My QED 2012 experience — part 2

(Click here for part 1.)

I bought lunch in the hotel bar (I wasn't going to repeat last year's mistake, when a bunch of us decided to eat out — unfortunately on that occasion service was so slow we had to bring our food back with us, twenty minutes late for Jim Al-Khalili's talk on time travel). So this time it was coffee and a sandwich — basic, cheap and quick — and I'd had a good breakfast, plus I was booked in for the Gala Dinner in the evening.

I was looking forward to Ophelia Benson's talk, titled "Silencing for God", as I read her blog Butterflies and Wheels (at least I try to; she's so prolific it's hard to keep up — a point I made to her in a brief conversation the previous evening during the Mixer). Her first example of free speech suppression was from University College London, where there had been some fuss over the use of a Jesus and Mo cartoon appearing on the Facebook page for the university's Atheist Secularist & Humanist Society. The Students' Union claimed this was offensive and demanded it be taken down. The controversy spread to the London School of Economics with similar results, and even further: award-winning young skeptic Rhys Morgan used the cartoon (actually it was the cover of a Jesus and Mo book) as his profile picture as a mark of solidarity with the ASHS, and his school demanded he take it down — on pain of expulsion. These are classic claims of the right not to be offended — which as it happens is not actually a right. Interesting to note that Rhys Morgan and "Author" (pen-name of the author of Jesus and Mo) were both at QED.

Ophelia had plenty of other examples from all around the world, many using intimidation to stifle free speech. The problem is that religions (of many different stripes) believe they have the right to censor the words of people who don't subscribe to the particular religion that's objecting. It's only by standing firm, en masse, that this kind of thing will be defeated — which is difficult when you're faced with what appear to be genuine threats.

Sarah Angliss delivered a talk-cum-demonstration entitled "Voices of the Dead", which included some highly surreal music and a live demonstration (recording as well as playback) of an Edison Phonograph. Weird instruments were in evidence, including what must be the ultimate weird instrument, a theremin, played by waving one's hands at and around it. The instrument on stage appeared to be commercially produced (it had the "Moog" logo on it). Sarah was another speaker I was keen to hear on account of her reference to a temporary exhibition (which I saw at the Science Museum) of the work of Daphne Oram, including the original "Oramics Machine" used for creating electronic music.


Previously I'd only come across Massimo Polidoro in Skeptical Inquirer, for which magazine he writes a regular column. He's been involved in the JREF Million Dollar Challenge, overseeing many attempts to prove paranormal phenomena, both as part of the MDC and elsewhere, none of which has so far succeeded. His talk, "The Search for Superman", documented some of the more unusual and hilarious of these attempts.


The afternoon concluded with Richard Saunders, well-known to listeners of the podcast The Skeptic Zone, otherwise well-known to viewers of Australian TV. His talk, "The Delights & Dangers of being a TV Skeptic", gave us the inside story on some of the programmes and series on which he's appeared. He also demonstrated the infamous "Power Balance" bracelet, using a not entirely unknown volunteer:

The Power Balance story is one of success for the balanced powers of organised skepticism. After several publicised tests and prolonged media exposure the product — shown to be fake — was withdrawn, and the company sold. Unfortunately other bogus woo has promptly jumped in to fill the gap in a credulous market. Eternal vigilance required!

The Gala Dinner on Saturday evening was a success. I didn't hesitate to book for this optional extra, as last year's was definitely worth it, but how successful it is for any individual depends on whose table you're assigned to, and what mix of dining companions you find yourself amongst. After the dinner, Robin Ince introduced the Skeptic Awards, which were followed by a musical performance from Sarah Angliss, including yet another weird instrument — a sonorous saw coaxed into audibility using a violin bow. Then we had laid-back stand-up from Alun Cochrane (superb), and stand-up plus conjuring from Paul Zenon, whose performance with a full beer glass swinging from a string, while walking among the audience, was as surprising as it was scary (I still wonder if he's ever had a serious accident — and concomitant injury claims — as a result of this reckless stunt). It was, needless to say, the cause of much nervous hilarity.

The night apparently continued with dancing late into the early morning, but I needed some sleep.

