguished educator whose PhD is in educational leadership. Dr. McQuaig has served for nineteen years in public education as a teacher and administrator both in the US and abr...
Listen
Eric Maisel - The Atheists Way from 2009-03-07T04:20
Eric Maisel, PhD, is the author of more than thirty works of fiction and nonfiction. His nonfiction titles include Coaching the Artist Within, Fearless Creating, The Van Gogh Blues, The Creativity ...
Listen
Jerry A. Coyne - Why Evolution Is True from 2009-02-27T05:03
Jerry A. Coyne has been a professor at the University of Chicago in the department of ecology and evolution for twenty years. He specializes in evolutionary genetics and works predominantly on t...
Listen
Norm Allen - Skepticism and Black History from 2009-02-20T06:12
Norm Allen is executive director of African Americans for Humanism, an educational organization primarily concerned with fostering critical thinking, ethical conduct, church-state separation, and s...
Listen
Ronald A. Lindsay - The Future of The Center for Inquiry from 2009-02-13T05:36
Ronald A. Lindsay is a bioethicist, lawyer, and chief executive officer and senior research fellow of the Center for Inquiry. For many years he practiced law in Washington, DC, and was an adjunct p...
Listen
David J Linden - The Accidental Mind from 2009-02-06T19:12
David J. Linden, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Department of Neuroscience at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. His laboratory has worked for many years on the cellular substrates o...
Listen
John W. Loftus - Why I Became an Atheist from 2009-01-31T04:37
John W. Loftus earned M.A. and M.Div. degrees in theology and philosophy from Lincoln Christian Seminary under the guidance of Dr. James D. Strauss. He then attended Trinity Evangelical Divinity Sc...
Listen
Kendrick Frazier - The Skeptical Inquirer from 2009-01-23T06:38
Kendrick Frazier has been the editor of Skeptical Inquirer magazine for over 30 years. He is a member of the National Association of Science Writers and the American Geophysical Union. In 2005, Fra...
Listen
Christopher Burns- Deadly Decisions from 2009-01-16T06:42
Christopher Burns is one of the country's leading minds on modern information management. He has been a news executive and consultant to government and the private sector for thirty years, advising...
Listen
Ginger Campbell - Podcasting Neuroscience from 2009-01-09T05:41
Ginger Campbell, M.D., is an emergency physician whose long-standing interest in philosophy and science motivated her to begin podcasting in 2006. While her Brain Science Podcast focuses on neurosc...
Listen
Simon Singh - Trick or Treatment from 2009-01-03T01:40
Simon Singh is an author focusing on science and mathematics for the general public. His books include Fermat's Enigma: The Epic Quest to Solve the World's Greatest Mathematical Problem, The Code B...
Listen
Tom Flynn - Science Fiction and Atheism from 2008-12-26T23:48
Tom Flynn is the Editor of Free Inquiry magazine. A journalist, novelist, entertainer, and folklorist, Flynn is the author of numerous articles for Free Inquiry, many addressing church-state issues...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - Forbidden Fruit from 2008-12-20T00:56
Paul Kurtz is the leading figure in the humanist and skeptical movements over the last four decades. He is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo. As chair ...
Listen
Solomon Schimmel - Fundamentalism and the Fear of Truth from 2008-12-13T03:05
Solomon Schimmel is professor of Jewish education and psychology at Hebrew College. He is the author of a number of books, including The Seven Deadly Sins: Jewish, Christian and Classical Reflectio...
Listen
Solomon Schimmel - The Tenacity of Unreasonable Beliefs from 2008-12-05T05:26
Solomon Schimmel is professor of Jewish education and psychology at Hebrew College. He is the author of a number of books, including The Seven Deadly Sins: Jewish, Christian and Classical Reflectio...
Listen
Jennifer Michael Hecht - Doubt from 2008-11-28T18:34
Jennifer Michael Hecht is the author of award-winning books of philosophy, history, and poetry, including The End of the Soul: Scientific Modernity, Atheism and Anthropology; Doubt: A History; The ...
Listen
James McGaha - Lights in the Sky from 2008-11-21T08:29
James McGaha is a retired USAF pilot, astronomer and director of the Grasslands Observatory. He held a TOP SECRET compartmented security clearance and was involved in numerous classified operations...
Listen
Peter Singer - Vegetarianism and the Scientific Outlook from 2008-11-14T17:25
One of the most controversial and influential philosophers alive today, Peter Singer is DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University, and laureate professor at the Centre for Applied Philo...
Listen
Peter Singer - Ethics in an Age of Darwin from 2008-11-07T17:04
One of the most controversial and influential philosophers alive today, Peter Singer is DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University, and laureate professor at the Centre for Applied Philo...
Listen
The 12th Annual CFI Houdini Seance from 2008-11-01T00:25
Harry Houdini, the world-famous magician and skeptic, sincerely explored the religion of spiritualism and communication with the dead after his beloved mother’s death in 1913. In this episode for ...
Listen
Todd C. Riniolo - When Good Thinking Goes Bad from 2008-10-25T02:35
Todd C. Riniolo is an associate professor of psychology at Medaille College. He has written many peer-reviewed articles in the psychological literature. In this discussion with D.J. Grothe, Todd R...
Listen
Edward Tabash - The U.S. Presidential Election and Secular Values Voters from 2008-10-17T13:00
Edward Tabash is a constitutional and civil rights lawyer in Beverly Hills, California. He has chaired the National Legal Committee of Americans United for Separation of Church and State since 1995...
