This is the podcast version of the Skeptics in the Pub Online live-streamed talks. We take the audio and give it to you in a nice easy podcast feed for you to listen at your pleasure. All of the talks are still available on our YouTube channel if you want to see any visuals/slides/etc. We release the live shows as we do them on the 2nd and 4th Thursday of each month and on weeks when there isn't a live show, we release an episode from the archive.
Podcast
Lost and found in the Science of Emotion – Dr Dean Burnett
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Why can’t we think straight when hungry? What’s the point of nightmares? And why can’t we forget embarrassing memories?
Emotions can be a pain. After losing his dad to Covid-19, Dean Burnett found himself wondering what life would be like without them. And so, he decided to put his feelings under the microscope – for science.
In this talk, Dean takes us on an incredible journey of discovery, stretching from the origins of life to the end of the universe. Combining expert analysis, brilliant humour and powerful insights into the grieving process, Dean uncovers how, far from holding us back and restraining logic and reason, our emotions make us who we are and allow us to think at all.
Dean Burnett, neuroscientist, lecturer, author, blogger, podcaster, pundit, science communicator, comedian and numerous other things, depending on who’s asking and what they need. Previously employed as a psychiatry tutor and lecturer at the Cardiff University Centre for Medical Education, Dean is currently an honorary research associate at Cardiff Psychology School, as well as a Visiting Industry Fellow at Birmingham City University.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
Unidentified Flying Objects: Are there any images that require an extraterrestrial explanation – Dr Steve Barrett
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As a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Physics, my research interests span all aspects of imaging, image processing and image analysis. This includes medical imaging (biophysics), scanning probe microscopy of atoms, molecules and surfaces (nanophysics), microscopy of earth materials (geophysics) and astrophotography.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
A critical perspective on what cognitive science can tell us about first impressions and stereotypes – Dr Lou Safra
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In this talk, I will present the key findings on first impressions and stereotypes offered by cognitive science. By presenting the main experimental designs that are used to product these results, I will question the limits and issues of this research and discuss how we can ensure a safe use of these results
Lou Safra holds a PhD in cognitive science awarded by the Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris in 2017. She is currently assistant professor in political psychology at CEVIPOF-Sciences Po and an associate researcher at the Institut d’Études Cognitives (Laboratoire de Neurosciences Cognitives & Laboratoire de Neurosciences Cognitives et Computationelles, École Normale Supérieure, Paris).
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
How to Make the World Add Up – Ten Rules for Thinking Differently About Numbers – Tim Harford
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When was the last time you read a grand statement, accompanied by a large number, and wondered whether it could really be true? Statistics are vital in helping us tell stories – we see them in the papers, on social media, and we hear them used in everyday conversation – and yet we doubt them more than ever.
But numbers – in the right hands – have the power to change the world for the better. Contrary to popular belief, good statistics are not a trick, although they are a kind of magic. Good statistics are not smoke and mirrors; in fact, they help us see more clearly. Good statistics are like a telescope for an astronomer, a microscope for a bacteriologist, or an X-ray for a radiologist. If we are willing to let them, good statistics help us see things about the world around us and about ourselves – both large and small – that we would not be able to see in any other way.
In How to Make the World Add Up, Tim Harford draws on his experience as both an economist and presenter of the BBC’s radio show More or Less. He takes us deep into the world of disinformation and obfuscation, bad research and misplaced motivation to find those priceless jewels of data and analysis that make communicating with numbers worthwhile. Harford’s characters range from the art forger who conned the Nazis to the stripper who fell in love with the most powerful congressman in Washington, to famous data detectives such as John Maynard Keynes, Daniel Kahneman and Florence Nightingale. He reveals how we can evaluate the claims that surround us with confidence, curiosity and a healthy level of scepticism.
Using ten simple rules for understanding numbers – plus one golden rule – this extraordinarily insightful book shows how if we keep our wits about us, thinking carefully about the way numbers are sourced and presented, we can look around us and see with crystal clarity how the world adds up.
