- Date – February 28, 2012
- Send your cool ‘SCIENCE!’ shout-outs to hosts @ skepticality.com.
- Theme song by Steve Seamans of the Daisy Dillman Band. Get the song HERE.
Skeptic History Notes
- Charles Ponzi was born March 3, 1882.
- Richard DeVos, co-founder of Amway, was born March 4, 1926.
- Children of Invention is an excellent dramatic film about the human cost of multi-level marketing schemes.
- Dean Radin was born February 29, 1952.
- The James Randi Educational Foundation was incorporated in Delaware on February 29, 1996.
- Phil Plait’s book Bad Astronomy was published March 1, 2002.
- Skeptic History facts are posted daily on social media find out where on this page at the Skeptools blog.
Interview Notes
- David DiSalvo regular writer for, Scientific American Mind, and Forbes used to be True/Slant.
- His original blog is Neuronarrative.
- Davids passion is technology and science.
- Has always been interested in why people tend to choose options which are bad for them.
- The title of his new book has a long title by design so it stands out.
- Can your brain actually get happy?
- To actually become happy, you kind of need to do things which tend to be uncomfortable.
- The Mind/Body argument seems to persist.
- We now know so much more about the brain, and now realize it does have the ability to ‘create mind’.
- Are we getting closer to Androids?
- Technology has recently been able to interface with the brain.
- In the book David outlines many good examples of how Logical Fallacies effect people directly.
- Perceptual Framing makes us ‘wired’ to believe things which are not quite true.
- Chi masters have been shown to use ‘Bullshido‘ to convince people they have magical energy, showing confirmation bias.
- One Chi Master made the challenge to defeat him, which one MMA fighter took him up on.
- Followers of false magical ‘masters’ often up becoming ‘programmed’ to have certain reactions.
- James Randi has told a story showing this effect concerning Chi masters in the past.
- “Washing the Dog” as a new way of thinking about just how faulty our memory of past events.
- During an argument about past events people will start to dig in about how they perceive reality.
- We should all be more like the Doozers, and much less like Fraggles.
- It is harder to keep working, than to keep up tenacity to make a difference.
- Do not get stuck on defeats or roadblocks in life.
- Couples finishing each others statements and ideas is a byproduct of our lazy brains using ‘transactional memory’.
- Our brains like to conserve energy and will tend to try to find the best way to ‘off load’ its work.
- Physical posing can actually effect your brain chemistry and ability to deal with social situations.
- Some older books tout postures a when presenting certain things to the public.
- Mimicking is a tool which can be used in situations to help with certain social interactions.
- The book has a good list of 50 final recommendations at the end to help people.
- We need to have a new book store section called ‘Science Help‘.