r/skeptic Feb 06 '22

🤘 Meta Welcome to r/skeptic here is a brief introduction to scientific skepticism

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skepticalinquirer.org
254 Upvotes

r/skeptic 3h ago

A second child has died in the Texas measles outbreak

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nbcnews.com
872 Upvotes

This would be the second pediatric death amid a fast-growing outbreak that’s infected nearly 500 people in Texas alone since January. An adult in New Mexico is also suspected of dying from measles. The deaths are the first from the disease in the United States in a decade.

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. was expected to attend the child’s funeral, which is scheduled for Sunday, according to a spokesperson familiar with the plans.

As of Friday, the Texas Department of State Health Services said 481 cases of measles had been confirmed, a 14% jump over last week.

That includes six infants and toddlers at a Lubbock day care center who tested positive within the past two weeks.


r/skeptic 21h ago

🚑 Medicine Since the HPV vaccine was introduced in 2006, cervical cancer deaths among young U.S. women have dropped 62% between 2013 and 2021.

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1.5k Upvotes

Click on the PDF to see the updated study.


r/skeptic 2h ago

🔈podcast/vlog Flint Dibble and the Underground Pyramids: Debunking Joe Rogan... Again

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youtube.com
50 Upvotes

r/skeptic 22h ago

🚑 Medicine The American Plan to Eliminate Vaccines

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mcgill.ca
1.4k Upvotes

As a nurse, public health fan, not to mention parent with a young kid... this is not great.

I'm gonna lose my shit if I start seeing hospital admissions for polio, measles, and pertussis.


r/skeptic 11m ago

🏫 Education How MAGA Redefines Discrimination to Feel Righteous Doing It

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therationalleague.substack.com
Upvotes

r/skeptic 12h ago

Ousted vaccine chief's biowarfare warning - Erin Burnett (30-seconds) - April 4, 2025

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62 Upvotes

Another RFK attack on scientific skepticism. The victim here is Dr. Peter Marks, who oversaw the FDA vaccine program. Recently, RFK, Jr. decided to force Marks from his position. His last day is April 5.


r/skeptic 23h ago

🏫 Education The Authoritarian Script Beneath MAGA’s Rage

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therationalleague.substack.com
319 Upvotes

r/skeptic 1d ago

Joe Rogan’s guest misrepresents a conversation he had with a skeptic… me!

2.5k Upvotes

When we started The Know Rogan Experience, I didn’t realise there was already an episode where Joe and his guest talked about me! Bit of a surprise to find it today.

Here’s Will Storr in 2024 misrepresenting a conversation I had with him in 2010. Will came along to cover QED conference and our 10:23 homeopathy overdose for the Telegraph and for his book.

Annoyingly, he made stuff up about our conversation in the book. And 15 years later he’s still misrepresenting it in interviews!

https://youtu.be/8Ct-q6sJOOY?t=9067


r/skeptic 3m ago

Some of the QAA crew (and Paul Cooper from Fall of Civilizations!) talk about Graham Hancock and it is a DELIGHT

Upvotes

Really great exploration of Hancock universe and the hit Netflix series Ancient Apocalypse. Definitely worth a listen. Added bonus: Paul is married to regular QAA guest Annie Kelley, and their dynamic on the show is adorable. https://soundcloud.com/qanonanonymous/graham-hancocks-ancient-apocalypse-e318


r/skeptic 2d ago

💨 Fluff Jim Cramer feels "Like a Sucker" for trusting President Trump on Tariffs. "They Cratered The Stock Market, And Gave Us Nothing"

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9.0k Upvotes

r/skeptic 1d ago

Ousted Vaccine Chief Says RFK Jr.’s Team Sought Data to Justify Anti-Science Stance. Dr. Peter Marks says the new health secretary’s team wants to show vaccines aren’t safe while promoting dangerous and unproven treatments.

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526 Upvotes

r/skeptic 1d ago

⚠ Editorialized Title RFK Jr. admits up to 2,000 health agency layoffs under Musk's DOGE were ‘mistakes’

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irishstar.com
1.4k Upvotes

r/skeptic 1d ago

🤘 Meta Scientists sound warning over Trump cuts — and 75% consider leaving the U.S.

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news.yahoo.com
812 Upvotes

r/skeptic 1d ago

Dr. Mike Jubilee was bad

182 Upvotes

https://youtu.be/o69BiOqY1Ec?si=pmaY93gnd2XcQTcI

Did anybody watch this because for me, it was difficult to sit through. This is why we don't "debate" anti science quacks unless it's for fun.

He was way too soft and wanted to be "nice". They steamrolled him. It was one long gish-gallop and he was basically impotent.


r/skeptic 2d ago

Elon Musk spreads a conspiracy theory over Wisconsin Supreme Court defeat. ‘Election fraud is alive and well and it lives in Wisconsin’ according to Republican lobbyist Roger Stone

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independent.co.uk
5.1k Upvotes

r/skeptic 2d ago

DeSantis announces support as Florida Senate takes up ‘chemtrails’ bill

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wfla.com
331 Upvotes

r/skeptic 2d ago

Porn addiction is not real

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psychologytoday.com
279 Upvotes

r/skeptic 1d ago

The Data that Says We're Getting Stupider

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youtu.be
161 Upvotes

r/skeptic 14h ago

💨 Fluff Question for Skeptics

0 Upvotes

What is your skeptic achilles heel?