Listen
Lawrence M. Krauss - The Fear of Physics from 2008-10-10T06:04
Lawrence M. Krauss is Foundation Professor in the School of Earth and Space Exploration and Director of the new Origins Initiative at Arizona State University. He is an internationally famous theor...
Listen
Michael Lackey - Science, Postmodernism, and the Varieties of Black Humanism from 2008-10-03T18:31
Michael Lackey teaches courses in twentieth-century American and African American literature at the University of Minnesota, Morris. A recipient of the Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship, he has pub...
Listen
Greg Long - The Making of Bigfoot from 2008-09-27T01:40
Greg Long is a professional writer, investigative journalist, and editor who lives in Washington state. He has been researching and writing about "mysteries" and unexplained phenomena of the Pacifi...
Listen
Justin Trottier - The Fight for Science and Reason on the Campuses from 2008-09-20T00:25
Justin Trottier is Executive Director of the Centre for Inquiry in Ontario, the first venue dedicated to secular humanists and freethinkers in Canada, and helps oversees CFI Communities in Calgary,...
Listen
Andrew Fraknoi - The Cosmic History of Your Body from 2008-09-12T19:23
Andrew Fraknoi is the Chair of the Astronomy Program at Foothill College near San Francisco. In 2007, he was selected as Professor of the Year for the state of California by the Carnegie Endowment ...
Listen
Barbara Oakley - Social Psychology, Genes and Human Evil from 2008-09-06T02:23
Barbara Oakley, PhD, has been dubbed a female Indiana Jones — her writing combines worldwide adventure with solid research expertise. Among other adventures, she has worked as a Russian translator ...
Listen
Ronald A. Lindsay - Future Bioethics from 2008-08-30T03:41
Ronald A. Lindsay is a bioethicist, lawyer, and chief executive officer and senior research fellow of the Center for Inquiry. He is also executive director of the Council for Secular Humanism. Fo...
Listen
Rev. Michael Dowd - The Marriage of Science and Religion from 2008-08-23T02:14
The Reverend Michael Dowd, along with his wife, science writer Connie Barlow, have lived permanently on the road for years, sharing a "sacred view of evolution" with religious and secular audien...
Listen
Rev. Michael Dowd - Thank God For Evolution from 2008-08-15T21:06
The Reverend Michael Dowd, along with his wife, science writer Connie Barlow, have lived permanently on the road for years, sharing a "sacred view of evolution" with religious and secular audiences...
Listen
Allan Mazur - Implausible Beliefs from 2008-08-08T23:53
Allan Mazur, a sociologist and an engineer, is professor of public affairs in the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. Previously a member of the social science faculties of MIT and Stanford Univ...
Listen
Guy P. Harrison - 50 Reasons People Give For Believing In A God from 2008-08-02T00:54
Guy P. Harrison is a graduate of the University of South Florida with degrees in history and anthropology. he currently lives in the Cayman Islands, where he is a columnist and travel writer for a ...
Listen
Lewis Wolpert - The Evolutionary Origins of Belief from 2008-07-25T17:43
Lewis Wolpert is Professor of Biology as Applied to Medicine in the Department of Anatomy and Developmental Biology of University College, London, focusing his research on the mechanisms involved i...
Listen
Joe Nickell - Humanistic Skepticism from 2008-07-19T05:00
The world’s leading paranormal investigator, Joe Nickell is a regular contributor to Skeptical Inquirer science magazine. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books, including Looking...
Listen
Maggie Jackson - Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age from 2008-07-12T00:29
Maggie Jackson is an award-winning author and journalist who writes the popular “Balancing Acts” column in the Boston Globe. Her work also has appeared in the New York Times and on National Public ...
Listen
Ben Radford - Paranormal Investigation from 2008-07-04T18:51
Ben Radford is is one of the world's few science-based paranormal investigators, and has done first-hand research into psychics, ghosts and haunted houses, exorcisms, Bigfoot, lake monsters, UFO si...
Listen
PZ Myers - Expelled from Expelled from 2008-06-28T00:42
PZ Myers is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris and the author of Pharyngula, the most heavily-trafficked science blog online.
In this discu...
PZ Myers - Science and Atheism in the Blogosphere from 2008-06-21T02:28
PZ Myers is a biologist and associate professor at the University of Minnesota, Morris and the author of Pharyngula, the most heavily-trafficked science blog online.
In this conver...
Susan Jacoby - The Age of American Unreason from 2008-06-13T23:52
Susan Jacoby is the author of Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism. A prominent public intellectual, she frequently appears in publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post...
Listen
Taner Edis - Science and Nonbelief from 2008-06-06T15:26
Taner Edis, born and raised in Turkey, is associate professor of physics at Truman State University and the author of The Ghost in the Universe: God in Light of Modern Science and Scie...
Listen
Robert M. Price - Top Secret: The Truth Behind Today's Pop Mysticisms from 2008-05-31T00:17
Robert M. Price is professor of theology and scriptural studies at Coleman Theological Seminary and professor of Biblical Criticism at the Center for Inquiry Institute. He’s a fellow of the Committ...
