TheESP – Ep. #480 – People Are the Worst

Viktor Orbán is coming down hard on free speech and Romania seems to (maybe) avoid chaos after their second attempt on presidential elections. In TWISH we get into classical skepticism and have a look at the Plauen UFO incident. Then it’s time for the news, with a little bit of Word of the Week:

• INTERNATIONAL: Overshooting 1.5°C: even temporary warming above globally agreed temperature limit could have permanent consequences
• EU: Petition against conversion therapy meets threshold!
• INTERNATIONAL: Retraction Watch inquiry results in Elsevier removing a whole journal from Scopus
• GERMANY: Research identifying subgroups of homeopathy users based on their attitudes towards science
• NORWAY: Putin’s billionaire funds new political party
• EU: TikTok in trouble with the European Commission for not adhering to Digital Services Act
• IRELAND: Psychics are repeatedly insisting on ‘helping’ the police
• UK / INTERNATIONAL: The largest ever profiling effort of susceptibility to misinformation

Elon Musk gets his second Really Wrong Award after his AI machine Grok goes both racist conspiracy theorist and antisemitic last week.

Enjoy!

Segments: Intro; Greetings; TWISH; News; Word of the Week; Really Wrong; Quote; Outro; Outtakes
 
0:00:27 INTRO

0:00:50 GREETINGS

• Orbán is dealing death-blow to organisations critical towards his government
  • Atlatszo: https://english.atlatszo.hu/2025/05/16/new-bill-gives-superpowers-to-the-sovereignty-protection-office-to-silence-independent-media-and-ngos-in-hungary/
• George Simion admits defeat in Romanian presidential election
  • the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/may/18/centrist-nicusor-dan-on-course-to-beat-far-right-rival-in-romanian-election-exit-polls-suggest

0:16:07 TWISH – THIS WEEK IN SKEPTICAL HISTORY

• 21 May 1994: The Plauen UFO Sighting
  • UFO Insight: https://www.ufoinsight.com/ufos/close-encounters/the-1994-plauen-ufo-sighting

0:24:06 NEWS

• INTERNATIONAL: Overshooting 1.5°C: even temporary warming above globally agreed temperature limit could have permanent consequences
  • the Conversation: https://theconversation.com/overshooting-1-5-c-even-temporary-warming-above-globally-agreed-temperature-limit-could-have-permanent-consequences-255523
  • UK Government: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/global-consequences-of-climate-overshoot-pathways
• EU: Petition against conversion therapy meets threshold!
  • European Citizen’s Initiative: https://eci.ec.europa.eu/043/public/#/screen/home/allcountries
• INTERNATIONAL: Retraction Watch inquiry results in Elsevier removing a whole journal from Scopus
  • Retraction Watch: https://retractionwatch.com/2025/05/16/scopus-indexed-journal-science-of-law-fake-editorial-board-sham-archive/
  • Retraction Watch: https://retractionwatch.com/2025/05/16/elsevier-removes-journal-from-scopus-after-retraction-watch-inquiry/
• GERMANY: Research identifying subgroups of homeopathy users based on their attitudes towards science
  • Sage Journals: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/09636625251332524
• NORWAY: Putin’s billionaire funds new political party
  • Omni: https://omni.se/ryskkopplad-miljardar-bakom-kontroversiell-reklam-i-oslos-t-bana/a/zA2kw9
• EU: TikTok in trouble with the European Commission for not adhering to Digital Services Act
  • the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/may/15/tiktok-breached-eu-advertising-transparency-laws-commission-says
• IRELAND: Psychics are repeatedly insisting on ‘helping’ the police
  • RTE: https://www.rte.ie/radio/radio1/clips/22513700/
  • Irish Times: https://www.irishtimes.com/crime-law/2025/05/16/psychic-visions-led-to-fresh-searches-for-missing-icelandic-man-jon-jonsson/
• UK / INTERNATIONAL: The largest ever profiling effort of susceptibility to misinformation
  • Science Direct: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886925001394

(0:51:09 WORD OF THE WEEK: IRISH: ‘An Garda Síochána’ (noun) – ‘The Guardians of the Peace’)

1:01:10 REALLY WRONG

• Really Wrong: Elon Musk after Grok blames holocaust denial on ‘programming error’ and also rants about ‘white genocide’
  • the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/may/18/musks-ai-bot-grok-blames-its-holocaust-scepticism-on-programming-error
  • the Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/may/14/elon-musk-grok-white-genocide

1:05:47 QUOTE AND FAREWELL

“Never be afraid to question the status quo. It is the first step towards progress.”
/ Irène Joliot-Curie (12 September 1897 – 17 March 1956), French chemist and physicist who received the 1935 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with her husband (Frédéric Joliot-Curie), for their discovery of induced radioactivity. /

1:07:48 OUTRO

1:09:11 OUT-TAKES