Parallax Views w/ J.G. Michael

On this edition of Parallax Views, James C. Zimring, M.D., Ph.D., Thomas W. Tillack Professor of Experimental Pathology at the University of Virginia, joins us to discuss his new book Partial Truths: How Fractions Distort Our Thinking. Zimring is also the author of What Science Is and How It Really Works. This conversation was recorded on 6/21/22. In this conversation Zimring explains what his book is about and how it deals with the ways in which fractional thinking shapes the way we think about the world. When we talk about fractions and fractional thinking in this conversation, however, we are not talking about solving math problems in an classroom or academic setting. Instead, as Zimring explains, we discussing our everyday usage of fractional thinking that we often take for granted. This fractional thinking is necessary, as we learn in this conversation, but also can distort our perception about a number of phenomena and issues. Among the topics covered in this conversation are: - Fractional thinking and the moral panic around Dungeons and Dragons in the 1980s - Fractional thinking and the blunder of the Iraq War during the Presidency of George W. Bush - Fractional thinking and the strange story of a McDonald's burger - New Age beliefs, spirituality, religion, and an on-air cold reading experiment - Heuristics, the availability heuristic, and inductive reasoning - A recent study by the Heritage Institute on Israel and China and the fault reasoning used in the study - Big data and racism - Information, p-hacking, selective reporting, and faulty academic studies - The problems of science reporting - And much, much more!

On this short but sweet edition of Parallax Views, we delve into the world of female MMA. Thanks to fighters like Ronda Rousey and Cris Cyborg the female side of mixed martial arts has gained greater traction amongst combat sports fans and the general public in recent years. One need look no farther than the fact that Hollywood produced a major motion picture with Halle Berry, Bruised, based on subject to see how female MMA has become part of popular culture. Heading the charge for women's MMA is the promotion Invicta FC. For over 10 years now Invicta FC has provided a platform for top female athletes to compete in combat sports. Joining us ahead of Invicta FC 48, which will be available on AXS TV as well as the Invicta FC Youtube and Facebook pages, is Invicta FC's CEO/President Shannon Knapp. Among the topics discussed: - The birth of Invicta FC and the obstacles and hurdles it faced as an all-women's MMA promotion - Invicta FC's card including the Bantamweight championship bout between Taneisha Tennant (c) vs. Olga Rubin and pro boxer Melissa Odessa Parker vs. GLORY kickboxer Isis Verbeek - Invicta FC's adoption of the open scoring system for fights - Shannon as an advocate for female athletes in the combat sports world and why she calls them athletes rather than fighters - Thoughts on the old criticism that MMA is "human cockfighting" - The challenge of finding female athletes in an often male-dominated sport - Leveling the playing field for female MMA athletes and the importance of Invicta FC to the broader world of combat sports - Shannon Knapp's thoughts on the success of Ronda Rousey and what it has meant for female MMA - And much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, Dutch sociologist M.B. Schuilenburg joins us to discuss his books Hysteria: Crime, Media, and Politics and The Algorithmic Society: Technology, Power, and Knowledge. In this conversation we discuss the history of the idea of hysteria from it's origins in a clinical setting used, often times, against women to its usage by philosophers like Hobbes and Foucault and the concept of mass hysteria around hot topics like immigration. In addition to all of this we discuss the empirical research Schuilenburg did for the book, the Rotterdam race riots, anti-immigrant rhetoric and the Dutch politician Geert Wilders, the concept of security in Western society and its different connotations, Zygmunt Bauman's idea of "Liquid Modernity", neoliberalism and globalization, hysteria and the collective sense of a loss of control, positive security/hysteria vs. negative security/hysteria, the phenomena of moral panic, algorithms and social media as they relate to mass hysteria, big data and discrimination, and much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, a previously unreleased conversation from April 2022 with Kali Tribune's Branko Malic, who specializes in writing about metaphysics from a Catholic and traditionalist bent, about the Russian philosopher that's been called "Putin's Rasputin", Alexander Dugin. Aleksandr Dugin has been a figure that's gotten media coverage ever since the election of Donald Trump. He's one of the most ardent supporters of Putin's invasion of Ukraine. But who is Alexander Dugin? What are his beliefs? Is he a Gnostic? A follower of the Traditionalist School of metaphysics in the vein of Rene Guenon or Julius Evola? An occultist who practices a chaos magick? A mere Russian imperialist who promotes his worldview through what he calls the "Fourth Political Theory" and Eurasianism? A madman? A Satanist? A Russian Orthodox Catholic? Or simply a man who wants to "immanentize the eschaton" (aka the apocalypse)? Branko and I will tackle all of this and much more in the conversation.