Listen
Jamy Ian Swiss - Skepticism and the Art and Philosophy of Magic from 2008-05-24T03:02
Jamy Ian Swiss is universally considered one of the world’s top sleight of hand performers, famous to magicians for his subtlety, skill and depth of understanding of magic’s history. He has appeare...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - The Transnational Center for Inquiry from 2008-05-16T22:16
Paul Kurtz, considered by many the father of the secular humanist movement, is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo. As chair of the Committee for the Sci...
Listen
Austin Dacey - Moral Values After Darwin from 2008-05-10T02:54
Austin Dacey serves as a respresentative to the United Nations for CFI, and is also on the editorial staff of Skeptical Inquirer and Free Inquiry magazines. His writings have appeared in numerous p...
Listen
Chris Hedges - I Dont Believe in Atheists from 2008-05-02T23:10
Chris Hedges is a journalist and author who focuses on American and Middle Eastern politics and society. He is currently a senior fellow at The Nation Institute in New York City and a Lecturer in t...
Listen
John Shook - Naturalism and the Scientific Outlook from 2008-04-26T02:20
John Shook is Vice President for Research and Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Inquiry Transnational in Amherst, N.Y. He received his PhD in philosophy at the University at Buffalo and was ...
Listen
Michael Shermer - The Mind of The Market from 2008-04-18T23:01
Michael Shermer is the author of ten books, including the bestselling Why People Believe Weird Things and The Science of Good and Evil. An adjunct professor of economics at Claremont Graduate Unive...
Listen
Tom Flynn - Ingersoll: The Most Famous Person You Have Never Heard Of from 2008-04-12T00:58
Tom Flynn is editor of Free Inquiry Magazine and director of the Robert Green Ingersoll Birthplace Museum. He also directs traditional video operations at the Center for Inquiry. He is editor of Th...
Listen
Marc Hauser - Moral Minds from 2008-04-04T22:52
Marc Hauser is an evolutionary psychologist and biologist. He is Harvard College Professor and Professor of Psychology, and Director of the Primate Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory at Harvard U...
Listen
Sir Harold Kroto - Science Education and Freethinking from 2008-03-29T02:30
Sir Harold Kroto, winner of the 1996 Nobel Prize for Chemistry, is in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at The Florida State University. He is a tireless science educator who gives lectu...
Listen
Austin Dacey - The Secular Conscience from 2008-03-22T00:36
Austin Dacey serves as a respresentative to the United Nations for CFI, and is also on the editorial staff of Skeptical Inquirer and Free Inquiry magazines. His writings have appeared in numerous p...
Listen
Norm Allen - African American Religiosity, Humanism, and Politics from 2008-03-14T19:34
Norm Allen is executive director of African Americans for Humanism, an educational organization primarily concerned with fostering critical thinking, ethical conduct, church-state separation, and s...
Listen
Robert M. Price - The Paperback Apocalypse from 2008-03-07T18:53
Robert M. Price is professor of theology and scriptural studies at Coleman Theological Seminary and professor of Biblical Criticism at the Center for Inquiry Institute. He’s a fellow of the Committ...
Listen
Matthew C. Nisbet - Communicating about Science and Religion from 2008-03-01T00:54
Matthew C. Nisbet, Ph.D., is a professor in the School of Communication at American University. His research tracks scientific and environmental controversies, examining the interactions between ex...
Listen
Tom Flynn - The Science vs. Religion Warfare Thesis from 2008-02-22T21:31
Tom Flynn is editor of Free Inquiry Magazine and director of the Robert Green Ingersoll Birthplace Museum. He also directs traditional video operations at t...
Listen
Lynne Kelly - The Skeptics Guide to the Paranormal from 2008-02-16T02:37
Lynne Kelly is a writer and science educator in Australia, and a founding member of Australian Skeptics. An expert on the paranormal who uses aspects of the magicians art to advance skepticism, sh...
Listen
Tory Christman - Anti-Science Scientology? from 2008-02-09T00:08
Tory Christman is a former member of the Church of Scientology. She left the organization in 2000, after being a member for about 30 years and is now one of its most visible and high-profile critic...
Listen
Edward Tabash - Science, Secularism, and the 2008 Presidential Election from 2008-02-01T22:45
Edward Tabash is a constitutional and civil rights lawyer in Beverly Hills, California. Graduating magna cum laude from UCLA in 1973, he graduated from Loyola Law School of Los Angeles three years ...
Listen
John Allen Paulos - Irreligion from 2008-01-26T01:57
John Allen Paulos is Professor of Mathematics at Temple University. He has been celebrated as a writer and speaker about the importance of mathematical literacy, although he is also drawn to other ...
Listen
Colin McGinn - Secular Philosophy and Skepticism from 2008-01-18T22:43
Colin McGinn, educated at Oxford University, is the author of sixteen previous books, including The Making of a Philosopher. He has written for the London Review o...
Listen
Aubrey de Grey - Ending Aging from 2008-01-11T22:30
Aubrey de Grey, PhD, is a biomedical gerontologist and Chairman and Chief Science Officer of The Methuselah Foundation. His major research interests are the role and etiology of all forms of cellul...
Listen
Dr. Stephen Barrett - Watching Out for Quackery from 2008-01-04T22:12
Stephen Barrett, M.D. has achieved national renown as an author, editor, and consumer advocate. In addition to heading Quackwatch, he is vice-president of the National Council Against Health Fraud,...
Listen
Lawrence Krauss - Seducing for Science from 2007-12-28T23:12
Lawrence M. Krauss is Ambrose Swasey Professor of Physics, Prof of Astronomy, and Director of the Center for Education and Research in Cosmology and Astrophysics at Case Western Reserve University....
