Point of Inquiry
649 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 2 months ago - ★★★★★ - 758 ratingsPoint 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.
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Episodes
Penalizing Pregnancy: Lynn Paltrow on the Fight for Reproductive Justice
January 05, 2015 18:39 - 34 minutes - 77.8 MBThe effort to overturn Roe v. Wade and criminalize abortion has spiraled into challenging not only women’s right to abortion, but a women’s right to carry her baby to term. Across the country, women who seek medical help for pregnancy complications are being met with incarceration and outrageous sentences, all without proper representation. According to this week’s guest, if a woman would like to give birth in America, she needs to be prepared to surrender her basic liberties. Here to di...
Christmas Extra: Tom Flynn’s 30th Year of Anti-ClausingTom Flynn is Executive Director of The Council for Secular Humanism, Editor of Free Inquiry magazine, Director of Inquiry Media Productions, as well as professional anti-Christmas advocate and au
December 25, 2014 14:19 - 12 minutes - 29.3 MBTom Flynn is Executive Director of The Council for Secular Humanism, Editor of Free Inquiry magazine, as well as professional anti-Christmas advocate and author of “The Trouble with Christmas.” Tom is on his 30th year of being completely Yule free and he’s here to talk about why the rest of us should join him in protesting the holidays.
Greta Christina on Coping with Death, No Afterlife Required
December 22, 2014 18:03 - 27 minutes - 62.8 MBOur Guest this week is Greta Christina, popular atheist blogger, speaker and author of several books on atheism including her newest, “Comforting Thoughts About Death That Have Nothing to Do With God.” Christina discusses with Lindsay Beyerstein the tendencies we have to avoid and deny death and how it affects our abilities to cope. Christina explains how the concept of an afterlife may actually be failing to prepare people for the end of their lives, and how we can use our humanism and...
Frank Schaeffer on Cynicism and Paranoia in the "War on Christmas"
December 16, 2014 20:51 - 32 minutes - 74.7 MBFox News’ "War on Christmas" is already in full swing, as Bill O’Reilly wasted no time jumping into battle this year to defend the holiday from the great secular menace. However, it looks like Bill might be able to leave the trenches a little early this year; according to a new Pew survey, just over 70 percent of Americans believe that Jesus was literally birthed from the womb of a virgin (a staggering percentage considering that only one third of Americans report interpreting the Bible as t...
Ronald A. Lindsay: Why God Can't Tell Us What to Do
December 08, 2014 19:45 - 34 minutes - 78.6 MBDespite the fact that the United States was founded as a secular state, government neutrality toward religion remains a tumultuous and controversial issue -- a conversation-stopper in most public policy discussions. This week on the show, Lindsay Beyerstein welcomes Ronald A. Lindsay, president and CEO of the Center for Inquiry, the organization responsible for Point of Inquiry. Ron joins us to discuss his just-released book, The Necessity of Secularism: Why God Can’t Tell Us What to Do, in ...
Deciphering Alan Turing, with Andrew Hodges
December 01, 2014 20:59 - 29 minutes - 66.9 MBAlan Turing was a true visionary. Founding what we understand today as computer science, he was also a mathematician, a philosopher, and an early trailblazer for gay equality. Without his genius for codebreaking, the Second World War might have gone in a much darker direction. He saved millions of lives and potentially the world as we know it, yet his efforts for humanity were not enough to spare him the inhuman treatment he received for his sexual orientation. Andrew Hodges was one of t...
Getting Over Racial Anxiety, with Rachel D. Godsil
November 24, 2014 22:03 - 43 minutes - 99.6 MBAs a nation, the U.S. prides itself on at least aspiring to the ideal of equality, even if it often falls short. The educational, health care, and legal systems, are plagued by institutional biases against racial minorities. The good news is that these disparities are likely not due to hateful intent, but caused by a combination of factors that include implicit bias, racial anxiety, and stereotype threat. To make sense of this, Point of Inquiry welcomes Rachel D. Godsil, research directo...
