BellGab.com Archive

I'm looking forward to snagging these and doing another blog post.   Sounds "classic." 

Quote from: valdez on November 11, 2011, 06:19:30 AM... and then someone who just might be insane, Andrew Basiago.

Oh, he's insane.  A soon as I snag last night's episode off the interwebs, I'll do a post about it, but for the moment, I have two previous posts up going into some of his idiocy (mainly quantum mechanics appeals and blowing up images 1000x, stretching them, and then finding life on Mars.

Rather than making another post and looking like a spammer, I thought I'd just add in here that I have written a long post on Bara's interview a year ago tonight.  I go into some detail about his claims on pendulums, astrology, ellipses, and other things.

Glynis McCants (sp?), Linda Howe, oil, energy policy ("policy" stuff in general), Ron Paul, economics, JFK, ghosts.  Those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head.

I mainly listen to stay on top of the big scams that do harm (doomsday crap and alt med) and ones I can blog or podcast about (anything related to astronomy or the related pseudosciences).  Oh, and I listen to the "psychics" because I actually record what they say (like the 2010 predictions).

Quote from: thefamilyghost on November 10, 2011, 11:16:07 AM
'Please don't appeal to QM to propagate your pseudeoscience' was really good! I think I will have to listen to this Basiago guy after all, even though I've stopped tuning in during the week.

Thanks.

By the way, just checked the shownotes for tonight and Basiago has been relegated to only the second half.

Quote from: HAL 9000 on November 10, 2011, 03:32:40 AM
The link to your podcast is severely malformed  - your link as posted is:

Code Select Expand

http://"http//podcast.sjrdesign.net/shownotes_010.php"

I'm sure you meant:

http://podcast.sjrdesign.net/shownotes_010.php
http://podcast.sjrdesign.net/media/podcasts/PseudoAstro_010.mp3

Quite.  But now for some reason I can't edit my post.

A year ago tonight, on November 10, 2010, George "interviewed" Mike Bara, author of "The Choice" and Hoagland's co-author on "Dark Mission."  There was a caller into the program that night who challenged Bara on one of the minor claims he made, and George cut him off, and he and Bara proceeded to talk about how Bara has "haters" out there.

I tracked down that caller and interviewed him for an episode of my podcast and I had him react to his call and George's and Bara's reactions with a year hindsight.  We talk about Bara's claims of science and early NASA history, a bit about Hoagland, and some about George's interview techniques and policy for callers and guests.  Here's the link to my podcast episode (this is to the shownotes, there's a direct link to the MP3 from that page).

Let me know what you folks think, if you give it a listen.  The episode is 42.5 minutes long, the interview being all but about 1 minute on the beginning and 2 on the end.

Quote from: Morgus on November 08, 2011, 02:46:51 PM
thats the key to a good noory guest -  needs to keep talking and not let noory get words in edgewise... 

But under that idea, Hoagland is a good guest.  And I would argue strongly against Hoagland being a good guest.

Quote from: pigtart on November 08, 2011, 01:06:29 AMI tried researching him on the net and googling his name in the news section and absolutely nothing came up, which means he hasn't been written about or profiled anywhere in any kind of news publication. On YouTube all I could find was cable access looking interviews that he had done with new agers.

I remember some people trying to find info on him to verify he actually owns a lawfirm ... and coming up completely empty.  But I try to avoid attacking basic credentials if they're not that important anyway in my blog and podcast.

Quote from: pigtart on November 08, 2011, 01:06:29 AMI mean it just sounds so BS if he could get on Coast without any kind of previous public attention, then why not put on any crackpot.

Um ... they do?

Quote from: Morgus on November 07, 2011, 02:06:37 PM
wouldn't it be ironic if that aircraft-carrier-sized asteroid crashed into Noory's cave tomorrow night during the show? 

It's not going to come anywhere "close," though I know you weren't saying that it was.  Actually, I haven't listened since Nov. 3 -- has Noory been spreading doom about this asteroid?  Has Hoagland been on lying about it?

