The Captivating Power of Reality- Guy P. Harrison, Leighann Lord

(This talk took place on August 19, 2021.)

Author Guy P. Harrison is a passionate advocate for science and reason. He describes critical thinking as a moral issue and points to the neglect of good thinking skills and basic science education as humankind’s “great unrecognized crisis”. Guy aggressively promotes a constructive, optimistic, and humble brand of skepticism. “We all believe silly things,” he says. “What matters is how silly and how many.”

As a journalist, Guy won the Commonwealth Award for Excellence in Journalism and the World Health Organization’s National Award for Health Reporting. Guy has interviewed many leading scientists and significant historical figures and writes about many diverse topics, including poverty, conservation, religion, racism, gender discrimination, space exploration, and human origins. He has written articles and essays for Skeptical Inquirer, Skeptic, Free Inquiry, and Reader’s Digest.

Here he present a lively talk entitled “The Captivating Power of Reality”. Guy believes that skepticism/critical thinking skills are so vital to the wellbeing of individuals and societies that we have a moral obligation to call out irrational beliefs and faulty thinking wherever present. But how best to do it? Guy believes a scorched-earth policy of condemnation and name-calling will never work as well as nudging and cajoling believers toward paths of passion and fascination for science and history. Fill as many heads as possible with the wonders of the universe and the thrills of real history and prehistory, he claims, and then maybe there won’t be so much available real estate for nonsense