Thursday I will be heading to Atlanta, Georgia for Dragon*Con 2010. I will be on several panels and I will be doing two live interviews that will be posted later as podcasts.

Here is my official schedule:

Please note that I did not write most of these descriptions!

Title: Popular Psychology Myths
Description: Pop Psychology is a confusing mixture of myth and science. Learn how to tell the difference and Why it Matters.
Time: Fri 11:30 am
Location: 207 / 206 / 205 – Hilton (Length: 1 Hour)

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Title: Skepticism and Sexuality
Description: When do we get skeptical about sex, the media? When alien cults want to save African clitorises, this panel is here to discuss the facts.
Time: Fri 10:00 pm
Location: 207 / 206 / 205 – Hilton (Length: 1 Hour)

Fridays panels are in the Skeptic Track. Pop Psycology Myths is an interview with Dr. Scott Lillienfeld, co-author of 50 Great Myths of Popular Psychology: Shattering Widespread Misconceptions about Human Behavior. An edited version of this interview will be posted at http://brainsciencepodcast.com in mid-late September.

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Title: Oil Disasters
Description: Oil disasters, effects of spills on humans and environment, peak oil crisis, nothing is sacred on this topic!
Time: Sat 02:30 pm
Location: L508 – Marriott (Length: 1 Hour)

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Title: Global Insurgency Open Discussion
Description: Open discussion on the effects of terror strikes.  Medical, sociological, and financial effects on the military, the public and the infrastructure
Time: Sat 05:30 pm Location: L508 – Marriott (Length: 1 Hour)

Saturday’s panels are in the Apocalypse Rising track. I have never been to this track, so it should be an interesting change of pace.

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Title: Books and Ideas Podcast
Description: Join host Dr. Ginger Campbell interviews author Skyler White about her book “and Falling, Fly.” I will also be interviewing Christiana Ellis.
Time: Sun 08:30 pm
Location: 204 – Hilton (Length: 1 Hour)

This interview will be conducted in the Podcasting Track and the edited version will appear in the Books and Ideas podcast feed in October.

Ginger and Massimo

Nonsense on Stilts: How to Tell Science from Bunk by scientist-turned-philosopher, Massimo Pigliucci is an excellent discussion of the challenges faced by the average non-scientist in today’s information-rich world. After explaining what distinguishes science from pseudoscience (a major source of “bunk”), his book gives practical advice about trusting experts. (hint: having a PhD doesn’t make one an expert!)

Pigliucci also discussed these themes during a talk he gave last month at The Amazing Meeting 8, which was held in Las Vegas, NV. That’s where I recorded the interview that I am posting today as Books and Ideas Episode 37. The focus of the interview is the role of philosophy of science in today’s complex world.

Listen to Episode 37 of Books and Ideas

Episode Transcript (Download PDF)

Episode 37 Show Notes:

• Massimo Pigliucci teaches philosophy at Lehman College (part of the City Universty of New York) and he is the host of the Rationally Speaking podcast
• The demarcation problem (how to tell science from psuedoscience) has been discussed by many philosophers including Karl Popper. I talked about this back in Episode 5 of Books and Ideas.
• Philosophers of science (including Barbara Forrest and Robert Pennock) were key witnesses in the  2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District decision against the teaching of intelligent design in the Dover public schools.

Further Reading:

• “Against Philosophy,” by Nobel physicist Steven Weinberg: not all scientists appreciate the role that philosophy continues to play in scientific thought.
• Twenty Questions: An Introduction to Philosophy by G. Lee Bowie, Meredith W. Michaels, and Robert C. Solomon: a good introductory text for students.
• A History of Western Philosophy by Bertrand Russell: a much-read classic.
• Making Sense of Evolution: The Conceptual Foundations of Evolutionary Biology by Massimo Pigliucci and  Jonathan Kaplan.
• Nonsense on Stilts: How to Tell Science from Bunk by Massimo Pigliucci.
• Several magazines about philosophy are aimed at general readers including: Philosophy Now, The Philosopher, and Think.
• The New York Times has a new philosophy blog called The Stone, which features posts by a wide variety of philosophers including Peter Singer (ethics)and Arthur Danto (aesthetics).