I find it interesting that in the last month or so, George has this "contest" of trying to sign up - first it was 1000, now it's 2500 - new "Coast Insiders" per month.  Fairly obnoxious.

This guy seems to come on about once a year, but this'll be his second time this year.  Anyone remember him?  Life on Mars and Pegasus Project.

I wrote a post about him last year on his appeal to and gross misunderstanding of quantum mechanics.  And I wrote about him 2 years ago on why you can't blow photos up 500%, stretch them, and claim you've found life.

I'm almost "eager" to find out what he's going to say this time!  Looks like it's just going to focus on his time travel story, so we're probably going to hear a lot of appeals to Quantum Mechanics that he doesn't understand.  And I'm sure George is going to give him as credulous an "interview" as always.

Quote from: DietCoke on November 03, 2011, 05:54:06 PM
hey astroguy just thought i would say i listened to your 'hollow earth' podcast, and have to say i really enjoyed it. Don't know if you've already answered this but how did you get into podcasting? I can guess coast to coast and your educational background played a big factor. I think a lot of people would like to do podcasts, etc but a lot of them don't bother to make them -  at least with a decent amount of effort. So props to you for that.

Thanks!  Glad you liked it.  It's typical of what I see this podcast being -- having clips of crazies make their claims and then explain why they're wrong.  It's fun .

I actually wrote this up on another forum a few weeks ago, so here 'tis:

I recorded my first episode in February 2008, and my second one the same month.  I asked for feedback from my parents.  My dad never responded, and my mom gave a polite, "You realize that radio hosts have teams of people writing for them" response.  So I didn't pursue it.  I revived the idea this past summer where (another guy on that board) really was some of the inspiration.  Well, not for doing the podcast in the first place, but for getting me over the hump.  I liked his attitude in his second podcast that he didn't care how many people listened to it, he just liked doing it.

While I've adopted that attitude and released my first episode on August 1, 2011 (after re-recording), I secretly of course hope that more people listen to it.  I think that's just something we want -- we put time and energy into this and we hope to get recognition and appreciation and acceptance from our peers.

I got that a bit with my fourth episode, a "bonus" one, on Comet Elenin.  I had been getting around 100-200 downloads/episode after a week or two of it being out.  Then the owner of 2012hoax.org - who has used my blog a lot in the past as source material for his site - posted about my Elenin episode in the forum on that site and to the twitter feed.  Frasier Cain, publisher of Universe Today which ranks around 13,000-14,000 in popularity of websites IN THE WORLD, posted about my episode.  I went up to 5000+ downloads in a week and a request that it be re-broadcast on a radio show.  I didn't actually gain 5000 subscribers; I'd estimate my subscribers somewhere around 500 now based upon the number of downloads per episode after about a week of it being out.

I'm still trying to figure out how to publicize it more, and I think once I get up to about a dozen episodes out, I'm going to start to contact other people in the astronomy/skeptical/education community and invite them for an interview.  That'll get them free publicity (not that they need it) and get me free publicity when they tell their followers they were on it.  I plan on contacting Phil Plait (who knows me well), Pamela Gay (who I work with on another project), as well as Bob Novella since he's the most astronomy-interested SGU person.  We'll see if my evil plan works.*

I really like listener feedback, and I also wish more people would write reviews on iTunes or just send me e-mails.  I actually have responded to EVERY e-mail written so far, and there were about a dozen that came in the few days after Frasier posted.  The main request I've gotten is to do longer episodes (my length now is around 20-30 minutes).  My initial promise was 10-20 minutes twice a month.  I'd rather under-promise and over-deliver right now rather than the opposite, and I'm over-delivering these days by releasing "bonus" episodes as extras each month now.

In terms of topics, my idea is kinda like Skeptoid but for astronomy.  Targeted, single issues to explore in-depth.  I have NO shortage of topics, though I still encourage people to send in requests, and I'll add them to the schedule.  Right now, I'm planned out through March 2012 with numerous ideas for more that are just not scheduled yet.

