The Skeptics Society & Skeptic magazine


SKEPTIC 24.2

Order the print edition, or download the digital edition today!

In this issue: The SkepDoc: Laser Therapy: Hope or Hype and Hokum? • The Gadfly: The Sisyphean Challenges of Skepticism or, Start by Disbelieving • Pterosaur Thunderbird: The Origin of a Fake Native American Legend with an Antievolution Agenda • Conversations with My Dead Mother: Why We See Signs and Omens in Everyday Events • Is Cousin Marriage Dangerous? • Therapeutic Touch Redux: Twenty Years After the “Emily Event” Energy Therapies Live on Through Bad Science • What Can Science Learn from Religion? Steven Pinker on Religious Beliefs and Rituals • Becoming Fantastic: Why People Embellish Already Accomplished Lives with Incredible Tales of UFOs and Other Phenomena • 1984 in 2019: The New Privacy Threat from China’s Social Credit Surveillance System • Michael Shermer v. Brian Huffling: Is the Reality of Evil Good Evidence Against the Christian God? • Graham Hancock’s America Before: The Key to Earth’s Lost Civilization reviewed by Jason Colavito • Junior Skeptic # 71 — The Colossal Case of the Cardiff Giant: One of America’s Greatest Hoaxes.

Buy digital edition

Buy print edition

Subscribe digitally

Subscribe print

DIGITAL EDITION

On what devices can I read it?

Read the digital edition of Skeptic magazine on your Apple iPads and iPhones, Android tablets and phones, Amazon Kindle, Windows Surface and phones, or on your PC or Mac via PocketMags.com. Your magazine purchase(s) can easily be synchronized across multiple devices. Find out how to read Skeptic magazine on your favorite device(s).

30-DAY FREE TRIAL : We offer a 30-day free trial to new digital subscribers on annual subscriptions within the Skeptic Magazine App for iOS and Android devices.

JUNIOR SKEPTIC # 71

The Colossal Case of the Cardiff Giant: One of America’s Greatest Hoaxes

This is a story of gigantic proportions! Once upon a time, America buzzed with claims that the remains of a giant had been dug up from a field in New York state. It was over ten feet tall and made entirely of stone. Amazed onlookers said this was the fossilized body of a colossal human being. Could this be true? Was America once home to a lost race of giants? Or was this a whopper too big to swallow? Let’s find out!

Read more about
Junior Skeptic # 71

Order Skeptic Magazine 24.2
to get Junior Skeptic # 71

Junior Skeptic — an engagingly illustrated science and critical thinking publication for younger readers (and the young at heart) — is physically bound inside each and every issue of Skeptic magazine. A dozen back issues are also available as single downloadable PDFs at an amazing price!

SCIENCE SALON # 70

Dr. Brian Keating — Losing the Nobel Prize

Losing the Nobel Prize: A Story of Cosmology, Ambition, and the Perils of Science's Highest Honor (book cover)
A Story of Cosmology, Ambition, and the Perils of Science’s Highest Honor

In this wide-ranging conversation Science Salon host Dr. Michael Shermer speaks with cosmologist and inventor of the BICEP (Background Imaging of Cosmic Extragalactic Polarization) experiment Dr. Brian Keating about the following topics:

  • how he almost won the Nobel Prize for his research that confirmed the inflationary model of the Big Bang
  • the problems with the Nobel Prize as it is currently structured, such as its limitation to only three people (when modern experiments are typically directed by a great many more); that it can’t be awarded posthumously (thereby neglecting people like Amos Tversky, who did as much work as his Nobel Prize-winning collaborator Daniel Kahneman); its neglect of many women scientists as deserving of the prize as their male counterparts, and especially how it distorts incentives to collaborate in science
  • his upbringing and what inspired him to probe the deepest questions about the nature of the cosmos and reality
  • what it’s like conducting research in the harsh conditions at the South Pole
  • what banged in the Big Bang and what there was before the Big Bang
  • the possibility (or not) of a multiverse model and a cyclical model of universes outside of, or before, our universe
  • the relationship between science and religion and why they need not always be in conflict
  • his Prager U video on why believing in the multiverse takes as much faith as believing in God.

Listen to the podcast via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, and TuneIn.

This Science Salon was recorded on May 21, 2019. We apologize for the very poor audio-video quality of this recording.

Watch or listen now

You play a vital part in our commitment to promote science and reason. If you enjoy the Science Salon Podcast, please show your support by making a donation.

PURCHASE WITH PURPOSE!

Shop AmazonSmile for Father’s Day

Turn your Father’s Day shopping into a force for good. Shop at smile.amazon.com and Amazon donates to the Skeptics Society.

Shop Now

Skeptic Magazine App on iPhone

SKEPTIC App

Whether at home or on the go, the SKEPTIC App is the easiest way to read your favorite articles. Within the app, users can purchase the current issue and back issues. Download the app today and get a 30-day free trial subscription.

Download the Skeptic Magazine App for iOS, available on the App Store
Download the Skeptic Magazine App for Android, available on Google Play
Download the Skeptic Magazine App for iOS, available on the App Store
Download the Skeptic Magazine App for Android, available on Google Play
SKEPTIC • 3938 State St., Suite 101, Santa Barbara, CA, 93105-3114 • 1-805-576-9396 • Copyright © 1992–2023. All rights reserved • Privacy Policy