Announcements:

• The next episode of Books and Ideas will be recorded LIVE at 8:30 PM (Eastern Time) Sunday September 5 at Dragon*Con in Atlanta, Georgia. I will be interviewing novelists Skyler White and Christiana Ellis.
• I am also scheduled to interview Dr. Scott Lilenfield co-author of 50 Great Myths of Popular Psychology: Shattering Widespread Misconceptions about Human Behavior. This interview will be posted in the Brain Science Podcast feed in late September.
• For updates please subscribe to Ginger Campbell’s newsletter.
• You can now stream or download episodes and transcripts of this podcast directly to your iPhone®, Touch® or iPad® using the Books and Ideas application.
• Please share Books and Ideas with your friends and don’t forget to leave reviews in the iTunes® Store.

Subscribe to Books and Ideas Podcast:

Last month I announced that the next new episode of the Brain Science Podcast will be posted in the second week of September 2010. Today I am posting a brief update in the feed.

Listen Now

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Recent research has discovered that glial cells (the non-neuronal cells that make up about 85% of the cells in the human nervous system) actually do more than just support neurons. In Episode 69 of the Brain Science Podcast I explore some of these recent discoveries with pioneering researcher, R. Douglas Fields, PhD. Dr. Fields is the author of The Other Brain: From Dementia to Schizophrenia, How New Discoveries about the Brain Are Revolutionizing Medicine and Science. The Other Brain provides a compelling introduction to this exciting new field. It is aimed at general readers, but it should also be on the must-read list for all students of neuroscience.

Listen to BSP 69

Click here for detailed show notes and episode transcript

Subscribe to the Brain Science Podcast:

]]> http://docartemis.com/blog/2010/05/bsp69-glia/feed/ 0 http://docartemis.com/blog/2010/04/books-36-george/ http://docartemis.com/blog/2010/04/books-36-george/#comments Wed, 28 Apr 2010 19:40:17 +0000 Ginger Campbell, MD http://docartemis.com/blog/?p=931

The Myth of Alzheimer’s: What You Aren’t Being Told About Today’s Most Dreaded Diagnosis (2008) argues that we should re-evaluate our current approach to dementia. Earlier this month I posted an interview with the book’s main author, Dr. Peter Whitehouse (BSP 68). Episode 36 of my Books and Ideas podcast is a follow-up interview with his co-author, Daniel George. As a medical anthropologist George helps put current attitudes into an historical perspective. Labeling  large numbers of older people with the diagnosis of “Alzheimer’s Disease” is a relatively new practice and a closer examination of how this occurred provides an interesting example of how the history of medicine (and science) is interwoven with political and social history. While Whitehouse and George challenge the current approach to dementia, there message is actually one of hope. I am recommending The Myth of Alzheimer’s to people of all ages.

Listen to Episode 36 of Books and Ideas

Episode Transcript (Download PDF)

Subscribe to Books and Ideas Podcast:

References:

• Alzheimer’s, a Love Story: One Year in My Husband’s Journey by Ann Davidson
• Self, Senility, and Alzheimer’s Disease in Modern America: A History by Jesse F. Ballenger
• The Myth of Alzheimer’s: What You Aren’t Being Told About Today’s Most Dreaded Diagnosis by Peter J. Whitehouse and Daniel George
• Brain Science Podcast 68: Interview with Dr. Peter Whitehouse

Useful Links:

• The Myth of Alzheimer’s website: includes a blog and other useful information
• Center on Age & Community (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee)
• TimeSlips: an innovative program started by theater professor Ann Basting
• The Intergenerational School in Cleveland brings elders and children together.

Announcements:

• Dr. Campbell was recently interviewed on the Alaska Public Radio program Line One. Click here to download the interview.
• Join the Books and Ideas Fan Page on Facebook.
• During a recent system update at Wizzard/ Libsyn Media all the episode transcripts disappeared from the iPhone Applications for both Books and Ideas and the Brain Science Podcast. New episodes will have transcripts, but it may be a while before they reappear for older episodes. All transcripts remain available for download from this website.
• Books and Ideas is currently on an irregular production schedule. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast feed so that you won’t miss any episodes.
• Send Feedback to Dr. Campbell at gincampbell at mac dot com.