*I've followed up on this since I wrote that explanation and I have two guys planned for this month (November), a Mayan expert for December for my "Intro to 2012" month, and both Phil Plait and Pamela Gay have agreed to come on for an interview/discussion at some point in the next few month (Pamela probably in late January after we co-launch a project).

Quote from: Agent : Orange on November 01, 2011, 10:39:31 PM
Well, I'm genuinely curious. What does this entail? What kind of problems are geophysicists interested in when it comes to craters?

Lots o' t'ings.  Right now I'm working on age-dating the largest craters on Mars to explore implications for the solar system's hypothetical Late Heavy Bombardment.

Quote from: Michael Vandeven on November 02, 2011, 10:16:41 AMplug away.

  I actually have an interview coming up with the guy who called Mike Bara out on his idiocy with orbits last November 10.  He's the guy George cut off and a later caller told him he shouldn't've.  But George explained that he was just protecting Mike from science and common sense.

(For those who don't remember, Mike was saying that the planet Mars has a hugely eccentric orbit because it goes from 0.5 AU to 2.5 AU from Earth.  The caller (my interviewee on Monday) was trying to tell him that that simply doesn't make any sense because you have to measure the ellipse from one of the foci, in this case the sun, and his claim is like me saying that Earth is about 13,000 km in radius because that's my distance from the other side.  Yeah, it doesn't make any sense.)

Quote from: Agent : Orange on November 01, 2011, 10:23:52 PM
Very interesting. Are they basically the lunar equivalent of lava tubes?

I think that's what most people think, that you've broken through a thin crust region into a lava tube.  But I'm not really sure, I've only seen pretty pictures in press releases, haven't actually read the papers.

Quote from: Agent : Orange on November 01, 2011, 07:29:24 PM
Very cool! I ran into this story the other day about caves on the moon:
http://www.universetoday.com/90031/russia-eyes-caves-on-moon-for-setting-up-a-lunar-base/
You would probably be the right guy to talk to about this then. Any idea on how many there are out there or how deep such caves would be?

FWIW I'm a fellow astroguy myself, I have been working on modeling gravitational lenses and I'm currently in the middle of writing up my PhD thesis, which has been an absolute hellish experience that I wouldn't wish on anyone. From what I've heard though, the pain means I'm doing it right.

I don't know much about lunar (nor martian) caves other than a few dozen or so are known, generally I think on the order of 10s of meters across/deep but we don't know how far they may extend under the openings that can be seen.

My 80 hrs work/week on thesis was December-April of last year, defended April 5, first in my class (by 27 hrs).  It's a marathon.  And after you turn in the thesis, you have two weeks (here at least) until you defend, and you lose ALL motivation to actually write and defend your talk.  And then there's always that areshole on your committee who 2 minutes into questioning states absolutely, "You clearly have no idea what's going on with [this]."  Fun stuff.  It's a hazing.

Quote from: Agent : Orange on November 01, 2011, 02:13:36 PMWelcome! What is your area of interest in geophysics?

Thanks.  I study craters, at the moment on Mars and Moon.

Quote from: Agent : Orange on November 01, 2011, 02:13:36 PMI'm digging the blog so far and interested in trying out the podcast as well. This board is a lot of fun and you are guaranteed to find all kinds of interesting people around here.

Thanks.   I'm actually trying to decide how self-promotive would be acceptable for me to advertise on here when I put a new 'cast out or particular blog post that demolishes a C2C guest.  I think it's perfectly reasonable for something like Hoagland or if there's a thread already started on that person, but starting my own thread to say, "Come listen/read 'bout why this guy's wrong!" could get annoying.

Figured I'd intro myself here.  I'm a professional geophysicist with an astrophysics background and I study surface processes on other planets and moons.  The first C2C episode I listened to was way back in the early 2000s when Phil Plait was "debating" Nancy Leider.  Didn't listen for several years, then I "joined" the modern scientific skeptics movement and decided to start listening again to C2C in late 2008 to stay on top of what "the other side" believed.