My QED 2012 experience — part 1

For me the stand-out features of QED this year were the range of speakers and the socialising. Unlike last year I didn't stay at the conference hotel so I had to carry everything for the day with me — which turned out to be a raincoat and a fairly large camera bag. These, I'm happy to report, didn't impede me much.

Like last year I arrived on Friday, catching an earlier train than I'd expected from Euston, and took my time ambling from my lodging to the Mercure Piccadilly Hotel for a relaxed meal before the Mixer, which was scheduled for 8 but seemed to be in full swing some time before that. By 8, however, wandering through the packed bar area was like swimming through a sea of skeptic celebrities. It's not called the Mixer for nothing and is one of the things that makes QED special. Whether or not they had read Hayley Stevens' blog, many people seemed to be taking her advice about talking to 'strangers'.

As for the event itself, I shall blog about it in short bursts, with photographs:



On Saturday, after Andy Wilson's official opening — not much more than a welcome and some housekeeping, Deborah Hyde kicked off with the historical context of the werewolf myth. Being the first speaker at an international conference can be, I imagine, a bit daunting, but Deborah displayed no sign of nerves even as her microphone was replaced or adjusted only seconds into her talk. Last year's first speaker was Bruce Hood, and I seem to remember he did take a few minutes (though not many) to get into his stride.

Deborah's talk was a new one, though she had given us a sneak preview at Portsmouth Skeptics in the Pub about a month earlier. In her QED talk she outlined the popular myths, and how it might have been reasonable, given the context and specific examples, to believe that werewolves were real. Bringing the myth down to earth, she included some real wolves.



Next was Steve Jones, explaining what is meant by natural selection — immediately illustrating the diversity of speakers and topics at this year's QED: from an investigation into the historical basis of popular myths we had moved on to why evolution, as understood by Charles Darwin (though he never used the word in his Origin of Species), is an undirected process. The example Steve used was the generation of effective shapes for nozzles used in the industrial manufacture of powder, by applying random but small variations to successively more effective shapes, thus refining the efficiency and durability of the nozzles without knowing precisely why they work. It's apparently an engineering technique still in use today.



The last speaker before lunch was David Aaronovitch. I was particularly keen to hear what he had to say as I attended the CFI Conspiracy Theories day at Conway Hall, at which David was scheduled to speak, but he had to withdraw due to ill health. So I was not entirely pleased when he began by announcing that his talk would be completely new and unike any of his previous talks. Nevertheless it was lively and off the cuff — conspiracy theories are everywhere so it's not as if there's a dearth of material — and well worth hearing. He spoke mostly about the conspiracy theory that's grown up around the affair of Dominique Strauss-Kahn — that the allegations against him of attempted rape are part of a sting organised by the French government (or more particularly by factions loyal to Nicolas Sarkozy).

After an equally lively Q&A session it was time for lunch. Topics had already ranged far and wide. More next time.

(Click here for part 2.)

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This is my 600th blogpost. I thought you'd like to know.

Question.Explore.Discover your media here

On Monday evening after returning from QED in Manchester I posted this tweet:

and received this response from Geoff Whelan:

Glad to see suggestions being considered. But you know what? I'm not going to wait. Think of this as a temporary repository for QED media. If you've posted images (photos, sketches, scans), video or audio, or blogged about QED, post links to your content in the comments below and I'll list everything on a special page, which the QED organisers can use or not as the fancy takes.

The page is here:

http://www.evilburnee.co.uk/p/qed-2012-media-links.html

I've put a few links in already, to kick things off.

QEDcon — Manchester, 10th & 11th March 2012

Last February's Question.Explore.Discover conference in Manchester was a great success, and Northwest Skeptical Events Ltd are doing the whole thing again next March. The list of speakers so far announced looks impressive. No news on a "break-out room" yet.

Tickets went on sale today. I've got mine, and I'm booked in to a nearby Travelodge (I note that the conference hotel — the Ramada Jarvis Piccadilly — has upped its room rates, such that the Travelodge is now more than just marginally cheaper.)

If the last QEDcon is anything to go by, next year's should be a superb event and lots of fun, beginning with the meet and greet, pre-registration session on Friday in the hotel bar.

