We discuss a surprise paleoanthropological development from the past week and weigh some falsehoods coming from a new member of Congress. Then for our main topic we do an overview of romance scams, from the Spanish Prisoner Swindle a few centuries ago to the online catfishing scams that are presently fleecing Americans to the tune of $500 million a year. Longtime grassroots skeptic volunteer Wendy Hughes kindly joins us to discuss her courageous and candid article "A Skeptic Trips Over a Romance...
Jan 13, 2023•2 hr 31 min•Ep. 192
As we wrap up another year, we make a few predictions for 2023 and then answer some listener questions on what has fooled us in the past. Then for our main segment we dish on films that were right up our strange and skeptical alley. There was some brilliant folklore-inspired work involving Djinn and a puppet come to life, as well as some fantastic documentaries -- and also some absurd stuff disguised as documentaries, like Netflix's recent "Ancient Apocalypse."
Dec 30, 2022•1 hr 25 min•Ep. 191
Ben titled this episode. In which we speak of all the reasons why you should think twice about renting a monochrome, windowless van in unfamiliar territory. From cursed vehicles to the average person's psychological priming that led police off the trail of the Beltway Sniper case, we look at the role vehicles have played in urban legends, dangerous rumors and real-life crime. How have the most common vehicles in our environment also become the most feared? Buckle up!
Dec 16, 2022•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 190
First Pascual and Celestia examine a mysterious woman "haunting" AI art, dubbed "Loab." Then we dip into a selection of the less famous lake monsters. There are literally hundreds. We talk about how they've spawned from either high-profile sightings/photos or questionable “news” stories from the period of yellow journalism. And even how some people have claimed copyright over a few of them for merchandising purposes! From Champ’s cousin George (who lives, predictably, in Lake George) and Tahoe T...
Dec 05, 2022•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 189
Ben has returned from adventures, so we hear about some of his travels and then discuss the Twitter blue checkmark brouhaha. In our main segment we look at Ley Lines, a literal game of connect-the-dots played on the surface of the earth. Somehow these evolved from simple common routes noticed by an early 20th-century landscape photographer to a catch-all mysterious network that affects dowsing, psychic energy, nodes, vortices and crop circles. Called holy lines by Nazis and dragon lines by write...
Nov 19, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Ep. 188
This week, after we take a moment to tally exactly how many kids were killed by rainbow fentanyl passed off as Halloween candy, we bring Sharon Hill on to speak about the excitement around a decade ago when Dr. Melba Ketchum announced she had tested and confirmed Bigfoot DNA. Ben sets the stage in terms of Bigfoot evidence timeline and the rise of genetic technology. Once a vacuum became apparent, it seemed inevitable that someone would eventually become a self-taught geneticist, open an unaccre...
Nov 04, 2022•1 hr 27 min•Ep. 187
First, Pascual and Celestia puzzle over Ben's location and discuss a few places in Vegas that skeptics might like to see while they attend CSI Con. Then we celebrate the nearly $1 billion judgment against Alex Jones and look into a minor (non)mystery about a ghost boat from WWII appearing in a California lake. Our main topic this week is a look back at our favorite scary episodes, and why they creep us out.
Oct 20, 2022•1 hr 18 min•Ep. 186
First we get sucked down a bit of a rabbit hole on all the things we never knew about crystal flutes. Then vampire expert Dr. Stanley Stepanic joins us to talk Slavic folklore, rabies and other diseases, shape-shifting, religious clashes in Eastern Europe during the early centuries of Christianity, and how all monster roads seem to lead back to vampires. Stepanic covers a lot of ground, all the way through movies and present-day vampire ostension (oh yes, Vampire: The Masquerade comes up). Grab ...
Oct 07, 2022•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 185
First Celestia gushes about "3,000 Years of Longing," starring Idris Elba as a sultry Djinn. Then Ben talks to us about the pirate life, which had a lot more worms than one might expect. What's the difference between a privateer and a buccaneer? Or a sloop and a four-masted mariner? We go into daily activities, reasons people ended up on pirate ships, and of course how pirates typically met their end. Then we spotlight a few female pirates and talk about Blackbeard, who had the greatest PR team ...
Sep 24, 2022•1 hr 29 min•Ep. 184
Part roadside attraction -- and apparently also part magnetic marvel, part harmonics and Ley Line energy well, part mystical creation of a stone-singer, part love letter, and part obsession, the Coral Castle in Homestead, Florida, has baffled engineers and scientists for decades. Or so it's been said. What was the real force behind this peculiar non-coral non-castle, exactly? Ben has written about and visited the Coral Castle and pored through the pamphlets of its builder, Latvian-American eccen...
