Point of Inquiry

The rise of ISIS, the self proclaimed Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, has sparked debate about the role of religion — specifically Islam — in violent extremism. This week, Dr. Adam Silverman offers us a glimpse into the theology of ISIS, and tackled some difficult questions; What does ISIS believe and how do its religious beliefs shape its political choices? What about the notorious video-taped b...

Josh Zepps is off, and since this week is the 5th  International Blasphemy Rights Day , we're rebroadcasting this interview by Chris Mooney with Austin Dacey, CFI's former UN representative and an expert on the subject of blasphemy laws. *** This week, our guest is a return one:  Austin Dacey . He's a philosopher, a writer, a human rights activist, and the creator of the  Impossible Music Sessions...

This week Point of Inquiry welcomes journalist Mark Oppenheimer. Mark writes the Beliefs column for the New York Times, and is the author of the e-book The Zen Predator of The Upper East Side . He is an expert on how religious and philosophical communities deal--or refuse to deal--with allegations of abuse in their ranks.    Mark joins host Lindsay Beyerstein to talk about a feature he wrote for B...

It’s National Chicken Month! But rather than celebrating the consumption of fowl, Point of Inquiry is asking what exactly is going on in America's meat industry? Is the way we consume meat at all rational?    Joining us this week is Christopher Leonard, investigative journalist whose work has appeared in  Fortune ,  Slate , and  The New York Times . He is a fellow with The New America Foundation,...

Point of Inquiry welcomes Caitlin Doughty, creator of the cult classic web series Ask A Mortician , which gives unvarnished answers to questions about dead bodies and the death industry. Caitlin has tackled topics ranging from " What to say to a grieving person? " to " How could my titanium hip implant end up as part of a road sign in the Midwest? "    Caitlin is the author of the new book Smoke G...

It’s been ten years since the publication of Sam Harris’s book  The End of Faith  kicked off the cultural phenomenon of “new atheism,” bringing frank criticism of religion into mainstream conversation. In the decade since, Harris has emerged as something of a maverick among nonbelievers and progressives, frequently at the center of controversy with his opinions on Islam and extremism, science’s ro...

This week Point Of Inquiry welcomes  Dr. Adia Benton , a professor of medical anthropology at Brown University. She joins host Lindsay Beyerstein to talk about the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. Medical anthropologists bring a unique expertise to epidemics because they study both the physiology of illness and the cultural factors that influence its transmission. That's why the World Health Organiz...

Point of Inquiry's hosts are off this week, so we're running Lindsay Beyerstein's excellent interview from earlier this year with Dr. Paul Offit. Dr. Offit will be the Center for Inquiry's special guest on September 6th in Amherst, NY , as he is awarded the Robert P. Balles Prize in Critical Thinking.  *   *   *  Paul A. Offit, MD is best known as a co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine and a staun...

One hundred years ago, Great Britain declared war on Germany, joining in what we now refer to as World War I, a conflict which cost more than 9 million combatants and 7 million civilians their lives, and shaped the the world we know today. How did reasonable people let "The Great War" begin, and what can reasonable people today learn from it?   Joining us this week is Christopher Capozzola, an MIT...

This week, Point of Inquiry welcomes Laurel Braitman, a TED fellow with a PhD in History and Anthropology of Science from MIT, and the author of Animal Madness: How Anxious Dogs, Compulsive Parrots, and Elephants in Recovery Help Us Understand Ourselves .   It might sound strange to say that animals suffer from mental illness but the brain systems that regulate anxiety, attachment, and arousal are...

How do we rationally assess risk? Following a terrible series of horrifying air travel disasters, reasonable people begin to question what we consider to be "safe." But should we?    To answer this question, our host Josh Zepps is joined by David Ropeik, an international consultant and expert on the subject of risk perception and communication, and author of  Risk: A Practical Guide for Deciding W...

On March 15, 2000, over a dozen whales beached themselves in the Bahamas in one of the largest multi-species strandings in history. Suspicion turned to U.S. Navy sonar, but at first there was no proof. This revelation brings us into the detective story told in  War of the Whales: A True Story .  Point of Inquiry  welcomes the author, Joshua Horowitz.  We discuss the history of the U.S. Navy’s use...

Point of Inquiry is taking a week off and filling in with a classic episode. After Saudi Arabia recently tried to silence the Center For Inquiry's UN representative, Josephine Macintosh, as she delivered a statement critical of their repeated assaults on freedom of religion, belief and expression, we felt that our Austin Dacey episode was fitting to fill in during our week off. Austin Dacey serves...