George Hrab at #QEDcon — "The Assumption"

George Hrab not only gave stellar service as MC of the QED conference (Question.Explore.Discover) on the weekend of 5th & 6th February 2011 in Manchester, UK but also performed after the Gala Dinner on Saturday night. This is a sample of his gig, shot on a JVC GC-FM1 pocket camcorder.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YX2exQvY5P0


The quality isn't great, as I was some way away and the lighting levels were fairly low, so the picture is grainy. The image stabilisation in iMovie works well, but judders when camera flashes go off. And I was right next to one of the speakers, which is why the sound is overmodulated in parts. (The JVC GC-FM1 pocket camcorder is fixed-focus and has no adjustments. It's a point-and-shoot camcorder, so I pointed and shot.)

But apart from all that, I'm quite pleased with the result.

QED day two — science-based skepticism

It turns out that during the entire two days I didn't go to any of the events in the breakout room. I don't know what this says about me, or about the main QED speakers, or about the concept of having things going on other than in the main room.

First thing, in the main room, was Michael Marshall on stage to update us on the global #ten23 campaign: Homeopathy — there's nothing in it! He mentioned that earlier in the day (after only two hours sleep) he took part in a brief radio discussion about the campaign, opposite a homeopath who didn't seem to get it (surprise!), and having since heard the piece I'm amazed how Marsh managed to stay cool in the face of the homeopath's same old same old.

As 10:23 am approached, Marsh showed some examples of his "homeopathy hate mail" — to which he always replies politely — and then it was time for the overdose. The pilules provided in unmarked vials to every attendant were apparently homeopathic Belladonna, and on the given signal over three hundred people downed enough "medicine" to ... well, to do nothing at all. And that was the point (a point that, as mentioned above, was entirely lost on Marsh's homeopathic radio opponent).

Wendy Grossman was the first speaker of the day. She's the founding editor of The Skeptic magazine in the UK, and her wide-ranging talk on Policy-Based Evidence emphasised the need to base policy on evidence rather than seeking evidence for policies adopted for other reasons. She touched on copyright, Big Pharma, public relations, ghost-writing of scientific papers and even UFOs — amongst many other matters. I hope there'll be a QED DVD, because Wendy Grossman's talk was one of those content-rich presentations (despite having only one slide) that would repay another hearing.

Simon Singh talked about the Big Bang — which is the title of one of his many books — and he seemed happy to be expounding on something other than libel-reform, homeopathy and chiropractic. I was particularly interested in his take on the Paul Nurse/James Delingpole BBC Horizon clash, as he talked about how non-experts can be expected to come to rational decisions about complex matters such as climate change, which is something I blogged about recently.

Having learned from my experience yesterday, I bought my lunch in the hotel bar and was therefore not late for Jon Ronson's typically idiosyncratic talk, The Psychopath Test, which is also the title of his forthcoming book from which he read some brief extracts. He identified certain characteristics of psychopaths and in the process unwittingly indicted at least half his audience. He also showed some video clips, including from his film about the Bilderberg Group (based on his book Them), and the Insane Clown Posse "Miracles" rap-music video (paused often, to intersperse comments) that he previously showed at TAM London 2010.

Colin Wright demonstrated the maths of juggling, including the idea of a negative juggling ball that goes back in time (to be fair, he also demonstrated how the maths worked for this concept, and showed how it's not actually nonsense). He did make the juggling itself look easy, though it clearly isn't. But the core point of his talk was that maths enables you to make predictions about physical systems (something Simon Singh also touched on). In Colin Wright's case, this enabled him to extrapolate the maths to produce a completely new juggling pattern, which he was able to show to attendees at a juggling conference. (A juggling conference is probably a bit like a skeptic conference, but with more balls.)

Final speaker was Eugenie Scott, director of the US National Center for Science Education. She gave us a run-down of the problems associated with the teaching of evolution in American schools, and how creationists have attempted to insinuate creationism into the school curriculum by various means. The creationists' methods have become more sophisticated over the years, from "scientific creationism" through "teaching the controversy" to "academic freedom". These are lessons we in Britain must learn and take to heart, because the creationists are hard at work in the UK. The Scotland-based UK Centre for Intelligent Design is busy amassing its forces, and will be attempting to inveigle its way into Scottish schools, using the same tactics the Discovery Institute has been adapting for years. Vigilance is essential if we are to prevent children's scientific education being stunted by ID/creationist nonsense.

