Point of Inquiry

Would you rather have your children looking at QAnon conspiracy Youtubers or porn online? That's a question author Erin Louis has had to confront with her teenage son. How do you employ critical thinking, media literacy, and a skeptical mindset in the every day world to make a real impact. In this episode of Point of Inquiry, Erin Louis joins Leighann Lord as they discuss her journey through the freethought movement, countering conspiracists with critical thinking, why she wrote Expose Yourself, stories from her life as a stripper, and how to get over our unconscious or implicit biases. Erin Louis, also known as the Brazen Atheist, has authored the books EXPOSE YOURSELF: How To Take Risks, Question Everything and Find Yourself - Humor and Insights From My Life As a Stripper, Dirty Money: Memoirs of a Stripper, and Think You Want To Be A Stripper? Her goal is to facilitate and foster self acceptance and critical thinking. You can follow Erin on her website erinlouis.com and on twitter @ErinLouis666

The names Jim Jones, L.Ron Hubbard, David Koresh, and Sun Myung Moon might come to mind when someone uses the term cult leader. Many have suggested that Donald Trump falls into the category. But does Trump himself truly qualify as a cult leader? Can Trump's followers be correctly described as a cult? In this episode of Point of Inquiry, Steven Hassan joins Jim Underdown as they dive into persuasive reasoning, the work of BJ Fogg's persuasive marketing technology used widely on social media platforms, why cults are successful, the processes involved that lead people into joining a cult, and why the President of the United States can accurately be described as a cult leader. Steven Hassan, is an expert on Undue Influence, brainwashing and unethical hypnosis and author of the best-selling book, Combating Cult Mind Control. He is a licensed mental health professional and cult expert. Steven helps people leave destructive cults after he was deprogrammed and left Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church. He is the founding director of the Freedom of Mind Resource Center. He developed the BITE and Influence Continuum models to assess what control methods an individual or group uses and where they fall on a continuum from not harmful to extremely harmful.

In this episode of Point of Inquiry, co-host Leighann Lord talks with professor, writer, and humanist Dr. Anthony Pinn. Lord and Pinn discuss the power and persistence of magical thinking as we face the current pandemic, the role of the church at a time when science is so important, Black Lives Matter and Pinn's opinion on struggle and progress, how women of color deal with oppression based on race, gender, and class, and the issue with respectability politics. Pinn also proposes the question, "What does our nontheistic perspective offer folks at this moment? What do we offer them beyond the critique of religion?" as we face the pandemic and the ever growing need for honest discussions and action on the issues of race. Anthony Pinn received his Ph.D. in the Study of Religion from Harvard University, and is currently the Agnes Cullen Arnold Professor of Humanities and Professor of Religious Studies at Rice University. He is also the Founding Director of The Center for Engaged Research and Collaborative Learning at Rice University, and Director of Research at The Institute for Humanist Studies. Among his many books are Writing God's Obituary: How a Good Methodist Became a Better Atheist and When Colorblindness Isn't the Answer: Humanism and the Challenge of Race.

Looming over the sidewalk of Hollywood, California are tens of millions of dollars of buildings owned by the Church of Scientology. This beleaguered religion may have had a decade of bad PR, but they still own a substantial amount of real estate in California and Florida. In this week's episode of Point of Inquiry, Jim Underdown decided to ride his bike to six major Scientology facilities in Hollywood. Activist Tory Christman, who spent 30 years in the "Church" of Scientology, spoke with Jim the following day to sit down and walk listeners through what happens in these buildings. You can follow along below with the pictures that Jim took while on his bike.

A short drive south of Cincinnati, OH, lie two well-funded, well-executed museums dedicated to the telling of biblical "history." The Creation Museum and the Ark Experience came about through Answers in Genesis, a Christian Apologetics organization, and its founder and CEO, Ken Ham. While the modern science-based community always found fault in these propaganda factories' notions about the age of the earth (6000 years), and the theory of evolution (it's wrong) -- among myriad other beliefs -- the Ark Encounter brought a new layer of controversy to the table when it was granted land, cash, and tax kickbacks by local government and the state of Kentucky at taxpayers expense. A documentary called We Believe in Dinosaurs looks at some of the issues surrounding these facilities through the eyes of both believers and skeptics. Joining Jim Underdown on this episode of Point of Inquiry are Rob Boston, Communications Director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, Dan Phelps, President of the Kentucky Paleontological Society, and Monica Long Ross, one of the co-directors of We Believe in Dinosaurs.