I started a blog in 2008 and podcast just a few months ago that addresses the actual science behind why almost every guest on C2C is wrong (at least the ones who talk about physics, geology, and astronomy).   Well, I talk about other things related to that, like how there is not dark side of the moon and how the last Transformers movie got that wrong, but C2C makes up a good chunk of material.  I also tend to use C2C clips in my podcast to illustrate points of what people actually believe, such as my 8th episode mid-last month on the hollow Earth.  (See sig. for links.)

I found this forum a few days ago I think by searching for something that my blog had indicated someone searched for and found me.  It was about Hoagland, I think.  So I read the last two pages of the Hoagland thread on this site and realized that even though most on here are fans of C2C, most actually seem fairly incredulous towards the crap most of the guests spew.  Like Hoagland, or like a recent episode by Greg Braden.  So I thought I'd join in.

Looks like I have 1993, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2001, 2003+.

Hmm.  I never listened to them before.  I have G2G dating back about a decade or so (I have like 150 GB of C2C on my computer ...).  Was there a particularly good year that Art did it that you'd recommend?  I'd like to listen to that and then I'll listen to, say, this year's as a comparison.

Quote from: Morgus on October 31, 2011, 11:25:34 PM
in the classic days, Art would have five hours of unscreened ghost-to-ghost callers plus excellent background sound effects and music.
only unscreened lines allowed for the real good stories, that get cut out by screeners.

noory in contrast can't even do a full show of open lines like the old days. he has to mess up the grand tradition and has guests on in the first hour, Art never did that - it was all callers only on Halloween... 

So it was basically ghost stories open lines, but creepier than usual and with good music and commentary by Art, as opposed to scripted pre-screened calls for 3 hrs with stupid George commentary?

So, n00b question from a guy who only started listening to C2C to keep his critical thinking skills honed because of the guests' craziness:  What exactly is G2G?  As in, how did Art run it that was so good?  I've hear George's solicitations for people to send in stories for G2G for at least this year and last, and while I admire Art doing unscreened calls, can someone explain to me why it's especially important for G2G?

Oh, I've covered Hoagland quite a bit.  Well, actually, much less than he "deserves" to be covered.  If you want to do a search on my blog, you'll come up with a few things, including my long post on his Elenin crap (here).  And, I also went into detail about that in the fourth episode of my newish podcast.

And thanks guys for the positive responses.  I get around half of my material for my blog from C2C, and the same can be said for my fledgeling podcast (a new episode of which I need to record in the next two days ...).  It's really nice to come across a forum that generally likes C2C but does not believe everything (most things?) that George and his guests espouse.  And Braden really pissed me off when he was trying to sound all sciencey and well researched when the references he gave don't exist and the data he used was selectively shown.

Oh, and as you can see, I've uploaded an avatar now.

Doesn't George claim he only takes 1 week off a year?  Seems like he takes a heck of a lot more time off than that.

Bit late to the party, but I REALLY liked Simone vs. Hoagland in this episode.  It was the least credulous interview I've heard of Richard in a very long time.  And the fact that Simone wouldn't defer to Richard and would not let Richard talk over him as George does was icing.  Now, if only Simone knew a bit astronomy and could've challenged Hoagland, that would've been better.

I was really pleased with it, especially when compared with his debut show on the pyramids and the second one on astrology.

Hi guys.  I found this site doing some random searching on Hoagland and saw that it's actually a fairly critiquing site on C2C.  I had planned on lurking a bit, but I thought I'd post a bit.  And I actually did a lengthy analysis of some of Braden's claims in a blog post a few days after he appeared.  (Hint:  He's full of you-know-what.)

Hmm. Nice to know I'm not the only one who can't stand listening to her.  Though I think Childress is the absolute worst voice-wise.