Skeptic Check: Fear Itself

Big Picture Science

Shhh. Is someone coming? Okay, we’ll make this quick. There are a lot of scary things going on in the world. Naturally you’re fearful. But sometimes fear has a sister emotion: suspicion. A nagging worry about what’s really going on. You know, the stuff they aren’t telling you. Don’t share this, but we have evidence that both our fear response and our tendency to believe conspiracy theories are evolutionarily adaptive.

A sociologist who studies fear tells us why we’re addicted to its thrill when we control the situation, and how the media exploit our fear of losing control to keep us on edge. Plus, we examine some alien “cover-ups” and discover why it’s not just the tinfoil hat crowd that falls for outrageous plots.

It’s Skeptic Check …. but you didn’t hear it from us!

Guests:

• Margee Kerr – Sociologist who studies fear, author of Scream: Chilling Adventures in the Science of Fear
• Rob Brotherton – Psychologist, adjunct assistant professor at Barnard College, and author of Suspicious Minds: Why We Believe Conspiracy Theories

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