Skeptic's Guide Interview : Aardvarchaeology

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Dr. Martin Rundkvist is a Swedish archaeologist, journal editor, public speaker, skeptic, atheist, lefty liberal, bookworm, and father of two.

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Skeptic's Guide Interview

Category: Skepticism
Posted on: May 17, 2008 3:34 PM, by Martin R

Getting up in the small hours on Thursday morning paid off: I'm on The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe #147!

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Postmodernism lingering in the Humanities departments, wow. "They always look both ways before they cross the street, so apparently they believe in, primarily, reality!" -- made me laugh out loudly!

Posted by: marko | May 17, 2008 4:07 PM

I was actually trying to use the Tolkienian term "primary reality" but got my tongue in a twist. Glad you liked it!

Posted by: Martin R | May 17, 2008 4:16 PM

"The constant i is equivalent to the erect male organ"?! -- "I'm not gonna let you keep me from suckling at the teat of the mother goddess"?! -- I have to give it to you, we have much kookiness in Europe. (-:
Being a German, I'm also interested in the story you mentioned, of American Indians denying your colleague excavations of Southern German (Bavarian?) graves. Can you tell some more about this?
Pretty good stuff for 3 o'clock in the morning. Dr Rundkvist, I enjoyed the podcast immensly. Thanks a lot!

Posted by: marko | May 17, 2008 4:44 PM

The husband of a friend of mine had applied for funding from a US university to go to Baden-Württemberg and dig prehistoric cemeteries. Everything was almost finalised when suddenly a professor of literature studies showed up at a faculty meeting and told everyone that she found it obscene that the guy would be digging graves. She was of Native American descent and apparently something of an activist. So, for fear of antagonising her and getting a lot of bad press, the grants board caved and the man never got his funding. Shortly thereafter his wife got a better job and they are now both at another university.

I don't like Blut und Boden ideologies regardless of who's into them.

Posted by: Martin R | May 17, 2008 5:10 PM

Couldn't agree more about your take on ideology.
Weird story, comparable to not researching evolution to avoid antagonizing those cdesign proponentsists -- or avoid looking into human DNA to keep the beliefs of the Mormons unscathed. There are just too many touchy groups' sacred cows around, I guess.

Posted by: marko | May 17, 2008 5:55 PM

Interview was a fun time. For reference, the US publication name of the book by Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont was Fashionable Nonsense

Posted by: Bad | May 18, 2008 1:57 AM

Have you read Alan Sokal's new book Beyond the Hoax (2008)? I bet you'd like it.

(This question may well be answered in the podcast, but I'm posting before listening, so ha!)

Posted by: Blake Stacey | May 18, 2008 10:26 AM

Haven't read it (yet)!

Posted by: Martin R | May 18, 2008 12:35 PM