Live Broadcasts R4 Other People

Hullo again. Crikey, what happened to April? (Don’t worry – I know what blogs are like. One day I’ll be writing “Crikey, what happened to the last three years?”)

   Anyway I thought it best to prepare a bit of explanation ahead of the inevitable “car crash” episode of a podcast I’ve been appearing on -"think/RANT" - with two very dear friends, Johnathan Stabler and Steve Brett. Well, maybe not dear friends but we get on very well indeed. Maybe not very well but we’re polite to each other. Okay, we’re a trio of belligerent spite monkeys but we enjoy mulling over the week’s news in a great podcast called “think/rant” which I joined from episode 23.

   The thing is ... it’s recorded live. And it’s available for live streaming.

   This has two very important ramifications. Firstly, there is no editing so I would ask any listener to imagine our chat, banter and repartee to be at least 35% funnier and more professional than it first appears. Maybe even 38%. We should take out the awkward silences, fumbled words, talking over each other and general twatty behaviour but I don’t have the first clue how. I don’t think Steve will be too upset if I refer to John as the technical brains behind the operation. If John sat down to edit the thing he would – and I’m paraphrasing here – “take about ten hours fine-tuning a one hour bloody podcast because I’m a little bit of an OCD control freak. And I have a new baby. Cut me some slack, Trev. Jesus.”

   Or something like that. I don’t remember it all. Bit scary.

   Secondly, there is no editing. If that sounds to you a little bit like point one then congratulations – it is, but there is another serious problem. One of the biggest problems with being variously spazzy* is that I can suffer (don’t you hate the martyrdom in that word?) mental as well as physical aberrations. I have believed bizarre crap while hypoing. I have behaved like an aggressive/ weepy/ terrified idiot for no explicable reason. I have had a phone call whereupon the recipient had time to drive over and treat my hypo while I maintained the hallucinatory conversation with them long after they had hung up (it’s very alarming to tell somebody not to interrupt you because you’re still on the phone – with them).

   The point is that some kind of disaster is fairly inevitable at some point but I will delay it for as long as possible. High blood sugar is the least likely time to have any problems (though a sudden drop from high to less-high is still a problem for me) so I engineer a bit of high blood sugar 8-9 every Thursday night. It means I have to usually top up with a small dose of insulin and stay up a bit later moderating it but I enjoy the hour so it’s worth the kerfuffle. 

   So this entry is for anybody hoping to enjoy think/rant and understand what’s going on; for anybody I may have upset or offended with awful comments or outlandish behaviour; for anybody who enjoys watching formula one only for the crashes and hopes to listen for a similar reason. 

   I may, of course, say something that offended you and truly mean it. I have lots of patience for most people most of the time (I can’t afford not to, to be fair) but the podcast is where we give opinion full reign – that is the point. There’s a good chance I will be annoying somebody (though not purposefully offensive I hope) with sane and well-thought argument but I might just as likely be out of my tree. 

   That’s my (main) problem and hopefully it won’t ruin the podcast. I think a podcast, though, is where my limit lies on “live” performance. If you know how to download a pocast (or indeed, what the Hell a podcast is) then you pretty much know what you’re going to get. A radio broadcast or similar is something people can whine about with greater authority, I believe. So here it is. My standing apology for if (or when) the condition of my conditions leads me to have a brainfart of some kind.

   Don’t forget you can contact the podcast if you have any questions, leave a comment here or at think/RANT’s blog page. I, of course, expect there to be no reply whatsoever until I have an “episode” on an episode.

   See you then. 

*It’s a reclamation of the word, okay? It’s worth doing don’t you think? Cerebral Palsy, spastic colon, Parkinson’s disease, epilepsy and a bunch of other disorders causing spasms or spasticity (for both of which the term “Spaz” has been applied) have been limited by language and need to reclaim it. The “OUCH” BBC radio show is doing a good job with similar words and should be congratulated for it. People are either terrified to talk to a “fitter” for fear of causing offence or are happy to call them “Spaz” as a powerful condemnation. Screw that.

