SFU Skeptics

Hey everyone! It was a fantastic Week of Welcome and the visit from Greta Christina was a complete success.

However, there’s still some work ahead. The Skeptics are at Clubs Days tomorrow (Tuesday) and Wednesday, and the first meeting will be on Friday (at 5 in the Pub). We’ll need people at the table at all times between 9:30 and 2:30 on these days, so if you are available at all during those times and want to contribute, then we want you.

Thanks!

George

Hello, everyone! This is just a last minute reminder that renowned activist Greta Christina is presenting her lecture “Atheism and sexual ethics” in AQ 3005 at 2:30 pm today followed by “Diversity in the atheist movement” at UBC at 7:00 pm in WOOD 3.

The lecture is free, and a lot of preparation has gone into it, so it promises to be a good event. Coming to the show would also help out the Skeptics in a big way.

I look forward to seeing you there,

George

Welcome back everyone!

We hope you had a great summer. There’s a lot of great events planned for the SFU Skeptics this year, so listen up:

Tabling

Again this year, we will be at Week of Welcome (September 7-10) in Convo Mall with the other service/religious clubs, so drop by and say hi or help out if you have some time. We will also be tabling at clubs days on Wednesday and Thursday (September 15 and 16), so check us out then. We need your signatures to know you still want to be members of the club!

We need to table from about 10 to 4 on each of those days, so email your availability to George.

Greta Christina

Atheist and LGBT writer and activist Greta Christina will be in town on Thursday, September 9 to speak at SFU and UBC.

At 2:30 PM she will be speaking in AQ 3005 on Atheism and Sexual Ethics and at 7 pm she will be speaking at UBC on Diversity in the Atheist Movement in Wood 3. After that she will appear at the Railway Club downtown for a free reception.

Definitely try to make at least one, if not all, of these talks.

Annual Humanist Picnic at Peace Arch Park

On Sunday, September 12 the BC Humanist Association will be travelling to Peace Arch Park for a picnic with the Victoria Humanists and a couple humanist groups from Washington state. The fun takes place from 11-3 and the meeting will be held on the American side (you can park in the Canadian parking lot and walk across the border).

If you need a ride (or are driving and want to offer some rides), you can try meeting at the Oakridge Seniors Centre where some people will be driving from. Expect to leave there at no later than 11 am.

It’s a potluck, so bring a dish to compliment salmon. Condiments, shelter, tables, grill, plates, and utensils will be provided.

First SFU Skeptics meeting

The first of our weekly meetings will happen on Friday, September 17 at 5:00 PM in the Pub (if it’s open, otherwise at Club Ilia or the Renaissance Coffee at Cornerstone). Come on out to hear about more exciting events and to get involved in the club.

The BC Humanist Association registered a marching group in the Vancouver Pride Parade and invited all local humanists, atheists and skeptics to march with them. A number of members of the SFU Skeptics showed up and brought out our banner.

George was interviewed for the third time by CJSF (first and second time), although I’m not sure if/when this will be going to air.

Here’s a video of some of the fun:

And finally, our biggest fan in the audience:

For more on skeptics in the Pride Parade read reviews at Terahertz, Crommunist Manifesto and Intellectual Waste.

I hope to see you all out there next year!

SFU Skeptics president George Parker was on CJSF radio again last Wednesday to talk (again) about vandalism occurring to our “There’s Probably No God…” banner. This time, someone painted a splotch over the display case where it was hanging to cover the “No God” part of the sign.

The SFSS is getting the case cleaned while the banner is in storage (it did appear in the Pride Parade though).

The Peak briefly covered the story here with quotes from Vice-President Jakob Liljenwall.

Here’s the audio:

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Hi everyone,

I just wanted to let you know about some upcoming events being held around town that you should check out:

This Sunday, July 25 at 9:30am at the Oakridge Seniors Centre (at the back of Oakridge Mall, Vancouver), the BC Humanists are hosting a memorial for Zoltan Weiss, a humanist who died recently in New Westminster and left most of his estate to Humanist Canada. Not too many humanists knew him around here, so a humanist officiant is flying in from Ottawa to perform the ceremony. If you’ve ever wondered what a humanist ceremony was like or have questions for the officiant, feel free to come by.

