The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe The Skeptics Guide #1081 - Mar 28 2026
Mar 28, 2026
A lively dive into confirmation bias and ways to spot motivated reasoning. NASA’s new plans for a sustained Moon presence and nuclear-electric propulsion are unpacked. Reports on limits of mammalian cloning and why prehistoric insects grew huge get discussed. A Vatican exorcism summit and risks of misattributing medical issues are examined. Listener audio mystery and a global nutrition quiz add fun segments.
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How Confirmation Bias Shapes Whole Narratives
- Confirmation bias is an all-encompassing cognitive process that selects, interprets, and remembers information to preserve existing narratives.
- Steve Novella explains it operates subconsciously across attention, interpretation, reasoning, and memory to create an illusion of evidence.
True Facts Can Build False Stories
- You can construct a wrong narrative out of individually true facts by cherry-picking and weighting evidence selectively.
- Steve Novella and Bob Novella discuss how people with shared facts can reach divergent, strongly held narratives via different weightings.
Practice Sitting With Uncertainty
- Sit with uncertainty and ambivalence to reduce reactive motivated reasoning when encountering conflicting evidence.
- Cara Santa Maria recommends practicing discomfort and delaying premature narrative closure to better integrate opposing information.