On this edition of Parallax Views, July 4th is just around the corner. What better way to celebrate than hitting the beach! Of course, if you're not careful in that water you could get munched up by a shark like in JAWS. Or worse... PIRANHA WOMEN! Piranha Women is the latest effort of Charles Band's long-running horror/fantasy/sci-fi factory Full Moon Features. It's also a return to said genre for it's director, the legendary independent filmmaker Fred Olen Ray. For a number of years now Fred has been working on TV, including making Hallmark Christmas movies with Chevy Chase and Lifetime thrillers. For him filmmaking is not merely some hobby, but a profession. Simply put, he's a working class filmmaker. Prior too much of his television work, Fred directed a great number of horror, sci-fi, action, and fantasy pictures during the VHS boom in the 1980s and a number of erotic thrillers during that genre's popularity in the 1990s. Among some of the cult classics Fred has directed are Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers, The Tomb, Biohazard, Cyclone, Evil Toons, Inner Sanctum (one of the most successful video rentals of the 99s), Beverly Hills Vamp, Witch Academy, Alienator, Deep Space, Star Slammer, Bad Girls from Mars, Mind Twister, Attack of the 60 Foot Centerfolds, Inferno, Possessed by the Night, and countless others. Through it all he's worked with such well-known actors as Ice-T, Don "The Dragon" Wilson, David Carradine, Sybil Danning, Martin Landau, Nightmare on Elm Street's Heather Langenkamp, Eric Roberts, Gunna Hansen (Leatherface in the original 1974 Texas Chainsaw Massacre), Morgan Fairchild, comedy movie legend Eddie Deezen, Bond girl Britt Ekland, Twin Peaks' Russ Tamblyn, Sid Haig, and many, many others. A monster kid that grew up on drive-in horror movies, Piranha Women marks Fred Olen Ray's returns to the type of fun genre fare that's made him a cult figure amongst cinema buffs. And it stars such beauties as Carrie Overgaard and Keep Chambers as the deadly titular fish women. In this conversation Fred and I discuss a number of topics including: - The secrets of indie filmmaking from matching shots to filming big name actors on a schedule - Working with classic actors like John Carradine, Aldo Ray, and Cameron Mitchell - The tricks he used to film the animated monster in the ambitious low-budget live-action horror Evil Toons - Working with Full Moon and thoughts on the promotional wizardy of Charles Band - Filming nude scenes with actresses - How to make films on low-budgets and tight-schedules - The craft of filmmaking - Orson Welles' cinematographer Gary Graves and his sabotaged film Moon in Scorpio - How he began working on Hallmark and Lifetime movies; what TV networks expect out of him as a director and why he gets the job - Filmmaking as a job rather than a hobby - The killer ta-tas gag in Piranha Women - The rise and fall of the "Scream Queen" cycle of films in the 1980s directed by Fred, Jim Wyrnoski, and David DeCoteau starring actresses like Linne Quigley, Michelle Bauer, Brinke Stevens, and Kelli Maroney - Advice to young filmmakers and what Fred looks for in young filmmakers (including discussion of Fred's producer credits for Steve Latshaw's Jack-O, which was recently re-released on Blu-Ray by Fred's Retromedia company, and Henrique Couto's Bigfoot web-series Boggy Creek) - And much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, former Bloomberg News reporter and investigative journalist David de Jong joins Parallax Views to discuss his new book The Dark History of Germany's Wealthiest Dynasties. There has been much academic research and debate over the years on the topic of big business and the rise of the Adolf Hitler's Third Reich, specifically in the form of Henry Ashby Turner's 1985 book Big Business and the Rise of Hitler. A little bit of digging will lead anyone interested in the subject to a secret meeting between Hitler and German industrialists that occurred on February 20th, 1933. De Jong picks up the story from those early days of the Third Reich and examines the wealthy families that prospered under Hitler's reign including the Quandt Family, the Porsche–Piëch family, the Von Finck family, the Flick family, the Oetker family, and Reimann family. These families have become associated with such familiar auto companies as Porsche, BMV, and Volkswagen over the years. Additionally, some of these families even have ties to brands like Dr. Pepper, Panera Bread, and Krispy Kreme donuts. Although Germany society has went to great length to reckon with the Holocaust over the decades since WWII, de Jong argues that these wealthy dynasties have not done the same or at least not done enough to grapple with the actions of their patriarchs and ancestors. We discuss all of this as well as other issues such as: - The seizure of Jewish businesses by the Third Reich and the ways in which wealthy German families benefitted from this - The career of August von Finck, Sr., founder of the German insurance company Allianz and the private bank Merck Finck & Co., and his son