December 18, 2008

Margaret Kittson

Margaret has over 30 years experience as a teacher and librarian in a range of government and private schools, predominantly in Queensland.
Back in the late 1970s, while working as a librarian at a large metropolitan high school, she had a number of run-ins with fundamentalist Christians, biblical literalists who tried their hardest not only to get “creation science” material placed in the school’s library, but to get what was already there relocated to a science number. For those familiar with Dewey, this means somewhere in the 500s. She had placed their material in the 200s (the division for religion), specifically at 213, the number for “creation”.
Things that upset her are people who think they know everything about education and teaching because they once went to school; people who believe that there are “magic bullet” solutions to complex issues in educating children out there which just need to be imposed on to recalcitrant teachers. In February 2006 she had a “close encounter of the first kind” with one such purported “magic bullet” solution: Brain Gym: a set of fun exercises purported to help people “Learn ANYTHING faster and more easily”.
The question which interests her is just how can something grounded in pseudo-science (Applied Kinesiology and Traditional Chinese Medicine are two key components) gain so much traction in educational circles.

May 7, 2008

Fourth Annual Skeptics Trivia Extravaganza


Victorian Skeptics are hosting our 4th Annual Trivia Night at La Notte Restaurant on Monday May 19th.
The Trivia starts at 7.30 pm.

  • NOTE: the earlier than usual start.

As usual, we’ll start gathering for a meal from about 6pm (or earlier!)
Last year’s Trivia Night was our most popular event;
– this year, get your team organised, and if you’re having a meal at the restaurant before the Trivia, please arrive and order early.
As we are offering a number of prizes, your monetary donation will be gratefully received!

Links

Other advertising for the event: http://www.getalife.com.au/ViewActivity.aspx?Activity_Id=10664&ref=myrddin

February 7, 2008

Dr Krissy Wilson

Dr Krissy Wilson has just emigrated from the UK and taken up a position as lecturer in psychology at University of Tasmania.
She completed her PhD at Goldsmiths, University of London.
Her main areas of interest are the psychology of belief, the unreliable nature of eyewitness testimony, false memories and the impact of belief.
She has recently published articles in Personality and Individual Differences, The European Journal of Parapsychology and The British Journal of Psychology.
She has also written a recent review of the medium Sharon O’Neill for the Skeptic (UK).
Krissy regularly appears on TV and on radio discussing a variety of paranormal subjects and has recently co-presented �Believe it or not’ for ITV West Country (UK), and hopes to do much of the same here.

December 23, 2007

Dr Krissy Wilson's Talk Outline

As opinion polls from around the world repeatedly show, levels of belief in the paranormal are high and show no signs of falling.  Skeptics remain unconvinced by the scientific evidence put forward in support of paranormal claims but it is clear that members of the public are not basing their opinions upon such evidence. Either, at least some of these experiences are based upon genuine paranormal phenomena, or people are misinterpreting non-paranormal events as involving forces that do not exist.
Anomalistic Psychology attempts to explain these types of experiences in terms of psychological and in some cases physiological phenomena. This talk will present some examples of the systematic biases in the way in which we process information that may help to explain why so many believe in the paranormal and report ostensibly paranormal experiences. One such example is the role of memory biases. Thirty years of research has shown that memory is not the reliable store that was once thought. Memory is in fact a constructive process, vulnerable to all kinds of misinformation, suggestion and individual biases.
I will illustrate how far individual differences might render someone more susceptible to distortions of memory and in particular how belief in, and experience of the paranormal impact on both perception and memory.

November 27, 2007

About Charles Darwin

Darwin Down House
These pictures are of Down House, Darwin’s home where the majority of his writing was done.
It is located in the pleasant Kent countryside approximately 40 km due south of London. The Darwin Day website contains more information.

1. Darwin married Emma Wedgwood, granddaughter of Josiah Wedgwood I. Darwin’s maternal grandfather was the same Josiah Wedgwood. Emma and Charles were first cousins. An interesting genetics match as they had 10 children, a number of whom led highly successful careers.
2. Darwin never ‘worked‘ for a living. His father being a very wealthy surgeon. In fact he paid for his passage as a young man on the Beagle more or less to be a companion of the Captain. This was a way to finance the voyage and Captains did not want to associate with the underclass of the crew and to a lesser extent the officers. This was also true of Sir Joseph Banks’ voyage to Australia with Cook.
Thanks to Don Hyatt for the photographs.

September 30, 2007

Catherine Deveney


Catherine Deveney is a comedy writer, columist, author, cultural Catholic, born again atheist and mother of three from The People’s Republic Of Moreland. One of her recent campaigns has been against the proliferation of 4WD’s.
On Monday 15th October, Catherine will be discussing her conversion to atheism for The Australian Skeptics at La Notte Restaurant, 140 Lygon Street Carlton at 8pm (Meal from 6pm, donation requested).

August 24, 2007

Jill Quirk and Sustainable Population Australia

 I have been interested in the human population factor in environment since I was a teenager in the 1960s. This came about through an interest in the environment and seeing a threat to wild life at that time as well as a push for and awareness of the need for National Parks in the face of “progress“, population growth and development in Australia. Around that time Paul Ehrlich’s rather alarming but seminal book, The Population Bomb came out and I read it with a large measure of disquiet. Although population was not the main preoccupation of my early adulthood, I later became concerned when it seemed to me that it was not being adequately addressed by environmental groups because it had become a taboo topic: yet population was already having such a huge impact on our environment.
It was and is a continual trade off between development and the environment and it seemed then as now that development was non -negotiable. I heard about Sustainable Population Australia some time in the 1990s and joined in that decade. I was Vice President of the Victorian Branch in 2004 – 5 and I am currently the Victorian President of Sustainable Population Australia, having been elected in 2006 and 2007.
The last four years have been packed with experience and learning. In that time, the current Vice President of SPA Victoria, Sheila Newman and I began using electronic video to record and investigate issues which are related to or dependent upon population growth. This has exposed much discontent which needs to be reported and publicized in the areas of development, democracy, population and environment.
My academic qualifications include a sub-major in philosophy and a degree in Arts/Psychology and French, Audiology and Librarianship along with about 3 years of study in Art, but my current interests are in population, energy and environment as these factors will shape the future of our world.