Surviving Saddam and Confronting Islam, with Faisal Saeed Al Mutar
November 19, 2014 17:38 - 35 minutes - 80.1 MBAs the threat posed by radical Islamists like those of ISIS grows in popular awareness, Islam itself becomes more of a target for criticism; some of it fair, and some of it based in ignorance or bigotry. Can efforts to defend Islam and Muslims from discrimination and racism go too far, and keep us from having an honest discussion about something of such critical importance? This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Faisal Saeed Al Mutar, an Iraqi refugee turned activist, and founder of the G...
Steven Pinker: Using Grammar as a Tool, Not as a Weapon
November 10, 2014 20:04 - 13.3 MBThe English language is often treated as delicate and precious, and disagreements about what is “proper English” go back as far as the 18th century. Then as now, style manuals and grammar books placed innumerable restrictions on what is and isn’t “correct,” as "Language Mavens" continue to delight in pointing out the unforgivable errors of others. To bring some fresh perspective to this remarkably heated topic (and to let some of us who are less than perfect, grammatically speaking, off the ...
Ebola in the Age of Epidemics - Special Live Episode
November 03, 2014 20:10 - 10.3 MBThere’s no doubt that Ebola is an incredibly dangerous and genuinely lethal virus, but it’s also a highly manageable one, though you’d be forgiven for thinking otherwise given the kind of hyperbolic coverage we’ve seen of the epidemic. In order to sort fact from fiction about the real threat posed by Ebola, and to better understand its origins and wider implications, Point of Inquiry presents a special episode, recorded before a live audience in New York. We begin with a presentation by ...
Halloween Extra: 18th Annual Houdini Séance with Joe Nickell
October 31, 2014 15:22 - 9.04 MBHarry Houdini, the most famous illusionist the world has ever known, spent the later part of his career fascinated with spiritualists and mediums. This led him to become a dedicated skeptic and investigator. In this special Halloween episode for 2014, Point of Inquiry’s new producer Nora Hurley chats with Joe Nickell, the world’s leading paranormal investigator, and a former professional magician himself. Together, they conduct the Center for Inquiry’s 18th Annual Houdini Séance. Listen in...
Pro-Choice Without Apology, with Katha Pollitt
October 22, 2014 15:08 - 15.5 MBGiven 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 three women will have an abortion before menopause), even those who are staunchly pro-choice feel compelled to hedge their support by making sounds about how abortions are "horrible" and "unfortunate." When both sides of the controversy associate abortions as immoral and shameful, much of the convers...
The Human Impact of Discovering Alien Life, with Astrobiologist Steven J. Dick
October 14, 2014 22:26 - 29 minutes - 27.4 MBOur 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 our own planet. Last month, some of the world’s leading scientists gathered at an Astrobiology Symposium run by NASA and the Library of Congress to discuss where we stand in our search for extraterrestrial life. This week on Point of Inquiry, Steven J. Dick, the Baruch S. Blumberg NASA/Library of Congress Chai...
The Theology of ISIS, with Dr. Adam Silverman
October 06, 2014 18:57 - 52 minutes - 30 MBThe rise of ISIS, the self proclaimed Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, has sparked debate about the role of religion — specifically Islam — in violent extremism. This week, Dr. Adam Silverman offers us a glimpse into the theology of ISIS, and tackled some difficult questions; What does ISIS believe and how do its religious beliefs shape its political choices? What about the notorious video-taped beheadings and reports of rape as weapons of war? How does ISIS want the United States to react, ...
Austin Dacey
September 29, 2014 19:43 - 41 minutes - 18.8 MBJosh Zepps is off, and since this week is the 5th International Blasphemy Rights Day, we're rebroadcasting this interview by Chris Mooney with Austin Dacey, CFI's former UN representative and an expert on the subject of blasphemy laws. *** This week, our guest is a return one: Austin Dacey. He's a philosopher, a writer, a human rights activist, and the creator of the Impossible Music Sessions, which we featured in a past show. Austin's books include The Secular Conscience: Why Belief Belo...
