The Skeptics Movement With a Capital S

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Phil Plait was a PhD level astronomer who worked with NASA on the Hubble telescope. He became an advocate for science communication, which led him to serve as the president of the James Randy Educational Foundation from August 2008 through 2009. As this movement grew and gained ground confronting everything from moon landing deniers to anti-vaxxers, he started to grow concerned about a general attitude within that community. It seemed more like the movement wasn't interested in persuading people to come over to their way of seeing things, but to consider them as intellectual opponents who needed to be crushed.

Astronomer Phil Plait joins us to discuss his new book, Under Alien Skies, in which he describes what it would be like (through human eyes and real physical experiences) to actually travel to Saturn, Mars, asteroids, and distant stars. Also, we discuss the recent surge in UFO sighting as well as his famous talk at The Amazing Meeting more than a decade ago in which he asked all science communicators and critical thinkers to approach those who believe in pseudoscience with empathy and respect instead of scorn and vitriol. And, we run through the history of James Randi's popularization of the big-S Skeptic movement.

- Phil Plait’s Substack: https://badastronomy.substack.com/

- How Minds Change: www.davidmcraney.com/howmindschangehome

- David McRaney’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/davidmcraney

- YANSS Twitter: https://twitter.com/notsmartblog

- Show Notes: www.youarenotsosmart.com

- Newsletter: https://davidmcraney.substack.com