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Don Riefler: So It’s Come to This

February 12th, 2010 by Don
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Welcome to Part 12 of my 20 part series “Better Know a Speaker!” Today’s speaker: me, Don Riefler, the fighting Speaker Conjurer!

I’ve been putting this one off because (1) I’m never terribly comfortable speaking about myself, and (2) I was hoping I could just get everyone else done before me so I didn’t feel conceited. But I’ve run out of bios to post, and Skepchicamp is only a few weeks away, so here goes nothing.

Hi. My name is Don Riefler. I’m your friendly neighborhood Supreme Speaker Conjurer right here at Skepchicamp Chicago 2010. In real life, I’m a Direct Care Supervisor at Cary Home for Children in Lafayette, IN, where I work with at-risk youth. I even designed a program to teach critical thinking to them and was privileged enough to be allowed to give a semi-decent speech about it at TAM7. Hey, at least I looked good in my suit.

I graduated from Purdue University in 2006 with a degree in philosophy and minors in English, creative writing, classical studies, religious studies and psychology. Much to my surprise, the job market for that kind of education isn’t very large. I am currently re-attending Purdue in pursuit of a BA in anthropology with plans to attend graduate school in museum studies starting next fall.

My hobbies include playing dirty songs on the guitar, collecting comic books, and rewatching old episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I am obsessed with Mythbusters, Ghostbusters, and the Fallout franchise of video games. I make serious plans for the apocalypse, whether zombie or retro-futuristic nuclear holocaust. My mother thinks I’m quite something despite my constant efforts to convince her otherwise.

Cool things I have done include:

  • Hunting for bigfoot across the state of Indiana
  • Scuba diving to catch lobster in the Gulf of Mexico
  • Spending an evening as a guitar-playing busker on the streets of San Francisco
  • Running a crappy webcomic for a couple of years
  • Rescuing an abandoned baby duckling from a public park
  • Performing a completion run of the Super Nintendo game Chrono Trigger in under eight hours

You can find me blogging at Action Skeptics (under a pseudonym), Lafayette Skeptics, and Gen Con Skeptics, where I am spearheading an effort to get a Skeptical Symposium at Gen Con Indianapolis to mirror Skeptrack at Dragon*Con in Atlanta (help is appreciated!).

My presentation is titled “Cults and Misogyny: The Saga of Warriorschool.” I will look at the mysogynist aspects of many cults using as an example my own experience with a martial arts pseudo-cult called Warriorschool.

Phew. Glad that’s over. Stay tuned right here for further installments of “Better Know a Speaker!”

–Speaker Conjurer Don

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Phil Ferguson: Master of Money

February 8th, 2010 by Don
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Welcome to part 11 of my 20 part series “Better Know a Speaker.” Today’s speaker: Phil Ferguson, the fighting investment advisor!

Phil Ferguson lives in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois with his wife Robin and 2 children. He has been a freethinker/skeptic since he was 13 and is the founder of Champaign-Urbana Freethinkers.

In the past few years he has been a board member of both
Atheist Alliance International and Secular Student Alliance. His recent claim to fame was coming up with the idea and the
funds to send PZ Myers to the Creation “Museum”.

Phil also has 23 years of experience as a DJ and is the owner
of Digital DJ which is based in Champaign-Urbana, IL. He is also a Illinois Registered Investment Advisor and has been giving investment advice for over 13 years.

His runs a skeptical investment website at SkepticMoney.com. In this blog he combines his knowledge of investments with his heretical views on religion.

Phil’s talk is titled, appropriately enough, “Skeptic Money,” during which he will sell the audience on a fantastic product called “Guaranteed Mutual Funds,” before choosing one audience member to be fleeced–ahem, given the benefits of this fantastic investment opportunity.

Check back soon for yet more better knowledge of speakers!

–Speaker Conjurer Don

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Tom Foss: Not, In Fact, a Ghost

February 3rd, 2010 by Don
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Welcome to Part 10 of my 20 part series “Better Know a Speaker.” Today’s speaker: Tom Foss, the fighting Foss!

Contrary to popular belief, Tom Foss is not a ghost. The genesis of this pernicious myth can be found in his complete inability to manifest at Gen Con in 2009, and has only gained traction by his continued failure to appear at meetings and FUNdraisers for Skepchicamp, or even the gatherings of his local skeptic group. In truth, there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for all of this: Tom is a first-year science teacher in northwest Illinois, and consequently he spends far too much of his time planning lessons and grading. Tom currently teaches high school Biology and Physics, and he makes a particular effort to include explicit instruction in critical thinking and the process of science in his lessons. His students were consulted as to Tom’s corporeal state, but their responses were dismissed due to obvious bias and wishful thinking. Tom occasionally blogs about skeptical and scientific topics at Dubito Ergo Sum, though his terribly infrequent entries there are perhaps the biggest single contributor to the rumors of his demise.

