Skeptics Unite!

Two news developments from the creationism battlefield reveal their sleazy use of funds, and the financial problems of the "Creation Museum"

I recently got into a small kerfuffle with a journalist, actually a sports writer who decided to dabble in science journalism. The exchange started at science-based medicine when I wrote a piece critical of the claims being made for a new device called the GyroStim, which is being offered as a treatment for brain injury. [...]

The giant hornless indricothere rhinos were apparently the largest land mammal that ever lived, but what was their true weight? The answer is not so simple.

The head of the House Science and Technology Committee (largely run by science deniers) is threatening to inject politics into the process by which NSF determines what science gets funded. This is incredibly dangerous and stupid for lots of reasons.

A recent review finds that over 97% of scientists believe that human activity is contributing to climate change. That is a very solid consensus of scientific opinion. This, of course, does not mean that the consensus must be correct, but (along with other data) it makes it unreasonable to claim that there is no consensus, [...]

The huge hornless Asiatic rhinos known as indricotheres were the largest land mammals that ever lived, wandering from Mongolia to Turkey across dry scrublands from 34-23 million years ago. Their sheer size poses many questions about how they lived, yet we can also make some educated guesses about their ecology based on the constraints on living mammals.

Daniel Loxton reflects upon the dangers of speaking beyond one's expertise—a danger no less serious for skeptics than for fringe science proponents.

Daniel Loxton looks at the 1976 birth of scientific skepticism as an organized modern project, and asks: If other movements already promoted humanism, atheism, rationalism, science education, and even critical thinking, why did skeptics find it necessary to organize an additional, new movement called “skepticism”?

On the SGU this week we did an interview with Don McLeroy, the former chairman of the Texas School Board of Education, famous for his (successful) attempts to insert wording into the science textbook standards that would open the door for creationist arguments. The interview was very enlightening. In my opinion it was an excellent [...]

Daniel Loxton shares an excerpt from his “Why Is There a Skeptical Movement?” on the topic of scientific skepticism’s long-standing focus on testable claims (particularly those related to the paranormal or fringe science).

My account of a stimulating and surreal secularism conference in conservative Orange County, where the turnout and speakers showed that secularism is expanding and capturing the future

Grief Vampire Sylvia Browne has once again proven herself to be the worst possible psychic medium in known history. Skeptics should be happy she is back in the news this time for her ”incorrectly predicting”(?) the outcome of the Amanda Berry disappearance. Chalk up another totally reprehensible miss to her worthless career. Words cannot be used here at Skepticblog that [...]

When will the next big quake happen on the San Andreas fault occur? The answer lies in an unimpressive set of dusty trenches in the middle of nowhere, known as Pallett Creek.

As has already been made public, Brian Dunning is currently involved in legal proceedings involving the charge of wire fraud. While we all take this situation very seriously, not all the facts of the case will be made public until after the court case is completed later this year. Only at that time will we be able to fully review the case and its implications. After lengthy discussion with Brian we mutually agreed that he would suspend his contributions to Skepticblog until after the case is completed.

A review of John A. Long's "The Dawn of the Deed: The Prehistoric Origins of Sex," a book that cleverly combines accounts of the paleontological discoveries of the first sexual organs and vertebrate embryos with a salacious description of the wild sexual practices throughout the animal world.

Daniel Loxton takes off his skeptic hat to speak in his personal capacity as an atheist.

What was actually in Thompson’s Cattle Powder, Hostetter’s Stomach Bitters, or Hamlin’s Wizard Oil? Prior to regulation by the FDA, over-the-counter medicine in this country was largely a creation of small businesses. There was a large variety of so-called “patent medicine,” each a proprietary blend of – what? The term “patent medicine” has nothing to [...]

A workshop of scientists and journalists entitled "Reporting across the Culture Wars" wrestled with the issues of science journalism for three long days—and learned a lot from each other.

We are seeing the beginning of technology to interface computers and brains. I have been writing about brain-machine-interface (BMI) technology, and brain-machine-brain interface technology. Now we have a report of brain to brain communication, which is currently as close as we can come to telepathy. Actually, the technology is – brain to machine to another [...]

A simple project with a bunch of undergrad students turns into a multi-authored set of publications documenting evolutionary stasis in birds and mammals despite the climate changes of the last interglacial-glacial cycle.

Six years ago I was asked to participate in a group debate over the legitimacy of homeopathy at the University of CT (there were six speakers, three on each side). This year I was asked to participate in another homeopathy debate at UCONN, but this time one-on-one with Andre Saine ND from the Canadian Academy of [...]

Daniel Loxton considers the case of an ethically questionable 1896 skeptical activism hoax described by skeptic Joseph Rinn.

Daniel Loxton announces that his brand new paleofiction storybook Pterosaur Trouble is hitting stores now.

Where do scientists get their inspirations for scientific names? In some cases, the stories behind the names are remarkable—and the names themselves can be quite funny.

STEM = Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics. The STEM fields are of special significance in the United States, as they are considered by the government to be strategically important, and because we have a shortage of experts in these fields. As a result, many government and educational agencies have STEM programs, and we’ll discuss some [...]

One after another, the big efforts to boost creationism have collided with reality sooner or later. The latest is the mighty empire of Ken Ham's "Answers in Genesis", which after years of dominance and success has failed to get their "Ark Park" off the ground, and now their main "Creation Museum" is losing money and declining in traffic as well.

Sometimes the targets of our skeptical analysis notice, and they usually are not pleased with the attention. Last year the Acupuncture Trialists Collaboration published a meta-analysis of acupuncture trials in which they claim, “The results favoured acupuncture.” The report was widely criticized among those of use who pay attention to such things. In my analysis [...]