Religions R4 the Religious

Hi, everybody (I say everybody – I mean several ... I say several – I mean both ... I say both ...). Come in, have a seat. I’d offer you a biscuit but even if I had successfully fit all of that last one in the computer I don’t think it would have arrived in an edible state. How have you been? Have you done something different with your hair? It looks gorgeous.

   So, it’s been a while, hasn’t it? I’ve been very busy. I’m sure you’ve been busier but then I’m very, very lazy (I pronounce it “ill” – my partner assures me it’s spelt L.A.Z.Y).

   It’s been a while since I posted anything, right? Well, I have been studying a (part-time obviously) course that lasted eleven weeks so that’s the excuse I’m using. I’ve contributed (is “contributed” the right word for someone who arrives, slags off, talks crap and giggles for an hour?) to a podcast called think/rant. You might want to check it out and even post a review on iTunes. Unless you hate it in which case let’s just both pretend it didn’t happen.

   I’ve got at least one future appearance booked where I intend to rip founder host John a new metaphorical arsehole about the comfortably nihilistic view of Determinism (and hopefully we’ll have another “Religion is a force for good: discuss” rant – I like those) but for now if you want to pretend like you’re in a pub with three poorly informed creepy gob-shites then get episode 23 now. You won’t/will/may regret it (delete as applicable).

   Finally I’d like to remind everybody about their census forms (a day late but come on – you haven’t got around to it either, have you?). In 2001 we all thought we’d be a bit clever and put Jedi on our forms to point out the insanity of insisting that people must identify with a religion. Apparently more of us did that than identified as Hindu but I can’t find the stats so it may be an urban myth (my Google-Fu isn’t up to it – wait ... is Google-Fu another religion?).

   I’d just like to point out something to everybody who doesn’t go to church, doesn’t believe that Christ died for our sins, rose on the third day etc. Please tick the “no religion” box. Don’t worry – they won’t take Christmas away from us. They won’t stop Easter. You can identify culturally as a Christian to oppose things like Sharia law. Sure, I can see that. But you don’t have to line up with Christianity to do it. There is no external benefit to being a Christian.

   Faith schools are not the panacea for education they appear to be, for example. The slightly higher grades they achieve is actually – when you take into account that they refuse admission to “trouble” kids (nice Christian attitude there, by the way) - a lot lower than it should be. The more dogmatic a church is the less charitable it is (if you dismiss donations to churches and pressure groups – as you should).

    You don’t have to call yourself a Christian to be a good person. Look at you – you’re lovely.

   I know only the die-hards have sent their forms back already. It’s only the couldn’t-really-care-lesses left. I hope you do care a bit though. Anglican bishops in the House of Lords are still ruling our lives. Religious dogma stops sensible compassionate laws like assisted suicide, global sex education* and contraception being promoted. Help to take away their unearned legitimacy. We’re not trying to take away their churches or their lovely hats. They can keep them.

   Believe what you want. Don’t tick a box out of fear. Cheers.

*although I’m not entirely sure what global sex is. I’d love to try it.

Festivals r4 Everyone (or “Hannukah and her Sisters”)

Anyone who knows me might expect a righteous rant this time of year about how Christmas is much older than Christianity and Santa is nothing more than an advert for Coke, but I’m not such a cynic. Christmas is lush. I cannot recommend heartily enough Tim Minchin’s white wine in the sun, a beautiful secular carol and I think the Muppet’s Christmas Carol is one of the finest works of cinema of the last twenty years. I’m a sucker for Christmas.

Yes, it does kind of annoy me when the religious bang on about the “true” meaning of Christmas and talk about the nativity as fact but they know as well an anybody (in the UK at least) that it was an ancient winter feast of indulgence long before the Christians made it here. Then, of course, you have the mentals who will bang on about the druids and the pagans and ancient rituals (little realising that most of the gubbins surrounding ancient mysticism was invented in the 18^th or 19^th Century by posh blokes with too much time on their hands). Sigh.

