The Hampshire Skeptics Society

Merry Christmas Everyone #Mythmas #Humbug #Fun #Newtonmas

After a fantastic year at our new home in the Discovery Centre all of us at the Hampshire Skeptics Society would like to wish you and all of our speakers, performers, members and helpers a very merry Christmas and a happy New Year !
May we continue to grow and spread the word of rationality, science and having geeky fun even further and wider than ever. We have some tremendous things planned for 2013 so keep an eye on the website and sign up for the mailing list so you hear about them first.
Thank you everyone who has contributed to the HSS, written for the website, helped with Winchester Skeptics, organised events and most special thanks to all of you very lovely and particularly sagacious and perspicacious people who come along every month to the WDC to Winchester Skeptics. Without you we would have nothing.
Merry Christmas everyone !
See you in 2013.

Thanks For A Great Night ! #SitP @simondwatt @magicmeech @amateursuman @moulds @helenarney @winchesterdc

Wow ! What a fantastic night.
So much comedy, fun, fire, music and magic. I for one was aching from laughing so much. For all of you that missed out on this once in a lifetime experience I have some photos below.
You can mouseover for the comments.
On behalf of the whole of the Hampshire Skeptics Society I would like to say a big thank you to all our performers who gave us such joy and laughter. I would also like to say a big thank you to Crispian and Clio who did all of the hard work behind the scenes organising this and another big thanks to the Winchester Discovery Centre for being so cool. Despite the fire. And the thermite.
And finally a huge thank you to everyone who bought tickets and came along to have some fun with us and supported the society. We’ll do it again next year.

And then we all went out for a curry.
Splendid.

Winchester Skeptics Christmas Bumper Fun Pack #SitP

We have (finally!) sorted the ticketing arrangements for our Christmas Bumper Fun Pack.
So you can click this link : Winchester Skeptics Christmas Bumper Fun Pack or click on the image below to get to the WDC website where you’ll see a big green button on the right hand side at the top that says Buy Tickets Online.
If you click that you’ll be taken to the events list. Select the month and date on the calendar on the right (Thursday December 13th) and the events will appear. You’ll see our event there. Now you can add a number of tickets with the rather small button on the left until you have at least 10 tickets and then click Add To Basket again to be taken to the payment screens.
The booking fee is included in the price you see there. The total price for one ticket is £6 including the booking fee. As with last year we have kept the ticket price to an absolute minimum to cover venue hire and our performer’s expenses so please give them a fabulous welcome and make them feel even more appreciated than they already are.
And speaking of performers we are very pleased to announce that Suman Biswas, formerly of The Amateur Transplants, will be there performing too !

Come along and have some fun !

*Update*
There seems to be some confusion on the WDC site as to the booking fee. We’re trying to sort it out but either way £6 such a great night out is well worth it

Bubbles – The Bath and Beyond with @HelenCzerski Winchester #SitP 29NOV12

Winchester Skeptics Christmas Bumper Fun Pack!

Hello everybody!

Yes, it’s that time of year when we at Winchester Skeptics say thank you to you, our loyal and noble patrons, for your steadfast support throughout the year.

This year, Dave and Crispian have done a fantastic job and to top it all off, they have invited some of our best friends down for what promises to be a superb evening of music, comedy, science and magic on the 13th of December! We are incredibly lucky and honoured to be able to announce that we will be joined by!;

Science magician, comedian and scientist, Oliver Meech!

http://www.olivermeech.co.uk/index.htm

Science comedian and scientist, Steve Mould! (Yes, that one off Blue Peter)

http://www.stevemould.com/

Science chanteuse and scientist, Helen Arney!

http://helenarney.com/

And holding the entire evening together with super-strength ooey gluey will be the peerless science programme presenting, big animal disecting, ugly animal representin’, evolutionary biologist, Simon Watt!

http://www.readysteadyscience.com/

Woo hoo!

I have no idea how much we will be charging for tickets yet but it won’t be ridiculous, I promise and there may well be additions to the bill so tickets will be tremendous value. The bar will be open as per usual and we will no doubt be retiring to a local restaurant afterwards for some curry.