Listen
Paul Kurtz - Ethics for the Nonreligious from 2007-12-21T23:02
Paul Kurtz, considered by many the father of the secular humanist movement, is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo. As chair of the Committee for the Sci...
Listen
Student Freethought Leaders Speak Out from 2007-12-14T23:50
CFI supports a growing network of campus groups on about 200 campuses throughout North America and around the world. While this is a much smaller number than its "cultural competitors," with groups...
Listen
Richard Dawkins - Science and the New Atheism from 2007-12-08T02:51
Richard Dawkins, considered one of the world's most influential scientists, is the first holder of the Charles Simonyi professorship of the public understanding of science at Oxford University and ...
Listen
Keith Stanovich - Finding Meaning in the Age of Darwin from 2007-11-30T23:23
Keith Stanovich holds the Canada Research Chair of Applied Cognitive Science at the Department of Human Development and Applied Psychology, University of Toronto. His research areas include the psy...
Listen
Richard Wiseman - Quirkology from 2007-11-23T05:00
Professor Richard Wiseman, a psychologist, started his working life as a professional magician. He currently holds Britain’s only Professorship in the Public Understanding of Psychology at the Univ...
Listen
Neil deGrasse Tyson - Communicating Science to the Public from 2007-11-16T21:58
Neil deGrasse Tyson is one of America's leading spokespersons for science. The research areas he focuses on are star formation, exploding stars, dwarf galaxies, and the structure of our own galaxy,...
Listen
Michael Behe - The Edge of Evolution from 2007-11-08T05:00
Michael J. Behe, a central figure in the Intelligent Design movement, is professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania and a senior fellow of the Discovery Institute's Center for S...
Listen
The 11th Annual Houdini Seance at CFI from 2007-11-02T21:40
Harry Houdini, the world-famous magician and escape artist, earnestly explored the religion of spiritualism and communication with the dead after his beloved mother’s death in 1913, even as he late...
Listen
Steven Pinker - The Stuff of Thought from 2007-10-26T18:56
Steven Pinker, a renowned cognitive neuroscientist, a research psychologist, and is Johnstone Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. His research on cognition and language won the Troland A...
Listen
Edward Tabash - Why There Really Is No God from 2007-10-19T21:10
Edward Tabash is a constitutional and civil rights lawyer in Beverly Hills, California. Graduating magna cum laude from UCLA in 1973, he graduated from Loyola Law School of Los Angeles three years ...
Listen
Barbara Oakley - Evil Genes from 2007-10-15T22:25
Barbara Oakley, PhD, has been dubbed a female Indiana Jones — her writing combines worldwide adventure with solid research expertise. Among other adventures, she has worked as a Russian translator ...
Listen
Alan Dershowitz - Blasphemy from 2007-10-05T20:47
Alan Dershowitz, the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, is one of the country's foremost appellate lawyers and a distinguished defender of civil liberties. More than a millio...
Listen
Joe Nickell - The New Idolatry from 2007-09-28T22:49
The world's leading paranormal investigator, Joe Nickell is a regular contributor to Skeptical Inquirer science magazine. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books, including Listen
Massimo Pigliucci - Making Sense of Evolution from 2007-09-22T01:42
Massimo Pigliucci is professor of Ecology and Evolution at the State University of New York at Stony Brook and is well known as an outspoken critic of creationism and advocate of the public underst...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - The New Atheism and Secular Humanism from 2007-09-14T20:27
Paul Kurtz, considered by many the father of the secular humanist movement, is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo. As chair of the Committee for the Sci...
Listen
Madeleine Van Hecke - Why Smart People Do Dumb Things from 2007-09-07T21:15
Madeleine Van KHecke is a licensed clinical psychologist and an adjunct faculty member at North College in Naperville, Illinois. She is a writer, and a lecturer and workshop leader for Open Arms Se...
Listen
Dr. Francis Collins - The Language of God from 2007-08-31T20:36
Francis Collins is one of the world's leading scientists. He has been the longtime head of the Human Genome Project, the groundbreaking international effort to map and sequence all of the human DNA...
Listen
Garrett G. Fagan - Archaeological Fantasies from 2007-08-24T20:09
Garrett G. Fagan is Associate Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies at Penn State University. He was educated at Trinity College, Dublin and McMaster University Canada. His main r...
Listen
Chris Mooney - Storm World from 2007-08-17T19:42
Chris Mooney is an acclaimed writer who focuses on subjects at the intersection of science and politics. His writing has appeared in Wired, New Scientist, Free Inquiry, Skeptical Inquirer, Slate, M...
Listen
Peter H. Gilmore - Science and Satanism from 2007-08-10T18:21
Peter H. Gilmore is the High Priest of the Church of Satan. He has been interviewed on numerous television and radio programs dealing with the topic of Satanism, including spots on The History Chan...
Listen
Carol Tavris - Mistakes Were Made from 2007-08-03T21:43
Carol Tavris is a social psychologist, lecturer, and writer whose books include Anger and The Mismeasure of Woman. She has written on psychological topics for the Los Angeles Times, the New York Ti...
Listen
Peter Irons - God on Trial from 2007-07-27T22:30
Peter Irons is professor emeritus of political science at the University of California, San Diego. A noted constitutional scholar, historian, and lawyer, he is the author of the bestselling May It ...
