Penn & Teller: Bullshit! (2003-) is a Showtime Channel TV program shown in the United States, hosted by professional magicians Penn Jillette and Teller. The aim of the show is to expose ideas they believe to be unscientific or pseudoscientific through scientific skepticism, and to expose promotors of such who make money out of them.

In the first episode, Penn explains that if they referred to people as frauds or liars, they could be sued for libel even in the face of overwhelming evidence of chicanery, but referring to them as assholes or motherfuckers (which express an opinion rather than a statement of fact) is legally safer. The show's name, Bullshit! reflects this approach.

The show reflects the atheist libertarian stance of the presenters, and inherits their characteristically explicit, often aggressive, style, complete with profanity and gratuitous sexual references. Contributors are often introduced with voice-overs like "look at this asshole!". In "PETA", they responded to a campaign comparing the slaughter of animals with the Holocaust by cutting between shots of PETA founder Ingrid Newkirk and Hitler. (Penn: "Cheap shot? Well, you bet it is.") This has led many to question the factual accuracy of the show.

Contents

1 Show format 2 Episode list 3 Criticism of the show 4 External links

Show format

Each episode, Penn & Teller choose one or two subjects and proceed to systematically undermine them, using a variety of methods:

• Proponents of the topic at hand, in heavily edited interviews, try to make their case. However, they often end up looking stupid or providing evidence to defeat their own arguments. For example, in "Safety Hysteria" a manufacturer of 'radiation guards' for mobile phones admits that there is no proven link between phone radiation and brain cancer, but assures viewers that you can't be too safe. He also says his background is in advertising, not medical science or engineering. The unspoken (and thus legally safe) conclusion is that he knows his product is useless, but uses marketing techniques to rip off an uninformed public.

• Opponents, sometimes, but not always, experts or authorities in the subject, are interviewed and try to rebut the proponents arguments.

• Penn & Teller make use of speakers from the Center for Inquiry Transnational and James Randi Educational Foundation.

• Penn & Teller conduct informal, and freely admitted unscientific experiments. For example, in "Bottled Water" diners are asked to choose between genuine bottled water and similarly-packaged tap water; most diners preferred the tap water in this pseudo-blind test.

• The subject matter is ridiculed by Penn and Teller through stunts performed on-set or through stock footage. The approach here seems to complement reasoned argument with straightforward ridicule.

• Penn & Teller often close with an impassioned ethical plea against the subject matter near the end of the show as to why this particular belief is harmful and should be resisted. The presenters distinguish between believers (often saying that they would like to believe also) and direct their anger at the alleged charlatans while showing compassion towards the merely hoodwinked.

Episode list

Season 1 (2003)

1. Talking to the Dead
2. Alternative Medicine
3. Alien Abductions
4. End of the World
5. Second Hand Smoke / Baby Bullshit (educational products for babies)
6. Sex, Sex, Sex
7. Feng Shui / Bottled Water
8. Creationism
9. Self-Helpless
10. ESP
11. Eat This! (Dieting / Genetically modified food hysteria)
12. Ouija Boards / Near-death Experiences
13. Environmental Hysteria

Season 2 (2004)

1. P.E.T.A.
2. Safety Hysteria
3. The Business Of Love
4. War On Drugs
5. Recycling
6. The Bible
7. Yoga, Tantric Sex, Etc.
8. Fountain of Youth (Life extension / Cosmetic surgery)
9. Death, Inc.
10. Profanity
11. 12-Stepping
12. Exercise vs. Genetics
13. Hypnosis

Season 3 (2005)

• A third season of the series has been confirmed (http://www.pennandteller.com/03/ontv.html) to begin in March 2005 [1] (http://www.lasvegasweekly.com/2005/01/20/feature02.html), although no episode topics have yet to be released.

Criticism of the show

Critics complain that Penn and Teller's political and personal beliefs get in the way of making an objective case. Instead of seriously considering the arguments of their targets, they simply assume that the claims are bullshit from the start and then spend the show making them appear foolish. While this approach may be appropriate for issues that are viewed with skepticism by most people (like talking to the dead), some critics say that the technique is unsuitable for murky or controversial issues (like recycling and the environment). Penn & Tellar can also be overly confrontational, brutally attacking and ridiculing people who may be well-intentioned.

Critics also feel the approach tends to weaken the force of the show's argument, since the audience is not getting the whole story, but instead a heavily biased view of the topic. Particularly criticized is the episode on second hand smoke, which features radio talk show host Larry Elders making factual or scientific claims. It also features experts from politically-motivated organizations like the Cato Institute (This episode is negatively reviewed at the web site Disinfopedia). The use of such sources, regardless of the truth of their factual claims, could contribute to the perception of the show as biased.

It is worth noting that Penn and Teller explicitly admit to being "bullshit artists" themselves. In the first aired episode they claim that the nature of the topics requires them to use such brute language and over-extended criticism, rather than "spend the rest of [their] lives in court". They don't seem to mind the criticism: quite to the contrary, they seem to induce it willingly, with the direct intent of exposing as much of what they see to be "bullshit" as possible, regardless of the apparent and undisputed bias.

External links

• Official web site (http://www.sho.com/site/ptbs/) (can only be accessed from within the United States)
• Article on Slate (http://slate.msn.com/id/2098134/)
• Episode guide (http://www.tvtome.com/PennandTellerBullshit/guide.html)
• Penn and Teller: Bullshit! SourceWatch critique of Second-hand Smoke and Environmental Hysteria (http://www.sourcewatch.org/wiki.phtml?title=Penn_and_Teller:_Bullshit!)