and getting more people science/critical thinking literate then Scams don't grow.
Whats the difference between SGU and a normal science podcast ?
it has a job to encourage good reasoning and critical thinking, and the scientific method is part of this. It's all about truth, but we live in a world of distortion due to Information Porn in the media (hyping news headlines and appealing to the emotions tricks), due to commercialism, marketing tricks and advertising, due to formulaic Hollywood films
and due to humans genetically inbuilt irrationality.
- We need to make good decisions in life and understand the decisions that governments etc. make on our behalf, but we need the true picture.
- Skepticism and critical thinking helps us sort out what is truth.
- As regards "Jennys show being good fodder". If we skeptics aren't careful then
we end up on the back foot being reactive, allowing scammers to set the agenda, and giving then undue free publicity. Sticking more to real science allows us to promote what is true instead of trying to counter what is untrue which is a much bigger job cos there are always a multitude more untrue positions than true positions. ie I could spend time debunking 10 theories of how a thing works or I could just explain the 1 true best idea of how it does work.
- Debunking and Exposing a scam is a good example of critical thinking in action. But scams keep appearing usually they are just new versions of scams exposed before, so it becomes a bit boring for the skeptic movement to do this
... Far better that the wider public learn to recognize a scam so preventing it growing legs and spreading to a wider audience. That's why SGU talks about science, it's about getting the public scientifically literate.
- The Skeptics movement is Great because :
- 1. Truly fun and enlightening as it explains amazing things which seem to be like magic
- 2. promotes the public understanding of Science and Critical thinking
- 3. Performs a consumer protection role in exposing scams and pseudoscience.
- "Who's that noisy" might be an interesting game, but I don't think it's that great at stimulating critical thinking... neither are some of the other games as effective as they might be due to the way they are played.
- Quote of day is stimulating and inspiring Good job !