My podcast appearances so far...

The European Skeptics Podcast
On 10 February 2016, I featured on The European Skeptics Podcast (50:20–1:06:20). My friends András Pintér, Jelena Levin and Pontus Böckman interviewed me about how I got involved with the skeptical / freethought movement, the three major organisations in the Netherlands battling pseudoscience and superstition and promoting critical thinking (De Vrije Gedachte [The Free Thought], Stichting Skepsis and the Vereniging tegen de Kwakzalverij [Association Against Quackery]), and my part in this movement, e.g. as board member of De Vrije Gedachte and the Dutch team leader of Guerrilla Skepticism on Wikipedia (GSoW).

Skepticule

On 4 May 2015, I featured on Skepticule (a.k.a. The Three Pauls Podcast, as both the host and two co-hosts are named 'Paul'), which was recorded at QED: Question, Explore Discover (28:45–46:25).


< Here we are, left to right: Paul Orton, Paul S Jenkins, me and Paul Thompson at QED in The Palace Hotel in Manchester.

They asked me about my experience of the conference and the previous one when we first met, my current projects on Wikipedia (of which I mentioned Skeptical organisations in Europe), my involvement in the Dutch freethinkers association De Vrije Gedachte (The Free Thought), my article in Skepter about GSoW, our skeptical Wikipedia project, with a special focus on the Rob Nanninga biography, and the state of secularism, atheism and free speech in the Netherlands.

Skepticality III: QED 2015

On 12 May 2015, Skepticality published a conversation that András Pintér, Jelena Levin, Pontus Böckman (the future team of the ESP), James Williams and I recorded at QED 2015 about our experiences editing Wikipedia and attending and meeting each other at that wonderful conference (25:00–37:00).

Skepticality II: The Vaccination Project
On 16 February 2015, Susan Gerbic interviewed me for Skepticality. Our conversation centred on how I was never vaccinated as a child, but when I learnt about the evidence, decided to do so in 2014, and started lecturing and writing on Wikipedia about the dangers of the antivaxx movement. The broadcast version is here (11:10–17:20), the full interview is available below.

Kritisch Denken

On 16 November 2014, my first (and so far only) solo podcast recording was published for the Dutch-speaking Belgian (Flemish) skeptical podcast Kritisch Denken ("Critical Thinking"), a Russells Theepot production. I explain why Wikipedia is a crucial battleground between science and pseudoscience, and skeptics should be there to correct misinformation and present the facts in the place where many ordinary people are looking for answers to their questions. The Guerrilla Skepticism on Wikipedia project (GSoW) seeks to coordinate the efforts of skeptical Wikipedians to accomplish this.

Skepticality I: QED 2014
This was my first multi-day skeptical conference, where I also met some people I had acquainted on the Internet in real life, some of whom have grown out to become great friends. It's obvious that I'm nervous, my English speaking vocabulary and accent were pretty bad at that time. I'm not sure if I didn't know we were videotaped instead of just audiotaped, or that I just didn't dare look into the camera.
The first recording is about Guerrilla Skepticism on Wikipedia project (GSoW), that brought all of us together. My part is from 4:55 to 6:20. This first recording also featured on Skepticality of 13 May 2014 (2:55–13:10), but the sound quality there is quite poor, unfortunately.

The second recording was about how cool going to skeptical conferences is. My part is from 4:45 to 6:16.

Deconversion is hard, but possible

Texan freethinkers 'debaptise' using a hair dryer.
It's very rare for people to publicly renounce formerly
held beliefs, and this one is obviously tongue-in-cheek.

Lees dit artikel in het Nederlands.

A good friend of mine who likes to discuss with religious people, conspiracy theorists, tin foil hats and others, recently asked in frustration why she had never deconverted anyone, despite having shown with great effort that some conspiracy theory is wrong, a certain 'medicine' is quackery, research was conducted pseudoscientifically, dogma is flawed and so on. Can you never actually talk someone out of a bullshit idea? Well, you certainly can, as I can confirm from amongst other things my own experience: other people talked lots of misconceptions out of my head as well, for which I'm quite grateful to them now. But don't expect someone to immediately shout out loud: 'Oh wow, I was so stupid!'

In most cases people won't convert instantly, let alone publicly. This is because everyone likes to think of themselves as intelligent, and so they take great pride in knowing what they think they know. Realising they're wrong about something, especially if you've been promoting it for years, induces shame, and even more to admit openly. (For example, Mark Lynas says he is ashamed it took him '15 years to learn to think for myself on [GMOs]' (2:04)). When you can no longer  reduce your cognitive dissonance, you tend to quietly change your mind and henceforth pretend you've always thought the way you do now, so you don't have to lose face. It's very human and understandable that someone won't publicly admit being wrong, especially because you run the risk that others will laugh at you and mock you for having believed nonsense. That fear keeps you 'in the closet', and forces you to maintain your old standpoint for a while longer, even though you know better by then. It is therefore important to anyone who tries to convince someone else to not attack her or him personally, also because this feeds the idea that a belief is part of their –considered unchangeable– identity. (At present, you see this is a huge problem when you criticise Islam; before you know it, one says 'you've just offended 1.some billions of Muslims!'). A belief should be regarded as something independent from the individual, which anyone could fall for, but also everyone could reject  (again) for rational reasons.

As a freethinker/skeptic, I try to not be too emotionally invested in ideas in the first place. The expected disappointment if they would turn out to be untrue, makes you seek the weirdest excuses, and wrestle yourself into the most illogical positions, just to be able to maintain the belief. It's much better to maintain an attitude of doubt, as Theo Maassen said: 'Doubt is important, if only to prepare yourself for the possibility that things are different than you think.'

I know our brain is flawed, that we constantly make mistakes, and all of us fall for nonsense sometimes. We can best resolve that to be ready to correct ourselves when we discover, or others point out, that an idea of ours is erroneous. If you're brave enough, you give the right example and publicly admit that you could be wrong, and if you dare also when you think you actually got something wrong (past or present). Show others that it's ok to make mistakes, as long as you correct them and are honest; perhaps they will also more easily come forward when they've freed themselves from a delusion. And consider that you've perhaps already quietly changed lots of people's minds already, even if they don't dare admit it publicly.