58: Deepak Chropa's Bullshit with Gordon Pennycook

Scamapalooza with Nicholas J. Johnson

I have long suspected that Deepak Chopra spouts garbage. Despite being a trained physician, the author and self-help guru’s trademark new-age ramblings have always struck me as little more than pseudo-scientific garbage.
But, I’m also the kind of guy who doesn’t like to dismiss ideas out of hand, just because I don’t understand.
It turns out that my instincts were correct. A 2015 study in the journal Judgment and Decision Making showed that many of Chopra’s tweets are indistinguishable from a randomly generated sentence using Chopra's favourite buzz-words.
They are—according to studies authors—Bullshit.
On this episode of Scamapalooza, I talk to the lead author of the study Gordan Pennycook and how you measure what is and isn’t bullshit and why it’s important to spot the difference.