For anyone in Richmond, there’s a Skeptics in the Pub being held on Monday, July 26 at Legends Pub.

On July 30, atheist blogger and biologist PZ Myers is speaking for CFI Vancouver at UBC. See CFI’s website for more details. Tickets are $10 for the general public, $7 for students and free for CFI Members (only $20 for students). There will be a ticketed reception after if you want to go drink with PZ Myers (well worth it). Dr. Myers will be speaking on “Atheism in the Scientific Battleground.”

On August 1 the BC Humanists will be marching in the Vancouver Pride Parade and are inviting any and all freethinkers in the lower mainland to join their troupe. More information is available on the Facebook event, or email me.

On the weekend of August 7-8, a bunch of skeptics from the Skeptics in the Pub group are planning a trip to Victoria. Meet some Island Skeptics and maybe even Junior Skeptic editor Daniel Loxton. For more information check out the Facebook event.

On August 13, CFI is presenting Dr. Christopher DiCarlo, a professor of bioethics and 2008 Humanist Canada Humanist of the Year. Dr. DiCarlo will be giving a talk entitled “We Are All African.” More information and tickets to come at the CFI website.

On August 14, CFI is launching a book club at The Grind Cafe on Main Street. The first book will be Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Infidel. For more information see CFI’s website.

Check out CFI for more local upcoming events. Hopefully we’ll get another couple meetings in soon.

Ian Bushfield, Treasurer

MORE IMPORTANT NEWS:

Now that 6 of us are trained for Free Geek, today I phoned them to book our Friday volunteer hours. Unfortunately, hey are completely booked this Friday! So I booked the hours for NEXT Friday, which is definitely happening. Hope that works for all of you.

On the bright side, those of you who would like to participate but who were not able to attend the events this week can now participate next week! If you have never received a Free Geek orientation, they will be giving the one-hour seminar next week on Wednesday at 4:00 pm, allowing you to participate when we volunteer on Friday July 2.

Just to make this clear: We are still volunteering, but now it’s on Friday 2 July at 2:00 pm to 6:00 pm instead of this week.

Thanks,

George

Although we asked them several times and more than a week in advance, the folks at Free Geek told us that we could just drop in and they would give us our orientation on Friday.

Today when I phoned them they told me that they will not orient us on Friday, and that we will thus have to go …in for orientation on Wednesday (Tomorrow)! I apologise for the short notice, but it really wasn’t our fault.

So, here’s the deal:
- 4:00 pm, Free Geek, 1820 Pandora Street #2b
- Get your orientation if you want to participate. I’ll be there getting mine.
- If you’ve already been oriented, you don’t have to be there on Wednesday.

Once again, sorry.
George

I just got an email announcing a new meetup that’s starting Monday at the Railway Club (Seymour and Dunsmuir St. downtown). It’s organized by UBC’s National Core for Neuroethics and is called Café Neuroéthique. Here’s some info:

VANCOUVER CAFÉ NEUROÉTHIQUE
Do you ever wonder what your brain might reveal about you? Are you excited by news stories that claim scientists have found love, prejudice, or faith in a particular part of the brain? Or do you worry about how information from brain scans might be used in court, in business, or in health insurance?
If so, Café Neuroéthique is for you! As neuroscience provides ever more information about the neural bases of disease, development, thought, personality, and behaviour, it also raises questions about how this information should be used. At Café Neuroéthique, we explore these questions through informal discussions, presentations, and arts events. You might meet a physician, ethicist, or philosopher over a drink, or hear a scientist talking about their cutting edge research – but you don’t need to know anything about the brain to come along. The format is relaxed, and you’re welcome to contribute, ask questions, or just sit back and listen.
Café Neuroéthique is based in Vancouver, at the University of British Columbia’s National Core for Neuroethicsin Canada. The Core’s objective is to align innovations in the brain sciences with societal, cultural and individual human values through high impact research, education and outreach.
To RSVP for an event, or to receive notification of upcoming events, send an e-mail with your name and e-mail address to Dr Louise Whiteley – lewhiteley@gmail.com. We also have a facebook group.

