The Michael Shermer Show

In this discussion with the author of the newly published book  Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World's Greatest Nuclear Disaster , Adam Higginbotham tells what really happened at Chernobyl, by far the worst nuclear disaster in history, and why it took so long to discover what really happened. Human error and technological design flaws in the reactor are only proximate explanations...

Bruce Schneier is a fellow and lecturer at the Harvard Kennedy School and the Berkman-Klein Center for Internet and Society. He is a special advisor to IBM Security and a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Access Now, and the Tor Project. You can find him on Schneier.com and on twitter at @schneierblog He is the author of Data and Goliath , Applied Cryptography , Liars and Outlier...

In this wide-ranging dialogue Michael Shermer and Gregg Hurwitz discuss being a public intellectual, how to convey ideas through fiction vs. nonfiction, the role of myths and archetypes in narrative stories, Jordan Peterson and religion, Shakespeare and tragedy, the role of life experience and suffering in the development of a successful novelist, screenwriter, or filmmaker, the role of narrative...

The Jordan Peterson Phenomenon In this short AMA Michael Shermer answers a single question: "What is your opinion of Jordan Peterson?" Dr. Shermer is asked this question in nearly every public appearance he makes, along with regular emails and social media queries he receives. At a November 2018 public event with Richard Dawkins, in the Q&A, he and Shermer received no less than four questions abou...

In this episode of the Science Salon Podcast, Michael Shermer speaks with Dr. Rachel Kleinfeld, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, where she focuses on issues of rule of law, security, and governance in post-conflict countries, fragile states, and states in transition. As the founding CEO of the Truman National Security Project, she spent nearly a decade leading a m...

In his second Ask Me Anything, recorded on the final day of 2018, Dr. Shermer reviews the latest issue of Skeptic magazine , introduces upcoming podcast guests Rachel Kleinfeld ( A Savage Order: How the World's Deadliest Countries Can Forge a Path to Security ), Bruce Schneier ( Click Here to Kill Everybody: Security and Survival in a Hyper-Connected World ), Mark W. Moffett ( The Human Swarm: How...

In this episode of the Science Salon Podcast, Michael Shermer talks to the renowned evolutionary behavioral scientist and Concordia University professor Dr. Gad Saad. Starting with his escape to Canada from war-torn Lebanon, Dr. Saad recounts how he got interested in the study of human nature in general and consumer behavior in particular through the evolutionary lens, why people make the choices...

In this wide-ranging dialogue Michael Shermer talks to Martin Rees about: his early education and how he got interested in astronomy and cosmology • how the Big Bang theory won out over the Steady State theory • origin of life, SETI, and the search for a second genesis • Fermi Paradox (if life is abundant in the universe…where is everyone?) • space exploration (human or robotic or both?) • future...

Dr. Susan Blackmore is no stranger to skeptics. Dr. Shermer has known Dr. Blackmore since the early 1990s. When the Skeptics Society and Skeptic magazine were founded in 1992 she was already a rock star in the skeptical movement, having moved from believing in the paranormal, ESP, telepathy, and all the rest, to being an arch skeptic of all such claims. After earning a Ph. D. in the paranormal she...

In this unusual Science Salon we bring you an interview of Dr. Shermer by Zac Sechler, a high school senior at Grace Prep High School in State College, PA. Zac is interested in studying areas such as religion, science, and history. He plans on studying history in college and hopes to work in the education field. This interview was for his Senior Project, on studying different worldviews that peopl...

In this unusual dialogue Dr. Shermer talks to author and journalist Daniel de Visé about one of the greatest athletes in American history, three-time Tour de France winner Greg LeMond and de Vise's new book about the cyclist, The Comeback: Greg LeMond, the True King of American Cycling, and a Legendary Tour de France . They also get into what constitutes fairness in sports, Lance Armstrong and the...

Humans have long seen ourselves as the center of the universe, the apple of God's eye, specially-created creatures who are somehow above and beyond the natural world. This viewpoint — a persistent paradigm of our own unique self-importance — is as dangerous as it is false. In this conversation with Michael Shermer based on his new book Through a Glass Brightly , noted biologist and evolutionary ps...

