"The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is reason. I have never used any other, and I trust I never shall." —Thomas Paine (1737-1809) American revolutionary, pamphleteer, and atheist, *The Age of Reason*
Had enough of conspiracy theories, religionists, attraction theory, Bitcoin fanatics, multilevel marketing schemes, essential-oil discussions, and hearing what the Universe has planned for you? Yearning to talk with someone rational for awhile? Then come on and meet up with other local skeptics for some refreshing and sane conversation!
What are we skeptical **of**? Basically any form of woo, rumors, fads, conspiracy theories, extraordinary claims, or anything at all based on the world’s worst method of decision-making, namely *faith*. That notably includes religion but also other fanaticisms and delusions such as imperialism, racism, quackery, reincarnation, ghosts, spiritism, fortune telling, palm reading, mind reading, precognition, psychokinesis, homeopathy, astrology, objectivism, numerology, "miracle" cures, ESP, ufology, creationism, climate-change denial, ritual satanic child abuse, anti-vax movements, a host of superstitions, personality cults, jingoism, perpetual motion, climate-change denial, election denial, dowsing, insurance scams, Ponzi schemes, acupuncture, aroma therapy, biorhythms, magic crystals, facilitated communication, chi energy, conversion therapy, graphology, hypnosuggestion, phrenology, eugenics, crop circles, 9/11 trutherism, Chinese traditional “medicine”, feng shui, and the insidious brain parasite that leads people to endlessly obsess over anyone named Kardashian.
We are a local nexus for the broader skeptical movement, along with such national groups as:
• Americans United for Separation of Church and State, publisher of *Church & State*
• Center for Inquiry
• Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, publisher of *Skeptical Inquirer*
• Freedom From Religion Foundation
• James Randi Educational Foundation
• The Skeptics Society, publisher of *Skeptic*
What is a skeptic, anyway? It's someone who lives by the Missouri state motto: "Show me!". Does some claim seem too good (or amazing) to be true? Well, that's because it's probably not. Having an open mind isn't the same as having holes in your head.
OTOH, doubting everything makes you a cynic, and suspecting everybody makes you a conspiracy theorist. We're neither. Skeptics ask for **evidence** and are persuadable if the evidence is convincing. We’re not so much **against** things as we are **for** science, reason, and critical thinking.
Skeptics who **are** shown something are willing to accept it. A couple of cases in point:
(1) Even little kids notice that the east coast of South America and the west coast of Africa look like jigsaw-puzzle pieces that should fit together. **Did** they, at one time? In the early 20th Century, skeptics scoffed at the idea. "Just coincidence", they said. And rightly so. There was no known mechanism for how anything that big could be moved. Then Alfred Wegener showed evidence that continental drift had definitely happened, and later Arthur Holmes explained how plate tectonics was the mechanism behind it. With those in hand, skeptics were convinced.
(2) For most of human existence, people believed the Earth was only a few tens of thousands of years old. Skeptics concurred. If the Sun were made of wood or coal or petroleum, it couldn't possibly keep burning for much longer than that. But there was all this other geological evidence that indicated the planet was millions, if not billions of years old. What to believe? Skeptics openly admitted they didn't have the answers. But as soon as we discovered the amazing amounts of energy that could be produced by nuclear fusion, the source of the Sun's longevity was revealed, and skeptics settled in on the proper scientific answer.
We skeptics take our cues from people like the Nobel-winning physicist Richard Feynman, who pointed out: "I have argued flying saucers with lots of people. I was interested in this: they keep arguing that it is possible. And that's true. It **is** possible. They do not appreciate that the problem is not to demonstrate whether it's possible or not, but whether it's going on or not."
In other words, "show me".
If you've got some kind of event or opportunity that's commensurate with what we're about (as described below), we'd love to hear about it and publicize it to our 1000+ members. E-mail your idea to RichardSRussell@tds.net and we'll either schedule it or explain why not.
