Skeptics Guide #1081

The Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe Skepticast #1081 March 26th 2026 Segment #1. Back to Basics Confirmation Bias Segment #2. News Items News Item #1 – NASA Announces New Moon Plans https://www.livescience.com/space/space-exploration/nasa-announces-near-impossible-space-plans-including-usd20b-moon-base-and-humanitys-first-nuclear-powered-interplanetary-spacecraft News Item #2 – The Limits of Cloning https://www.sciencealert.com/dead-end-radical-20-year-study-reveals-genetic-cloning-hits-a-limit News Item #3 – Giant Insects https://phys.org/news/2026-03-massive-insect-body-size-million.html News Item #4 – Pushing Exorcism https://www.ewtnnews.com/vatican/exorcists-urge-pope-to-appoint-trained-practitioners-in-every-diocese News Item #5 – Update on 3I/Atlas https://theness.com/neurologicablog/what-happened-to-comet-3i-atlas/ Segment 3. Who’s That Noisy Segment #4. Science or Fiction Each week our host will come up with three science news items or facts, two genuine, one fictitious. He will challenge our panel of skeptics to sniff out the fake – and you can play along. Theme: Global Nutrition Item 1: About half of all deaths of children under 5 are linked to malnutrition. Item 2: The most prevalent micronutrient deficiency globally is Vitamin A. Item 3: According to recent data, current fortification programs prevent 7 billion nutritional deficiencies per year. Segment #5. Skeptical Quote of the Week “Doubt everything, roughly, although most people know his most famous second saying, cogito ergo sum, the first was to doubt everything, of which he couldn't doubt he was doubting, hence, I think, therefore I am. The cartesian coordinate system was named after him, a true polymath of his time.” - De omnibus dubitandum - Renee Descartes


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This Is Why You Should NEVER Represent Yourself... Sovereign Citizen In COURT!!!

Today we have a Sovereign Citizens in court for a bench trial. This takes place in Kansas, and he almost gets away with 2 of the charges, but then he opens his mouth and ends up telling on himself! To Support The Channel : Team Skeptic Fund : https://paypal.me/TeamSkepticYT Become A Channel Member : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCawl3BI9azbMB5DQqJNpRrg/join Join Our Patreon : https://www.patreon.com/TeamSkeptic #Court #CourtCam #TeamSkeptic


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The REAL Liquid Death?

If you’re reading this and were old enough to have 4loko back when it was called “blackout in a can”, I’m glad you survived because that sounds terrifying. ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ *Credits:* Writers: Eric Naessig Editor: KL Allen Sound Designer: Yosi Berman ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ #4Loko #College #Beer #Wine #Alcohol #Caffeine


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I Dissolved My Credit Card To Understand How It Works

How safe are the cards we use? Sponsored by Saily - Prepare for your next destination today! Download the Saily app now or go to https://saily.com/veritasium and use code ‘veritasium’ for 15% off. Share your referral code with friends and family to collect more credit for your next trip. If you’re looking for a molecular modelling kit, try Snatoms, a kit I invented where the atoms snap together magnetically - https://ve42.co/SnatomsV Sign up for the Veritasium newsletter for weekly science updates - https://ve42.co/Newsletter ▀▀▀ 0:00 Dissolving A Card In Acetone 1:32 The Soviets’ Powerless Bug 6:24 The First Credit Card 8:21 Magnetic Stripe Credit Cards 11:51 How To Clone A Credit Card 13:50 Chip and Pin 18:03 Operation Easy Chair 19:58 How does a contactless card work? 23:39 Digital Pickpocketing ▀▀▀ We’d love to thank some of the experts who helped us on this video. Firstly, a huge thank you to Neil Smith for sharing his technical and historical knowledge of “The Thing” and operation Easy Chair. These devices are crazy complicated! And Neil (given that he’s actually built a working replica of “The Thing!”) gave invaluable insight into how it works, and detailed feedback on early versions of the video. You can see even a more detailed explanation of “The Thing” from Neil here – "Leon Theremin Changed Spying FOREVER with this 1940s invention!", on his channel: @MachiningandMicrowaves Thanks to R. Paul Wilson for a comprehensive overview of the potential ways that credit cards and contactless payments can be compromised, and for connecting us with Christopher Forte. A big thank you to Christopher for his technical advice on different attack vectors for NFC transactions, his insights into the “cat and mouse game” between hackers and security providers, and feedback on different parts of the video. Thanks to Pavel Zhovner, CEO of Flipper Devices, for talking us through the various security layers in NFC transactions, showing us round the Flipper HQ, and even giving us several Flippers to experiment and film with! Thanks as well to Tony Sales, for his candid – and thoroughly entertaining(!) – recounts of credit card vulnerabilities, and explaining the work he does today in testing them. Thanks to @mkbhd and his team for filming all the different demo’s with us – and of course, putting himself forward for the hack we’ll cover in part 2 of this video! And last but definitely not least, a big thank you to professors Tom Chothia and Ioana Boureanu, for their technical support on the video, and of course, talking us through in great detail and even lending us the equipment for the hack we’ll be attempting in part 2! ▀▀▀ References: https://ve42.co/Spies&CardsRefs ▀▀▀ Special thanks to our Patreon supporters: Adam Foreman, Albert Wenger, Alex Porter, Alexander Tamas, André Powell, Anton Ragin, armedtoe, Balkrishna Heroor, Bertrand Serlet, Blake Byers, Bruce, Charles Ian Norman Venn, Daniel Martins, Data Don, Dave Kircher, David Johnston, David Tseng, EJ Alexandra, Evgeny Skvortsov, Garrett Mueller, Gnare, Hayden Christensen, Hong Thai Le, Ibby Hadeed, Jeromy Johnson, Jesse Brandsoy, Jon Jamison, Juan Benet, Kelcey Steele, KeyWestr, Kyi, Lee Redden, Marinus Kuivenhoven, Mark Heising, Martin Paull, Meekay, meg noah, Michael Krugman, Moebiusol - Cristian, Orlando Bassotto, Parsee Health, Paul Peijzel, Richard Sundvall, Robson, Sam Lutfi, Shalva Bukia, Sinan Taifour, Tj Steyn, Ubiquity Ventures, Vahe Andonians, wolfee ▀▀▀ Writers: James Moore, Casper Mebius & Henry van Dyck Producer & Director: James Moore Presenters: Derek Muller & Henry van Dyck Editor: Peter Nelson Animators: Andrew Neet, Domonkos Józsa, Alex Drakoulis & Mike Radjabov Illustrator: Jakub Misiek Assistant Writers: Aakash Singh Bagga & Darius Garewal Assistant Editor: James Stuart Researchers: Aakash Singh Bagga, Darius Garewal & Callum Cuttle Camera Operators: Andrew Abballe, Henry van Dyck, Gregor Čavlović & Andy Perez Thumbnail Designers: Abdallah Rabah, Ren Hurley & Ben Powell Production Team: Jess Bishop-Laggett, Matthew Cavanagh, Anna Milkovic & Sulli Yost Executive Producers: Derek Muller & Casper Mebius Additional video/photos supplied by Getty Images & Storyblocks Music from Epidemic Sound


