by Brian Dunning
October 3, 2023
Today is the 17th anniversary of the Skeptoid podcast. And moreover, it is episode #904, and the 904 is my favorite Porsche model, and which ended production in the year I was born. So we are celebrating with one of Skeptoid's famous pop quizzes, 17 questions, one from each year of the show. Since it's my anniversary, I'll pick an episode from each of the previous 17 years that I personally really enjoyed researching and writing — and we'll see if your skeptical chops are up to par. We'll go with 10 out of 17 as a passing grade. So no more dallying; let's get started!
In what type of clinical trial are the test administrators blinded, but the statisticians who tabulate the results are not?
A. Single blinded
B. Double blinded
C. Triple blinded
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is B, double blinded. The test subjects are always blinded; double blinding is when the test administrators are blinded as well. If the statisticians are also blinded, then the test is triple blinded.
A few Mormon theologians attempt to prove the literal truth of the Book of Mormon by disputing the historical fact that some things in the book are known not to have existed in pre-Columbian America. Which of the following did exist in pre-Columbian America?
A. Horses
B. Barley
C. Gold plating
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is C, gold plating. Multiple pre-Columbian cultures in South America developed gold and silver chemical plating, and even depletion gilding which can leave an object coated in nearly pure gold.
HAARP, the High Frequency Active Auroral Research Program, is a 28-acre field of radio antennas that conspiracy theorists accuse of everything from causing targeted weather disasters to world mind control. Where is it located?
A. Antarctica
B. Alaska
C. Near Alice Springs, Australia
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is B, Alaska. Now operated by the University of Alaska Fairbanks, HAARP is rarely actually turned on, and when it is, it is often used by visiting academics from all over the world. There is an annual Open House during which anyone is invited to visit.
This first century mechanism, retrieved from an ancient merchant vessel in the Ionian Sea, starred in Indiana Jones 5 as a time travel device. What was its actual purpose?
A. A toy for rich people
B. A naval instrument
C. An astronomical instrument
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is A, a toy for rich people — according to our best theory. The complex geared instrument had many functions, more than any one profession would ever have use for; so our best analysis is that it was something like a fancy Rolex that does all sorts of things nobody would ever actually need.
This image of the Virgin Mary, painted by one of the earliest known educated Aztec painters, had its use debated in converting Native Americans argued by which two Catholic orders in the 1500s?
A. The Jesuits and the Dominicans
B. The Dominicans and the Franciscans
C. The Franciscans and the Jesuits
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is B. The Dominicans supported the use of the painting as religious propaganda to persuade the Aztecs that it had been miraculously created, while the Franciscans felt such usage was sacrilegious.
Pit bulls unquestionably have a reputation for being a dangerous dog breed. Which of the following is true about pit bulls?
A. They tend to hold a bite longer than other dog breeds
B. They are more likely to bite than other dog breeds
C. Rottweilers kill more Americans than pit bulls
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is A, pit bulls do tend to hold a bite longer than most other breeds. They don't attack most often, but their attacks are more likely to be fatal. However, data is very clear on the most important point: It is the owner, the owner's personal level of aggression, and the owner's training of any dog that is most responsible for that dog's danger to others.
Correction: An earlier version of this actually misstated my own episode! No excuse for that! It gave the correct answer as pit bulls have the strongest bite, a popular belief for which there is no evidence. —BD
This episode about scientists who experimented on themselves, because they were unwilling to endanger others, included this famed rocket sled rider whose data persuaded Congress to require seatbelts in cars:
A. Col. John Stapp
B. Col. Joseph Kittinger
C. Ralph Nader
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is A, the heroic and comprehensively injured Col. John Stapp. John Kittinger flew the Lockheed T-33 camera plane that Stapp passed, and Nader was the consumer advocate who lobbied Congress with Stapp's data.
Sedona, Arizona is famous for its "energy vortices" which appeal to the New Age crowd. Which of the following is true?
A. About a half dozen specific locations in the Sedona region are geomagnetically distinctive.
B. Sedona, in general, is geomagnetically distinctive from the surrounding region.
C. There is nothing geomagnetically distinctive about Sedona
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is C. The thing that makes Sedona stand out is its extraordinary beauty. There is nothing geophysically, or otherwise measurable, or anything that might reasonably be called a vortex, about it at all.