Mark Oppenheimer on Misogyny in the Freethought Community
September 22, 2014 20:07 - 36 minutes - 20.7 MBThis week Point of Inquiry welcomes journalist Mark Oppenheimer. Mark writes the Beliefs column for the New York Times, and is the author of the e-book The Zen Predator of The Upper East Side. He is an expert on how religious and philosophical communities deal--or refuse to deal--with allegations of abuse in their ranks. Mark joins host Lindsay Beyerstein to talk about a feature he wrote for BuzzFeed entitled "Will Misogyny Bring Down The Atheist Movement?", a discussion (as he puts it,...
Factory Farming and the Meat Racket: Christopher Leonard on our Irrational Meat Industry
September 17, 2014 16:08 - 39 minutes - 22.6 MBIt’s National Chicken Month! But rather than celebrating the consumption of fowl, Point of Inquiry is asking what exactly is going on in America's meat industry? Is the way we consume meat at all rational? Joining us this week is Christopher Leonard, investigative journalist whose work has appeared in Fortune, Slate, and The New York Times. He is a fellow with The New America Foundation, a nonpartisan public policy institute in Washington, DC., and the author of The Meat Racket: The Sec...
Ask a Mortician: Caitlin Doughty on the Death Industry's Dirty Secrets
September 08, 2014 19:30 - 30 minutes - 13.8 MBPoint of Inquiry welcomes Caitlin Doughty, creator of the cult classic web series Ask A Mortician, which gives unvarnished answers to questions about dead bodies and the death industry. Caitlin has tackled topics ranging from "What to say to a grieving person?" to "How could my titanium hip implant end up as part of a road sign in the Midwest?" Caitlin is the author of the new book Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: and Other Lessons from the Crematory, the story of her stint as a crematory opera...
Sam Harris: Seeking Transcendence Without Religion
September 02, 2014 16:54 - 49 minutes - 28.5 MBIt’s been ten years since the publication of Sam Harris’s book The End of Faith kicked off the cultural phenomenon of “new atheism,” bringing frank criticism of religion into mainstream conversation. In the decade since, Harris has emerged as something of a maverick among nonbelievers and progressives, frequently at the center of controversy with his opinions on Islam and extremism, science’s role in morality, and his embrace of a kind of “spiritualism” grounded in science. It is this la...
Dr. Adia Benton on The West African Ebola Outbreak
August 25, 2014 18:47 - 39 minutes - 22.3 MBThis week Point Of Inquiry welcomes Dr. Adia Benton, a professor of medical anthropology at Brown University. She joins host Lindsay Beyerstein to talk about the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. Medical anthropologists bring a unique expertise to epidemics because they study both the physiology of illness and the cultural factors that influence its transmission. That's why the World Health Organization has deployed med anthros to combat prior Ebloa outbreaks. They ask questions like: "How do ...
Paul Offit, MD - Do You Believe in Magic?: The Sense and Nonsense of Alternative Medicine
August 18, 2014 17:47 - 38 minutes - 22.1 MBPoint of Inquiry's hosts are off this week, so we're running Lindsay Beyerstein's excellent interview from earlier this year with Dr. Paul Offit. Dr. Offit will be the Center for Inquiry's special guest on September 6th in Amherst, NY, as he is awarded the Robert P. Balles Prize in Critical Thinking. * * * Paul A. Offit, MD is best known as a co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine and a staunch, public supporter of vaccination and opponent of pseudoscientific alternative medicine. Hi...