To discuss last week's Supreme Court decision in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, Point of Inquiry welcomes Dr. Brian Leiter, law professor and philosopher at the University of Chicago. He's the author of several books including  Why Tolerate Religion? . He blogs at  Leiter Reports: A Philosophy Blog .  Leiter and host Lindsay Beyerstein discuss what the Hobby Lobby decision means for women's health, corpo...

Best known for his 17 years as a talk show host, Montel Williams is now bringing his name and dynamic personality to activism on behalf of U.S. servicemen and women. Raised during the height of the Civil Rights Movement and into the tumultuous sixties, he joined the Marines as a young man and enrolled at the U.S. Naval Academy, earning a Bachelor of Science in Engineering.    After spending years...

We evolved to eat berries rather than bagels, to live in caves rather than condos, to sprint barefoot rather than wear sneakers—or did we? These, along with many other questions about what is or is not "natural" for humans from an evolutionary perspective and is the subject of the new book by biologist, Dr. Marlene Zuk, Paleofantasies: What Evolution Really Tells Us about Sex, Diet, and How We Liv...

Few intra-party political battles have been as astonishing and unexpected as last week's primary loss by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor to religious-conservative challenger David Brat, who was quickly embraced by the Tea Party after his victory. To discuss what this means for the future of the GOP, and how religion has waxed and waned as a factor in American politics,  Point of Inquiry  welcome...

This week POI welcomes bestselling author and trans rights activist, Janet Mock. Janet is the author of the new memoir   Redefining Realness: My Path to Womanhood, Identity, Love and So Much More , which recounts her emotional and physical transition from an infant sexed male at birth in Hawaii in 1983, to a young woman in New York City.   Some traditionalists accuse trans activists of playing gam...

This week, we welcome Negin Farsad, a groundbreaking Iranian American comedian. A TED speaker and TED Fellow, she was named one of the  Huffington Post 's 50 Funniest Women. She's been seen on Comedy Central, MTV, CNN, MSNBC, and in her movie  The Muslims are Coming! , a documentary following some of the funniest Muslim comedians as they travel America's Red States, cracking people up and demolish...

This week,  Point of Inquiry  welcomes Dahlia Lithwick, Senior Editor and Legal Correspondent for  Slate , where she writes the "Supreme Court Dispatches" and "Jurisprudence" columns. Her legal commentary won her a National Magazine Award in 2013. She is a graduate of Stanford Law School and she joins Lindsay Beyerstein to talk about the crisis facing capital punishment in the United States.   Alm...

Our guest this week is Farzana Hassan, a Pakistani-Canadian political scientist, a columnist for the  Toronto Sun,  whose new book is  Prophecy and the Fundamentalist Quest: An Integrative Study of Christian and Muslim Apocalyptic Religion .  Hassan joins  Point of Inquiry' s Josh Zepps to talk about issues surrounding Islam, in particular the difficulty in honestly dealing with terrorism and extr...

Our guest this week is Donald Prothero, paleontologist, geologist, and author of the new book  Reality Check: How Science Deniers Threaten our Future . He's an expert on the effect of past climate change on the fossil record, as well as the co-author of  Abominable Science , a skeptical look at  cryptozoology and cryptozoologists with Daniel Loxton. Science Denialism is a many-headed hydra that re...

Our guest this week is Cara Santa Maria, contributor to Al Jazeera America's science show  TechKnow , and the host of the podcast  Talk Nerdy . This neuroscientist, science educator, producer, writer, and television personality has brought her intelligence and insights to the  Huffington Post  as its former senior science editor, was the co-host and producer of  TakePart Live  on Pivot TV, and has...

This week Point of Inquiry welcomes the well-known atheist  blogger , speaker, and author Greta Christina to talk about her new book,  Coming Out Atheist: How to Do It, How to Help Each Other and Why ,  a no nonsense guide to leveling with everyone in your life about your non-belief. Greta is a woman at home with difficult conversations. Her previous books include  Why Are You Atheists So Angry: 9...

This week, Point of Inquiry is excited to welcome “The Amazing” James Randi: famed magician a godfather (as it were) of the modern reason movement, and founder of the James Randi Educational Foundation. Randi is the subject of a new documentary film, An Honest Liar, which brings to life Randi's intricate investigations that publicly exposed psychics, parapsychologists, fait- healers, and con artis...