The Skeptics Society has retired Skepticblog (while preserving all posts online at their original urls for future reference), but we’re proud to announce our bigger, better new blog: INSIGHT at Skeptic.com! Dedicated to the spirit of curiosity and grounded in scientific skepticism’s useful, investigative tradition of public service, INSIGHT continues and exp […]
Some people say, "Oh, there's anti-science on both sides of the political aisle." But that neglects one important fact: in only ONE political party are the leadership and the party platform dominated by science denial.
Would you believe there is a patch of trapped garbage floating in the North Pacific bigger than the state of Texas? It's called the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch".
In honor of “Weird Al” Yankovic’s birthday, I wanted to share with you one of his songs which has a funny skeptical and cynical slant to it… “That’s Your Horoscope for Today” (lyrics here). Enjoy! 🙂
Incidentally, here’s my favorite section of the lyrics:
Now you may find it inconceivable or at the very least a bit unlikely
that the relative position of the planets and the stars could have
a special deep significance or meaning that exclusively applies to only you, but let me give you my assurance that these forecasts and predictions are all based on solid, scientific, documented evidence, so you would have to be some kind of moron not to realize that every single one of them is absolutely true.
I just had to share this in a quick post: one of my favorite musical groups from the 1990s – They Might Be Giants – has a neat video about science out on Youtube. It’s called “Science Is Real” – check it out 🙂
Sometimes people get the impression that the only people who embrace the title of “skeptic” are science nerds & geeks. Not so. There are, fortunately, a growing number of artists – musicians, comedians, singers – who have taken up the cause of promoting skepticism through their work. I wanted to give some of them a brief mention here.
They are Julia Sweeney (of Saturday Night Live fame), George Hrab, Greydon Square, and Tim Minchin. There are undoubtedly others beyond these four, but these are the big ones I know about now. I have met Julia, George, and Greydon, and I look forward to meeting Tim someday in the future.
I became aware of Julia Sweeney, George Hrab and Greydon Square through a well-known skeptical meeting called The Amazing Meeting (learn more about TAM’s sponsoring organization – the James Randi Educational Foundation). And I learned about Tim Minchin from one of the best skeptical podcasts on the Internet, the Skeptics Guide to the Universe.
It is encouraging to see that more and more high-profile artists are coming out and not only embracing but also promoting skepticism. This is a welcome trend, because it not only expands the message of the modern skeptical movement beyond areas to which it has traditionally been limited (i.e. the sciences), and it also lends an air of coolness to the movement which will broaden the appeal. And getting the message out to younger people that scientific thinking & skepticism can be cool and isn’t just for nerds is one of the best things that artists have to offer.
The Skeptical Teacher 