Beleth
FAQ Creator
- Joined
- Dec 10, 2002
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Here is a transcript of the notes I took on Friday at TAM4. All misunderstandings and misquotes are my fault. After-the-fact notes are in parenteses and italicised. I sat next to Roadtoad the first day, and he too far more notes than I did. Maybe we can persuade him to post his notes too!
Anyway.
Christopher Hitchens - "Mr. Jefferson, Shore Up This Wall!"
(So I get to start this off by saying that I can't find the notes I took for this. I remember that he talked a lot about Jefferson's slave-mistress and that he was hung over to the point of near-unintelligibility.)
Michael Shermer - "The Soul of Science"
"The Soul of Science" is an essay published in mini-book form that Shermer wrote to be a rebuttal to the book "The Purpose-Driven Life".
Happiness - Liberty - Purpose
It is moral to seek these things, and it is better to achieve these when others also achieve them than to achieve them at the expense of others' achievements.
Science doesn't really diminish the wonder and enjoyment of the world and of beauty.
(He mostly just read his "The Soul of Science" book, which was a bit of a letdown to be honest.)
Murray Gell-Mann - "Daze in Washington"
Nobel Laureate
Served on a lot of government science advisory panels for a lot of presidents, going back to Kennedy.
Talked about his experiences in such panels
Nixon - disbanded PSAT (I'm pretty sure I got that acronym wrong)
Reagan - "Raygun" - picked awful advisors
Bush, Clinton, Gore
- He liked meeting with all of them
- They were all bright, quick, and interested in science
Stanley Krippner - "Rape, War, and AIDS"
He has written books on dreams and hypnosis
President of Parapsychological Association
The rate of civilian deaths has increased from 45% to 88% in the last century, and not just because of bombs and guns and stuff
Rapes drastically increase during wars & civil wars
This increases the spread of AIDS
Education does a lot of good to prevent this
ABC - Abstinence, Be faithful, use Condoms
This is the best maxim. If you can't abstain, be faithful. If you can't be faithful, use condoms.
But when the US gives aid during these times, they make the countries they help sign an abstinance-only agreement... which makes the AIDS rate go up
James Randi - "So Little Time, So Much To Do"
Went into detail about a test he performed on homeopathic "doctor" Bienveniste of France.
He went over to France to investigate this guy, and was met at the hotel by two solemn-looking men who told him that people simply don't investigate people with PhD's like Bienveniste. Apparently this is cultural thing in France - scholars just aren't questioned.
The scientific procedures Bienveniste and his colleagues used stunk - they didn't have proper double-blinding, for example.
Penn Gillette - "Q&A"(This was a long Q&A session with Penn. It turned out to be mostly questions about "Bull****!", especially what was coming up in the next season and whether they will ever do a show on Scientology. The answer was no, they wouldn't do a show that delved into any one religion, although religion in general was fair game.)
Nadine Strossen - "The War on Civil Liberties"
She's the president of the ACLU.
Jimmy Carter thinks that science doesn't conflict with religion.
The Supreme Court issued a very narrow ruling over a VT law banning abortions for young women (what she didn't say about the ruling was the additional "without parental notification", which changes the whole meaning of the ruling).
"The Silver Ring Thing" - some fundie program about abstinence.
REAL - Real Education About Life
- A bill submitted by the ACLU
- The important part of the bill is the statement that "educational programs must be scientifically based".
Zero tolerance for drugs - another attack on liberties.
Gonzalez vs. Oregon - death with dignity act.
Medical Marijuana laws
The federal government threatens to revoke the licenses of doctors who act scientifically and within the laws of their state.
"No fight for civil liberties ever stays won."
Panel - "Science in Politics and the Politics of Science"
Jamy Ian Swiss, Moderator
Shermer, Randi, Penn, Strossen, Leon Jaroff, Gell-Mann, Carolyn Porco
Porco: "We are both the beneficiary and the victims of the partnership between science and politics."
Sherman: "We're so used to Big Government funding Big Science that we've forgotten how to do it any other way."
Anyway.
Christopher Hitchens - "Mr. Jefferson, Shore Up This Wall!"
(So I get to start this off by saying that I can't find the notes I took for this. I remember that he talked a lot about Jefferson's slave-mistress and that he was hung over to the point of near-unintelligibility.)
Michael Shermer - "The Soul of Science"
"The Soul of Science" is an essay published in mini-book form that Shermer wrote to be a rebuttal to the book "The Purpose-Driven Life".
Happiness - Liberty - Purpose
It is moral to seek these things, and it is better to achieve these when others also achieve them than to achieve them at the expense of others' achievements.
Science doesn't really diminish the wonder and enjoyment of the world and of beauty.
(He mostly just read his "The Soul of Science" book, which was a bit of a letdown to be honest.)
Murray Gell-Mann - "Daze in Washington"
Nobel Laureate
Served on a lot of government science advisory panels for a lot of presidents, going back to Kennedy.
Talked about his experiences in such panels
Nixon - disbanded PSAT (I'm pretty sure I got that acronym wrong)
Reagan - "Raygun" - picked awful advisors
Bush, Clinton, Gore
- He liked meeting with all of them
- They were all bright, quick, and interested in science
Stanley Krippner - "Rape, War, and AIDS"
He has written books on dreams and hypnosis
President of Parapsychological Association
The rate of civilian deaths has increased from 45% to 88% in the last century, and not just because of bombs and guns and stuff
Rapes drastically increase during wars & civil wars
This increases the spread of AIDS
Education does a lot of good to prevent this
ABC - Abstinence, Be faithful, use Condoms
This is the best maxim. If you can't abstain, be faithful. If you can't be faithful, use condoms.
But when the US gives aid during these times, they make the countries they help sign an abstinance-only agreement... which makes the AIDS rate go up
James Randi - "So Little Time, So Much To Do"
Went into detail about a test he performed on homeopathic "doctor" Bienveniste of France.
He went over to France to investigate this guy, and was met at the hotel by two solemn-looking men who told him that people simply don't investigate people with PhD's like Bienveniste. Apparently this is cultural thing in France - scholars just aren't questioned.
The scientific procedures Bienveniste and his colleagues used stunk - they didn't have proper double-blinding, for example.
Penn Gillette - "Q&A"(This was a long Q&A session with Penn. It turned out to be mostly questions about "Bull****!", especially what was coming up in the next season and whether they will ever do a show on Scientology. The answer was no, they wouldn't do a show that delved into any one religion, although religion in general was fair game.)
Nadine Strossen - "The War on Civil Liberties"
She's the president of the ACLU.
Jimmy Carter thinks that science doesn't conflict with religion.
The Supreme Court issued a very narrow ruling over a VT law banning abortions for young women (what she didn't say about the ruling was the additional "without parental notification", which changes the whole meaning of the ruling).
"The Silver Ring Thing" - some fundie program about abstinence.
REAL - Real Education About Life
- A bill submitted by the ACLU
- The important part of the bill is the statement that "educational programs must be scientifically based".
Zero tolerance for drugs - another attack on liberties.
Gonzalez vs. Oregon - death with dignity act.
Medical Marijuana laws
The federal government threatens to revoke the licenses of doctors who act scientifically and within the laws of their state.
"No fight for civil liberties ever stays won."
Panel - "Science in Politics and the Politics of Science"
Jamy Ian Swiss, Moderator
Shermer, Randi, Penn, Strossen, Leon Jaroff, Gell-Mann, Carolyn Porco
Porco: "We are both the beneficiary and the victims of the partnership between science and politics."
Sherman: "We're so used to Big Government funding Big Science that we've forgotten how to do it any other way."
