On the 10th anniversary of his banned TED talk, Dr. Rupert Sheldrake in conversation with Dr. Alex Gomez-Marin

In January 2013 Rupert Sheldrake gave a talk at TEDx Whitechapel entitled “The Science Delusion” where he questioned ten fundamental beliefs of mainstream science. The event was called “Visions for Transition: Challenging existing paradigms and redefining values (for a more beautiful world)”. After protests from two militant materialists, P.Z. Myers and Jerry Coyne, and in consultation with an undisclosed Scientific Board, TED declared: “we feel a responsibility not to provide a platform for talks which appear to have crossed the line into pseudoscience.”

The irony (and tragedy) was twofold. First, Sheldrake’s questioning of dogmatism was met with a dogmatic canceling of his questioning. Second, despite TED’s famed ethos of “ideas worth spreading”, they deemed other ideas worth canceling, especially when challenging TED’s sanctioned narrow worldview. Mislaying their reputation, TED’s decision refuted itself.

Ten years after the controversy, Dr. Sheldrake will reflect together with Dr. Gomez-Marin on the effectiveness of heterodox critiques of mainstream scientific thinking. Did they make a difference? What has changed, if anything, after such clashes?

Nowadays’ media landscape affords new opportunities to expose and share different worldviews through podcasting and blogging. However, curricula remain unchanged, as students continue to be indoctrinated with the materialist mechanistic reductionist program. In addition, venues such as Wikipedia profess the same unexamined prejudices, and so do major newspapers, TVs, and grant agencies. In the meantime, scientific breakthroughs stagnate.

Recorded on March 14, 2023.