Skeptics' Guide - Episode #58
Recording Date: August 30th, 2006
Link to the Official Episode Notes
Official Episode #58 thread on the forums
Download Episode #58 MP3
Panelists (in order of appearance)
- Steven Novella
- Evan Bernstein
- Rebecca Watson
- Jay Novella
- Perry DeAngelis
Interesting Facts
- Perry used to be Catholic
- As of this episode, there were approximately 4000 listeners
- Rebecca worked as an activist in Seattle
- No Skeptical Puzzle in this episode
- No one correctly answered the puzzle from last episode
- Rebecca lives in Boston
- Rebecca offered a care package of "skeptic fun and maybe porno magazines" to any deployed troops who listen to the podcast
Interviewee
Kimball Atwood
Science or Fiction**
- Evan (12/33)
- Perry (12/40)
- Rebecca* (10/20)
- Jay (5/19)
Funny Quotes
1. Rebecca (about the new pope coming out against evolution): "You know all I have to say is it's a good thing that the pope is infallable. Cuz wait a minute didn't the last pope say that evolution was a fact? Shouldn't all their heads just explode at this point?"
2. Steve (about the pope's stance on ID): "The papal bull?"
3. Rebecca: "Here's the thing, imagine though that your job title is 'caster out of demons' and it is currently 2006. Just put yourself in his shoes for just one second and just think, what would you do to keep your job? You have got to be on the verge, you know that you are a remnant of the middle ages. You have to come up with something, so what are you gonna do? Go for the Nazi demon thing."
Jay: "What does the pope do? Say: 'Summon my caster out of demons!'"
Rebecca: "I think the pope is sitting there thinking 'who is that dude?' And you know his advisor leans over and says 'sir, that's your caster out of demons' and the caster out of demons is sitting there like 'Oh my god I am totally gonna lose my job'. So you know, he calls up the radio station 'hey let me tell you about demons.'"
Jay: "Imagine that guy filling out an application for a credit card? 'Occupation: Caster out of Demons... no for real, I'm not kidding, I do that'."
4. Rebecca (about the celestial object designated as Xena): "Everybody knows what I'm talking about when I say Xena. You don't need to say the body formerly known as Xena"
Evan: "Warrior princess."
5. Perry (about Pluto): "I say eff that ball of ice and rock! Good riddance to it."
6. Perry (about Pluto): "I've moved on. I have new planets now I'm interested in."
Rebecca: "Stop calling, Pluto. God. Don't be so needy."
7. Rebecca (about having 4000 listeners): "I'm pretty sure 2000 of them are my mother, but still."
8. Evan (about Madonna's magic water that makes radioactivity go away): "You had me at 'magic' I'm convinced."
Perry: "Magic coffee-enemas?"
Steve: "It's a magic kabbalah fluid."
Jay: "Does this fluid come out of her husband?"
9. Perry (about Madonna and her husband being into Kabbalah): "They're not even good enough for Scientology?"
10. Jay: (about Madonna): "Remember when she was all new and hot in the 80s and we were all young, or partially unborn if you're Rebecca but. You know, remember when she was cool and all that and now she's creating the cure for radioactive material?"
11. Rebecca (about scientists on the phone with Madonna): "Can't you see them all standing around the lab saying 'It's Madonna, she says she has water! What do I do?'"
12. Jay: "Do I need to start classifying Madonna on my hate list along with Tom Cruise? I mean I'm starting to wonder here, do I expand my list?"
13. Jay: "Ok she's officially on my list, that's it, her and Tom Cruise are the two people I wanna shoot when I..."
Steve: "We have to call that the Tom Cruise List because he tops it. So Madonna is now on the Tom Cruise List of crazy celebrities. Right below Mel Gibson!"
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14. Perry: "We all know that birds and monkeys never existed at the same time in the history of the planet. So this is all hokum, these raptors never existed with the great apes. End of story."
Jay: "Alright but Perry please for the scientific record, because we do have people out there that believe half the stuff we say, it did happen, and you're wrong."
Steve: "Perry, this is your opportunity to grasp intellectual integrity Perry and admit that you were wrong."
Rebecca: "Seriously did the researchers look into the possibility that the birds played dirty?"
Jay: "Maybe they dressed up like female monkeys."
Steve: "They characterize the birds as ambush hunters."
Rebecca: "Aha, see I told you, they were playing dirty."
Perry: "Wait a minute, lets just take, lets say, lets go out on a limb, no pun intended. Lets say that these monkeys and birds were around at the same time. Ok fine. What did they do, they found a couple of bones right? Bird bones and monkey bones. How do they know that the monkeys didn't kill the BIRDS!?"
Steve: "No these were found in bird nests, in the nests."
Perry: "So what?! How do you know the monkeys didn't go in there, snap the birds' necks and live in the nests?!"
Rebecca: "And also the monkeys had scrawled 'Oh God help me' in berry juice."
Steve: "Perry that's actually a very good skeptical question. And the answer is that the primate skulls had talon holes in them."
Perry: "Once again, these are all assumptions. You don't know that there wasn't a king of the monkeys taking over the other monkeys and using their heads as bowling balls."
Rebecca: "Yeah maybe the monkeys killed the birds and used their talons as weapons against each other."
Perry: "And that's another possibility, the possibilities are endless. Occam's razor! Cut off the ridiculous before you accept the insane."
Rebecca: "You know what? God put those bones there to test us."
Perry: "Monkeys can beat birds."
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15. Steve: "Rebecca you might become the pin-up girl for the Iraqi war."
Rebecca: "I would be ok with that"
Perry: "Might be what that country needs to get it all together."
Evan: "She looks good in burka"
Rebecca: "Actually yeah, in the 2006 calendar we had a girl dressed up in a scarf."
Jay: "Dressed all the way up in a scarf?"
16. Rebecca: "Well I'm pretty sure syphillis isn't self-inflicted unless something's changed."
17. Perry: "So doctor what you're saying is that, uh basically, that hippies, nazis and naturopathy are roughly equivalent"
18. Perry (about the 'God spot'): "The God spot, of course! By the way it's not in the brain it's down uh.."
19. Rebecca: "I'm really not with it tonight I apologize."
Evan: "You're as cogent as ever."
Rebecca (laughing): "Oh screw you."
20. Perry (about the physicist trying re-incarnate a version of the ether): "What?! This guy's a doctor? What is he a veterinarian?"
Evan: "He's a naturopath."
Rebecca: "He made the mortal sin of disagreeing with Perry."
21. Perry: "If the ether turns out to be true. I'll move to Iran and become a muslim and I'll raise birds. Ok? And if it's not true I'm flying out there to tell the doctor he's a living baboon."
Rebecca: "So either way we get a good show."
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22. Perry: "To err is human, to stumble into it is Rebecca."
23. Jay (in a silly accent): "Oh hello Evan, if that is your real name."
24. Perry (after Evan reads the new puzzle): "Evan you're no rapper or Dr. Seuss."
Rebecca: "Was he Sir-Mix-a-Lot?"
25. Jay (about Evan's puzzle): "Dr Seuss would smack your teeth right outta your mouth if he was still alive."
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* - won this week's game