A lecture by and follow-up discussion with Jonathan Haidt about the excessive divisiveness of American politics and culture the past several years. Dr. Haidt visited the campus of Chapman University on October 18 on his book tour for The Coddling of the American Mind, about which Dr. Shermer talked to him in Science Salon # 36 . While on campus Professor Haidt made a guest appearance in Professor...

In this dialogue on life's deepest and most meaningful issues Michael Shermer talks with psychologist Clay Routledge about: the evolution of motivation and goals in animals and humans ● what a "purpose driven life" really means ● how atheists and nonbelievers can create meaningful and purposeful lives ● the self, personal identity, and existential psychology ● why people believe in God and fear de...

In this wide-ranging conversation Dr. Appiah and Dr. Shermer review the 5 "Cs" of identity—Creed, Country, Color, Class, and Culture—and what they tell us about who we are, or at least who we think we are. Dr. Appiah's new book The Lies That Bind: Rethinking Identity explores the nature and history of the identities that define us. It challenges our assumptions about how identities work. We all kn...

In this riveting review of the campus craziness investigative journals, writer, and lawyer Heather Mac Donald and Michael Shermer dive deep into the root causes of what has gone wrong on college campuses, in corporations, and in government agencies, over the decades that has led to a crisis in higher education … and beyond. Race and gender form the core of Identity Politics, which Mac Donald and S...

In this dialogue with one of the most interesting minds of our time, the Hebrew University historian and best-selling author ( Sapiens , Homo Deus ), Dr. Yuval Noah Harari, he and Dr. Shermer discuss the central ideas of his new book, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century , an exploration of: history, work, liberty, equality, community, civilization, nationalism, religion, immigration, terrorism, war, h...

In this deep dive into the history of science and war, and the strange but productive alliances that have been formed over the centuries—particularly those between astrophysicists and politicians, governments, military, and corporations—Neil deGrasse Tyson and Michael Shermer cover centuries of history and the many facets of science policy that have brought us to the modern world of space telescop...

In this fascinating dialogue Dr. Haidt and Dr. Shermer discuss what has been going wrong on many college campuses in the last few years. Speakers are shouted down. Students and professors say they are walking on eggshells and are afraid to speak honestly. Rates of anxiety, depression, and suicide are rising—on campus as well as nationally. How did this happen? In his new book Haidt has teamed up w...

In her new book, The Influential Mind , neuroscientist Tali Sharot takes readers on a thrilling exploration of the nature of influence, so she and Shermer start the conversation by discussing how we can influence, for example, climate deniers to accept climate science, anti-vaxxers to accept vaccines, and creationists to accept evolution. As Sharot shows in her research, merely presenting people w...

In their second Science Salon conversation Michael Shermer and Colin McGinn consider the broader sweep of philosophy after their first encounter in which they focused on consciousness, free will, and God. In this dialogue they review some of the paradoxes and puzzles of philosophy, pseudo-questions, realism v. antirealism, how to deal with unknown unknowns, immortality and the nature of the self a...

In this dialogue with one of the best nature and science writers of our generation, David Quammen and Michael Shermer discuss his new book on the history of one of the most exciting revolutions in evolution and genetics that is unfolding before our eyes. In the mid-1970s, scientists began using DNA sequences to reexamine the history of all life. Perhaps the most startling discovery to come out of...

In this fascinating conversation with Michael Shermer, the investigative journalist Nina Teicholz reviews the scientific literature on diet and nutrition, the link (or lack thereof) between dietary cholesterol and heart disease, the history of the government's recommendation of what constitutes a healthy diet and why they got it so wrong, statins and heart disease, exercise and nutrition, an updat...

In this unique conversation Michael Shermer talks with the science writer and weekly advice columnist Amy Alkon about her new book, Unf*ckology: A Field Guide to Living with Guts and Confidence . She calls her book a "science-help" book, instead of "self-help" because she grounds her recommendations in solid science. Her hilarious anecdotes are there just to illustrate a scientific point. She also...

In this wide-ranging conversation Michael Shermer talks with the author of the new book Finding Purpose in a Godless World: Why We Care Even if the Universe Doesn't , Dr. Ralph Lewis. Dr. Lewis is a psychiatrist at the University of Toronto who works with cancer patients and others facing death. They often face existential crises, so Dr. Lewis—himself an atheist—has developed techniques to help pe...