During his meager and brief experience as an educator, Tom has argued with creationists, answered e-mail forwards with links to Snopes, and fielded more student questions about 2012 than he can count. These encounters with woo serve as the foundation for his presentation on Skepticism and Teaching. Those who are still skeptical about Tom’s consistently-maintained humanity are encouraged to bring their PKE meters and test the claims first-hand.

Tom can also often be found in the comments at Skeptico, laying down the smack on woos big and small with his patent-pending supremely long, detailed comments.

Tom’s presentation is titled “Skepticism and Teaching,” which will (presumably) focus on how he incorporates critical thinking into his lesson plans. It could actually be a placeholder title for a talk about blue whale husbandry; he hasn’t elaborated for me. I kind of hope it’s the latter.

Check back here soon for further adventures in knowing speakers better!

–Speaker Conjurer Don

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Hemant Mehta: The Friendly Something-or-Other

February 2nd, 2010 by Don
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Welcome to Part 9 of my 20 part series “Better Know a Speaker!” Today’s speaker: Hemant Mehta, the fighting Friendly Atheist!

If you haven’t heard of Hemant already, shame on you. His blog Friendly Atheist has been required reading among nonbelievers for years now, and he really is damned friendly, and he was good enough to let us auction him off for the grand sum of $70 at our fundraising party a couple of weeks ago!

Hemant is the Chair of the Secular Student Alliance (SSA) Board of Directors.

He attended the University of Illinois at Chicago, where he graduated with honors in both Mathematics and Biology. While there, he also helped establish their first secular student group, Students WithOut Religious Dogma (SWORD). He is now earning his Masters in Math Education at DePaul University.

He has worked with the Center for Inquiry and is the SSA representative to the Secular Coalition for America. He is also on the board of Foundation Beyond Belief, a charity organization targeting non-theistic donors.

Hemant was featured on the front page of the Wall Street Journal during his journey as the “eBay Atheist” and his book about the experience, I Sold My Soul on eBay (WaterBrook Press), was released in 2007.

He currently works as a high school Math teacher in the suburbs of Chicago.

Hemant’s presentation is titled “How the Religious Right Went After Me… and Lost!” In it, he will regale us with the epic tale of the time, last fall, when a right-wing Christian group tried to get him fired from his teaching job because of the contents of his website. He’ll explain how he came out of the ordeal even stronger, with his job as secure as ever.

It will, it seems, be an epic tale about Epic Fail. Go Hemant!

Check back here soon for part 10 of “Better Know a Speaker!”

–Speaker Conjurer Don

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Brehon Pub to host the first Skepchicamp

February 2nd, 2010 by William
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The first Skepchicamp will be held at the Brehon Pub on March 6 from 1:00pm to 10:00pm. Located at 731 N. Wells Street in Chicago, this River North bar is easily accessible by public transit, has a strong wifi signal, and great food and drinks.

For one day, the Brehon Pub will be half-Irish, half-Chicago, and all Skepchicamp.

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Matt Lowry: The Skeptical Teacher

January 31st, 2010 by Don
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Hello and welcome to part 8 of my 20 part series “Better Know a Speaker!” Today’s speaker: Matt Lowry, the fighting teacher!

Matt, when he’s not getting cinderblocks crushed over a bed of nails lying facedown on his chest, is a high school physics teacher and part-time physics and astronomy college professor with a strong interest in promoting science education and critical thinking among my students and the population in general. He is a self-described skeptic, someone who believes in Carl Sagan’s adage that “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.”

He’s a strong believer in teaching by example, which he describes as “sacrificing myself for science”, often performing demonstrations that challenge a number of woo claims. Included among these demonstrations are walking on broken glass, board breaking, and the dreaded Bed Of Nails. In addition, he has my students apply their physics knowledge to dealing with a variety of woo claims, from claims that aliens built the pyramids to the claim that low-frequency EMFs cause brain cancer.

In addition to his usual teaching duties, I also have gotten involved in the grassroots skeptical movement. Specifically, a few years ago he started a group called Darwi’ns Bulldogs, which is a pro-science and evolution group that keeps tabs on creationist activity in northern Illinois and surrounding areas while promoting good science education through letter writing campaigns and public outreach.

Lastly, he also maintains a blog called “The Skeptical Teacher” where he expounds upon various topics related to skepticism, science, and education. Some of his posts are about specific topics – such as scientific illiteracy, pseudoscience, tips & tools for promoting skepticism and critical thinking in the classroom, current events in the news, etc. Other posts consist of random thoughts of the day.

Matt’s presentation is called “Bringing Skepticism Into the Physics Classroom,” where he will embody his motto of sacrificing himself for science by performing a number of skeptical physics demonstrations and wow the audience with his sheer awesomeness. Take a look:

He’ll survive just fine. That is, assuming I don’t mess up the sledgehammer swing…

Stay tuned for more skeptical speakers here on “Better Know a Speaker!”

