# Best Debunkers? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 20, 2012, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900 "2012-07-20T23:03:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 20, 2012, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/1 "2012-07-20T23:03:44Z")
Who are the best debunkers of rumours, superstitions, and fallacies in your opinion? A lot of these books and sites often cover the same old things (like say nobody in Columbus’ day thought the Earth was flat for example). First of all there is our incomparable Cecil Adams and his Straight Dope. Then there is Snopes. com. Among books I’d say the best I’ve seen are Brunvand’s work on urban legends, Ackerman’s \*_Popular Fallacies_, \*and John Stossel’s _Get Out the Shovel_ (which is more explicity political than the other ones. Maybe _Dictionary of Misinformation_ too. ---
**Author:** ![zombywoof](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/9e8a1a/32.png) [@zombywoof](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zombywoof)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/2 "2012-07-21T00:21:29Z")
[James Randi](http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/about-james-randi.html) / [JREF](http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/about-the-foundation.html) ---
**Author:** ![JackieLikesVariety](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackielikesvariety/32/296_2.png) [@JackieLikesVariety](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JackieLikesVariety)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/3 "2012-07-21T00:51:08Z")
I don’t have a debunker to add, just want to say I despise John Stossel with the white hot intensity of ten thousand suns. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 12:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/4 "2012-07-21T00:52:45Z")
Houdini, James Randi, Penn & Teller (outside of political stuff). ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/5 "2012-07-21T01:02:10Z")
Add _Mythbusters_ to the list. ---
**Author:** ![goonhead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ebca7d/32.png) [@goonhead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/goonhead)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/6 "2012-07-21T02:19:11Z")
\www.politifact.com\ is pretty good for debunking stuff from politicians and commentators. ---
**Author:** ![Fenris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fenris/32/498_2.png) [@Fenris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fenris)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/7 "2012-07-21T03:30:43Z")
Martin Gardner’s _Fads and Fallacies In The Name Of Science_ is the single best debunking book ever written. Granted, some of the stuff he’s debunking is now out of date or totally forgotten, but his ability to write with flair, to not get shrill\* and to seem to actually enjoy the hell out of the weird crap he’s debunking makes it a must-have. \*One of the unfortunate flaws in Randi’s writings is that his written voice is _shrill_. Even when I’m nodding in agreement with him, I’m also wishing he’d just chill out a little. ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/8 "2012-07-21T03:41:37Z")
> [@Fenris](#): > > \*One of the unfortunate flaws in Randi’s writings is that his written voice is _shrill_. Even when I’m nodding in agreement with him, I’m also wishing he’d just chill out a little. No shit. If the dude cut out all of his bitching, moaning, and insulting, he’d have room for twice as much debunking. ---
**Author:** ![Jamicat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c67d28/32.png) [@Jamicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jamicat)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 10:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/9 "2012-07-21T22:19:24Z")
[Phil](http://www.badastronomy.com/index.html) ---
**Author:** ![StarsApart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecc23a/32.png) [@StarsApart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarsApart)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2012, 11:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/10 "2012-07-21T23:10:41Z")
I like Brian Dunning of [Skeptoid](http://skeptoid.com/), a podcast (with transcripts for those who can’t listen). ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 1:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/11 "2012-07-22T01:13:30Z")
_The Mistakes We Make_ by Nathan Dole is an oldie but a goodie: [http://books.google.com/books?id=LNtTAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Mistakes+We+Make&source=bl&ots=ZCmLqWEqqK&sig=p4SUayZrw5oE-cKcFu3g7xCd6ug&hl=en&sa=X&ei=q0MLUO7pH6Lo2QXr9LD7Dw&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Mistakes%20We%20Make&f=false](http://books.google.com/books?id=LNtTAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Mistakes+We+Make&source=bl&ots=ZCmLqWEqqK&sig=p4SUayZrw5oE-cKcFu3g7xCd6ug&hl=en&sa=X&ei=q0MLUO7pH6Lo2QXr9LD7Dw&ved=0CDEQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Mistakes%20We%20Make&f=false). There’s a sequel too called _More Mistakes We Make_ ---
**Author:** ![Victor\_Charlie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/7ea924/32.png) [@Victor\_Charlie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Victor_Charlie)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 2:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/12 "2012-07-22T02:28:40Z")
[Skepdic.com](http://Skepdic.com) is a good site as well as Skeptic magazine. I’ll second Penn & Teller. When it ran on Showtime, their show “Bullshit” was a great. Then there’s Christopher Hitchens, R.I.P. Not a typical debunker, but one of the world’s great skeptics. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 3:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/13 "2012-07-22T03:25:42Z")