Paul Offit, MD - Do You Believe in Magic?: The Sense and Nonsense of Alternative Medicine
August 18, 2014 17:47 - 38 minutes - 22.1 MBPoint of Inquiry's hosts are off this week, so we're running Lindsay Beyerstein's excellent interview from earlier this year with Dr. Paul Offit. Dr. Offit will be the Center for Inquiry's special guest on September 6th in Amherst, NY, as he is awarded the Robert P. Balles Prize in Critical Thinking. * * * Paul A. Offit, MD is best known as a co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine and a staunch, public supporter of vaccination and opponent of pseudoscientific alternative medicine. Hi...
Christopher Capozzola: 100 Years After the Great War, Lessons in Reason
August 11, 2014 16:44 - 30 minutes - 17.3 MBOne hundred years ago, Great Britain declared war on Germany, joining in what we now refer to as World War I, a conflict which cost more than 9 million combatants and 7 million civilians their lives, and shaped the the world we know today. How did reasonable people let "The Great War" begin, and what can reasonable people today learn from it? Joining us this week is Christopher Capozzola, an MIT professor in political and legal history, war, and the military, and author of Uncle Sam Want...
Laurel Braitman on Animals and Mental Illness
August 04, 2014 17:18 - 35 minutes - 20.3 MBThis week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Laurel Braitman, a TED fellow with a PhD in History and Anthropology of Science from MIT, and the author of Animal Madness: How Anxious Dogs, Compulsive Parrots, and Elephants in Recovery Help Us Understand Ourselves. It might sound strange to say that animals suffer from mental illness but the brain systems that regulate anxiety, attachment, and arousal are evolutionarily ancient. If faulty neurochemistry compounded by stress can lead to mental illne...
David Ropeik: Airplane Disasters and the Psychology of Risk
July 29, 2014 22:08 - 30 minutes - 17.5 MBHow do we rationally assess risk? Following a terrible series of horrifying air travel disasters, reasonable people begin to question what we consider to be "safe." But should we? To answer this question, our host Josh Zepps is joined by David Ropeik, an international consultant and expert on the subject of risk perception and communication, and author of Risk: A Practical Guide for Deciding Whats Really Safe and Whats Really Dangerous in the World Around You and How Risky Is It, Really...
Jason Horowitz: Protecting the Whales from the U.S. Navy
July 21, 2014 18:04 - 37 minutes - 21.5 MBOn 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 first there was no proof. This revelation brings us into the detective story told in War of the Whales: A True Story. Point of Inquiry welcomes the author, Joshua Horowitz. We discuss the history of the U.S. Navy’s use of high-intensity active sonar; the cover-up of sonar in the Bahamas; and the titanic struggle betw...
Austin Dacey - The U.N. and Defamation of Religions
July 14, 2014 18:27 - 24 minutes - 8.35 MBPoint of Inquiry is taking a week off and filling in with a classic episode. After Saudi Arabia recently tried to silence the Center For Inquiry's UN representative, Josephine Macintosh, as she delivered a statement critical of their repeated assaults on freedom of religion, belief and expression, we felt that our Austin Dacey episode was fitting to fill in during our week off. Austin Dacey serves as a respresentative to the United Nations for CFI, and is also on the editorial staff of Skep...
Austin Dacey - The U.N. and Defamation of Religions
July 14, 2014 18:27 - 24 minutes - 8.35 MBPoint of Inquiry is taking a week off and filling in with a classic episode. After Saudi Arabia recently tried to silence the Center For Inquiry's UN representative, Josephine Macintosh, as she delivered a statement critical of their repeated assaults on freedom of religion, belief and expression, we felt that our Austin Dacey episode was fitting to fill in during our week off. Austin Dacey serves as a respresentative to the United Nations for CFI, and is also on the editorial staff of Skep...
The Gospel According to Hobby Lobby--With Brian Leiter
July 07, 2014 18:41 - 38 minutes - 17.8 MBTo discuss last week's Supreme Court decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, Point of Inquiry welcomes Dr. Brian Leiter, law professor and philosopher at the University of Chicago. He's the author of several books including Why Tolerate Religion?. He blogs at Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog. Leiter and host Lindsay Beyerstein discuss what the Hobby Lobby decision means for women's health, corporate personhood, and the separation of church and state. In 2013, Leiter headlined a daylong ...
