The lecture dealt with issues such as neuroscience, human biology and evolution, but Shermer used techniques such as optical illusions and puzzles to cleverly tease the audience and demonstrate that it’s the human propensity to pattern seek that has led us to become superstitious, then in turn this leads us to believe in conspiracies, the supernatural and other “weird things.”

“You’re not doing science anymore if your looking for supernatural or paranormal explanations. In fact, I’d say there’s no such thing as the supernatural or the paranormal,” Shermer said. “Those are just words, linguistic placeholders for things we can’t explain yet. They don’t exist at all.”

In the lecture, Shermer went through many issues he said need a lot of debunking.

He touched upon the conspiracy theories surrounding the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, those in denial of global warming and mind readers.

Also hoping to debunk UFO claims, Shermer spoke about reasons people believe they’ve seen UFOs, a point of view Shermer has expressed on Larry King Live while debating people who claimed to have been abducted by aliens.

Shermer argues all these experiences can be explained by neurological effects in the brain through scientific investigation.

As for the eye witnesses to UFOs, Shermer’s stresses they are just that — unidentified flying objects, and that just because something is unidentifiable, doesn’t mean it’s made from aliens.

“Before we say something is out of this world, we should first make sure that it’s not in this world,” he said.

Madison Heights resident Matthew Gezewich said Shermer’s lecture was funny, as well as intellectually stimulating. Gezewich said it left him embracing skepticism as a tool to find the truth.

“I think that we would do much better to think about things rather than submit to unproven authorities,” Gezewich said.

MSU’s Center For Inquiry board member Christian Orlic helped organize Shermer’s appearance and was happy to bring someone who has influenced his own thinking to MSU.

“I’m a big fan of his writings,” Orlic said. “It’s always exciting to meet people who you admire.”

Orlic has been with the Center For Inquiry for three years and has enjoyed being involved with the interesting, inspiring and problematic topics the group discusses.

Jefferson Seaver, director of Center For Inquiry in Michigan, said the group’s mission statement is a broad one that covers enough ideas to get many people involved.

“Our mission statement is to foster a secular society, specifically through science, reason, freedom of inquiry and humanist values,” Seaver said.

Shermer said it’s a mission that’s worth promoting.

“The reason it’s important is because it’s so easy to fall back into paranormal, pseudoscience, superstitious magical thinking,” he said.

“It’s sort of the default position everybody goes to and we need to override that with a new program. So basically we’re reprogramming people not what to think, but how to think.”