SGU Episode 149

Introduction
You're listening to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe, your escape to reality.

Ban Wi-Fi

 * http://kob.com/article/stories/S451152.shtml?cat=517 http://www.electrosensitivity.org/ http://skeptoid.com/episodes/4072

New Zealand Considering CAM

 * http://www.skeptics.org.nz/SK:CAM

UK CoS Free Speech Follow up

 * http://www.mister-info.com/?cmd=displaystory&story_id=10673&format=html

Science Reporting

 * http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2008-05/plos-uro052108.php

Tasmania Correction
"Hey guys! I've heard both Steve and Rebecca make this mistake now (Steve on the podcast a couple of times, and Rebecca in a blog entry). Tasmania is not in New Zealand! It's an Australian state, the small island down the bottom.  So far you've attributed both the world's oldest tree (or shrub, whatever it turned out to be) and the Tasmanian devil to New Zealand. Not fair! :)  Anyway, love the show and keep up the good work. James Russell Australia    Hey guys, Love the podcast.  Just wanted to write in about a minor error in your last podcast about the thylacine. You said in your segment that it went extinct in 1933. In fact it went extinct in the wild in 1933 and the last thylacine died in captivity in 1936.  Sorry to nit pick but I had to write in. :P  Elliot Birch Melbourne, Australia www.naturalworlds.org/thylacine/additional/benjamin/Benjamin_2.htm"

Least Skeptical
"Hi. I have listened to all the shows and I have a question. At heart I am a skeptic and I think, probably, that the vast majority of educated people are also privately of the same inclination. Your show gives a voice to a huge silent majority that cant be bothered to speak out or confront the status quo because its just too much like hard work and will attract unwanted passionate debate, specially so on the bigger topics. If your out there doing it on podcast then I dont need to as the voice of sanity is present somewhere, so thanks. I am torn, however, because if I am really honest about it, one key reason that I listen to your show is in the hope that Bigfoot rides into your studio on a unicorn and hijacks the microphone to announce the second coming of Elvis. Go bigfoot.  My question therefore is, what are you least skeptical about. If you had to list all the things that you were skeptical about 100% what would be the last thing on the list. Mine, for instance, is telepathy. I think there might be scientific possibilities there even after you consider the evolutionary implications. Anyway I must go, my wife is just about to shout up the stairs about the mess I left in the kitchen (QED). Justin Holt Braintree, UK."

Interview with Diana Blaney

 * Dr. Blaney is a soil scientist involved with the Phoenix Mars lander. www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/phoenix/main.php

Science or Fiction
Question #1: A new study shows that public schools are just as effective as private schools at teaching math skills. Question #2: Researchers have developed the first smell map - describing which chemical structures result in which smell sensations. Question #3: Yale computer scientists have devised an e-mail algorithm that they claim will eliminate, if fully implemented, 98% of all SPAM.

Quote of the Week
"'The high-minded man must care more for the truth than for what people think.'- Aristotle"

== References ==