Here at BA Central, I have my hands full trying to battle the Forces of Darkness: those who would spin, fold, and mutilate reality for their own gain. They may be motivated by greed, or power, or ignorance, or ideology, but the thing they all have in common is, they’re wrong. They come in many flavors: homeopaths, psychics, creationists, antivaxxers… and yes, sadly, far too many politicians.

And I can rail against them time and again, my arsenal filled with the facts from an entire Universe at my disposal, yet make hardly a dent in their armor.

Sometimes, though, a small dose of satire penetrates right through that shielding and pierces the very heart of antiscience. Thank you, The Daily Show, for fighting this good fight:

Looking for a last minute jack-o-lantern idea? You might get some inspiration from BABloggee Kevin Puetz, who made this space-station-based pumpkin for Halloween:

[Click to engourdgenate.]

Pretty cool! I like the Orbiter docked on the right, too. I’ve been away the past few days and didn’t have time to carve a pumpkin, so here’s a picture of mine from last year:

Got dorky pumpkins? Put links to ‘em in the comments!

And since I’ve got your attention, here again is my gallery of spacey, spooky astronomical objects, so that when you’re walking along outside tonight you’ll know that when you look up to the stars, they’re looking back at you! Mwuahahahahaha!

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If you’re looking for some spooky listening for your Halloween, then aim your ectoplasmic resonator at astronomer Neil Tyson’s Star Talk radio show, because last night he hunted ghosts… or at least, talked to some folks who know about ghosts. He chats with author Mary Roach, skeptic ghost investigator Joe Nickell, and… me!

Yeah, I’m not really an expert on ghosts — still being alive and all — but I’ve seen a few ghost movies in my time, so we chat about those, and why I don’t personally think dead people are floating around, knocking on walls and hoping some "ghost hunter" will notice us and anxiously whisper, "Did you hear that?"

As always, talking with Neil is a lot of fun, and you’ll enjoy the whole show. You can also download the MP3 directly, too. [UPDATE: you can subscribe to Star Talk using iTunes, as well!]

My interview is broken up into several segments; the first starts around 11:30, the second at 24:50, the third at 36:15, and the fourth at 41:00. But of course you should listen to the whole show; it’s pretty entertaining!

I’ll note we did this interview through Skype, and my voice is a little warbly. Or was I just communicating from the other side??!!

OK, yeah, it was just warbly. But you were scared there for a second, weren’t you?

OK, yeah, no you weren’t. Damn. Being a skeptic on Halloween is hard.

Image credit: me! If you’re curious, that’s my pal Jennifer Ouellette and me from TAM 9, chatting with the disembodied head of Neil. Having him floating around like that was distracting.

Some people might consider this a sin, but hey: I’m no angle.

This comic is from Luke Surl, who has some pretty funny geek comics on his site.

… and if you don’t get it, this might help. Or you could try searching on it; secant you shall find.

Tip o’ the sunscreen lid to Neil Tyson, whom I hear is really into astronomy.

Recently, a man called the Hertfordshire (UK) police to report flashing lights in the sky… and, well, listen for yourself:

Heh. Well, I’m actually glad he called back to admit his mistake!

You might think this is really unusual, but this call doesn’t surprise me at all. Take a look at the links in the Related Posts section below; people have reported Jupiter and balloons as UFOs, and the Moon has made an appearance once or twice as well. Even dust motes on old photographic plates have spurred warnings of a menace from space…

Tip o’ the tin foil beanie to Nancy Atkinson.

You know what really eats me up? People who claim they can talk to the dead, when it is far, far more likely they are simply using psychological tricks (like cold reading) and random guesses, making it seem like they have some supernatural power.

A while back, the James Randi Educational Foundation publicly challenged so-called "psychic" James van Praagh to take their Million Dollar Challenge and prove he can do what he claims. It’s been weeks, and he hasn’t replied. I can’t imagine why, can you? It’s almost as if he’s afraid of being tested in a controlled environment.

The JREF decided to follow up on their challenge to van Praagh, to see if they could make sure he got the message. And this time, they brought some friends…

Man, I would’ve given an arm and a leg to be there for that. But c’mon, do you really think van Praagh will ever respond?

Gnaw.

I somehow missed it when it came out, but the folks at IRrelevant Astronomy have a great video about how stars die, and it has Sean Astin (Samwise!) and Sandeep Parikh (Zaboo!).

IRrelevant Astronomy is a very funny web series about infrared astronomy put together by folks at Spitzer Space Telescope, and they’re all pretty good. This one is a followup for great video about galaxies featuring Felicia Day. They also have a couple with a guy named Wil Wheaton. Never heard of him myself, but he has promise as an actor, I think.

If you have the time, you should watch ‘em all. They’re funny, and well done, and you just might learn something.

Tip o’ the beryllium mirror to Jennifer Ouellette on Google+.

- Felicia Day collides galaxies
- Astronomy Veronica anemone
- IRrelevant Astronomy: Dr. Wheaton edition
- Robot Wil Wheaton takes over the Universe