With all of the fun and fascination at Skeptrack 2009, a couple of controversies emerged in the conversations there. The first, discussed openly in a few panels, was the role of religion in the skeptic/atheist/freethought movement. This is still a sore spot for some, particularly given the wide range of individuals who fall under the [...] [...more]
Every Labor Day weekend 40,000 or so geeks descend on Atlanta to revel in at least four days of Nerdvana at DragonCon (www.dragoncon.org). It’s the largest fan-based popular culture convention in the U.S. There is a fan track dedicated to almost any science fiction, fantasy, horror, game, comic, art, or geek subculture that you can [...] [...more]
Lately I’ve been listening to the archived episodes of the Skepticality podcast. A few weeks back I heard a good quip, one that I’ve been thinking a lot about in the meantime. Unfortunately I’ve managed to forget not only the exact quote, but also the guest who quoted it as well. Leaning hard on my poor [...] [...more]
Early in my Junior year of high school, my mom decided to move back “home” to West Virginia. Well, it was still home for her, at least, but after a decade in Florida it was no longer home for me; I felt terribly out of place. I was a strange and lonely kid who read [...] [...more]
Skeptic. Freethinker. Non-believer. Humanist. Agnostic. Secularist. Deist. Nontheist. Bright. Atheist. Whatever you call us, whatever we call ourselves, two things are certain: there are many who hate and fear these labels…and we nonbelievers are not alone. Despite what you might have heard to the contrary, we never were. From Epicurus in approximately 300 B.C.E. to Richard [...] [...more]
From the newest scientific discovery to the oldest email investment scam, we are pummeled every day with more information – make it bigger, now it’s better, get it faster, but wait, there’s more! With all of the garbage flying around, how do we figure out what’s real? How do we decide when our kids are [...] [...more]
“English doesn’t just borrow words from other languages, it chases them down back alleys and then goes through their pockets for spare metaphors.” – George Bernard Shaw English is the language in which you can tie a bow, choose a beau, or climb to the highest bough, but typically only pull a plow – or a [...] [...more]