The closing ceremony consisted of Mike Hall thanking a whole load of people who had contributed in many different ways to the success of QED — and it has been a resounding success — followed by a general exodus to the bar, where it was pleasant to relax off schedule. Eight of us went for a meal at a nearby Indian restaurant, after which we spent the rest of the evening back in the bar. I would welcome the opportunity to do it all again next year.

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Note: due to failure of my netbook during Saturday night, this post was written Monday evening and backdated.

QED day one — your brain lies to you

First day of #QEDcon has been intense. This is my brief adumbration of events, to be expanded (with links) in later posts. (I know I said that about TAM London 2010, but that's an ongoing blogging project, for which your patient indulgence is required. As for this also.)

For QEDcon I thought the biggest problem was going to be deciding when to break out to the breakout room, but at least for today I found my preferences were all for the main room — on the basis that much of what was going on in the breakout room was likely to be accessible at a later date (at least in audio podcast form). The main room is apparently being video-recorded — not just for the projection screens.

Bruce Hood was first up (after George Hrab's introduction) with Hugging Murderers and Stabbing Teddy Bears in which he presented some of the ideas about essentialism that he covered in his book (which I've read, and of which more later). An onerous task — opening the show, as it were — but well handled, and we were soon into the intricacies of evolved cognition. All of us have built-in (not necessarily accurate) ways of interpreting our surroundings, which we never fully grow out of. This cognitive unreliability proved to be a theme of the day.

Professor Hood's talk was a tricky one to follow, but Kat Akingbade gave us her take on the value of faith (a slightly different topic from that scheduled). She also explained that though the target audience of the web series Science of Scams was teenagers, the show garnered a wide demographic, illustrating the critical need for training people to use critical thought.

She described how she elected to adopt a religious faith for one week, in an attempt to enter and perhaps understand the mindset of a believer. This was no doubt useful for experiencing and illuminating the rules and rituals of a particular religion, but since (as she admitted) she didn't actually become a believer — even for a week — I felt this was an exercise of limited merit. It's not the rituals that are the problem with faith — it's the dogma, and those without faith can easily circumvent the most damaging aspects of the dogma because they don't feel bound by it.

Next came the panel Ghost Investigations Today, with Chris French, Hayley Stevens and Trystan Swayle. Some brief exposition on their respective experiences in investigating paranormal activity — whether or not of ghostly origin — and their current methods, yielded insights into what it's actually like ghost-hunting (and why that's not what it should be called). Unlike for the previous two speakers, the panel audio was weak and I missed some of what was being said, including most of the questions from the floor.

The break for lunch wasn't long enough for anyone going farther afield than the hotel bar (as I did, along with others from Winchester Skeptics in the Pub). Which meant that we were late back and missed the beginning (about 20 minutes) of Jim Al-Khalili's talk on time travel. But what I did hear was fascination stuff. He maintains that travelling backwards in time is possible in principle (if not in practice), according to the modern theory of Quantum Gravity — grandfather paradox notwithstanding. (Incidentally I conferred with neighbours and established that I had missed only introductory laying of time-travel groundwork. The tricky bits — like how to to configure your double-wormhole space-time tunnel — came later, which I heard.) Mind-bending though this all is, the science apparently supports it, which goes to show that we can't trust our intuitive conclusions on such abstruse matters.

In a lively talk Chris Atkins demonstrated the blatant perfidy of the British tabloid (and some not so tabloid) press, and included selected clips from the films he's made. If you had any vestige of credulity left regarding the integrity of tabloid journalism in the UK, this talk would have dispelled it.

Chris French's The Psychology of Ghosts and Haunting expanded on some of the topics he touched on in his earlier panel, talking about ghost-hunting kit, predilections and biases. He made the point that the TV show he was on (as the "token skeptic") did not fake any ghostly activity, which explains why nothing much happened, and why the show didn't get renewed. When modern TV ghost-hunters report ghostly activity, they're doing it because they've already convinced themselves that ghosts exist — in spite of the lack of sound objective evidence to support such a conviction.

Last of the afternoon talks was by Steven Novella, who was soon into his stride regaling us with the difference between how the brain subjectively seems to operate, and how the same brain-functions appear to a neuroscientist such as himself. Once again the brain is playing tricks, making us think it works in a particular way, when in fact the science says it simply can't. (This whole discussion is weird anyway; the brain trying to examine itself is almost certainly not party to all the information it needs to do such a thing. If our brains were simple enough that we could understand them, they would be too simple for us to be able to do it.)