Montel Williams: Leading a Surge on the Veterans Administration
July 02, 2014 15:58 - 33 minutes - 19.4 MBBest known for his 17 years as a talk show host, Montel Williams is now bringing his name and dynamic personality to activism on behalf of U.S. servicemen and women. Raised during the height of the Civil Rights Movement and into the tumultuous sixties, he joined the Marines as a young man and enrolled at the U.S. Naval Academy, earning a Bachelor of Science in Engineering. After spending years as a motivational speaker and talk show host he returns to his roots in supporting U.S. milita...
Marlene Zuk: The Paleo Delusion
June 23, 2014 17:48 - 34 minutes - 19.7 MBWe 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 questions about what is or is not "natural" for humans from an evolutionary perspective and is the subject of the new book by biologist, Dr. Marlene Zuk, Paleofantasies: What Evolution Really Tells Us about Sex, Diet, and How We Live. The book was recently long-listed for the Royal Society's Winton Prize, one of the most book ...
Howard Fineman on Eric Cantor's Defeat and the Battle for the Soul of the GOP
June 16, 2014 20:07 - 33 minutes - 19.1 MBFew intra-party political battles have been as astonishing and unexpected as last week's primary loss by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor to religious-conservative challenger David Brat, who was quickly embraced by the Tea Party after his victory. To discuss what this means for the future of the GOP, and how religion has waxed and waned as a factor in American politics, Point of Inquiry welcomes the great political analyst Howard Fineman. Howard Fineman is the editorial director of The ...
Janet Mock, Redefining Realness, Biology, Sex and Gender
June 09, 2014 21:45 - 40 minutes - 23.4 MBThis week POI welcomes bestselling author and trans rights activist, Janet Mock. Janet is the author of the new memoir Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love and So Much More, which recounts her emotional and physical transition from an infant sexed male at birth in Hawaii in 1983, to a young woman in New York City. Some traditionalists accuse trans activists of playing games with language when they insist on the right of trans people to be called by their preferred pr...
Negin Farsad: Red States and Muslim Comedy
June 03, 2014 17:05 - 46 minutes - 26.8 MBThis week, we welcome Negin Farsad, a groundbreaking Iranian American comedian. A TED speaker and TED Fellow, she was named one of the Huffington Post's 50 Funniest Women. She's been seen on Comedy Central, MTV, CNN, MSNBC, and in her movie The Muslims are Coming!, a documentary following some of the funniest Muslim comedians as they travel America's Red States, cracking people up and demolishing stereotypes. Host Josh Zepps and Farsad discuss everything from the gray areas in religious ide...
Capital Punishment in Crisis with Dahlia Lithwick
May 27, 2014 17:30 - 33 minutes - 19.4 MBThis week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Dahlia Lithwick, Senior Editor and Legal Correspondent for Slate, where she writes the "Supreme Court Dispatches" and "Jurisprudence" columns. Her legal commentary won her a National Magazine Award in 2013. She is a graduate of Stanford Law School and she joins Lindsay Beyerstein to talk about the crisis facing capital punishment in the United States. Almost all executions in the United States are performed by lethal Injection but America's go-to leth...
Farzana Hassan on Islamic Extremism and the Boko Haram
May 20, 2014 22:46 - 35 minutes - 20.4 MBOur guest this week is Farzana Hassan, a Pakistani-Canadian political scientist, a columnist for the Toronto Sun, whose new book is Prophecy and the Fundamentalist Quest: An Integrative Study of Christian and Muslim Apocalyptic Religion. Hassan joins Point of Inquiry's Josh Zepps to talk about issues surrounding Islam, in particular the difficulty in honestly dealing with terrorism and extremism and their relation to Islam, and the fine line between legitimate criticism and Islamophobia. H...