Sep 09, 2022•1 hr 10 min•Ep. 183
Yes, so our guest this episode is . . . Ben! We take a look at a few strange things in the news first, like "Hunger Stones" and a "Surprise Spanish Stonehenge"! (No one expects the Spanish Stonehenge!). Then we dive into some media literacy themes and lessons in Ben's latest book, "America the Fearful: Media and the Marketing of National Panics." Part primer on what ties folklore of old to the anxiety-riddled news of today, part catalog of biases that influence the news, and part exploration of ...
Aug 27, 2022•2 hr 30 min•Ep. 182
To our credit, we manage to not giggle like third-graders for most of the episode, as we discuss the strange belief that one's penis has gone missing, become smaller, or been switched out. A peculiar mix of superstition, body dysmorphia, and curse belief, Koro has many traits of a mass sociogenic illness (MSI) and is "contagious" to a degree. When we peel back the layers, it's not such a funny topic after all, and falls into the category of suspicious folklore that results in harm: to victims, t...
Aug 12, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Ep. 181
This episode is special because all three of us have personal experience -- in Santa Fe, the Black Rock Desert, or Lewes, England -- watching giant effigies burn down in a symbolic cleansing ritual reputed to have dark, murderous roots. Yet this ubiquitous form of expression is also clever, satirical, and a way to showcase public art and bring a community together. From Wicker Man to Zozobra, what kind of strangeness have humans conjured up, only to burn down?
Jul 29, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Ep. 180
This week, as we await Pascual's time-out due to COVID, Ben and Celestia look into strange burial practices over the ages. With a peppering of pop culture here and there, we hear from Ben on medieval ways to keep your relatives from leaving their graves, from wooden stakes to mouth bricks to even the origins of headstones! Then we look into the Enlightenment and Victorian era and fears of being buried alive, as well as two very recent cases where families feared that had happened. Finally, Celes...
Jul 15, 2022•2 hr 37 min•Ep. 179
We are joined by Professor Michael Branch, who has just released his new book "On the Trail of the Jackalope." What began as an idea for a taxidermy correspondence course 90 years ago has blossomed into a cultural phenomenon. Michael Branch shares his appreciation for the Western tall tale, the whimsy and skill that went into original Wyoming jackalopes, and what sets a hoax apart from a scam or a con. We discuss tall tale postcards and other "jackalopiana" and uncover the surprising role jackal...
Jul 01, 2022•1 hr 23 min•Ep. 178
We begin with a look at the continuing danger of online rumors igniting mob violence and the Google engineer who is in the news for his belief that the AI in development there has reached sentience. Then we are joined by Susan Gerbic and Kenny Biddle, who ventured out to Vegas recently and joined Ben for a tour of Zak Bagans' Haunted Museum (but is it, really?). We discuss the "real paranormal" angle versus theatrical haunted house that this museum tries to straddle, and Kenny shares some detail...
Jun 17, 2022•2 hr 6 min•Ep. 177
Ben has done several deep dives into various aspects of how the public processes mass shootings, and recent events moved us to bring this topic out now. As political talking heads and newsmakers cherry-pick and sound off about their own causative theories and narratives, what will and won't work to curb these horrific events, we thought we'd take a look into what we do know, and don't know, about the profile of an "average" mass shooter. Data on mass shootings, and other gun violence, is lacking...
Jun 03, 2022•1 hr 7 min•Ep. 176
Ben announces the release of his new book, "America the Fearful," and then Celestia takes over for a main segment inspired by current events. While we hope these fears turn out to be unfounded, there is much worry presently about parents turning to DIY recipes for baby formula amid the nationwide shortage. Another looming fear is that many lives will be lost to unsafe abortion practices if access is restricted -- herbal abortions share many features with other forms of alternative medicine, but ...
May 20, 2022•1 hr 16 min•Ep. 175
After a few words on current events, Pascual takes us on a tour of tales about Old Scratch influencing music. Whether he's giving free violin lessons, defending himself in court, or even hanging out with Anton LaVey and Sammy Davis Jr., the devil has a longstanding relationship with music of all types.
May 06, 2022•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 174
After some excitement over the release of Science Friction, and Ben's discussion of Huggy Wuggy, we talk about alien implants. No, it's not just about probing jokes. We go into the multiple factors that lead people to think aliens have implanted some kind of technology into them, and what reasons aliens are thought to have for doing so, as well as how useful such implants would really be. Memory, biology, and good old cultural context all come into play.