We really hope you will be able to join us in celebrating our third year and welcoming in our fourth. See you on the 13th!

***UPDATE***

Tickets will be £5!

W00T!

Please tell all of your friends. Or kidnap them on the night.

***UPDATE 2*** by Dave

There may be a small booking fee to accommodate the WDC ticketing process. We’ll let you know what it is as soon as we know.

Culham Fusion Reactor Trip – @fusionenergy @ReadingSITP

Well, last Wednesday was a particular highlight of my transient existence thus far. What was this amazing highlight ?
It was a trip to the Culham Centre for Fusion Energy organised by those most splendid peeps of Reading Skeptics. Some time ago Mike posted a message on Twitter saying there was one last place on the trip and I almost fell over myself to try and get that place. I couldn’t believe it. A trip to see a fusion reactor ! As a member of the public ? So I could just walk around and see it ?! And maybe talk to some of the people working on it ?!?
Oh wow.
My Got-To-See-That-O-Meter went banging right off the end stops.
And so several of us gathered in deepest Oxfordshire to go and see something that is so awesome, so awe inspiring and so vital for the future of human kind that I was fizzing with the excitement of it all.
And then when we got there they told us that we couldn’t see one of these things. We were allowed to see TWO OF THEM !

So, here are some of the pics I took :

Awesome.

Golden Duck Nominations

What are the Golden Duck nominations ?

Well the Golden Duck awards is the annual competition run by those splendid people at the Good Thinking Society to award the Golden Duck (of shame) to the person (or organisation) that has supported or practised pseudoscience in the most ludicrous, dangerous, irrational or irresponsible manner.
And now is your chance to vote.
But there are so many bonkers woo merchants out there, so many well-meaning but deluded people and of course the downright dangerous. There are soooo many to choose from. To simplify this gargantuan task the GTS have managed to winnow out the chaff to leave the true errr… chaff that are the most worthy nominees of this prestigious award.

And who might they be ? Well here we go. Drrrrrrrumrollll please :

Charles, Prince of ~~Woo~~Wales
Prince Charles is nominated for using his position to consistently promote pseudo-science.
Andrew Wakefield
Andrew Wakefield is nominated for the harm caused by his discredited research into the supposed link between the MMR vaccine and autism.
David Tredinnick MP
David Tredinnick is nominated for being the most active supporter of alternative therapies in Parliament.

You can see the full nominations behind the links and you can add your vote in the comments below. We will be having a vote at the next Winchester Skeptics on the 29th as well. When we have our numbers in we’ll send them off to the GTS and they will collate the results from all the groups around the country. The winner of the competition, voted by you to be the most egregious promoter of woo or, as I like to call them, Top Quack, will be announced shortly after.
These thoroughly deserving people need your votes.

So get voting !

Nick Cohen – You Can’t Read This Book, Censorship in an Age of Freedom. Winchester #SitP @NickCohen4

QED Con is Back ! #QEDcon

Awesome ! It’s 194 days and 16 hours away and still I can’t wait !
If you have ever been to a QED conference then you know how much fun is had there and what a great feeling it is to be surrounded by hundreds of other geeks and skeptics and science nerds all there to soak up the incredible atmosphere, meet loads of new and interesting people and have as much fun as possible. It’s brilliant.
If you have not been to a QED conference before then please, please, please get yourself a ticket and join us having a great time. You can do that here : QED Con. It’s only £99 for a weekend ticket and there are student discounts available. And for the first time at QED there is also a creche so excuses of not being able to go because of having to look after the wee ones are not valid this time
Just as a taster for what you’ve missed if you’ve not been before here’s some of the pics I took at the last one :

How to Cut Nonsense from the Web – New Scientist article

Reality checker: How to cut nonsense from the net.

Interesting article about various proposals for providing optional validation for web content. Hurry, only 6 days left and you might need to register (free) to read it.

While it seems quite well thought out, I can envisage a few “competing truths” battling it out in the interwebs, and may have some of the rationally challenged going overboard.

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