Join Mario Di Maggio, the Thinktank astronomer, to hear about the facts and the fantasies about Aliens on Earth. Determine the likelihood of extraterrestrial intelligence and learn how to track it down.
Minute 1 OFOs
Minute 23 Life
Minute 33 Life out side Earth
Minute 37 Milky Way photo size scale
Minute 39 Elements of Life
Minute 40 Drake Equation estimation
Interactive Periodic Table
The Great Debate: Dinesh D’Souza v. Michael Shermer 2008.9.1
The Skeptics Society (Michael Shermer) - www.michaelshermer.com
In this debate on what are arguably two of the most important questions in the culture wars today — Is Religion a Force for Good or Evil? and Can you be Good without God? — the conservative Christian author and cultural scholar Dinesh D’Souza and the libertarian skeptic writer and social scientist Michael Shermer, square off to resolve these and related issues, such as the relationship between science and religion and the nature and existence of God. This event was one of the liveliest ever hosted by the Skeptics Society at Caltech, mixing science, religion, politics, and culture
This six part series on philosophy is presented by popular British philosopher Alain de Botton, featuring six thinkers who have influenced history, and their ideas about the pursuit of the happy life.
Episode 1: Socrates on Self-Confidence - Why do so many people go along with the crowd and fail to stand up for what they truly believe? Partly because they are too easily swayed by other people's opinions and partly because they don't know when to have confidence in their own.
One of the earliest efforts from Richard Dawkins in his identification and attack on the rise of creationism with the rising star of the US fundamentalist christian demographic. In the important documentary, Dawkins shows ways to easily refute some of the more common creationist arguments.
Dawkins begins with the question, "Did everything in Creation fall together by chance or was there an intelligent designer like God?" He then looks at the spreading disaffection with Darwinism and argues that it should not be written off as a worn out declaration of scientific faith.
Jared Diamond, professor of geography at UCLA, received the Pulitzer Prize for non-fiction in 1998 for Guns, Germs and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies. In 1999, he received the National Medal of Science. His most recent book is Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed (2004).
Professor Diamond argues that religion has encompassed at least four independent components that have arisen or disappeared at different stages of development of human societies over the last 10,000 years.
Author Christopher Hitchens discusses his book "God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything" as a part of the Authors@Google series. The author of Why Orwell Matters and Letters to a Young Contrarian, Christopher Hitchens is a Vanity Fair contributing editor, a Slate columnist, and a regular contributor to The Atlantic Monthly. He has also written for The Nation, Granta, Harper's, The Washington Post, and is a frequent television and radio guest. Born in England, Hitchens was educated at Balliol College, Oxford, where he received a degree in philosophy, politics, and economics. He now lives in Washington, D.C., and he became a U.S. citizen in 2007. This event took place on August 16, 2007 at Google headquarters in Mountain View, CA.
Authors@Google:
YouTube - Authors@Google: Christopher Hitchens
Operation Auca
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Operation Auca was an attempt by five Evangelical Christian missionaries from the United States to make contact with the Huaorani people of the rainforest of Ecuador. The Huaorani, also known as the Aucas (the Quechua word for "naked savages"), were an isolated tribe known for their violence, against both their own people and outsiders who entered their territory. With the intention of being the first Protestants to evangelize the previously unreached Huaorani, the missionaries began making regular flights over Huaorani settlements in September 1955, dropping gifts. After several months of exchanging gifts, on January 2, 1956 the missionaries established a camp at "Palm Beach", a sandbar along the Curaray River, a few miles from Huaorani settlements. Their efforts came to an end on January 8, 1956, when all five—Jim Elliot, Nate Saint, Ed McCully, Peter Fleming, and Roger Youderian—were attacked and speared by a group of Huaorani warriors. The news of their deaths was broadcast around the world, and Life magazine covered the event with a photo essay.
