SGU Episode 499
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| SGU Episode 499 |
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| January 31st 2015 |
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| (brief caption for the episode icon) |
| Skeptical Rogues |
| S: Steven Novella |
B: Bob Novella |
J: Jay Novella |
E: Evan Bernstein |
| Quote of the Week |
To every complex question there is a simple answer and it is wrong. |
| Links |
| Download Podcast |
| Show Notes |
| Forum Discussion |
Introduction
You're listening to the Skeptics' Guide to the Universe, your escape to reality.
Forgotten Superheroes of Science ()
- Jocelyn Bell Burnel: Astrophysicist who discovered Pulsars
News Items
Green Coffee Bean “Hoax” ()
Disneyland Measles Outbreak ()
Galaxy-Sized Wormhole ()
Fail-Safe for Artificial Life ()
Who's That Noisy ()
- Answer to last week
Questions and Emails
DNA Comparisons ()
I got into a discussion with “The Absurdity of Atheism” (AoA) on Facebook, (https://www.facebook.com/TheAbsurdityOfAtheism) regarding the similarity of Human and Chimp DNA. It was exhausting and ultimately nonproductive, unless someone on the fence was moved by my argument, one can hope. I’d like to know if there are resources available to help argue various points of contention with a theist. There are resources online to help the theists. The argument – he cited what looked like a legit paper that stated 66-93% of the DNA was the same and that chimps and humans had a common ancestor. From that moment on, he used the number “70%,” would not acknowledge up to 93%, said the “common ancestor” part of the paper was opinion, and that three million years was not enough time to explain the 30% divergence given current rates of mutation. Now, I am a science enthusiast. I don’t know anything about the moderator, and I feel I was not adept enough to defend my position. I found three papers from the same site that stated 93% and up to 95% simularity. One of the papers used only 800kb of genome information, which was all the information available at that time (2004). It was difficult to defend my position. David Arizona
Name That Logical Fallacy ()
- Name That Logical Fallacy
Hello! I run a Youtube channel that is completely unrelated to anything skeptical, and is mainly just about living in Japan as an international couple with a baby. However, recently in a video blog I was commenting on a silly television show here in Japan that had a segment that day with a supposed UFO expert. It was the usual stuff you see in the media, nothing special. However, I got a random comment in the youtube video that was full of the usual UFO believer arguments that I felt was full of logical fallacies, so I thought I'd ask: How many logical fallacies are in this comment? The comment: Yes. A percentage of UFO videos and pictures are faked or photoshopped. But dude really? There are thousands of videos and photos, and more and more of them in daylight and close up. Just the law of averages with thousands of them means that there are real craft. They do perform things that cannot be done with any current public technology. AND cannot be done with any materials we have with our present understanding of physics. A human body would not survive the maneuvers performed. Just go to The Disclosure Project web site and read the affidavits from hundreds of upper US and global military and scientists working on government black ops projects. You need to catch up. /end comment You can see my response here: http://youtu.be/z93kVfOoj3E I felt like this was my first chance to try to be a good skeptic directly, even though I've been following your show for years now, and it really feels hard to deal with people I know personally believing the usual pseudoscience fluff without insulting them. Thanks! Chase in Japan
Crazy Stuff from the Week ()
Science or Fiction ()
Item #1: Raw cashews contain the same highly toxic chemical found in poison ivy, which is in the same family as the cashew tree. Item #2: Walnuts are the #1 culinary nut produced world-wide, at 23 tonnes per year. Item #3: Botanically speaking, peanuts are legumes, while cashews, pistachios, almonds, and the white part of the coconut that we eat are all seeds. Chestnuts, hazelnuts, and acorns are true nuts. Item #4: Botanically speaking, peanuts are legumes, while cashews, pistachios, almonds, and the white part of the coconut that we eat are all seeds. Chestnuts, hazelnuts, and acorns are true nuts.
Skeptical Quote of the Week ()
To every complex question there is a simple answer and it is wrong… ~ H.L. Mencken
S: The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe is produced by SGU Productions, dedicated to promoting science and critical thinking. For more information on this and other episodes, please visit our website at theskepticsguide.org, where you will find the show notes as well as links to our blogs, videos, online forum, and other content. You can send us feedback or questions to info@theskepticsguide.org. Also, please consider supporting the SGU by visiting the store page on our website, where you will find merchandise, premium content, and subscription information. Our listeners are what make SGU possible.
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