August von Funck, Jr.'s alleged involvement with the German far-right political party AfD in the 21st century - BMW heirs Stefan Quandt and Susanne Klatten - The persecution of Porsche's Jewish co-founder Adolf Rosenberger - Were these families driven by opportunism or ideology? - The American connection to the post-WWII fates of these families; how Cold War politics played into that connection; Telford Taylor: Chief prosecutor of the Nuremberg Military Tribunals, and his attempts to make German big business reckon with Nazi collusion; the role of John J. McCloy, U.S. high commissioner for occupied Germany, in this story - American investigator Josif Marcu and the man he called "the modern self-made German Robber Baron", Friedrich Flick; Friedrich Flick's comments about his trial - War crimes, slave labor, and German industry - Herbert Quandt, the AfD, and the whitewashing of history - Aryanization, big business, and the Third Reich - And much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, journalist Kathyrn Miles joins the show to discuss her new true crime book Trailed: One Woman's Quest to Solve the Shenandoah Murders. In the spring of May 1996, Julianne “Julie” Williams and Laura “Lollie” Winans went into Shenandoah National Park, part of the Appalachian trail. They were two bright young women in college with a future ahead of them. That future, however, was stolen as both Lollie and Julie were murdered in the woods of Shenandoah Nation Park. Their murder became nationwide news. So much so in fact that when George W. Bush became President of the United States, the Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales of announced that they had found a suspect and that the murder was a hate crime. You see, Lollie and Julie had been in a romantic relationship. As such, their murder could've been a hate crime. The culprit? A man by the name of Darrell David Rice. However, not all is as it seems. Kathyrn Miles takes us through her investigation of the Shenandoah murders explaining the missteps and even, in some cases, malfeasance by the FBI, National Park Service, and the Department of Justice. In doing show she cast doubt on Rice as the perpetrator (note: Rice has not been convicted, even to this day) and offers another suspect. But this isn't just the story of the investigation of the murders. It's also an exploration of what it's like to be a woman, LGBTQ+, or other marginalized identity exploring the frontier of the Appalachian trail and the ways in which that trail is experienced differently by men and women. We discuss all that and more on this edition of Parallax Views.

On this edition of Parallax Views, a previously unpublished conversation from April 2022 with Brandan P. Buck, a Ph.D. candidate in history and Digital History Fellow at George Mason University. Brandan has been researching the topic of a early-mid 20th century conservative formation known as the "Old Right". Epitomized by figures such as Senator Robert A. Taft and journalists like John T. Flynn and Garet Garrett, the Old Right was a force that opposed President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Some of this was in opposition to FDR's New Deal, but the Old Right was also known for its antiwar stance often leading to it being accused of isolationism or antisemitic, fascist/Nazi sympathies. Brandan and I discuss all of this as well as the history of the Old Right and specifically its connection to antiwar thought. This conversation came about after reading Brandan's piece at Responsible Statecraft entitled "No ‘Putin apologia’ and certainly not new: the Old American Right on war". Said piece details the history of the Old Right including the figure of Republican politician Eugen Siler's 1968 Senate run as an explicitly antiwar candidate during the Vietnam War. Prior to his Senate run Siler was a Congressman where he was the sole member of the House of Representatives to oppose the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (a resolution that led to greater U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War). Among the topics discussed in this conversation: - The connection between the Old Right's opposition to FDR-era progressive economic policies and the Old Right's non-interventionism and opposition to mass conscription - Understanding the Old Right and its origins within the GOP - Anti-interventionist and antiwar sentiments in the aftermath of WWI and the U.S. soldiers who were casualties of that war. - The question of antisemitism; the America First Committee; Charles Lindbergh's September 11th, 1941 speech - The book Merchants of Death about war-profiteering in WWI and left/right anti-war coalition - The Cold War, the Ronald Reagan era, Pat Buchanan, William F. Buckley and the National Review, and the decline of the Old Right - The differences between the antiwar left and the antiwar right - The Old Right's view that war and militarism were destructive to either individual liberty and/or family units - The influence of both Jeffersonianism and particularism on the Old Right - And much, much more!