Listen
Ophelia Benson - Why Truth Matters from 2007-07-20T22:20
Ophelia Benson is the joint-author (with Jeremy Stangroom) of Why Truth Matters and The Dictionary of Fashionable Nonsense, and Deputy Editor of The Philosophers' Magazine. In addition to maintaini...
Listen
Philip Kitcher - Living with Darwin from 2007-07-13T21:23
Philip Kitcher is the John Dewey Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University. An eminent philosopher, he is the author of many books on science, literature, and music, including Abusing Science:...
Listen
Christopher Hitchens - God Is Not Great from 2007-07-06T22:22
Christopher Hitchens, one of the most celebrated social critics of our time, has been a columnist for Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, The Nation, Slate and Free Inquiry. He is the author of more than a ...
Listen
Natalie Angier - The Canon from 2007-06-29T23:02
Natalie Anger is a Pulitzer Prize-winning science journalist for the New York Times. Born in the Bronx borough of New York City, New York, she studied physics and English at Barnard College, where ...
Listen
Tom Clark - Encountering Naturalism from 2007-06-22T22:03
Tom Clark is founder and director of the Center For Naturalism, a non profit advocacy organization in the Boston area devoted to educating the public about naturalism, policy development, and commu...
Listen
R. Joseph Hoffmann - The Jesus Project from 2007-06-16T00:54
Joe Hoffmann, formally at Oxford, is director of Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER). He has appeared widely in the media and at venues across the United States speaking on ...
Listen
Chris Wisnia - Dr. DeBunko from 2007-06-08T21:22
Chris Wisnia has been involved with the comics self-publishing for several years. The creator of the celebrated comic books Tabloia, and Doris Danger Seeks Where Giant Monsters Creep, he also recen...
Listen
David Triggle - Science and the Public from 2007-06-01T18:52
David Triggle is distinguished professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo and president of the Center for Inquiry Institute. He is the author and editor of several books dealing with ...
Listen
Jennifer Michael Hecht - The Happiness Myth from 2007-05-25T21:44
Jennifer Michael Hecht is the author of award-winning books of philosophy, history, and poetry. Her Doubt: A History (HarperCollins, 2003) demonstrates a long, strong history of religious doubt fro...
Listen
David Koepsell - Why Secular Humanism? from 2007-05-18T14:53
David Koepsell is the Executive Director of the Council for Secular Humanism, North America's leading organization for nonreligious people. An author, philosopher and an attorney, David's work focu...
Listen
Joe Nickell - The Relics of the Christ from 2007-05-12T01:41
The world’s leading paranormal investigator, Joe Nickell is a regular contributor to Skeptical Inquiry science magazine. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books, including Inquest o...
Listen
Hemant Mehta - I Sold My Soul on Ebay from 2007-05-04T23:29
Hemant Mehta is an honors graduate from the university of Illinois, and has been involved in secularist student activism for years. Early on, he attended one of CFI's summer sessions on scholarshi...
Listen
Taner Edis - Science and Religion in Islam from 2007-04-27T21:53
Taner Edis, born and raised in Turkey, is associate professor of physics at Truman State University and the author of The Ghost in the Universe: God in Light of Modern Science and Science and Non-b...
Listen
Matthew C. Nisbet - Selling Science to the Public from 2007-04-21T00:52
Matthew C. Nisbet, Ph.D., is a professor in the School of Communication at American University. His research tracks scientific and environmental controversies, examining the interactions between e...
Listen
Phil Plait - The Bad Astronomer from 2007-04-13T04:47
Phil Plait works in the physics and astronomy department at Sonoma State University. In the early '90's, he started Badastronomy.com, which has become a popular website focused on educating the pub...
Listen
Joe Nickell - Debunking in Hollywood? from 2007-04-06T19:38
The world's leading paranormal investigator, Joe Nickell is a regular contributor to Skeptical Inquiry science magazine. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books, including Inquest on t...
Listen
Nica Lalli - Nothing: Something to Believe In from 2007-03-31T00:42
Nica Lalli is an art educator working with the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She also writes a weekly column in the Brooklyn Paper. In this discussion with D.J. Grothe, Nica talks about her new and ...
Listen
Susan Haack - Defending Science -- Within Reason from 2007-03-23T23:36
Susan Haack, formerly Fellow of New Hall, Cambridge, and then professor of Philosophy at the University of Warwick, is presently Cooper Senior Scholar in Arts and Sciences, Professor of Philosophy,...
Listen
Tawfik Hamid - My Life as a Muslim Terrorist from 2007-03-17T02:47
Tawfik Hamid, an expert on Islamic terrorism, joined the Islamic group Muslim GI in Egypt, while in medical school. His colleagues in the terror movement included Al Zawaherri, then a friend with ...
Listen
Robert M. Price - Jesus: The Failed Hypothesis from 2007-03-09T23:41
Robert M. Price is professor of theology and scriptural studies at Coleman Theological Seminary and professor of Biblical Criticism at the Center for Inquiry Institute. He's a fellow of the Committ...
Listen
Victor Stenger - God: The Failed Hypothesis from 2007-03-03T00:13
Victor Stenger is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of Hawaii and Adjunct Professor of Philosophy at the University of Colorado. He is also founder and president of Colorado Citizens ...
Listen
Steven Pinker - Evolutionary Psychology and Human Nature from 2007-02-23T21:55
Steven Pinker, a renowned research psychologist, is Johnstone Professor of Psychology at Harvard University. His research on cognition and language won the Troland Award from the National Academy o...