You know what, though? They’re welcome to whatever they want to believe in. Much the same as I believe in every field of thought – follow your own opinion as long as it doesn’t hurt anybody else. Have your festival and dress up, decorate, do what you fancy. Follow traditions or invent your own. Hooray. Everybody part – whoops. Nearly used the word “party” as a verb – have fun.

Oh wait. Hang on.

I can’t let this one slide. I investigated Hannukah. I shouldn’t, I know. There’s no way I’m going to be agreeing with it, so why torture myself? Well, here’s why.

I’ve been watching the excellent “Walking Dead” on FX, and it’s been surrounded by ads for “Joop: Homme” or – as the bloke says – “Jew Pom”. I’ve been so perplexed with a combination of chuckles and shame that it’s been making me think of the plight of the British Jewish Male. Which leads me on to Olly Mann on the brilliant “answer me this”. He (and Helen and Martin-the-sound-man) constantly invite listeners to question everything. And send their questions to him. And for him to answer them. And they’re, like, funny. And that.

But all I can think of in December (since I looked it up) is “Hannukah? Is that it? Seriously?” and I don’t want to so blatantly challenge anybody’s precious beliefs about any holidays.

But come on. Have you heard it?

A tribe called the Maccabees frees their temple from an occupying force. They rededicate their temple by relighting an “eternal flame” but then realise they don’t have enough oil. It will take eight days to make more oil. The oil lasts until more oil is made. MIRACLE!

Whuh?

Let’s pretend for a second that nobody called the leader an idiot for relighting an “eternal flame” without the goods to back it up. Let’s further pretend that the amount of oil originally available was correctly assessed to be only a day’s worth. Let’s add to that pretence the idea that nobody in this new Jewish state would secretly add any oil they found to keep it going. Let us, in fact, go so far as to say that all laws of the natural world insisted that the flame would go out at the end of day one but a deity stepped in and kept the flame burning.

Okay?

Is that it? Is that seriously the miracle on which you’re going to base an entire holiday? God barely turned up. He could have made an actual appearance. He could have spoken with a voice of thunder, sent pillars of smoke or flame, burned bushes, parted rivers, he could have sent them a “thanks for retaking my temple” card from a newsagent.

But no. The light didn’t go out. That’s it.

God barely even got out of bed for that one. This was the snooze button of miracles.

I’m sure there are pompous, pious explanations full of “aah”s and “my poor fool”s and such but truly – I don’t want to throw any kind of challenge to anybody. I support your right to believe if you do. It’s just ... it’s no wonder that when Christianity (itself only a breakaway sect of Judaism after all) came along it did things a bit louder. None of these new ideas were an iota more plausible than the old ones but at least they don’t provoke a reaction of “really? Is that it?”

Still, the great news for modern day Judaism is that Christmas is so decidedly torn from its religious trappings that everybody can fling presents at each other in as ostentatious a manner as they can afford. Just avoid adverts around “The Walking Dead”. You may find them offensive.

Christians should be fine with it; and the show is about creatures risen from the dead – it should be just like Sunday school.*

*it definitely isn’t.

Movements R4 Sphincters (literally)

The Science Punk is wrong.

   In case you don’t know who I’m talking about “Science Punk” is not his real name. For one thing that would make him the unfortunately named “S.Punk” and for another any child with the first name “Science” would likely get beaten to death fairly early on in the British school system.

   His real name is Frank Swain and I should admit here that – even though I intend to disagree with him – he outranks me utterly in sceptical, critical, rational credentials. He’s a genuine science writer, involved in the past with government schemes to improve scientific knowledge. I’m a bit of a shut-in who likes to appear intelligent because he scraped together a Philosophy degree before his health went tits up. Nevertheless, I like a challenge so here goes...