Tim is an economist, journalist and broadcaster. He is author of The Next Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy, Messy, and the million-selling The Undercover Economist. Tim is a senior columnist at the Financial Times, and the presenter of Radio 4’s More or Less, the iTunes-topping series ‘Fifty Things That Made the Modern Economy’, and the new podcast ‘Cautionary Tales’. Tim has spoken at TED, PopTech and the Sydney Opera House. He is an associate member of Nuffield College, Oxford and an honorary fellow of the Royal Statistical Society. Tim was made an OBE for services to improving economic understanding in the New Year honours of 2019.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
Women, Wellness, and Woo – Dr Alice Howarth
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We all want to be well, right? Whether you’re a bit run down and just need a pick me up to get through the next working week, you’re suffering symptoms of a long-standing condition that you just can’t figure out or you’re reaching an age where you want security in your long-term health.
The wellness industry has become ever more popular in an age where chronic illnesses can go undiagnosed for years and access to medical support for mental ill-health is either prohibitively expensive or subject to long wait times. Women and other marginalised people are sometimes dismissed or overlooked in healthcare – where resources are already stretched and spending time really listening to a patient can be difficult even without biases.
To fill the gap, we often turn to the wellness industry; an amorphous, indefinable collection of well doers, businesses and practitioners who offer patients control over their health, empowerment to make medical choices that suit their needs and the gentle ear of a practitioner who’s always willing to listen.
But does the wellness industry really provide answers? Are women really empowered by the range of choices available to them? Is there really a solution to “wellness”?
Dr Alice Howarth is a scientist and skeptic who is also disabled and chronically ill. She’s spent years navigating the healthcare system while trying to learn how to manage her health conditions at the same time as working in academia and juggling a bunch of roles in the skeptical community. As a podcaster with Skeptics with a K and writer for The Skeptic, Alice has researched a wide variety of wellness industry hacks and products and practitioners, and the reasons people might feel encouraged to make use of them.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
Food Therapy: How our psychology affects how we eat – Pixie Turner
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How does food make you feel? We need food to survive, but often we don’t stop to think about why we eat the way we do. From birth, we are shaped by our early psychological environment, which ultimately affects what, where, when, and why we eat. Are your parents really to blame for everything? Can you actually eat your way out of depression? Or is it perhaps a bit more complicated than that.
Pixie Turner is a registered nutritionist (RNutr) and psychotherapist (MBACP), and director of The Food Therapy Centre, where she specialises in food and body image issues. She is the author of several books, including ‘Food Therapy’ which was released this year. In 2020–21, she co-hosted (alongside cardiothoracic surgeon Nikki Stamp) ‘In Bad Taste’, a podcast that casts a critical eye over the content and claims of health documentaries.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
Halloween Special: I ain’t afraid of no ghosts! – Richard Wiseman and Chris French
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October 31st is Halloween – traditionally the scariest night of the year (although we’re a bit more scared about what might happen in the US election a few days later). All things considered, it’s pretty safe to say that this has been a slightly unsettling year for lots of people and the last thing we need right now is a bunch of ghosts and ghouls turning up and causing havoc on Halloween.
Fear not, however, because we’re pleased to say that ghosts don’t actually exist. But if ghosts aren’t real, why do so many people believe that they’ve seen one? How can we explain the supernatural experiences people have reported? How do places develop a reputation for being haunted? What are those things that go bump in the night?
Richard Wiseman is a psychologist and author. For years, he has researched the science behind the paranormal. He will be discussing the natural explanations behind the supernatural and showing how the paranormal is perfectly normal. Richard will be Interviewed by his good friend Chris French, Head of the Anomalistic Psychology Research Unit at Goldsmiths.
Professor Richard Wiseman has been described by a Scientific American columnist as ‘…one of the most interesting and innovative experimental psychologists in the world today.’ His books have sold over 3 million copies and he regularly appears on the media. Richard also presents keynote talks to organisations across the world, including The Swiss Economic Forum, Google and Amazon.
He holds Britain’s only Professorship in the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire, is one of the most followed psychologists on Twitter, and the Independent On Sunday chose him as one of the top 100 people who make Britain a better place to live.