Listen
Barbara Forrest - The Wedge of Intelligent Design from 2007-02-16T22:33
Barbara Forrest is a philosopher and public intellectual at Southeastern Louisiana University. Widely praised for her compelling expert testimony in the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School Distric...
Listen
Peter Singer - The Way We Eat from 2007-02-09T16:41
Peter Singer has been called "the world's most influential living philosopher," by The New Yorker and Time Magazine listed him in "The Time 100," their annual listing of the world's 100 most influ...
Listen
Solomon Schimmel - Specious Proofs for Quranic Divinity from 2007-02-02T22:52
Solomon Schimmel is a psychologist of religion and Professor of Jewish Education and Psychology at Hebrew College. He has been a Fulbright Senior Research Scholar and Visiting Fellow at Cambridge U...
Listen
Neil deGrasse Tyson - Death by Black Hole from 2007-01-26T05:22
Neil deGrasse Tyson is one of America's leading spokespersons for science. The research areas he focuses on are star formation, exploding stars, dwarf galaxies, and the structure of our own galaxy,...
Listen
John Shook - Scientific Naturalism and its Discontents from 2007-01-20T01:29
John Shook is Vice President for Research and Research Fellow at the Center for Inquiry Transnational in Amherst, N.Y. He received his PhD in philosophy at the University at Buffalo and was a profe...
Listen
Eugene Burger - Magic and Mystery from 2007-01-12T22:22
Eugene Burger, "universally recognized as perhaps the finest close-up magician in the world," (Stagebill magazine) has written fifteen best-selling books for magicians, starred in a number of instr...
Listen
Ann Druyan - Carl Sagan and The Varieties of Scientific Experience from 2007-01-06T01:47
Ann Druyan is an author, public lecturer, and TV and movie writer and producer whose work focuses on the worldview of science. She is the widow of Carl Sagan, the great astronomer and public advoca...
Listen
R. Joseph Hoffmann - The Scientific Study of Religion from 2006-12-29T17:55
Joe Hoffmann, formally at Oxford, is director of Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER). He has appeared widely in the media and at venues across the United States speaking on ...
Listen
Tom Flynn - The Real War on Christmas from 2006-12-22T21:54
Tom Flynn is the Editor of Free Inquiry magazine. A journalist, novelist, entertainer, and folklorist, Flynn is the author of numerous articles for Free Inquiry, many addressing church-state issues...
Listen
Susan Blackmore - In Search of the Light from 2006-12-15T20:07
Sue Blackmore is a psychologist and writer whose research on consciousness, memes, and the paranormal has been published in over sixty academic papers, as well as book chapters, reviews and popular...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - What is the Point of Inquiry from 2006-12-08T06:02
In this special episode of Point of Inquiry, Paul Kurtz joins D.J. Grothe for an overview of CFI's mission and challenges. Kurtz is founder and chair of the Center for Inquiry and many other organi...
Listen
Barry Kosmin - The Scientific Study of Secularism from 2006-12-02T01:52
Barry Kosmin is a sociologist, and is research professor in public policy and law at Trinity College. He is co-author of One Nation Under God and author of Religion in a Free Market. Kosmin was als...
Listen
Norm Allen - Science, Humanism, and the Black Community from 2006-11-24T06:11
Norm Allen is executive director of African Americans for Humanism, an educational organization primarily concerned with fostering critical thinking, ethical conduct, church-state separation, and s...
Listen
Michelle Goldberg - Kingdom Coming from 2006-11-18T04:59
Michelle Goldberg is a freelance writer who has reported from all over the United States, as well as from Jordan, Egypt, Iraq, Israel and the West Bank. In her writing, she focuses on the role of i...
Listen
Richard Wiseman - Theatre of Science from 2006-11-10T23:38
Psychologist Professor Richard Wiseman started his working life as a professional magician and currently holds Britain's only Professorship in the Public Understanding of Psychology at the Universi...
Listen
Chris Mooney - Science, Politics, and the Midterm Election from 2006-11-04T03:45
Chris Mooney is an acclaimed writer about subjects at intersection of science and politics. His writing has appeared in Wired, New Scientist, Free Inquiry, Skeptical Inquirer, Slate, Mother Jones, ...
Listen
The CFI 10th Annual Houdini Seance - Halloween 2006 from 2006-11-01T00:26
Harry Houdini, the world-famous magician and escape artist, earnestly explored the religion of spiritualism and communication with the dead after his beloved mother's death in 1913. He eventually c...
Listen
Salman Rushdie - Secular Values, Human Rights and Islamism from 2006-10-28T06:10
Salman Rushdie is a British-Indian essayist and novelist widely acclaimed for his narrative style that blends myth and fantasy with real life. He has won many awards for his fiction, including the ...
Listen
Jill Tarter - Are We Alone? from 2006-10-21T00:17
Jill Tarter holds the Bernard M. Oliver Chair for SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, CA where she also serves as director of the Center for SETI...
Listen
Richard Dawkins - The God Delusion from 2006-10-16T21:47
Richard Dawkins, considered one of the world's most influential scientists, is the first holder of the Charles Simonyi professorship of the public understanding of science at Oxford University and ...
Listen
Sam Harris - Letter to a Christian Nation from 2006-10-07T02:56
Sam Harris is the author of the New York Times best-seller The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason. He is a graduate in philosophy from Stanford University and has studied both ...