Some marijuana advocates claim that the reason it's illegal goes back to a conspiracy primarily driven by newspaper magnate William Randolph Hearst. Which of the following was not a factor in marijuana being declared illegal?
A. Religion: the ban was to appeal to the temperance/prohibition lobby
B. Money: the ban was to protect paper and cotton profits
C. Racism: the ban was a punitive measure aimed mainly at Mexicans and Chinese
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is B, paper and cotton profits, neither of which were impacted in the slightest by marijuana or hemp. Racism and religion were the drivers of change in America, 100 years ago as much as they are today.
The 1914 Christmas Truce between British and German troops did happen, but which of the following statements about it is true?
A. It was actually a bloodier than normal day
B. It was, as the urban legend says, an uncommonly peaceful day
C. It was about like any other day
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is C, about like any other day. At that early stage in World War I, earnest fighting was still rare; nobody expected it to escalate into much of a war, and most soldiers were expecting to go home pretty soon.
Earthquake lights are the name given by some to apocryphal flashes that light up the sky during an earthquake. Which of the following is the only proven cause of them?
A. Exploding electrical transformers
B. Piezo-electric effects in quartz rock layers
C. Atmospheric lightning-like phenomena called sprites
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is A. Contrary to popular belief, there is no evidence of any natural earthquake lights beyond conventional light sources such as flashes from exploding transformers associated with power outages.
Although "the Mandela effect" today is our name for when a lot of people share the same false memory, that's not what the term originally meant. What did the Mandela effect originally refer to?
A. People trading consciousness with other people in different centuries
B. People drifting between alternate dimensions where things are actually different
C. The artificial implantation of a false memory by Cold War spies
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is B, people moving between alternate dimensions, or alternate realities. The term "Mandela effect" was coined by psychic Fiona Broome, and multiple realities was her best explanation for how many people could share the same false memory.
If you ate three Big Macs a day, you would get too much of what?
A. Sodium
B. Sugar
C. Calories
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is A, sodium. Three Big Macs would give the average adult 118% of their recommended daily sodium allowance — which still isn't bad, considering that the average American eats 132%.
Which of the following is true of Mexico's mysterious Zone of Silence, a remote desert region that's become a tourist attraction because of all the strange legends surrounding it?
A. A missile once contaminated it with radioactive cobalt
B. Radios do not work there
C. Compasses are wrong there
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is A. An American missile test went awry in 1970 and contaminated its crash site with cobalt-57, which was soon cleaned up by Mexican and American authorities. Radios and everything else still work just fine there.
Which of the following statements is true about the Earth's magnetic field?
A. Pole reversals are often triggered by major earthquakes.
B. It's not known what impact to life on Earth a pole reversal might have.
C. Pole reversals take thousands of years and have happened many times.
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is C. The Mid-Atlantic Ridge gives us a magnetostratigraphic history showing at least 183 pole reversals in the past 83 million years, averaging one every 450,000 years.
When this superbolide exploded over Siberia in 1908, how many human casualties were there (to the best of our knowledge)?
A. No humans are known to have been killed or injured.
B. An entire village of hundreds of Evenk people was completely destroyed.
C. Three people were killed and many in the vicinity were injured.
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is C. Semi-nomadic Evenk people, plus a number of Russian homesteaders, were injured over a radius of 500 km from the blast center. Only three are believed to have died.
This giant, sprawling mansion that follows no clear plan was built by Sarah Winchester, widow and heiress to the Winchester rifle fortune, at the turn of the 20th century, for what reason?
A. To confound the ghosts of those killed by Winchester rifles
B. To keep people employed
C. On the advice of her psychic
Reveal the answer
The correct answer is B, to keep people employed. Sarah Winchester was a generous philanthropist and successful businessperson, and contrary to legend, had no documented belief or interest in the supernatural.
And there we have it, 17 questions for 17 years of Skeptoid. Did you get 10 or more right? If you didn't, you need to listen to more Skeptoid; and if you did, your reward is that you get to continue listening to Skeptoid for many more years to come.
By Brian Dunning