   It seems that Swain sees Skepticism as unfailingly in open warfare with credulity and mysticism. He described things like the 10:23 campaign as misguided because it’s not going to change anybody’s mind. Anybody who subscribes to nonsense is already so invested in it, he argues, that you have to risk using a debating method other than bare facts if you’re going to compel them to change. And I agree with him so far. Thing is, he’s got the wrong target.

   10:23 was not there to make homeopaths slap their foreheads and realise the error of their ways, it was there to make the rest of the population realise something they hadn’t previously been exposed to. We live in a mostly secular country. The figures that religions produce for memberships include everybody who ever signed up. You have to ask for your name to be removed from a religion’s database for it to happen and as so many joined a church because it will look good in the wedding photos, for example, they might feel like a bit of a git for then so obviously withdrawing their support*. Similarly with faith schools (and their misleading monopoly on the selection of well-off children to get better results) you would feel even more dishonest to retract your support in so minor yet so obvious a way after junior gets his A-levels**. That is Britain today.

   Imagine a naked man (steady, it’s not that sort of blog). His left hand, Skepticism, is covered in thick red paint; the right, credulity and mysticism, is covered in blue. The only weapon we reds have is a pot of more diluted red paint (representing facts. Stick with me here, I’m going somewhere). If we keep slapping at the right hand with our diluted paint we may wash away our own sense of purpose. Swain argues that we need thicker paint – stories, anecdotes, parables – because these are the things that change minds.

   I don’t think we need to bother to change those minds. We don’t need to target nutters because they’ll always be selling their snake-oil. We should be showing the rest of the public that critical thinking works because they already agree with us – they just haven’t realised or declared it yet. Just take that red hand and smear it all over the rest of that body. The head, the face, the chest, the arms, legs and feet. Let the blue hand have the cock and balls (that area could do with a bit of magic and mystery, to be honest – and there will always be lies attached to it).

   The British public is already sceptical they are just a bit apathetic but I don’t even feel that we need to target anybody. Swain says that Facebook and Twitter trends are not campaigns, that Skeptics in the pub might be a wonderful social event but it’s also an echo chamber – preaching to the converted - and that blogs are only read by the same supportive crowd. So what?

   There have only been three Cardiff events of skepticsinthepub so far (all excellent) but there was a barman at the pub who, while still fairly baffled as to why we seem to give so much of a shit is clearly a rational person. I haven’t tried to “convert” him or change his mind because that’s patronising and creepy and, well, I’ve been a barman and there’s probably an element of “placate the mentals” to the questions he asks.

   A very good friend of mine is as much a devoted and mildly obsessed Tim Minchin fan as I am but he still enjoys ghost-hunting programmes and activities and why shouldn’t he?

   Another old friend (old as in longstanding - she is utterly youthful) asked on Facebook about a “traditional” and “alternative” therapy I hadn’t heard of. By using the word “Skeptic” in my search terms I found enough references to bullshit phrases to offer an opinion. Without that word, without those blogs to steer my search I would have encountered page after page of personal anecdotes.

   I’m not looking to convert anyone. I don’t think we need to. Just like millions vote for a party but there are only a few thousand actual members, we are the active members of a sceptical movement but there are millions of supporters out there who would vote along with us if they just get informed. Let people have their beliefs; we can’t prove it wrong and it helps them but equally they can’t prove that it’s right so it shouldn’t hurt us. As long as that balance is maintained we don’t need to attack anybody. 10:23 spoke out to raise debate because of diverted NHS funds and I think it was very good try.

   As for Swain’s attack on Skeptical terminology I completely agree with him. It is so tiresome to hear or read a coherent opinion derailed by childish name-calling. And everybody who does it is a nob-head (see what I did there?)

(In that spirit maybe I should add a glossary of sorts so that everybody who is sceptical but doesn’t yet appreciate the fact can follow the Skeptical scene without recoiling in confusion or disgust. In fact yes, I think I will. There, I’ve committed to it in front of a reading audience of literally several people. ... If I’m lucky) 

   So, yeah, go ahead and download Swain's talk from the Westminster Skeptics (available on iTunes and such. It's from August. I'm that topical, me). It's a great talk (almost) full of very good points. There. I've done a blog on that now. Point proved, job done (just listen to the talk).