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Do artists really write their own songs? | Think Like A Musician

Professional songwriters share their writing process, how they collaborate with other artists, and what it takes to be a songwriter. -- "Think Like A Musician" connects you with working musicians who want to help the music-curious and music-passionate hone and share the gift of music with the world. Part interview, part animated course, our second season "Think Like A Songwriter" features artists sharing their insight on the ins and outs of fine-tuning your songwriting and crafting timeless, memorable music. Each episode features free supplemental learning materials developed by Education Through Music (https://etmonline.org) — a nonprofit with over 30 years of experience developing classroom-adaptable curriculum for music educators. Directed by Kozmonot Animation Studio. A special thanks to the musicians who provided their insights and expertise for this video. You can check out their pages here: https://www.youtube.com/@bonniemckeeofficial https://www.youtube.com/@TaylaParx https://www.youtube.com/@Breland Support Our Non-Profit Mission ---------------------------------------------- Support us on Patreon: http://bit.ly/TEDEdPatreon Check out our merch: http://bit.ly/TEDEDShop ---------------------------------------------- Connect With Us ---------------------------------------------- Sign up for our newsletter: http://bit.ly/TEDEdNewsletter Follow us on Facebook: http://bit.ly/TEDEdFacebook Find us on Twitter: http://bit.ly/TEDEdTwitter Peep us on Instagram: http://bit.ly/TEDEdInstagram ---------------------------------------------- Keep Learning ---------------------------------------------- View full lesson: https://ed.ted.com/lessons/do-artists-really-write-their-own-songs-think-like-a-musician Dig deeper with additional resources: https://ed.ted.com/lessons/do-artists-really-write-their-own-songs-think-like-a-musician/digdeeper ---------------------------------------------- Thank you so much to our patrons for your support! Without you this video would not be possible! Roberto Chena, Oliver Koo, Luke Pisano, Andrea Gordon, Aleksandar Donev, Nicole Klau Ibarra, Jesse Lira, Ezekiel Raui, Petr Vacek, Dennis, Olivia Fu, Kari Teffeau, Cindy Lai, Rajath Durgada Manjunath, Dan Nguyen, Chin Beng Tan, Tom Boman, Karen Warner, Iryna Panasiuk, Aaron Torres, Eric Braun, Sonja Worzewski, Michael Clement, Adam Berry, Ghaith Tarawneh, Nathan Milford, Tomas Beckett, Alice Ice, Eric Berman, Kurt Paolo Sevillano, Jennifer Heald, Megulo Abebe, isolwi, Kate Sem, Ujjwal Dasu, Angel Alberici, Minh Quan Dinh, Sylvain, Terran Gimpel, Talia Sari, Katie McDowell, Allen, Mahina Knuckles, Charmaine Hanson, Thawsitt, Jezabel, Abdullah Abdulaziz, Xiao Yu, Melissa Suarez, and Brian A. Dunn.


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Why are "they" hiding the giant rock whales from us?

🪐 SUBSCRIBE / 🚀 LIKE / 👽 COMMENT The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe Website & Podcast: https://www.theskepticsguide.org/ Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/SkepticsGuide Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theskepticsguide Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theskepticsguide/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/SkepticsGuide TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@skepticsguide ✉️ Send your questions to: info@theskepticsguide.org Check out Our Books: 📘 The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe: How to Know What's Really Real in a World Increasingly Full of Fake 📙 The Skeptics’ Guide to the Future: What Yesterday’s Science and Science Fiction Tell Us About the World of Tomorrow https://www.theskepticsguide.org/our-book #SGU #SkepticsGuide #Science


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PROJECT HAIL MARY!

we're not talking about it


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