Rick Alan Ross is the founder and Executive Director of The Cult Education Institute. He is an internationally known expert regarding destructive cults, controversial groups and movements. Since 1982 he has been studying, researching and responding to the problems often posed by such groups or movements.

Ross has been qualified and accepted and testified as an expert witness in court proceedings across the United States. He has also frequently assisted local and national law enforcement and government agencies. He has personally assisted thousands of families in an effort to help the victims of destructive cults, groups and movements.

Rick Ross is one of the most readily recognized experts offering analysis about destructive cults, controversial groups and movements in the world today. He has been a paid consultant for the television networks CBS, CBC and Nippon of Japan. And also was retained as a technical consultant by Miramax/Disney.

Our guest Dr. Frederick Coolidge will explain what is cognitive archaeology and how it used to explain the evolution of the human race. Professor Frederick L. Coolidge received his BA, MA, and PhD from the University of Florida. Professor Coolidge conducts research in evolution of cognition and brain structures, behavior genetics, and psychopathology. His blogs on this topic and many other writings can be found at: https://cognitivearchaeologyblog.wordpress.com/

Hunky Gay Jesus has been a vocal proponent of atheism, LGBT rights, and equality for all. Whenever possible, he employs his sharp sense of humor to make his points. He has made many like-minded acquaintances and true friends through Twitter and is has a large group of followers. His unique view on world has lead to fun podcast for us and we hope you enjoy as well!Hunky Gay Jesus™@HunkyGayJesus

The freedom of thought is a fundamental human right. As long as people don’t seek to oppress others or use violence against others, everyone should be free to believe whatever the hell they like about religion or anything else. The idea of governments discriminating against some people, while offering special privilege to others, based what what they believe in the privacy of their own minds, is absolutely abhorrent. The Free Thought Prophet is every bit as opposed to infringements on the rights of the religious (from all faiths) to freedom of thought, as we are to infringements on the rights of atheists or anyone else. We discussed these ideas in the context of the recent Executive Orders signed by President Donald Trump …

For the very few smart people remaining who don’t yet follow Eiynah on @nicemangos, she is a Pakistani-Canadian, who has also lived in Saudi Arabia. She is an illustrator and a podcaster at the very popular ‘Polite Conversations‘ podcast and she is well-known as a critic of both the more conservative tenets within Islam and also of anti-Muslim bigots.

Nichole (Nikki)@SkepticNikki : Skeptic Nikki is an atheist tweeter. who feels religion causes more harm than good, dcience causes more good than harm. and drunk tweets might (will) happen. Scientia potentia est.

Lee Burvine is the anonymous pen name used by the author of “The Kafir Project“. Sadly, we live in a world where publicly speaking certain truths can be very bad for your health. Lee’s lifelong thirst to get to the bottom of things and to tell cracking stories about what he found, has culminated in The Kafir Project, his first novel.

It was wonderful to speak with the funny and urbane, Lee Burvine and he very kindly allowed us to include the first few chapters of the audiobook (read by Seth Andrews) at the end of this podcast

A widely read article on Quillette Magazine, written by AR Devine, involved the story of ‘Martin’ (not his real name). The article was called Fleeing Theocracy: An Asylum Seeker’s Defence of the West. Martin grew up as a devout Muslim in Pakistan. He has since left both his faith and his country. We spoke to Martin on the podcast:

Special Episode Freethought Christmas with the wonderful Letha Hughes. Historical facts, current events and lots of laughs.

Syed Muhammad Tahir Nasser, is a writer moonlighting as a medical doctor, and a co-founder of the Rational Religion organisation, which is a spiritual response to the New Atheist movement. Tahir also serves as the science editor for the Review of Religions, which is one of the oldest English-language magazines on comparative religions. He writes for national and online media, and is a speaker on University lecture circuits on issues relating to Islam in the modern world. He has been published in a number of high-profile outlets, including the Huffington Post and the Guardian. Tahir also enjoys writing fiction and has recently published his first novel, which is called “The Day They All Died Young“.

We had a great conversation with Tahir on theodicy, eschatology and epistemology: