TWISH

Several awards and gatherings to be on the look-out for: the Ockham Award, the Rusty Razor, the Bent Spoon and Das Goldene Brett. The feast of Santa Rosalia is the topic for TWISH and Pope Frankie is nostalgic about the Mongolian invasion (wtf?). Then, we have this week’s news:

• GERMANY: Follow-up on the Reichsbürger movement
• INTERNATIONAL: Prediction of 1 billion+ deaths related to climate change by 2100
• SCOTLAND: Issues with science publishing – Researcher finds his name on editorial boards of journals he hasn’t even heard of
• SWEDEN / INTERNATIONAL: New measles cases in Stockholm
• UK: Country can no longer be considered christian

Swedish science journalist Maria Gunther gets the award for being Really Right and in Word of the Week Carl Sagan get translated to Norwegian: ‘påstander’ means ‘claims and ‘bevis’ means ‘evidence’.

Enjoy!

Segments: Intro; Greetings; TWISH; Pontus Pokes The Pope; News; Really Right; Word Of The Week; Quote And Farewell; Outro; Out-Takes
 
0:00:27 INTRO

0:00:50 GREETINGS

• Nominations for the Ockham and Rusty Rasor awards are open until 17 September
  • Skeptic UK: https://www.skeptic.org.uk/about/the-ockham-awards/ockhams-2023-nomination-form/
• The Bent Spoon Awards are open for nominations as well
  • Australian Skeptics: https://www.skeptics.com.au/about/activities/bent-spoon/
• Skeptical Walk in Cologne
  • GWUP: https://blog.gwup.net/2023/09/03/skeptischer-spaziergang-zur-esoterikmesse-in-koeln/
• Nominations for Das Goldene Brett
  • Goldene Brett: https://goldenesbrett.guru

0:12:32 TWISH – THIS WEEK IN SKEPTICAL HISTORY

• 4 September 1624: The Feast and Pilgrimage of Santa Rosalia in Palermo (or maybe that of the Holy Goat?)
  • Science Blogs: https://scienceblogs.com/laelaps/2009/02/09/saint-rosalia-and-dr-buckland

0:23:23 PONTUS POKES THE POPE

• Frankie praises Genghis Khan and the Mongol Empire for their ‘absence of conflicts’
  • AP: https://apnews.com/article/pope-mongolia-corruption-98740116fdfefb395683b9b28c7e8c3c
  • Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Destruction_under_the_Mongol_Empire

0:27:43 NEWS

• GERMANY: Follow-up on the Reichsbürger movement
  • GWUP: https://blog.gwup.net/2023/08/29/reichsbuerger-doku-bei-arte-innenansichten-einer-extremistischen-bewegung/
• INTERNATIONAL: Prediction of 1 billion+ deaths related to climate change by 2100
  • Phys.org: https://phys.org/news/2023-08-climate-changing-human-billion-deaths-century.html
• SCOTLAND: Issues with science publishing – Researcher finds his name on editorial boards of journals he hasn’t even heard of
  • Retraction Watch: https://retractionwatch.com/2023/08/30/unethical-and-misleading-researcher-finds-his-name-on-editorial-boards-of-journals-hes-never-heard-of/
• SWEDEN / INTERNATIONAL: New measles cases in Stockholm
  • Omni: https://tt.omni.se/flera-masslingsfall-i-stockholm/a/EQnpqa
  • WHO: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/measles
  • ECDC: https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en/publications-data/coverage-second-dose-measles-containing-vaccine-2018
• UK: Country can no longer be considered christian
  • Humanists UK: https://humanists.uk/2023/08/30/anglican-priests-agree-britain-is-not-a-christian-country/

0:45:56 REALLY RIGHT

• Really Right: Swedish science journalist Maria Gunther for putting nuclear risks in perspective
  • DN: https://www.dn.se/varlden/maria-gunther-radslan-for-stralning-ar-farligare-an-sjalva-stralningen/

0:50:34 WORD OF THE WEEK

• NORWEGIAN:
  Påstander – ‘claims’, Bevis – ‘evidence’
• ‘Ekstraordinære påstander krever ekstraordinære bevis’ => ‘Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence’

0:54:08 QUOTE AND FAREWELL

“We must learn to live with contradictions, because they lead to deeper and more effective understanding.”
/ Edward Teller , [Hungarian: Teller Ede] (January 15, 1908 – September 9, 2003), Hungarian-American theoretical physicist who is known colloquially as ‘the father of the hydrogen bomb’ and one of the creators of the Teller–Ulam design. /

0:57:24 OUTRO

0:58:38 OUT-TAKES