*You shouldn't. They built that church by exploiting your ancestors. Take your place inside.

** Yeah, you shouldn't really feel bad about this either. Faith schools have achieved good results by neglecting to choose disadvantaged kids. They should be performing better.

Skeptics R4 Teapots

   There's a worrying new trend in today's skeptical blogging, podcasting and even in skeptical conversation. The skeptical movement is something I profoundly care about (I won't say "passionately" - people oversue that word far too much. I am committed to skepticism but I do not wish to lick its nipples) but it is being encouraged over a philosophical cliff; whether it is being led by the nose or pushed up the ass I cannot say - maybe you can help.

   The problem is exemplified by the Pod Delusion badge "Russell's Teapot".

   The Pod Delusion is a wonderful skeptical podcast edited and presented by James O'Malley - a man who, although his delivery in early episodes suggested mild autism, has grown into a confident wit and a guide through the emergent skeptical scene. The problem is not him. It's the badge. The badge with the damn teapot.

   I'm not going to stand on a chair at the next Skeptics In The Pub meeting yelling, "I actually studied Philosophy; I outrank you!" for two reasons. 1) there are people with far better and more profound qualifications than I in the room and 2) I am actually one of the dumbest people in that room and that includes a 16 year old boy in that list of cleverer buggers. What I will say is that a strict course of Philosophical study - examining the propositions of humanity's cleverest people and working out why they were wrong - gives you decent analytical skills.

   (not the bogus analytical skills asked for in job applications ..."If I were Freddie Kreuger and I developed anal fissures I would use my analytical skills and realise that taking my glove off before I wiped my arse would probably help" ... "Congratulations. Have a headset and a cubicle")

   As I was saying... I can't help noticing something that happens when people become skeptics. They escape the dogma and conditioning of religion and/or the Daily Mail. Hooray. One less moron in the world. I think ... did you feel that? I think the world actually got a little lighter. So Skeptic Joe reads a few Dawkins books, listens to some podcasts, reads a few blogs. He hears that "undisprovable hypotheses are scientifically worthless" and of Russell's teapot.

   From wikipedia...

   "If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense."

   Suddenly everything is a teapot. The self is a delusion. The mind is merely a bi-product of electrical impulses. Emotions are nothing but deterministic responses, devoid of meaning. Guilt, innocence or justice are abstract and pointless.

   "Look at me," shouts Joe, "I'm an electrical flesh machine racing to oblivion. That's right, I believe in materialism and nothing else. Aren't I brave? The void awaits me. I'm so grown up. Somebody should make a film about me now."

   - sigh - 

   I'm sure you're not like this but maybe you know somebody who is. Skeptics should not be so dismissive, surely. Here is where many immeasurable things differ from God or the teapot.

   They affect the world.

   There are things that unequivocally exist that affect our material universe without being material themselves. Mathematics or geometric principles, for example. Can you find a principle? Or some maths? Can you bring it to me on a bed of lettuce? No. No, you can't.

   What about things like subatomic particles? Are we actually looking at and measuring the particle itself? I'm pretty sure we're measuring only its effects in certain conditions (technically true of everything but that's a semantic debate for another time). Weirder still are purely theoretical things like solid objects with more than three dimensions or the square root of minus one. Both impossible things in out universe but both are (apparently) used in equations and formulae to practical effect.

   My point is that we shouldn't dismiss ideas of different "planes of existence" as just simplistic nonsense. To say a concept or a law or a mind may have existence doesn't mean it's hovering around nearby, only visible in infra-red, leaving ectoplasm behind it. I want to discuss ideas with skeptics precisely because so many bad ideas will have been automatically discarded but a couple of metaphorical babies may have been thrown with all that religious bathwater. I worry that most people wearing the badge of skepticism are also wearing that bloody teapot badge and not entirely getting Russell's point (or at least what I take his point to be). If Russell were a simple materialist his books would have been very different.