–Speaker Conjurer Don

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Buffy Baggott: Skeptic of the Opera

January 27th, 2010 by Don
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Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to part 7 of my 20-part series “Better Know a Speaker.” Today’s speaker: Buffy Baggot, the fighting mezzo soprano!

Buffy is Skepchicamp’s resident opera singer and (presumably) vampire slayer (I’m sure she’s never heard that one before). I will defer to her list of operatic performances and accomplishments to more fully capture her career:

California native Buffy Baggott has gained recognition throughout the US as an accomplished and versatile mezzo-soprano. She is an alumnus of the prestigious Lyric Opera Center for American Artists and has appeared numerous times on the Lyric Opera of Chicago’s stage. Notable performances there include Carmen (Carmen), Stephano (Roméo et Juliette), Dryade (Ariadne auf Naxos), Siegrune (Die Walküre) and most recently a trio of characters: The Dresser, Schoolboy and Groom in “Lulu.”

Other performances include Schwertleite (Ring Cycle), Sonyetka (Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk), Flora (La Traviata) and Maddalena (Rigoletto) for the Canadian Opera, Mrs. Lovett (Sweeney Todd) for Arizona Opera, Flosshilde (Das Rheingold) for San Francisco Opera and Flosshilde (Das Rheingold) for Indianapolis Opera. Ms. Baggott’s upcoming performances include Cherubino (Le nozze di Figaro) and Siegrune (Die Walküre): both for Hawaii Opera Theater, Siegrune (Die Walküre) for the Los Angeles Opera Ring Cycle and she serves as Mezzo Soprano Vocalist/faculty for the Bay View Music Festival in Northern Michigan.

While singing remains her primary focus, she also considers herself a “junior skeptic” and is interested in all things woo…

I notice quite a few performances of Wagner in there, Buff. Keep up the good work spreading viking awareness to the masses.

Buffy’s presentation is called “Opera Woo,” wherein she will delve into the various kinds of woo to which musical artists and singers are exposed to and why they may be more attracted to woo than your average Joe.

See you next time for more speakeriffic knowledge!

– Speaker Conjurer Don

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Skepchicamp Thanks You (cross-post at Skepchick)

January 25th, 2010 by Elyse
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In addition to Matt’s update, I wanted to thank you all as well!

Thank you to everyone who has donated money to Skepchicamp! By now, most of you will be thrilled if you never hear “Skepchicamp needs money” ever again. Bad news: you will. Good news: you will!

Last weekend’s fundraiser was far more successful than I or my fellow organizers could have ever imagined. My goal for Saturday night was to raise $1000 for camp. By the end of the evening, we had raised over $1600!

This may seem like an enormous amount of money for a skepticamp, and, honestly, it is. But thanks to the unprecedented popularity of Skepchicamp, we need it!

This money is not just for the March 6 event; it also goes towards the future of the Skepchicamp organization. If all goes according to plan, by the time our 2011 event happens, Skepchicamp will be a 501(c)3 organization.[more]

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Next Skepchicamp Planning Meeting

January 24th, 2010 by MattusMaximus
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Our next planning meeting is scheduled for Saturday, January 30th at 1:30pm at the Galway Arms. In case you cannot attend in person but would still like to be involved, please contact me or Elyse so that we can make arrangements to Skype you into the meeting.

Cheers – MattusMaximus

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$$$ Skepchicamp FUNdraiser Rakes It In!!! $$$

January 24th, 2010 by MattusMaximus
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Howdy all,

I just wanted to give a quick update about the kick ass success of our Skepchicamp FUNdraiser last night.  Combined with donations, auction money, and tickets to the event, we raised over $1600 for Skepchicamp!  Combine this with other money which was donated earlier, and we determined that our grand total comes out to over $2600 :)

Folks, this far exceeds anything either Queen Elyse or I had ever expected going into this thing just a few months ago in the fall.  Skepchicamp has gotten to be such a huge thing already, and we haven’t even held the event yet!  I can’t wait to see what happens at the actual event!

Here are Elyse and I crunching the numbers.  I think that dude behind us was getting a drink, or hurling…

As if this news isn’t good enough, it gets better: after doing some calculations at the party, and yes these calculations can be trusted since neither Elyse or I were boozing at the time, we figure that we will be able to cover all the expenses of Skepchicamp AND have enough money left over for working towards forming as a non-for-profit group!

Last, but most definitely not least, we all need to give a BIG shout-out to Dr. Jen, who so graciously hosted the Skepchicamp FUNdraiser at her place.  She is an amazing hostess, and a blast was had by all… thanks Jen!!! :D

Cheers,

MattusMaximus

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