Listen
Robert M. Price - The Reason Driven Life from 2006-09-29T21:59
Robert M. Price is professor of theology and scriptural studies at Coleman Theological Seminary and professor of Biblical Criticism at the Center for Inquiry Institute. He's a fellow of the Committ...
Listen
Michael Shermer - Why Darwin Matters from 2006-09-22T22:56
Michael Shermer is one of the most well-known skeptics in America. He is a contributing editor and monthly columnist for Scientific American, and is the host of the Skeptics Distinguished Lecture S...
Listen
Ann Druyan - Science, Wonder, and Spirituality from 2006-09-15T20:36
Ann Druyan is a renowned author, lecturer, and television and motion picture writer/producer whose work mostly explores the implications of science and technology for our society. She is the widow ...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - World War and World Religions from 2006-09-08T23:52
Paul Kurtz is founder and chair of the Center for Inquiry and a number of other organizations. A Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, he is Professor Emeritus of Philo...
Listen
Amy-Jill Levine - Who Was Jesus of Nazareth from 2006-09-01T21:43
Amy-Jill Levine is E. Rhodes and Leona B. Carpenter Professor of New Testament Studies at Vanderbilt University Divinity School, where she also holds the position of Director of the Carpenter Progr...
Listen
Joe Nickell - Ancient Astronauts and the Nazca Lines from 2006-08-26T00:27
Joe Nickell, Senior Research Fellow for CSICOP, is considered the world's leading paranormal investigator. A former professional stage magician and private investigator, he has used his varied back...
Listen
Neil deGrasse Tyson - The Sky Is Not the Limit from 2006-08-18T04:31
Neil deGrasse Tyson, one of America's superstars of science, focuses his research on star formation, exploding stars, dwarf galaxies, and the structure of our own galaxy, the Milky Way. In additio...
Listen
Eugene Straus, M.D. - Medical Marvels, Compassion, and Skepticism from 2006-08-11T22:48
Eugene Straus, M.D., is Emeritus Professor of Medicine at the State University of New York Downstate College of Medicine. He's also served as a senior faculty member at the Albert Einstein College ...
Listen
Bill Cooke - Is Scientific Humanism Anti-Religious? from 2006-08-04T20:51
Bill Cooke, former international director for the Center for Inquiry, is a senior lecturer at the School of Visual Arts at University of Auckland at Manukau. He is a fellow of the Committee for the...
Listen
Derek Araujo - A Decade of Campus Freethought Activism from 2006-07-28T21:12
Derek Araujo was one of the founders and the first student president of the Campus Freethought Alliance in 1996. At the time he was attending Harvard College where he also founded the Harvard Secul...
Listen
Barry Beyerstein - The Sins of Big Pharma from 2006-07-22T01:14
Barry Beyerstein is Professor of Psychology and a member of the Brain Behaviour Laboratory at Simon Fraser University. His research has involved many areas related to his primary scholarly interest...
Listen
Thomas Kida - Dont Believe Everything You Think from 2006-07-15T02:31
Thomas Kida is a professor in the Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and the author of many articles on decision-making. For the last 25 years he has been r...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - The Courage to Become from 2006-07-08T03:54
Paul Kurtz, considered the father of the secular humanist movement and a founder of the worldwide skeptic movement, is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffal...
Listen
James Randi - Science, Magic, and Future of Skepticism from 2006-06-30T15:39
James "The Amazing" Randi is a world-renowned magician, skeptic and investigator of paranormal claims. He has been a central figure in the development of the world-wide skeptical movement. He's per...
Listen
Tom Flynn - The Rise of the Non-Religious from 2006-06-23T23:35
Tom Flynn is the Editor of Free Inquiry magazine. A journalist, novelist, entertainer, and folklorist, Flynn is the author of numerous articles for Free Inquiry magazine, many addressing church-sta...
Listen
Jerry Coyne - The Case Against Intelligent Design from 2006-06-16T20:57
Jerry Coyne is a professor in the department of ecology and evolution at the University of Chicago, where he works on diverse areas of evolutionary genetics. The main focus of his laboratory is on ...
Listen
Cathleen Falsani - The God Factor from 2006-06-09T23:48
Cathleen Falsani is the religion reporter for the Chicago Sun-Times, where she has covered spirituality and popular culture from Vatican City, Ireland, the White House, the Playboy Mansion and the ...
Listen
Joe Nickell - Psychic Detectives from 2006-06-03T03:33
Joe Nickell, Senior Research Fellow for CSICOP, is considered the world's leading paranormal investigator. A former professional stage magician and private investigator, he has used his varied back...
Listen
R. Joseph Hoffmann - Examining The Da Vinci Code from 2006-05-26T23:03
Joe Hoffmann is Campbell Professor of Religion and Human Values at Wells College, New York and chair of the Committee for the Scientific Examination of Religion (CSER) at the Center for Inquiry. He...
Listen
Matt Nisbet - Framing Science from 2006-05-20T02:22
Matt Nisbet is assistant professor in the school of communication at the Ohio State University. He focuses on the intersections between science, media, and politics, tracking how political strategi...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - Science and Planetary Ethics from 2006-05-12T04:04
Paul Kurtz, considered the father of the secular humanist movement and a founder of the worldwide skeptic movement, is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffal...