On this edition of Parallax Views, Stuart Smith, author of Otto Skorzeny: The Devil's Disciple, joins the program to discuss the life, myths, and controversies of Nazi SS commando Otto Skorzeny. Skorzeny is perhaps best known for his involvement in a 1943 rescue mission operation to save Benito Mussolini in what has become known as the Gran Sasso raid. In this conversation we discuss: - The Luftwaffe and the controversies around the credit Skorzeny gets for the Gran Sasso raid - The connection between Otto Skorzeny and Ian Fleming's James Bond 007 novel Moonraker - Skorzeny, Operation Greif, and the Battle of the Bulge; efforts of the Axis forces to deceptively dress as Allied soldiers to cause havoc during the Battle of the Bulge - The myth-making of Otto Skorzeny and the media; discussing how Skorzeny's superficial qualities, such as the distinctive scar that got him nicknamed "Scarface", and his self-aggrandizing memoirs (My Commando Operations: The Memoirs of Hitler's Most Dangerous Commando) made him appealing to media - The trial of Otto Skorzeny in 1948 and how he skirted justice - The Operation Long Jump assassinations plot; Operation Knight's Move (the airborne raid against Yugoslavia's Marshal Tito); War crimes and the death squad-style Operation Peter aimed at taking out the resistance in Denmark - Otto Skorzeny and post-war intelligence; the CIA; Reinhard Gehlen and the Gehlen Organization; the Mossad; Skorzeny's brother Alfred and the Soviet Union; French intelligence; was Skorzeny a post-war spy?; surveillance of Skorzeny after WWII - Skorzeny's lack of organizational skill and his penchant for having big ideas that weren't focused on the fine details - The question of the post-war fascist international, Nazi ratlines in South America, and Skorzeny's involvement in those matters; Die Spinne (The Spider) and Skorzeny in Latin America - Otto Skorzeny's wealth in his final years and his involvement in private mercenary contracting (the Paladin Group) and arms dealing - Skorzeny and antisemitism - Skorzeny's attempts to paint himself as merely patriotic German  rather than a killer - Otto Skorzeny in Egypt; Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser - 

On this edition of Parallax Views, Project Censored's Mickey Huff and Nolan Higdon return to the program to discuss their new book, available now from Routledge, Let’s Agree to Disagree A Critical Thinking Guide to Communication, Conflict Management, and Critical Media Literacy. This was recorded around the time that Mia Janowicz and the Department of Homeland Security's Disinformation Governance Board was in the news so we also delve into issues related to censorship and corporate media bias. In the course of our conversation we also touch upon critical theory and Frankfurt School thinkers like Herbert Marcuse, the abortion debate, and much, much more! In the second segment of the show, a previously unpublished conversation from early 2022 in which J.G. spoke with friend of the show and returning guest John Duffy (co-author with Ray Nowosielski of The Watchdogs Didn't Bark: The CIA, NSA, and the Crimes of the War on Terror and the investigative documentary podcast After The Uprising: The Death Of Danyé Dion Jones) to discuss Duffy's latest docu-podcast Origins: Birth of a Pandemic, which investigates the issue of COVID and the lab leak hypothesis. In the conversation we discuss a number of topics including biolabs and biodefense, Anthony Fauci, Peter Daszak and the EcoHealth Alliance, biosafety, and much, much more!