Though I have not read it, I have heard good things about the _Skeptical Inquirer_ magazine, so this thread prompted me to look it up, and on its Wikipedia page I found this quote: > [@](#): > > Cecil Adams of The Straight Dope calls the Skeptical Inquirer “one of the nation’s leading antifruitcake journals”. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [July 22, 2012, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/14 "2012-07-22T04:04:24Z")
> [@JackieLikesVariety](#): > > I don’t have a debunker to add, just want to say I despise John Stossel with the white hot intensity of ten thousand suns. Indeed, I was nodding at the good list from the OP and then suddenly it was like Sesame Street’s “One of this things is not like the others!” > **[John Stossel](https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/John_Stossel)** > > As of 10 December 2009, John Stossel (6 March 1947–) was the latest mouthpiece of the right-wing to out himself by jumping from the "mainstream media" to Fox News. He claims to be a libertarian\[note 1\] and not a right-winger. He claims that movie... > [@](#): > > If you can believe it, Stossel was actually once an upstanding advocacy journalist in his early career on 20/20, exposing corruption and fraud in both the public and private sectors. In 1998, Stossel also hosted a primetime special, The Power of Belief, challenging quack, New Age, and supernatural claims. That special also featured interviews with magician-turned-skeptic James Randi.[4] Since his conversion to libertarianism, he mostly deals in Reaganism, global warming denialism, and general fact distortion.[5] Unfortunately, due to his frequent criticism of all forms of woo, he has suckered other skeptics into appearing with him to promote his free market fundamentalism and denialism.[6] BTW one should add these to the list of best debunking sites: [skepticalscience.com](http://skepticalscience.com) to deal with fake skeptics on climate science, [talkorigins.org](http://talkorigins.org) and [pandasthumb.org](http://pandasthumb.org) to deal with Creationists and IDer’s, [biofortified.org](http://biofortified.org) for GMO contrarians and Skeptic’s Dictionary at [skepdic.com](http://skepdic.com) and [rationalwiki.org](http://rationalwiki.org) for most topics. ---
**Author:** ![Meatros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@Meatros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Meatros)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/15 "2012-07-23T12:55:14Z")
> [@StarsApart](#): > > I like Brian Dunning of [Skeptoid](http://skeptoid.com/), a podcast (with transcripts for those who can’t listen). I second Skeptiod. It’s short and sweet and filled with good info. ---
**Author:** ![grude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47774/32.png) [@grude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grude)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/16 "2012-07-23T13:00:31Z")
> [@Victor\_Charlie](#): > > I’ll second Penn & Teller. When it ran on Showtime, their show “Bullshit” was a great. . Bullshit had some excellent episodes where they completely blow apart cultural bias, the circumcision and immigration and prison episodes come to mind. They had some episodes that picked much less focused targets and just felt boring and like shooting fish in a barrel, oh look they got a woman selling healing crystals to say a bunch of nonsense on camera like contacting past lives etc. They then proceed to freeze frame and insult her, good thing they pointed out to me that reincarnation isn’t real:smack: Some episodes just seemed about mocking non-mainstream beliefs which never needed the debunking as no testable claims were made. ---
**Author:** ![AaronX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/7bcc69/32.png) [@AaronX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AaronX)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/17 "2012-07-23T13:25:37Z")
Dr Karl Kruszelnicki writes some books on these, and I think Popular Science and New Scientist as well. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Knig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cdc98d/32.png) [@Typo\_Knig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Knig)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/18 "2012-07-23T16:06:22Z")
Bob Park (Wiki link [Robert L. Park - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Park)). He’s been fighting the “EM fields cause cancer” BS for decades. It’s taking longer than we thought. ---
**Author:** ![JeffB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jeffb/32/188_2.png) [@JeffB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JeffB)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/19 "2012-07-23T16:53:53Z")
For health related issues, [Quackwatch](http://www.quackwatch.com/) run by Stephen Barrett is good. ---
**Author:** ![Sister\_Vigilante](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@Sister\_Vigilante](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sister_Vigilante)\ **Post date:** [July 23, 2012, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/best-debunkers/628900/20 "2012-07-23T19:57:45Z")
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