EP 47 – Darby Orcutt – Academic Researcher willing to Dive into the Strange
A first generation college graduate now on faculty at North Carolina State University, Darby Orcutt never stopped being curious about the world. A librarian, instructor, and researcher, his expertise at the intersection of science and culture is both intellectual and applied, as he teaches and writes about science and society while also building collaborative scientific teams to tackle complex problems and fostering conversation between researchers and the broader public.
Darby Orcutt is especially known for his work on science and the strange - that is, the paranormal, fringe science, edge science, or just “the weird.” His NC State course "Science, Psi, Sasquatch, and Spirits" examines how science actually works by looking at fields of scientific inquiry outside the mainstream. Orcutt has also built collaborations with top scientific researchers - in genetics, forensics, chemistry, anthropology, and more - to seriously assess the best potential physical evidence for Bigfoot. The first results will be coming in 2022.