The Skeptics Society & Skeptic magazine

In this eSkeptic, we present a tribute to Richard Dawkins by Michael Shermer, plus a short film spoof on the creation of the QAnon conspiracy theory.

A tribute to Richard Dawkins by Michael Shermer. The following essay was commissioned by Oxford University Press to be included in a volume entitled Richard Dawkins. How a Scientist Changed the Way We Think: Reflections by Scientists, Writers, and Philosophers, edited by Alan Grafen and Mark Ridley (biologists and former graduate students of Dawkins) and published in 2006 to mark the 30th anniversary of the publication in 1976 of Dawkins’ influential book, The Selfish Gene.

In Science Salon # 148, Michael Shermer reflects on the recent resurrection of Jordan Peterson, the resurgent criticism of him and why so many people attack him, why similar such unwarranted attacks have been made against other public intellectuals.

In March 2019, Jared Diamond predicted what might happen if Trump loses his bid for reelection in 2020. PLUS: From the Distinguished Science Lecture Series Archives from October 2010, we present Dr. Richard Dawkins in Conversation with Dr. Michael Shermer discussing Dawkins’ book The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution.

In Science Salon # 89 Michael Shermer speaks with Richard Dawkins about his new book Outgrowing God. Dawkins explains how the natural world arose without a designer and challenges head-on some of the most basic assumptions made by the world’s religions. PLUS: Is the statement “We are living in a post-truth world” true? If your answer is “yes” then the answer is “no” because you’ve just evaluated the statement in an evidentiary manner, so evidence still matters and facts still…

Richard Dawkins explains how the natural world arose without a designer — the improbability and beauty of the “bottom-up programming” that engineers an embryo or a flock of starlings — and challenges head-on some of the most basic assumptions made by the world’s religions.

Missed the Skeptics Conference? Watch the mornign and afternoon panel discussions as well as Richard Dawkins and Michael Shermer in Conversation on the Future of Religion and Morality; ALSO in this week’s eSkeptic: New in our online store: Skeptic eGift Certificates; INSIGHT: Weekly Blog Recap; MonsterTalk: Let’s Get This Off Our Chest; Rent Science Lectures for as low as $1 per lecture: on Vimeo On Demand

Tim Farley looks into the origin of the saying "keep an open mind, but not so open your brain falls out," and finds it is older than most skeptics may think.

In this conversation with Michael Shermer, based around his book, An Appetite for Wonder, Richard Dawkins shares a rare view into his early life, his intellectual awakening at Oxford, and his path to writing The Selfish Gene. He paints a vivid picture of his idyllic childhood in colonial Africa, peppered with sketches of his colorful ancestors, charming parents, and the peculiarities of colonial life right after World War II…

A review of Richard Dawkins’ The God Delusion (Bantam Books, 2006, ISBN 0618680004). This review was originally published in Science, January 26, 2007.

In this week’s eSkeptic, we present an explosive interview with one of the most controversial scientists of our generation: Richard Dawkins, on the triumphs, limitations, uses and abuses of Darwinism. This interview was first published in the sold out issue of Skeptic magazine volume 3, number 4 (1995).

If Charles Darwin walked onto a 21st-century campus and wanted to know how his theory had fared, this is the lecture he would attend to find out! Based on his book The Greatest Show on Earth, Dawkins dispassionately demonstrates the truth of evolution beyond sane, informed, intelligent doubt.

In this week’s eSkeptic, we present William Stansfield’s article from the archives of Skeptic magazine Volume 10, Number 4 in which he critiques the typing monkeys metaphor generated by Richard Hardison and Richard Dawkins as being too unlike the biological realities of natural selection.