Yesterday and today I’ve been listening to a couple of interesting podcasts, one from Skepticality (the official podcast of Skeptic Magazine) and the other from Skeptico, another (supposedly) skeptical podcast which investigates “Science At The Tipping Point” which I highly recommend everybody checks out.

They involve a challenge set between Alex Tsakiris, the host of Skeptico, and Ben Radford (editor of The Skeptical Enquirer) and deals with a case of a so-called psychic detective, Nancy Weber from the early eighties. I listened to them in the wrong order (I suggest you listen to the Skeptico one (which you can get and read the transcript of here) first then listen to Radford’s discussion of it in Skepticality (which you can get here). It’s a fascinating insight into the conflict between believers and skeptics and, I believe, firmly demonstrates why the scientific approach is the far healthier one for us to advance and grow as a species.

The point is raised in the Skepticality podcast, and seems clear to me at least in the Skeptico podcast, that Tsakiris is certainly not a skeptic. He chose the Weber case as the best example of psychic detectives that he could find but with just a little bit of effort Radford tears the case to pieces. They have a conference call with Weber and both men also speak to the policemen who (supposedly) verify Weber’s claims but their conclusions could not be futher apart.

I highly recommend everyone checks these out as it is such a great example about the dangers of not questioning the world around us and just accepting a person’s own version of events as “proof” of anything at all… Anyone who does listen to them, or who has already heard them, please do let me know your own thoughts by replying to this post.