Listen
Edward Tabash - True Meaning of Church/State Separation from 2006-05-05T04:53
Edward Tabash is a constitutional and civil rights lawyer in Beverly Hills, California. Graduating magna cum laude from UCLA in 1973, he graduated from Loyola Law School of Los Angeles three years ...
Listen
Eugenie Scott - Evolution vs. Religious Belief? from 2006-04-29T01:02
Eugenie Scott, a physical anthropologist, has been the director of the National Center for Science Education for nearly 20 years. A former president of the American Association of Physical Anthropo...
Listen
Bill Nye - Changing The World With Science Education from 2006-04-21T18:22
Bill Nye is one of America's leading popularizers of the scientific outlook. As a scientist, engineer, comedian, author, and inventor, he hosted Bill Nye The Science Guy, which earned 28 Emmys dur...
Listen
Sam Harris - The Mortal Dangers of Religion from 2006-04-14T21:53
Sam Harris is the author of the New York Times bestseller The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. Mr. Harris is a graduate in philosophy from Stanford University and has studi...
Listen
Sam Harris - The End of Faith from 2006-04-07T16:21
Sam Harris is the author of the New York Times bestseller The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason. Mr. Harris is a graduate in philosophy from Stanford University and has studi...
Listen
Herbert Hauptman - The Joy of Science from 2006-03-31T23:46
Herbert Hauptman is winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for pioneering a mathematical model for determining the molecular structures of crystallized materials. This work has proved to be of the ...
Listen
Jamy Ian Swiss - Psychics, Science, and Magic from 2006-03-24T23:43
Jamy Ian Swiss is universally considered one of the world's top sleight of hand performers, famous to magicians for his subtlety, skill and depth of understanding of magic's history. He has made nu...
Listen
Susan Jacoby - American Freethought Heritage from 2006-03-17T22:31
Susan Jacoby is the author of Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism, now in its tenth hardcover printing and recently published in paperback. Freethinkers was hailed in the New York Times ...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - Skepticism of the Third Kind from 2006-03-11T02:33
Paul Kurtz, considered the father of the secular humanist movement and a founder of the worldwide skeptic movement, is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffal...
Listen
Daniel Dennett - Breaking the Spell from 2006-03-03T21:13
Daniel Dennett, the author of such groundbreaking and influential books as Consciousness Explained and Darwin's Dangerous Idea: Evolution and the Meanings of Life (which was a finalist for the Nati...
Listen
Dr. Wallace Sampson - Science Meets Alternative Medicine from 2006-02-25T03:14
Dr. Wallace Sampson serves as editor of The Scientific Review of Alternative Medicine and is a member of the Board of Directors of the National Council Against Health Fraud. He has served as Chief ...
Listen
Joe Nickell - Aliens and Abductions from 2006-02-18T03:35
Joe Nickell, Senior Research Fellow for CSICOP, is considered the world's leading paranormal investigator. A former professional stage magician and private investigator, he has used his varied back...
Listen
Richard Dawkins - The Root of All Evil? from 2006-02-11T00:59
Richard Dawkins is professor of the public understanding of science at Oxford University. The recipient of a number of awards for his writing on science, including the Royal Society of Literature A...
Listen
Marci Hamilton - Religion and the Rule of Law from 2006-02-04T02:36
Marci Hamilton is a distinguished constitutional law professor at Cordozo School of Law and is the author of the critically acclaimed book God vs. The Gavel: Religion and the Rule of Law. She has a...
Listen
Chris Mooney - The Republican War on Science from 2006-01-28T02:52
Chris Mooney, a Washington correspondent for Seed magazine, a senior correspondent for the American Prospect, and a columnist for Skeptical Inquirer magazine, focuses on issues at the intersection ...
Listen
Eugenie Scott - The Dover Trial: Evolution vs. Intelligent Design from 2006-01-20T22:54
Eugenie Scott, a physical anthropologist, has been the director of the National Center for Science Education for nearly 20 years. A former president of the American Association of Physical Anthropo...
Listen
Max Maven - Magic and Skepticism from 2006-01-13T12:14
The great movie director Orson Welles wrote that Max Maven has "the most creative mind in magic." The New York Times observed that his "category-defying mind-reading veers into conceptual art." The...
Listen
Ibn Warraq - Why I Am Not a Muslim from 2006-01-06T23:53
Ibn Warraq is the author of a number of books, including Why I Am Not A Muslim, considered among the most important critical looks at the negative aspects of Islam today. He is an outspoken critic ...
Listen
Susan Jacoby - The History of American Secularism from 2005-12-31T01:36
Susan Jacoby is the author of Freethinkers: A History of American Secularism, now in its tenth hardcover printing and recently published in paperback. Freethinkers was hailed in the New York Times ...
Listen
Andrew Skolnick - The Dangers of Alternative Medicine from 2005-12-23T23:23
Andrew Skolnick, Executive Director of the Commission for Scientific Medicine and Mental Health, is a nationally renowned science journalist who has won numerous national awards and honors for his ...
Listen
Joe Nickell - Skeptical Inquiry vs. Debunking from 2005-12-16T22:51
Joe Nickell, Senior Research Fellow for CSICOP, is considered the world's leading paranormal investigator. A former professional stage magician and private investigator, he taught at the University...
Listen
Paul Kurtz - Science and Religion: Are They Compatible? from 2005-12-11T23:54
Paul Kurtz, considered the father of the modern secular humanist movement, is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo. As chair of the Committee for the Scie...
Listen