For example, Susan Blackmore and Alex O’Connor take pause at the idea of materialism citing qualia as unaccounted for in a materialist view of consciousness. Christopher Hitchens cites fine tuning as his one reason to hold back his atheism.

What’s yours and why?


r/skeptic 2d ago

🚑 Medicine RFK Jr. says 20% of health agency layoffs could be mistakes

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cbsnews.com
812 Upvotes

r/skeptic 2d ago

💩 Pseudoscience Why are so many people into astrology?

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vox.com
50 Upvotes

What is Vox even doing publishing this crap? Astrology is very clearly not evidence-based. Has Vox lost its way? I thought it was pretty trustworthy, but am I mistaken?

“A skeptic saying, ‘I don’t believe in astrology,’ is like someone saying, ‘I don’t believe in maps,’ or, ‘I don’t believe in instruction manuals.’ Whether or not you choose to engage with it means nothing,” Register says. “You can go through life just fine without maps or instruction manuals and figure it all out yourself, but those tools can make things way easier on you.”

As the zodiac tells us, people are different, and need different things. Register’s argument might be convincing enough for some, and it won’t be enough for others. Especially if you’re a Capricorn.


r/skeptic 1d ago

⚖ Ideological Bias Can careless "newbie" skepticism undermine the credibility of skepticism? When pitching counter-explanations that happen to be wrong, despite being broadly more parsimonious

10 Upvotes

If a "skeptical" counter-explanation to some claim is demonstrably wrong, people who are more on the fence about the claim may start to lean somewhat more in the acceptation of those claims.

There's a valid argument that even very "basic" default skepticism is generally preferable, as it's "erring toward realistic possibilities," based on what's known to be real, or more likely real, compared to the "open mindedness" toward the extraordinary or not established as real. Right most of the time, versus only extremely exceptionally not totally wrong.

Arguably a skeptical argument countering a claim should itself be expressed with some uncertainty."It's far more likely this comparatively banal explanation, or maybe this other relatively trivial thing, or maybe even this rare thing but known to actually exist." Versus something that leans more boldly into one specific possibility that's not specifically confirmed on that instance. To state that trivial thing ABC only "may be" the explanation is not implicitly suggesting that utterly unfounded hypothesis XYZ is even tenable. Even "no particular alternative explanation comes to mind right now, but XYZ is extremely unlikely regardless," can be preferable in some cases, ideally followed by "standard" known problems for XYZ to be considered real.

One example of an instance I think went poorly was of a skeptic countering that a deformed skull was one of an human-alien hybrid by saying it was one of a gorilla. It was definitely not one of a gorilla, which just don't have hydrocephalic-like larger vaults. What may look like a big vault on the gorilla's head is actually partly from the angle and a bony "keel" for muscle attachments, the vault itself is rather small. Human hydrocephaly, even artificial reshaping, or even adulteration happen to be better alternatives than "gorilla skull," which ends up being a point in favor of the one defending it's "alien hybrid" for part of the audience, even if in making it seem like the skeptic is just rationalizing a conclusion made in advance, rather than something more positively in favor of the "aliens" proponent.

Besides that, we have a propensity towards some degree of "strawmanning" in mocking/parodying certain claims. While this is potentially too funny to be altogether avoided, perhaps it should also be sometimes followed with some sincere "steel-manning" of the claims we're addressing.

Doing it shows a more thought-through process, harder to be taken by those "on the fence" as an acritical reliance on canned explanations, group-thinking, which can be the result in cases when a "skeptic" counter-argument happens to be demonstrably wrong, despite being inherently more parsimonious than the claims being made on the other side.

The steel-manning itself may in some cases end up not being something that really strengthens the extraordinary claims, but rather highlights its "unlikelihood," by stressing on several assumptions that must be held in order for the claim to possibly be "true," but that are most likely overlooked by the actual proponents.

It may end up being more like an exhaustive parody covering highly specific details in a way, depending on what the claim is, and what would be necessary for it to possibly be true. So even the humor of the straw-man parody is not necessarily lost, although it changes from something like "this is not another ZAZ-wannabe spoof movie" to something more like "Monty Python," or whatever are one' preferred examples of sources of dumb jokes and more elaborate ones.


r/skeptic 2d ago

🚑 Medicine Senate confirms Dr. Oz to lead Medicare and Medicaid

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523 Upvotes

r/skeptic 2d ago

⚖ Ideological Bias Trump White House directs NIH to study ‘regret’ after transgender people transition

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nature.com
359 Upvotes

r/skeptic 2d ago

The Tartarian conspiracy: a silly pseudo-archaeology for our serious times | Dave Hahn, for The Skeptic

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skeptic.org.uk
27 Upvotes

According to the Tartaria conspiracy theory, an ancient civilisation built the Chrysler Building before dying off in a great flood