Apr 22, 2022•1 hr 17 min•Ep. 173
After a brief diversion about who slapped who at that big pop culture event recently, we look into a much, much different vein of show business. Get it? Vein? Seriously though, what makes people bleed from their hands and other places, allegedly spontaneously, in a replication of Christ's wounds? How many people have become known for this peculiar blessing, and how do they profit from it exactly? We'll discuss miracles versus Munchausen, fakery versus pious frauds, as well as other explanations ...
Apr 09, 2022•1 hr 22 min•Ep. 172
After a few thoughts on Daylight Savings Time, we discuss a short list of purported deathbed confessions. The last words of a consequential figure can be hijacked or twisted to fit agenda -- or, sometimes, it's not just the words that are made up, it's the person too. From cautionary tales to urban legends, deathbed confessions are a peculiar branch of the folklore tree. There are also very real deathbed confessions that have solved mysteries, revealed crimes, or reversed a long-held position. J...
Mar 25, 2022•1 hr 15 min•Ep. 171
After a brief discussion on the recent jailbreak (rock break?) of a Japanese nine-tailed demon, and some thoughts on war rumors and viral stories coming out of Ukraine, we talk about people who think they can talk to animals. Or people who think their animal can talk to them -- psychically, of course. From a lost champion purebreed to a thoroughly tested terrier in the UK, we go over a few examples and our thoughts on the matter.
Mar 11, 2022•1 hr 11 min
From superheroes to saints to trumpets, the idea of things seeming to float inexplicably in the air certainly captures our imagination. First Ben takes us through a history of levitation--as a sign of possession or piety, then as purported by Spiritualist mediums, and then as a side-effect of meditation. Celestia discusses some technological ways humans have found to levitate themselves or objects, using the magic of magnetism or air friction. And then Prof. Richard Wiseman joins us to delve int...
Feb 25, 2022•1 hr 17 min•Ep. 169
First, all the way from New York City Skeptics, Russ Dobler drops in to tell us about AIPT Comic's skepticism month -- and we also chat about Joe Rogan and Ivermectin. Then our main topic is sex urban legends, a field so fertile it's a veritable cornucopia of naughty, forbidden, lurid, or merely humiliating tales that someone swears happened to a friend's cousin's boss's uncle. From Lemmiwinks the gerbil to the poor woman impregnated by a Civil War bullet, we dive into stories old and new about ...
Feb 11, 2022•1 hr 28 min•Ep. 168
We are joined by two guests who can share their experiences with televangelist and self-proclaimed exorcist Bob Larson. Alisa Yang has produced a short documentary, Sleeping with the Devil, about her Skype exorcism by Larson, and she shares insights into the communities that gave rise to such predatory figures. Then JD Sword discusses a Larson event he attended remotely that was advertised as the exorcism of a possessed doll. Both incidents have disturbing undercurrents that have nothing to do w...
Jan 28, 2022•1 hr•Ep. 167
As Oscar season approaches, we wanted to take some time to chat about movies we saw that either tripped our skeptical alarms or warmed our skeptical hearts. Some are major motion pictures like Don't Look Up, Nightmare Alley or even Disney's Encanto, but we discuss quite a few lesser known flicks on streaming services: Sasquatch, Seaspiracy, the The Lost Leonardo, and House of Secrets: The Burari Deaths. Tune in for our thoughts on these films and info on where you can see them. And boy do we hav...
Jan 14, 2022•2 hr 39 min•Ep. 166
In this final installment of our moral panic series, as well as our final episode of 2021, we go into various banned books, fears about literature's effect on "weaker minds," the hearings on comic books and juvenile delinquency, and what makes a moral panic. Whether it's murders attributed to Catcher in the Rye or the big boss battle between Fredric Wertham and William Gaines, there's plenty of historical examples to draw from. Then Ben wraps up with some considerations (and criticisms) of moral...
Dec 31, 2021•2 hr 40 min•Ep. 165
This penultimate episode in our moral panic series starts with a discussion of the TikTok worries that interrupted schools last week as authorities braced for possible gun violence. Then we talk cinema and television from old to new, and the themes in moral panicking that jump out repeatedly -- such as worrying about what the fragile minds of children or females might absorb, or copycat fears, or concerns about sex, violence, or low self-esteem.
Dec 24, 2021•2 hr 34 min•Ep. 164
In part 2 of our 4-part series, we talk about moral panics in music history. Some will seem quaint to our modern ears, while others are a bit more recent. From jaunty tunes interfering with factory work in the 1940s to rock artists in the 1980s defending their lyrics in congressional hearings, we look at a long history of how parent's just don't understand their kids' music. And what does the future hold in terms of musical panics? Can we even begin to predict that, when one of the key features ...
Dec 10, 2021•2 hr 34 min•Ep. 163
