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Hello, everyone. This is Glenn Lowry. You have tuned into the Glenn Show. Thank you for doing so.

I am emeritus professor at Brown University. You've been doing the Glenn Show for a while, and I am

really honored and pleased today to be talking with Michael Sherman.

Dr. Michael Sherman is the founding publisher of Skeptic Magazine, and he's the host of the podcast, the Michael Sherman Show.

For decades, he's been teaching at colleges and universities on critical thinking, and for 18 years, he was a monthly columnist for Scientific American.

He's the author of many books, New York Times bestsellers, like why people believe weird things, the believing brain, why Darwin matters,

the science of good and evil,

and other books.

Most recently, though,

and what I was hoping to be able to talk with Michael about today,

are his book's conspiracy,

why the rational believed the irrational

and his newest book, I think,

forthcoming truth, what it is, how to find it, why it matters. So welcome, Michael.

Thanks, Glenn. Longtime fan. Longtime listener, first time caller.

Yeah, well, I'm really pleased to be able to talk with you today.

I wanted to start by saying how much I appreciated these last two books of yours,

taken together, I think, conspiracy and truth constitute pretty much a single project,

which is an attempt to defend the very idea of truth at a moment when large numbers of people seem to have lost confidence in it.

You're not just diagnosing fringe beliefs you're worried about whether a liberal pluralistic

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