   Shorter. Much shorter.

   If I recall correctly he enjoyed raging debates about semantics and meaning and the entire history of Philosophy. That's a whole lot of immaterial, immeasurable ... stuff. The point about his teapot is that in the proposition he points out that he is prepared to redefine it to avoid being proved wrong. That is what makes it absurd and a waste of time.

   I am right and I know I am. Feel free to point out where you think I may have gone wrong (and I'll go back and edit the text. Ha ha! You'll never disprove my ... oh bugger).

Diabetics R4 Logic

   It'a great thing to be a skeptic. A skeptic holds no belief that they are not prepared to defend in a logical argument. We tend to abandon beliefs that prove to be flawed and although we might react like a startled walrus if our own opinions re proved wrong we will ultimately be grateful for the truth. It's a wonderful thing to be able to gather together with like-minded people and although a church wouldn't really be suitable, a church would also serve fewer beers so I think Cardiff skeptics in the pub has it about right.
   But I've asked myself, "self, I wonder what would be the best way to create a skeptic."
   "Oh," I would reply, "Butt, thass norra question, is it, mun? Thassa statement," (my answering self obviously has a broader valleys twang than my asking self), "an' anyway, iss obvious, innit?"
   Clearly the best way to create a skeptic is to train someone to use critical thinking as though their life depended on it. Perhaps in some elaborate "Saw" movie-type-shenanegans we could force somebody to analyse every aspect of their life and kill them if they fail.
   Analyse what you do, what you eat and drink, what medication you take, what exercise you participate in, what rest you get and all the sensory input you receive in case it is deceiving you. And if you get it wrong you die.
   That would do it.
   But of course there already is something out there doing that for us - type one diabetes. We skeptics don't need to torture anybody (Hooray/Gutted - delete as applicable). Yes, I'm banging on about diabetes again. That's a hundred percent hit rate so far but bear with me. I have a theory that type one diabetes necessarily leads to intelligent analysis and I've invented a brilliant new compound word for it.
  The Dialysis theory (brilliantly combining the two essential elements of the theory and eerily foreshadowing the inevitable organ failure that a lifetime on insulin will eventually deliver).
   Having proposed this theory it makes me realise two things.One; I can no longer be quite so chuffed with myself that I saw through the fallacies of religion, pseudo-science and poor journalism unaided, and two; skeptics should really be targeting diabetic clinics for potential members.
   Seriously.
   Type two diabetics wouldn't be so predisposed to analytical thinking and (as they are more likely to be elderly and clinging to comforting beliefs as their condition slides toward death) shouldn't really be targeted for debate. Do you think a munter would really appreciate your advice that an interesting hat might draw attention away from their face?
   ...
   In case you're unsure, the answer is no. No, they wouldn't. Stop being a bugger, you know they wouldn't.
   But type one diabetics? Surely there lies a massive untapped skeptical audience. Next time I'm at my diabetic clinic and I see a young(ish) person I might strike up a conversation with them. We already have one thing in common - I'm writing checks with my stomach my pancreas can't cash, same as them. They must have analytical skill to have survived to this stage and if not, well ... I guess they won't be there to remind me of my mistake next year.
   For all the (both the...? The one...?) "not-skeptic-yet-if-ever"s that read this: if Astrology winds you up; if Derek Acorah seems like a camp but polite thief of money from the deluded and joy from the informed; if the Pape (hey, if it's "Papal" then he's the bloody "Pape". Just because "Popal" sounds stupid is no reason to mess with grammar) seems like the world's best advert for contraception then please check out some skeptical web-sites, blogs or podcasts. Maybe I'll post some links.
   We're not a weird group of freaks, losers, nutters and... hold on.If you can get to the Promised Land in Cardiff on the third Monday of every month and you are even vaguely interested in science, logic, reason. evidence and such then come and hang out with the nicest weird group of freaks, losers, nutters...