In this episode of Point of Inquiry, cohost Leighann Lord talks with famous skeptic and Assistant Professor of Neurology, Steven Novella, MD. Novella is also the founder and current Executive Editor of Science-Based Medicine which explores issues and controversies between science and medicine and works to expose dangerous medical scams and practices. He is also the host of the popular weekly podcast, The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe. Novella also has a series of insightful courses on critical thinking that he has published through Great Courses. In this week's interview, Lord and Novella speak about the ongoing battle to fight scientific ignorance especially during the current Covid-19 outbreak, how Novella's Science-Based Medicine has stepped up to counter vast amounts of misinformation about the disease, the relationship between doctors and patients when there's hard news to deliver, how we all have blind spots in our thinking that hinder our curiosity and skepticism, and the importance of not being too comfortable with information that confirm our biases. You can follow Leighann on twitter @LeighannLord.

In this episode of Point of Inquiry, cohost Leighann Lord talks with fellow comic Ian Harris. Besides being a comedian, Harris is a voice actor, writer, director, and MMA trainer. He is also an outspoken atheist and skeptic who confronts magical thinking and religion in his comedy. In 2019, Leighann Lord and Harris joined forces and performed their mainstage show at Dragon Con. That show, dubbed "The Science and Fiction Comedy Show," blended nerdom (it's Drgaon Con after all!), atheism, skepticism, and science. In this engaging interview with Lord, Harris tells us about what it's like to perform skeptical comedy for audiences and lets us in on the type of audience that gives the best laughs. Harris explains how he effectively uses his comedy to teach people skeptical and critical thinking. He's seen certain topics, such as climate change, become politicized and divorced from science. It's his hope to rectify that with his comedy. Lord and Harris also dive into the observation that even within the atheist community, many hold onto their own "religious" beliefs and not everyone in the community is a critical thinker or skeptic. They then discuss the resulting schism or gap that's been created. You can follow Leighann on twitter @LeighannLord. You can follow Ian on twitter @comediocre and check out his YouTube channel, IanHarrisComedian, where you can enjoy videos from his stand-up specials, "Critical & Thinking" and "ExtraOrdinary", his Reason Rally performances, interviews, and more.

On this week's episode, Leighann Lord speaks with Mandisa Thomas, president of Black Nonbelievers. Black Nonbelievers connect with other Black folks and allies who have chosen to live without religion. They serve as a community for those who have been otherwise shunned by family and friends. From the Black Nonbelievers' website, "Instead of accepting dogma, we seek to determine truth and morality through reason and evidence." Leighann and Mandisa have a frank and honest discussion about their shared experience of what it's like to exist in the atheist community as women of color and how things they've seen and witnessed may be holding the atheist community back from growing. They also discuss the importance of critical thinking and introspection and how growing up as a New Yorker has helped Mandisa navigate a world as an atheist women of color running a national organization. You can follow what Mandisa and Black Nonbelievers are up to on twitter @mandy0904 and @BNonbelievers. You can follow Leighann on twitter @LeighannLord

Kurt Andersen is the author of the novels Fantasyland: How America Went Haywire: A 500-Year History (2017), True Believers (2012), Heyday (2007), and Turn of the Century (1999). He's also written for film, television, and the stage and is the former host and co-creator of the Peabody Award winning Studio 360, a weekly radio show about arts and culture. He regularly appears as a commentator on MSNBC, CNN, PBS, and the BBC. He is also the former editor of New York Magazine and co-creator of Spy magazine. On this week's episode Andersen speaks with Point of Inquiry's new host, Leighann Lord, to discuss his book, Fantasyland and if the United State's "fantasyland" thinking helped create the current predicament the country finds itself dealing with. Andersen and Lord offer context on Fantasyland to better understand what happens when the departure from empirical reality-based thought plays out during a global pandemic. You can also watch Andersen's CSICon talk where he goes into riveting detail about Fantasyland and how he came to write it.

Coronavirus continues to infect more and more people around the world. As the number of infected grows so does the misinformation surrounding the virus and the disease it causes, COVID-19. From fake and explicitly dangerous cures, like drinking bleach to folklorish myths and conspiracies on the origins of the virus, institutions like the CDC and the World Health Organization are doing what they can to not only battle the virus itself but also the overwhelming amount of misleading information on social media and the web. In this week's episode, Jim Underdown speaks with Ben Radford to debunk the most common myths and pieces of misinformation surrounding the coronavirus. How did it really begin? What can be done to prevent it? How has racism and xenophobia contributed to the spreading of various myths? Radford has also recently published an article on CFI where he goes into more detail on the virus's myths and conspiracies. Benjamin Radford is deputy editor of Skeptical Inquirer science magazine and a Research Fellow with the non-profit educational organization the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. He has written thousands of articles on a wide variety of topics, including urban legends, the paranormal, critical thinking, and media literacy.