Newcastle Skeptics

How your body lies to you about pain – Nikolas Lloyd (Lindybeige) – Thursday 10th October

We’re officially back with a talk from a fantastic local speaker Nikolas Lloyd who you may know as Lindybeige and his hugely successful YouTube channel with over 1.2 million subscribers.

Nikolas is going to be talking to us about how your body lies to you about pain. Join us from 7:30pm for this talk which will be followed by a Q&A.

Nikolas ‘Lloyd’ Lloyd is an amateur historian and evolutionary psychologist with more than 15 years of prolific YouTube content creation as ‘Lindybeige’ in his beige metaphorical rucksack. His 700+ videos cover technology and warfare in the ancient and medieval worlds, storytelling conventions and trends in historical inaccuracy in films, archaeology, science, dance, psychology and the life of the geek, with dashes of fiction such as the adventures of Stoke Mandeville (astronaut and gentleman). He is an honorary Novocastrian if ever there was one.

Check out his channel at https://www.youtube.com/lindybeige

It is free to attend, but we suggest a donation of £5 (or more if you can afford it!) so we can cover our costs and allow us to invite speakers from further afield.


Using data to counter quackery and alternative medicine – Michael Marshall

As skeptics, it’s easy for us to warn people about the harms of alternative medicine at an individual level, but what can we do when quackery is being pushed by authorities, or when the problem is to widespread for a one-on-one approach? From NHS homeopathy to midwifery alt-med, via quack charities and dubious overseas cancer clinics, professional skeptical investigator Michael Marshall will explain how a dogged approach to analysing publicly-available data can help us understand what we’re up against, and provide the media with the evidence they need to publish stories that make a difference.

Michael Marshall is the Project Director of the Good Thinking Society, Editor of The Skeptic, and President of the Merseyside Skeptics Society. He regularly speaks with proponents of pseudoscience for the Be Reasonable podcast, and presents investigative reporting on the Skeptics with a K podcast. His work has seen him organising international homeopathy protests, going undercover to expose psychics and quack medics, and co-founding the popular QED conference. He has written for the Guardian, The Times, The New Statesman and New Scientist.

It is free to attend, but we suggest a donation of £5 (or more if you can afford it!) so we can cover our costs and allow us to invite speakers from further afield.