People

See James Randi in Norway – Live Online Video on Monday

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I’ve simply cut and pasted this from here where the original was (well) written by Sadie Crabtree. It hit my “Oh thats cool” button, and yes indeed, I’m a JREF fan and 100% support all that they do. If you are not familiar with the JREF you may be interested in checking them out, I do highly recommend you to do so.

James Randi is traveling throughout Norway for a public awareness campaign sponsored by the Norwegian Humanist Association. Friday night he gave a lecture to a packed theater in Oslo, where more than 2,500 lined up to get one of the 1,000 seats for his free presentation.

Randi’s next talk in Trondheim will be broadcast live online by the University student association Studentersamfundet, beginning at 1:00 p.m. Eastern (10:00 a.m. Pacific) on Monday. Bookmark this link and tune in on Monday to watch.

Randi has given nearly a dozen interviews to Norwegian TV, radio, podcasts and daily newspapers—about homeopathy, Uri Geller’s recent visit, and the strange beliefs of the Norwegian Princess Märtha Louise. We’ll put some of these online when they’re available in English, along with video of Randi’s lectures.

If you’re in Norway, you can find Randi’s tour schedule here.

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Crises in Japan – Its not a numbers game

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It has not just been one disaster, but instead is disaster heaped upon disaster three times over. First the earthquake, then a Tsunami, and now the growing Nuclear crisis. Just one is a national catastrophe, but all three together is truly hard to grasp. This is not a story of anonymous numbers in a far away place, its about people, just like you are me.

It is times like this that brings out both the best in people and also the worst. The kooks quickly rush in spouting nonsense about super moons being the cause, or simply religious crap about the wrath of made-up gods, but I don’t propose to rant about them now. Instead I wish to simply focus upon the very human factor here.

This is not a numbers game, these are people we can all empathise with, for they are us and we are them, we are all related and have a common ancestor. There is a common belief in some minds that only the religious can empathise with others, but it is times such as this that such myths are washed away by the stark realities of this human tragedy.

In Today’s UK Telegraph, Julian Ryall writes from Ishinomaki …

The atmosphere in the room on the third floor, where 30 children whose parents simply disappeared when the tsunami swept through the town, is very different.

Viewed through the window, the children sit more still and are apparently engrossed in books or card games. They are watched over by other relatives or teachers and we are not allowed to enter or speak with them. Understandably, they do not want their charges to have more reminders of the disaster that has befallen them.

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God and Disaster

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A C Grayling has written a few thoughts that are well worth pondering over, here is an extract.

One thinks with sorrow of the hundreds of thousands whose lives have been horrendously lost or affected by the great Japanese earthquake and tsunami, which will put a black mark against this year 2011 in the annals, coming so soon after the earthquake that hit Christchurch in New Zealand. The events are almost certainly linked tectonically, reminding us of the vast forces of nature that are normal for the planet itself but inimical to human life, especially when lived dangerously close to the jigsaw cracks of the earth’s surface.

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Why Do We So Devotedly Insist On Believing In Nonsense?

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This is a complete cut and paste of a JREF article entitled – Why Do We So Devotedly Insist On Believing In Nonsense? – keep reading, I highly recommend it.

Written by James Randi

Thursday, 10 February 2011 15:55

A survey conducted this month by the Russian Center of Public Opinion Research of 1,600 Russians in different regions of that country has revealed that 32% of them believe that the Sun revolves around the Earth, four percent more than in 2007 when a similar survey was conducted. This fact was trumpeted just as President Medvedev called for national Lunar and deep space programs to be implemented, rather highlighting scientific misconceptions among Russians. That same survey also found 55% of Russians believe that radioactivity is a human invention, and 29% believe that humans lived in the era of dinosaurs. What a strange mixture between scientific ambitions and pure superstition! Right?

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