Richard is a Member of the Inner Magic Circle, a Director of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and has created psychology-based YouTube videos that have attracted over 500 million views. He also acts as a creative consultant, including work with Derren Brown, The Twilight Zone and the hit television show, Brain Games.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
From f#ck to microorganism – why do words sound the way they do? – Dr Shiri Lev-Ari
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One of the characteristics of language is that there is no relationship between the way that words sound and their meaning. For example, there is nothing window-like about the word window, and it is named with completely different sounds in other languages, from fenêtre in French to shubak in Arabic. In this talk, I will discuss cases where the sounds of words are not arbitrary. I will start by showing what characterises the sounds of swear words across the world’s languages. I will then discuss which languages have more words whose sounds express their meaning, and why that is the case. I will end with an example that illustrates that our intuition regarding whether the sounds of certain words express their meaning can be very wrong.
Dr. Shiri Lev-Ari is a cognitive scientist studying language from a social perspective. She is particularly interested in how language evolution is shaped by the social needs of the society. She holds a PhD from The University of Chicago and is currently a lecturer at Royal Holloway, University of London.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
The Bloody Work of Naturopaths – Britt Hermes
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Naturopathy is scary! For three years, I practiced as a licensed “naturopathic doctor” in the United States. The overwhelming majority of naturopathic care relies extensively on dubious alternative therapies, rather than established protocols based on medical and scientific research. In this Halloween-themed talk, I share the experiences that led to my interest in natural medicine, some spooky naturopathic practices, and how I became the most hated naturopath in the world.
Britt Hermes is a writer, scientist, and a former naturopathic doctor. She practiced as a licensed naturopath in the United States and then left the profession after realizing naturopathy is a pseudoscientific ideology. Since this time, Britt has been working to understand and communicate how she was tricked by alternative medicine, so others do not repeat her mistake. She now writes to expose issues with naturopathy, the current rising profession in alternative medicine. Her work focuses on the deceptions naturopathic practitioners employ to scam patients and contrive legitimacy in political arenas. She hopes her stories will protect patients from the false beliefs and bogus treatments sold by alternative medicine practitioners. Hermes is currently living in Germany where she is completing her doctorate in evolutionary genomics.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.
The social and cultural factors influencing attitudes to abortion – Lora Adair and Nicole Lozano
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Scientific approaches to understanding reproductive choice – the decision to have a child, the decision to terminate a pregnancy, etc. – typically position decision-makers as rational. Attention is paid to economic forces of change (e.g., industrialisation, rising costs of living, globalisation), to explain why people are having fewer children relative to previous generations. What is missing is a description of the internal, psychological process when someone is making a choice about their reproduction, their family constellation, and their future. Are these choices rational? Do people really view children as a calculus of financial gains and losses? We explore these questions by emphasising the role that our social world plays in shaping our reproductive decisions and attitudes. Specifically, we explore the kinds of things that are important to women as they navigate their own reproductive choices. In interviews with 29 women in the UK, we find that practical concerns (health, financial resources) and relational concerns (anticipated support from others) are both critical in the decision to terminate a pregnancy. In a cross-cultural study, we find that judgments of other people’s reproductive choices are shaped by several factors – people living in places with greater gender inequality and more restrictive abortion legislation, are less likely to support the decision to abort. Our findings can help us understand reproductive choice – and the judgement and stigmatisation of reproductive choice. Ultimately, this research can help us empathise with people’s experiences.
Dr. Lora Adair is a senior lecturer in psychology at Brunel University London, a member of the Centre for Culture and Evolution, and lead of the Gender, Sexuality, and Relationships working group. Her research applies feminist and evolutionary theory to investigate topics relevant to romantic relationships, intimate partner violence, and reproductive decision-making. Her research is highly engaged with the West London and broader UK community, through advisory work with NHS CCGs and research collaborations with reproductive health clinics. She is a member of The Bridge, a women’s health community advisory group and serves on the editorial board for Culture and Evolution.
Dr. Nicole Lozano is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Angelo State University. Nicole leads the Cultivating Advocacy, Relationships and Equity (CARE) Lab at Angelo State using feminist and intersectional qualitative methods to explore people’s relationships with gender, parenting, trauma, and reproductive decision making. Nicole has secured approximately $250,000 in grants for a variety of research work, including exploring STEM education, reproductive health care, creativity and parenting, and developing feminist teaching methods. In addition to her research, Nicole maintains a part-time clinical practice utilising telehealth, focusing on high functioning clients experiencing depression, anxiety, and perfectionism.
The music used in this episode is by Thula Borah and is used with permission.