Then came a break before the Gala Dinner at 6 pm. This was a sit-down affair with people randomly allocated to tables, each with one of the QED speakers. I found myself seated next to the aforementioned Professor Bruce Hood, who proved to be excellent "value" — keeping us fascinated and entertained with stories from his field of study. I was pleased to say that I'd read his book Supersense, but as it was the Kindle edition I regretted not being able to bring a copy for him to sign.

Dinner was followed by a prolonged sound-check, as the audio set-up seemed to be misbehaving, but it was eventually fixed and Matt Parker introduced Helen Keene standing in for Robin Ince who'd had to pull out at short notice. Helen Keene's interactive history of the space race (including shadow puppets!) was smart, hilarious and incredibly geeky. Matt Parker followed with a freestyle routine on skepticism with a numerical bent (much of which seemed to be a mix-and-match made up as he went along), and George Hrab finished off with a typically polished performance of some of his best-loved songs.

A great day of skeptical infusion. Exhausting too. More tomorrow.

#QEDcon is go for launch.

Via one taxi, a train, a tube, another train and a short walk I'm now in Manchester for #QEDcon, ready for the start of proceedings at 9:00 tomorrow morning.

After settling into my hotel room on the 6th floor I transverticulated to level three where the promise of satisfying comestibles awaited. The said comestibles comprised as much curry as I could consume, notwithstanding permitted platter recharges of unlimited enumeration. So I ate as much as I wanted.

Then to the bar, awash with skeptics from all over the country (plus some from much farther afield). Pre-registration was efficient and friendly, and the QED badges are quite nifty (but it has to be said I'm easily impressed in this department).

Alcoholically lubricated discussion ensued between various attendees regarding the QEDcon schedule (amongst, no doubt, other things), and as far as I can tell a good time was had by all.

But now it's time for bed.

QEDcon is this coming weekend — reports may or may not be erratic

On Friday I'll be heading up to Manchester for QEDcon:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwypRRZ-548


I'll be travelling by train, and unlike previous excursions (which have mostly been shorter than the 4+ hours of the Manchester trip) I hope to be connected while on the move. I'll have my netbook with me, and it's now equipped with a mobile broadband USB dongle. I've no idea how effective this will be out in the real world (as opposed to trying it out in two or three places locally), or what coverage will be like. It could be an interesting experiment. On the other hand it could be intensely frustrating. Expect reports (or not, depending...).

Question, Explore, Discover

Last October I attended TAM London, the first of the well-established Amaz!ng Meetings to be held outside North America. It was a great success, and in less than three weeks I'll be attending this year's TAM London as well. There was considerable fuss over the ticket price of TAM London this year, which I felt was misplaced, given that it's the only major sceptical event to be held in Britain.

But that's only true until next year, because in February we have QED, which stands for "Question, Explore, Discover", and is to be an event of similar nature to TAM, held in Manchester, jointly organised by Greater Manchester Skeptics and Merseyside Skeptics. It's cheaper than TAM London by a significant margin (less so for me, as travelling to Manchester will cost about four times what it costs me to London).

I seem to have acquired a taste for such events, so I am now booked in for QED, staying at the Ramada Manchester Picadilly Hotel, where QED is to be held. The conference lasts two days — the weekend of 5th and 6th February 2011, and includes (at the last count) the following speakers: Steve Novella, Eugenie Scott, Jon Ronson, Jim Al-Khalili, Bruce Hood, Kate Akingbade, Chris Atkins, Wendy Grossman, Colin Wright, Simon Singh, Robin Ince and George Hrab (who will be Master of Ceremonies). That's an impressive line-up by any standards (though it may change — check the website for updates).

There's also an optional extra: a gala dinner on Saturday evening, where QED attendees will be able to "enjoy a delicious three-course meal in the company of our celebrity speakers." Sounds like fun — I'm in.

A "home grown" sceptical event seems like a good idea, and should be encouraged, not least because it reduces the (small) risk of the UK's sceptical agenda being set by one organisation. If successful QED could become a regular event, and I urge anyone whose interests veer towards the sceptical to register for it now. And I'll see you there.