August 21, 2011

Leo Igwe in Melbourne

Humanist Leo Igwe, currently touring Australia will be in Melbourne from Thursday 25th  to Saturday 27th of August. Leo is a tireless campaigner against witch-hunting and other superstitions in his native Nigeria.

Subscribers to The Skeptic Magazine will be familiar with Leo through his frequent Reports From Nigeria

  • Listen to ABC Local Radio 774’s Drive Time program at 4:30 pm on Thursday for a live interview between Leo and host Lindy Burns.
  • There are still a few limited spaces available for Thursday evening’s Dinner with Leo Igwe at La Notte Restaurant, Carlton. You must book by ‘phoning 9378 4414 or emailing vic@skeptics.com.au. It’s La Notte’s famous Smorgasbord at $50 per head.
  • Leo Igwe will speak again at a public meeting on Saturday. The Humanist Society of Victoria is joining Vic Skeptics in staging this event. It’s at 2pm at Victorian Trades Hall New Council Chambers at 54 Victoria Street Carlton South. $10 at the door, ($5 concession). Refreshments will be available.

Leo has undertaken that his Thursday and Saturday presentations will be different in content.

For information about Leo Igwe, please see

http://newhumanist.org.uk/2548/witch-hunt-saboteurs?sms_ss=twitter&at_xt=4dcaeb01c8d28212,0

and our previous posts

https://skeptics.cafe/2011/04/02/leo-igwe-tour/

https://skeptics.cafe/2010/07/14/support-for-leo-igwe

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August 17, 2011

Previous Product Reviews

or,

Blasts from the Past

Given that many of our readers have only recently become acquainted with us, we thought we’d revisit some of the more entertaining product reviews that Vic Skeptics has performed in past years.

The Electrostatic Gravitator

Our mate Barrie Johnson combines his two greatest loves, electronics and fossicking: and he knows a bit about electronics – most of his working life was spent as electronics maintenance officer in a major Melbourne hospital.

Barrie Johnson with gold nuggets

In semi-retirement in the early 2000s, Barrie opened a business in the heart of the Victorian goldfields,  servicing and repairing  detection equipment. One day a friend brought in a flash-looking device called The Electrostatic Gravitator.

He’d been so impressed by a prominent advertisement in a glossy American fossicker’s magazine that he bought one, notwithstanding its considerable expense. Unfortunately, once unpacked it failed to live up to expectations.

Barrie promised to look into it (literally). What he discovered was a maze of components and wires. The weird thing was that most of the circuits were open. Things weren’t connected to other things.

Barrie concluded that not only could the Gravitator not work, it was never designed to work. He reported back to his disappointed customer, then went to the trouble of posting a warning to the magazine that it was hosting ads for a dubious product, including technical details. That, he thought, was that.

View More Previous Product Reviews

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August 10, 2011

A Skeptic’s Guide to Free Energy Machines

This article first appeared as a Vic Skeptics discussion pamphlet. It was written several years ago by our good friend Peter Barrett of Canberra Skeptics, but it’s up to date: from time to time these machines still get promoted in niche magazines and websites. 
The full range of our discussion pamphlets can be downloaded here: http://www.skeptics.com.au/resources/educational/or by clicking on the “Useful Info” link at the top of this page.

Imagine you have an ordinary one litre jug. Two things which I’m sure you’d agree with are that you couldn’t pour more than a litre of water into it or empty more than one litre out of it.

Now imagine you had two such jugs, one full to the brim with water and the other empty. Pour the water from one jug to the other and back again. Repeat this process as often as you like. Is there any way you could imagine that you’d end up with more than one litre of water split between the two jugs?

The logical answer is “No.” In fact, due to spillage and evaporation, it’s more likely that you’d end up with less than one litre of water.

This is a fairly accurate representation of one of the most basic principles of physics, known as Conservation of Energy. This principle states that energy can change form, but can’t be destroyed or created. A good example of this is the production of household electricity in Australia. Most electricity in Australia is generated by burning coal. The coal has chemical energy. When it’s burned, it releases heat energy.

This energy heats water to steam, which turns a turbine (kinetic energy). The turbine drives a generator, producing electrical energy. We then use this electrical energy for heating, cooling, running the TV, and so on. View More A Skeptic’s Guide to Free Energy Machines

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August 5, 2011

The Census and Question 19

Tuesday 9th of August is Census Night in Australia. Question 19 asks What Is the Person’s Religion? It’s the only optional question.

Skeptics generally do not get involved in mainstream religious matters, preferring to concentrate on pseudoscience, fraud and the paranormal. However, from time to time we react to perceived abuses; examples include teaching Creationism in Science classes, government spending taxpayer’s money on a papal visit, and arguably unconstitutional School Chaplaincy programs at the expense of secular ethics classes.

The Census Form’s Question 19 may well be considered such an abuse. Whether by design or accident, it is almost a text-book example of push-polling in favour of entrenched interest. Our advice, if you believe in the principle of enlightened self-interest, is to answer Question 19 honestly, for yourself and for every member of your household. View More The Census and Question 19

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July 31, 2011

“Mixed Bag” August 2011 Answers

1. a. Matt  b. Jim  c. Dick  d. Chris  e. Sally  f. Dinah  g. Justin

2.  Hourglass / egg timer

3. Lionel Rose

4. Shoes; that he was dead

5. Menzies, McEwen, McMahon

6. 27th

7. Yachting

8. My Fair Lady is by Lerner and Lowe; the others are by Rogers and Hammerstein

9.  Clogged drains

10. Entails  (although SALTINE or ELASTIN might be accepted under some rules!)

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July 22, 2011

Jason Brown on Online Activism

Back in June Jason Brown (who will be well known to listeners of the Skeptic Zone podcast) visited the Vic Skeptics Cafe to talk about online activism.

Online communication and social networking has led to a huge spike in our ability to reach out to the community, both in terms of education and in response to social and political issues

Twitter, Facebook and now Google Plus are offering more and more opportunities for us to spread the word that critical thinking and rationality are the way to go.

Here Jason talks about the Australian Christian Lobby’s attempt to remove a safe sex advertising campaign, and social media’s devastating (to them) response.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0pUq8nRroGk]
View More Jason Brown on Online Activism

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July 19, 2011

Cleaning up the Medicine Cupboard

This post is a mixed bag of alternative medicine news featuring the TGA, Dr Ken Harvey, magic bracelets, magic pills and magic spray.

Do you recall our story about the health giving jewellery that could be purchased from Qantas duty free? Dr Ken Harvey put in a complaint to the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA)’s Complaints Resolution Panel (CRP) about the same. The complaint was upheld; the CRP asked for the withdrawal of advertising.

click full size

A company called Alpha Flight Services Pty Ltd handles the sale of duty free items on Qantas flights.

Alpha Flight Services Pty Ltd also stated that, in response to the complaint, they had “acted promptly to withdraw all promotion of the products online” and had stopped selling the products.

In part the decision says:

The Panel was therefore satisfied that the advertisements contained many claims that had not been verified, were likely to arouse unwarranted expectations, and were misleading. These included the claims that the advertised products could improve heath, improve metabolism, improve or encourage blood circulation, expel toxins, reduce stress, improve sleep, lift alkaline levels in the body, neutralise acidic toxins, return the body to a natural state of balance, enhanced the immune system, reduce stress View More Cleaning up the Medicine Cupboard

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