And their first event:

CAFÉ NEUROÉTHIQUE PRESENTS:
Interior Traces Film Screening
Monday 21st June, 6.30-8.30pm
Michael is in prison for murder, and thinks a brain scan will help him ‘prove’ his innocence… But is the science ready? And is Michael treated differently because he’s been diagnosed as a psychopath?
Interior Traces is a new multimedia drama exploring how different ways of seeing the brain might change how we see ourselves. Come and find out what happens to Michael at this inaugural Café Neuroéthique event, and join in a discussion about the ethics of his story with psychiatrists, Emily Borgelt from UBC’s National Core for Neuroethics, and Dr Louise Whiteley, who is one of the writers of the play.
The event is free, and drinks will be available for purchase from the delightful Railway Club bar – find us in the back room (and on facebook!)
The Railway Club, 579 Dunsmuir Street, Vancouver, BC V6B 1Y4, Canada

So check them out on Facebook and join up with them if you like stimulating discussions about the brain.

First of all, I’d like to apologise for any distress we caused you or anyone else. The event did not go as we planned, and there were a number of problems preventing us from communicating our message.

The event was intended to be primarily about censorship, and we even had books and information on the table about the history of censorship. Our biggest problem was that a lot of individuals who were not affiliated with the club expressed hateful and even racist points of view, and there was little we could be to stop them, particularly since there was so much going on that we had to deal with. For example, the SFU Skeptics did not put up any advertisements, but someone else put up a number of posters around campus without our endorsement. Many of these posters were racist, and we would never have put them up.

Even at the table, there were only ever two or three club members. From what I saw, there were a significant number of individuals not associated with the club who believed they were supporting us, but who were actually quite hateful and irrational. Any of the posters making absurd or derogatory claims about Muslims would have been drawn by them, not us. We are very upset that such views would be associated with us. We do not share their attitudes or opinions, and we are very upset that they believed we agreed with them.

I want to make things perfectly clear: We do not hate Muslims. We do not hate anyone. The event was supposed to be about freedom of expression, not about Muslims as a cultural group. Although we may disagree with Muslims about a number of things, we have tried to keep our disagreement civil and focused on ideas rather than people. To a great extent we have failed, and we are very sorry. We disown and disavow all portrayals of a derogatory nature. What we intended to draw were stick figures.

At most, the event was intended to criticise Islam as an ideology, not as an ethnic group. Just as we are free to criticise liberalism, socialism, postmodernism, and even religions like Christianity and Buddhism, we are free to criticise the ideology of Islam. However, derogatory portrayals of Muslims as individuals are completely inappropriate and pointless. We are very sorry that such portrayals would be associated with us. As I have said, although it would not have been club members who created them, we disown those images and apologise.

As for the taking of Qu’ran verses out of context, no SFU Skeptic would have said “Muslims are allowed to kill non-Muslims”. That interpretation of the Qu’ran is overly simplistic and entirely absurd. Whoever said it is a fool, and the SFU Skeptics do not endorse that point of view. We apologise and I apologise that we our event provided an opportunity for hatred to be expressed. It will not happen again. I am personally outraged and entirely surprised that any threatening or intimidating remarks would be exchanged at SFU, since I had no idea that discrimination took place here. Of course such remarks would not have come from the SFU Skeptics, and are completely unacceptable as far as we are concerned. The throwing around of threats is precisely what the event was intended to oppose.

If you would like to speak with us face-to-face, please contact me. I would be happy to come to one of your meetings to give an apology and to answer any questions.

Once again my sincerest apologies,
George Parker
President, SFU Skeptics.