Episode #338

[Steven Novella]

Interview with Martin Rundkvist
This Day in Skepticism
News Items: Psychic Predictions 2011, Hacker Satellite, Testing Violins
Quickie with Bob - Lost World of Antarctica
Who's That Noisy
Science or Fiction

[seaotter]

Thanks for the podcast! That's a record for sure!

[smithkhome]

WTN Theme: anti-vaxxers talking about empowering parents to be able to skip vaccinating their children...using 'Health freedom' laws.

[Old Hoplite]

WTN Theme: anti-vaxxers talking about empowering parents to be able to skip vaccinating their children...using 'Health freedom' laws.

Damn beat me. The middle one was Michelle Bachman.

[Trinoc]

Thanks guys and Happy New Year. WTN starts at 38:00 and the new Noisy is at 41:13 .. but I think smithkhome has probably nailed it.

[EvanHarper]

The cast discussed studies showing that people's judgments about food were heavily influenced by their expectations, and by non-gustatory cues. It reminded me of the classic paper 'Can People Distinguish Pâté from Dog Food?', published in the American Association of Wine Economists' journal.

Rebecca discussed the notion that the particular words and structure of a person's language has a profound importance for their thoughts and perceptions. This is commonly called the 'Sapir–Whorf hypothesis' but it's not very sensible or well-supported by evidence. (Tthat Wikipedia page I linked seems to exaggerate its credibility.)

[Citizen Skeptic]

There is already a system in place that in theory could allow hackers to communicate with satellites. Amateur radio has all the capabilities - satelites, repeaters, internet (IRLP), and hardware gallore. The problem though is that the FCC regulates ALL of the airwaves. So if you're using spectrum, you have to have the appropriate license.

Here's a link to the satellite stuff and IRLP.

http://www.amsat.org/amsat-new/satellites/status.php

http://www.irlp.net/

I'm working on my extra license. It's a good retirement hobby. I plan to do some "expeditioning" once I move up to the northwest and want an alternative to cell phones. Amateur radios have a lot of range and emergency features now.

[Chew]

The cast discussed studies showing that people's judgments about food were heavily influenced by their expectations, and by non-gustatory cues. It reminded me of the classic paper 'Can People Distinguish Pâté from Dog Food?', published in the American Association of Wine Economists' journal.

Ha! The dog food was rated worst tasting of the 5, but even more shocking was the 2nd place winner:
[spoiler]Spam! [/spoiler]

[pchemist]

I had a thought on the wine story. The panel talked about  two experiments:
1- Saying something bad about wine before or after tasting would give different outcomes.
2- Adding color to white wine.

What if you were to combine the two experiments by coloring the wine, and either telling the testers before or after having them taste the wine that it was colored wine (in both cases tell them before you asked for their reaction to the wine). What would you expect?

I've heard about the study where they colored the wine before, and wondered if the wine experts truly tasted "red" wine or were they just embarrassed to say it tasted like white wine.

[EvanHarper]

Ha! The dog food was rated worst tasting of the 5, but even more shocking was the 2nd place winner:
[spoiler]Spam! [/spoiler]

Well, spam contains no organ meat, and the experimental subjects were apparently Brooklyn college students. So that might be why they preferred it as "paté". It would be interesting to see the experiment run with French foodies.

[Hanes]

Maybe if Rebecca hadn't pointed it out it wouldn't bug me, but I agree with her nonetheless.

For the love of all that is skeptical, please, it's twenty-twelve.

Also, yay podcast!

[Chew]

I've heard about the study where they colored the wine before, and wondered if the wine experts truly tasted "red" wine or were they just embarrassed to say it tasted like white wine.

Either way they don't deserve the title of "expert".

[Old Hoplite]

Great podcast guys.  Really like the new idea on "WTN". 

Also, anyone else catch "brain and brain, what is brain" from Evan?

Last, being Rebecca's lover would be . . .uh. . .daunting.

[seaotter]

What was it that made rebecca lose it? Bl ---- wh------ I forgot. I'm old.

[stellaluna]

(I apologize in advance, but I HAVE to say it!)

In keeping with Evan's Blizzard / Wizard theme... During the discussion of the hacker satellite network, Steve clarified that the term "hacker" could be misleading, and that there are so-called white hackers who help with security issues.

I was waiting for Evan to say, "Yes - those are called Whackers..."