Subscribe to Books and Ideas Podcast:

Brain Science Podcast 68 is an interview with Dr. Peter Whitehouse, co-author (with Daniel George) of The Myth of Alzheimer’s: What You Aren’t Being Told About Today’s Most Dreaded Diagnosis. Alzheimer’s Disease originally referred to a relatively rare form of premature dementia, but in recent decades the diagnosis has been expanded to include patients of all ages. This change is not based on science and in this interview we talk about why being labeled with with Alzheimer’s may be doing older patients more harm than good.

Dr. Whitehouse is one of the pioneering researchers in this field, but advocates devoting resources to helping elders with with a wide range of age-related brain changes. This interview should be of interest to physicians, scientists, as well as patients and their families. I will be posting a supplemental interview with Daniel George, the co-author of The Myth of Alzheimer’s later this month. (Learn more at http://booksandideas.com.)

Listen to Episode 68

Click here for detailed show notes and episode transcripts.

Subscribe to the Brain Science Podcast:

In Episode 33 of my Books and Ideas podcast I interviewed Kyla Duffy from Happy Tails Books. I am proud to announce that my dog Jake is one of the dogs featured in Duffy’s latest book, which features stories of rescued German Shepherd Dogs. You will find Jake’s story on page 91. Part of the purchase goes to support German Shepherd Rescue or you can choose contribute to helping rescue dogs in Haiti.

Also, don’t forget that Jake is also featured in this year’s calender put out by German Shepherd Rescue of Central Alabama.

Click here to buy Lost Souls Found: Inspiring Stories about German Shepherd Dogs by Kyla Duffy and Lowrey Mumford.

Buy the 2010 Calender from German Shepherd Rescue of Central Alabama.

The free podcast version of Brain Science Podcast 67 is now available. It is an interview with German philosopher Thomas Metzinger, author of The Ego Tunnel: The Science of the Mind and the Myth of the Self and Being No One. Dr. Metzinger argues that any credible model for how the brain generates the mind must incorporate unusual human experiences, such as so-called out of body experiences (OBE), and psychiatric conditions. In this interview we explore how OBE and virtual reality experiments shed light on how the brain generates the sense of self that characterizes normal human experience.

Listen to Episode 67

Click here for information about Premium Versions

Subscribe to the Brain Science Podcast:

Click here for detailed show notes and episode transcripts.

Episode 35 of the Books and Ideas podcast is an interview with best-selling horror writer, Scott Sigler. Scott is widely admired for pioneering the use of podcasting to promote his fiction writing, but so far hasn’t gotten the recognition I think he deserves for incorporating hard science into his unique blend of horror and science fiction.

This interview gave me the opportunity to talk with Scott about how he meets the challenge of incorporating accurate science without sacrificing storytelling. I think this is an excellent follow-up to the interview I did with Sheril Kirshenbaum (co-author of Unscientific America) back in Episode 32.

Listen to Episode 35 of Books and Ideas

Episode Transcript (Download PDF)

Subscribe to Books and Ideas Podcast:

Recommended Reading:

• The Rookie by Scott Sigler (Listen to this podcast to get a coupon code!)
• Contagious by Scott Sigler
• Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens our Future by Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum
• Early chapters of The Crypt are now available at Podiobooks.com.

Useful Links:

• Scott Sigler’s website
• Podiobooks.com: where you can sample all of Scott’s work in free audiobook format.
• Scott Sigler’s iPhone application

Announcements:

• Don’t forget to check out the Books and Ideas application for the iPhone and iPod Touch.
• Books and Ideas will be on hiatus for the next few months while I work on producing and promoting the new premium versions of the Brain Science Podcast.
• You can get updates by joining our Facebook Fan page or my subscribing to my newsletter.

Episode 66 of the Brain Science Podcast is an interview with Randy Gallistel, PhD, Co-Director of the Rutgers Center for Cognitive Science and co-author (with Adam Philip King) of Memory and the Computational Brain: Why Cognitive Science will Transform Neuroscience. We discuss why read/write memory is an essential element of computation with an emphasis on the animal experiments that support the claim that brains must possess read/write memory. This is significant because current models, such as neural nets, DO NOT incorporate read/write memory in their assumptions about how brains work. It is not necessary to have any background in information theory or computation to appreciate the experiments that are discussed in this episode. Episode 3 and Episode 12 of the Brain Science Podcast provide  background information for this episode.

Listen to Free Podcast

Click here for show notes and episode transcripts.