Science Denialism with Donald Prothero
May 12, 2014 17:32 - 32 minutes - 18.8 MBOur guest this week is Donald Prothero, paleontologist, geologist, and author of the new book Reality Check: How Science Deniers Threaten our Future. He's an expert on the effect of past climate change on the fossil record, as well as the co-author of Abominable Science, a skeptical look at cryptozoology and cryptozoologists with Daniel Loxton. Science Denialism is a many-headed hydra that rears up when people don't want to believe what science tells us. In this day and age, science has en...
Talking Nerdy (And Ethically) with Cara Santa Maria
May 05, 2014 21:04 - 38 minutes - 17.7 MBOur guest this week is Cara Santa Maria, contributor to Al Jazeera America's science show TechKnow, and the host of the podcast Talk Nerdy. This neuroscientist, science educator, producer, writer, and television personality has brought her intelligence and insights to the Huffington Post as its former senior science editor, was the co-host and producer of TakePart Live on Pivot TV, and has appeared countless times on CNN, FOX, BBC, among many others. Point of Inquiry’s Josh Zepps sat down w...
Coming Out Atheist - Greta Christina
April 28, 2014 16:52 - 34 minutes - 19.9 MBThis week Point of Inquiry welcomes the well-known atheist blogger, speaker, and author Greta Christina to talk about her new book, Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other and Why, a no nonsense guide to leveling with everyone in your life about your non-belief. Greta is a woman at home with difficult conversations. Her previous books include Why Are You Atheists So Angry: 99 Things That Piss Off the Godless, and Bending: Dirty Kinky Stories about Pain, Power, Religion, Uni...
A Trek Through Skepticism with The Amazing Randi
April 21, 2014 18:47 - 35 minutes - 20.2 MBThis week, Point of Inquiry is excited to welcome “The Amazing” James Randi: famed magician a godfather (as it were) of the modern reason movement, and founder of the James Randi Educational Foundation. Randi is the subject of a new documentary film, An Honest Liar, which brings to life Randi's intricate investigations that publicly exposed psychics, parapsychologists, fait- healers, and con artists. Randi and host Josh Zepps diagnose the state of American credulity, and discuss why human ...
Living with a Wild God: Barbara Ehrenreich, Atheism, and Transcendence
April 14, 2014 17:19 - 23 minutes - 10.9 MBThis week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Barbara Ehrenreich, award-winning columnist and essayist, and author of 21 books. In Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, she went undercover as a minimum wage worker and in Bright-Sided: How Positive Thinking Is Undermining America, she took aim at our punishing national obsession with positive thinking. Her new book Living with a Wild God: A Nonbeliever's Search for the Truth about Everything is very different from her previous writing. Li...
Ann Druyan: Telling the Story of the Cosmos
April 07, 2014 17:24 - 32 minutes - 18.6 MBThis week, Point of Inquiry is delighted to welcome Ann Druyan, co-writer and co-creator of both the original Cosmos: A Personal Voyage, starring her late husband Carl Sagan, as well as the new series, Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, starring Neil deGrasse Tyson. In a wide-ranging discussion, Druyan talks to Josh Zepps about how the first Cosmos series came to be, her efforts to translate the majesty of science into relatable and accessible storytelling, and how we've progressed toward making ...
Investigating the Oldest Profession: Prostitution and Science Meet, with Meredith Dank of the Urban Institute
March 31, 2014 19:57 - 38 minutes - 22.2 MBThis 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 domestic human trafficking projects, including the new study, "Estimating the Size and Structure of the Underground Commercial Sex Economy in Eight Major US Cities”, which attempts to put dollar figures on prostitution in Atlanta, Denver, San Diego, Seattle, and other major municipalities. Point of Inquiry goes behind ...