The deaths of the men galvanized the missionary effort in the United States, sparking an outpouring of funding for evangelization efforts around the world. Their work is still frequently remembered in evangelical publications, and in 2006 was the subject of the film production End of the Spear. Several years after the death of the men, the widow of Jim Elliot, Elisabeth, and the sister of Nate Saint, Rachel, returned to Ecuador as missionaries with the Summer Institute of Linguistics (now SIL International) to live among the Huaorani. This eventually led to the conversion of many, including some of those involved in the killing. While largely eliminating tribal violence, their efforts exposed the tribe to exploitation and increased influence from the outside. This has caused Huaorani culture to begin to disappear, but anthropologists argue over the ultimate effect—some negatively view the missionary work as cultural imperialism, while others contend that the influence has been beneficial for the tribe.
Operation Auca - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Christian apologist Kent Hovind debates Dr. Mike Shermer(chief Editor of Skeptic magazine) and schools Dr. Shermer in the topic of evolution vs creation. "Be ready always to give answer to every man that asks you for the reason of the faith you have"-
About this talk
Speaking at the most recent EG conference, author, philosopher, prankster and journalist A.J. Jacobs talks about the year he spent living biblically -- following the rules in the Bible as literally as possible.
About A.J. Jacobs
Immersing himself in alternate lifestyles and long, hilarious experiments (usually with himself the guinea pig), writer A.J. Jacobs tests the limits of behavior, customs, culture, knowledge
A.J. Jacobs' year of living biblically | Video on TED.com
Tatterred Cover
Denver, CO
Jan 17th, 2008
Michael Shermer discusses his newest book The Mind of the Market: Compassionate Apes, Competitive Humans, and Other Tales from Evolutionary Economics.
Psychologist Michael Shermer, the author of nine previous books, including the bestselling Why People Believe Weird Things, is a columnist for Scientific American, the publisher of Skeptic magazine, and the founder and director of the international Skeptics Society - Tattered Cover
FORA.tv - | Business
City Arts & Lectures
San Francisco, CA
Feb 27th, 2008
Karen Armstrong is among the world's foremost commentators on religion. A former nun in the Roman Catholic Society of the Holy Child Jesus, Armstrong now defines herself as a "freelance monotheist," drawing from Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.
The theologian writes about multiple faiths in her bestselling books, including Muhammad, A History of God, Buddha, The Battle for God, and The Great Transformation. In her critical studies and the memoirs Through the Narrow Gate and The Spiral Staircase, Armstrong's perspective is based on compassion instead of reduction.
"It doesn't really matter what you believe as long as it leads you to practical compassion," Armstrong has said.
Her most recent book is The Bible: A Biography, a brief study of the sacred text and the centuries of biblical interpretation - City Arts & Lectures
FORA.tv - Karen Armstrong in Conversation with Alan Jones
About this Talk
With stunning photos and stories, National Geographic Explorer Wade Davis celebrates the diversity of the world's indigenous cultures, now disappearing from the planet at an alarming rate. He argues passionately that we should be concerned not only for preserving the biosphere, but also the "ethnosphere" -- "the sum total of all thoughts and dreams, myths, ideas, inspirations, intuitions brought into being by the human imagination."
TED | Talks | Wade Davis: Cultures at the far edge of the world (video)
Ep 1: Waking Up in the Universe
'Growing Up in the Universe' Ep 2: Designed and Designoid Objects
'Growing Up in the Universe' Ep 3: Climbing Mount Improbable
'Growing Up in the Universe' Ep 4: The Ultraviolet Garden
'Growing Up in the Universe' Ep 5: The Genesis of Purpose
'Growing Up in the Universe' Ep 1: Waking Up in the Universe
The Four Horsemen - 2 hours
58 min 4 sec - Dec 14, 2007
On the 30th of September 2007, Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris and ... all » Christopher Hitchens sat down for a first-of-its-kind, unmoderated 2-hour discussion, convened by RDFRS and filmed by Josh Timonen.
All four authors have recently received a large amount of media attention for their writings against religion - some positive, and some negative. In this conversation the group trades stories of the public’s reaction to their recent books, their unexpected successes, criticisms and common misrepresentations. They discuss the tough questions about religion that face to world today, and propose new strategies for going forward.
Authors’ Recommended Books: The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins Breaking the Spell by Daniel C. Dennett Letter to a Christian Nation by Sam Harris The End of Faith by Sam Harris God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens
The Four Horsemen - Hour 1
