You're listening to the skeptics guide to the universe.

Your escape to reality.

Hello and welcome to the skeptics guide to the universe.

Today is Thursday, January 29th, 2026, and this is your host, Stephen Novella.

Joining me this week are Bob Novella.

Hey, everybody.

Kara Santa Maria.

Howdy? Jay Novella. Hey, guys. And Evan Bernstein. Good afternoon, everyone. It is freaking cold out there, like below zero Fahrenheit. Oh, Steve, do you know what the high is here today in L.A.? 60. Enviable. 78. Oh my God. 78.

That number is inconceivable to my brain right now.

It's like I took my kids to the bus this morning and here's how the temperature went.

I drove my son Dylan to the bus stop.

It was seven degrees out.

An hour later, I drove my daughter to the bus stop. It was six degrees out. That's how that works. No, it's 70 right now and the high today is 78. And the low at night, in the middle of the night, is 51. The weather is gorgeous here. Oh, my God. That's tropical. That is. But hey. Negative 2 Fahrenheit this morning. Negative 2. I haven't seen that in years locally, years. But hey, negative 2 Fahrenheit this morning. Negative 2. I haven't seen that in years locally. Years.

But hey, karma's a bitch because even though I get to enjoy this beautiful weather, I found out recently that I have to get a root canal next week.

Oh, no. So this is my first ever. I do have, to be fair, a ton of dental work. I think genetically, I have pretty weak teeth because dentists always tells me my gums are beautiful that I'm doing everything right, but I just get cavities. And so I found out about a year and a half ago, I actually thought I lost a filling. I go to my dentist and I'm like, hmm, it feels like I lost a filling. He's like, you never had a filling in that tooth. You've been grinding your teeth. And I think that you, like, it looks bad. So he was like, we're going to get in there. Hopefully you don't need a root canal. He gets in there. He goes, okay, I think we're good. It wasn't quite as deep as I was worried. So we're going to fill it. Give you a crown. But you've got to keep an eye on it. And then, of course, like a year later, I developed the timiest little, like, blistery bubble on my gum line. And that is like a surefire indicator that you have an infection in your root and you need a root canal. Oh, God. Kara, I have so much to tell you. Oh, gosh. Because you all know I love to take care of my teeth. Mm-hmm. And I have, I got a root canal myself, like I think about two and a half, three years ago. Then do it yourself. And I want you to find a, what do they call them, Stephen? Endodontist, I did. And she's amazing. She's going to use a laser tip. She does it under a microscope. Good. She already told me I have four channels but three roots. And the fourth channel is like kind of vestigial and hard to find. So she's like, I may not even be able to finish in one session.

If I can't really find everything, we'll close it up and we'll bring you back to make sure.

I went to the equivalent of like the kind of like mechanics garage you would find in the middle of the, like driving on a highway.

One of those horror scenes. So I just went to like a dentist dentist for a real.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And they're confident.

Oh,

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