Frank Schaeffer on Escaping Fundamentalism, and the Death of Fred Phelps
March 24, 2014 19:46 - 49 minutes - 28.1 MBFollowing the death of the Westboro Baptist Church's Fred Phelps, Josh Zepps discusses the state of religious fundamentalism with Frank Schaeffer, the New York Times bestselling author of Crazy for God: How I grew up as one of the Elect, Sex, Mom, and God: How the Bible's Strange Take on Sex Led to Crazy Politics-- and How I learned to love Women (and Jesus) Anyway, among many others. Having recovered from being raised in a fundamentalist Christian family, and having written multiple novel...
Cancer Quack Stanislaw Burzynski: Exposed
March 17, 2014 17:24 - 38 minutes - 22.1 MBThis week, Point of Inquiry welcomes David Gorski, MD, PhD: cancer researcher, surgeon, and managing editor of the Science-Based Medicine blog, aka "Orac" of Respectful Insolence. Gorski and Beyerstein discuss a pair of exposés of cancer quack Stanislaw Burzynski in the March/April issue of the Skeptical Inquirer, one by Gorski and one by skeptical activist Robert Blaskiewicz. Gorski explains why Burzynski's urine-derived antineoplaston therapy is worthless; how the doctor strong-arm...
The Philosophy of Belief with Rebecca Goldstein
March 10, 2014 17:21 - 36 minutes - 20.7 MBRebecca Goldstein, a professor of philosophy and the author of five novels and a collection of short stories, joins us on Point of Inquiry to discuss atheism, philosophy and her new book, Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away. Along with some of her weightier philosophical works she has also recently published 36 Arguments for the Existence of God: A Work of Fiction, a novel that is both deep and playful in its examination of apologist positions. Goldstein, who will be a gu...
Daniel Loxton: Bigfoot, Nessie and Other Kinds of “Abominable Science”
March 03, 2014 21:00 - 35 minutes - 20.2 MBThis week Point of Inquiry welcomes Daniel Loxton, longtime Editor of Junior Skeptic, the 10-page kids' science section bound within Skeptic magazine, author and illustrator of the national award-winning kids' science book Evolution: How We and All Living Beings Came to Be, and a series of illustrated books subtitled Tales of Prehistoric Life. Loxton has published two major essays on skeptical activism; "Where Do We Go From Here?" in 2007, dealing with the focus and direction of the new gene...
Gabriel Sherman - The Loudest Voice in the Room : How the Brilliant, Bombastic Roger Ailes Built Fox News--and Divided a Country
February 24, 2014 20:19 - 35 minutes - 20.4 MBThis week Point of Inquiry welcomes Gabriel Sherman, writer and contributing editor for New York Magazine and author of the new book The Loudest Voice in the Room: How the Brilliant, Bombastic Roger Ailes Built Fox News - and Divided a Country. The book takes an indepth look at Roger Ailes, the conservative mastermind and president of Fox News Channel, and the effect he has had on American culture. Sherman interviewed over 600 people and spent years compiling a history of Ailes, from the...
Amy Tuteur, MD
February 17, 2014 19:27 - 30 minutes - 17.2 MBThis week, Point of Inquiry looks into midwives, home births, and what they mean for a safe delivery for child and mother. Our guest is skeptic, obstetrician, gynecologist, and author of How Your Baby is Born, Dr. Amy Tuteur. Dr. Tuteur, a graduate of Harvard and the Boston University School of Medicine, and former clinical instructor at Harvard Medical School, joins us to talk about some of the misinformation and unscientific theories being peddled to expectant mothers, and the harm t...
Stanton Peele, PhD - Addiction and Recovery
February 10, 2014 18:10 - 42 minutes - 24 MBThis 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 ‘disease model’ view of addiction and the recent tragedy involving actor Philip Seymour Hoffman. Peele holds the somewhat contrarian position that, depending on the person, abstinence or moderation are valid approaches to treat excessive drinking or other substance abuses. He argues that 12-step programs may do more harm tha...