Think Inc!

So I'm finally getting my butt into gear and writing about the covention we went to on the 18th, Think Inc. It was an awsome experience and made me even more excited for the GAC next year! This may be long...

(The videos I have included are not from Think Inc. But I thought I would add a taste of each speaker for viewing =) )

The first speaker of the day was Tim Flannery.

He is an Aussie and a professor and currently works for the government going around to places educating people about global warming. Most of his talk was quite nerdy and not very interesting for people who do not know much about him or what he does. So I won't go into lots of detail. His talk was mostly on how difficult it is to get some people (like older engineers who are not used to the new technology) to look at the facts of global warming without bias. He also spoke a little about how we need to re-establish the respect we should all hold for professionals and their expertise in their area.




The second speaker was Christina Rad.

A Romanian Youtube blogger, she is very outspoken, comical and quite definite in what she believes, how she thinks and how things should be. I feel she is much better in her videos than what she was on stage, but as it was her very first public speaking event I think she did tremendously. Her biggest gripe is with religion and peoples rights, so her talk was mostly on that. And it was very informative.
Did you know that 70% of the worlds population lacks freedom of religion? And this fact remains unchallanged.
She also spoke about decriminilisation of drugs and the affects it would have on society. Portugal decriminilised all drugs in 2001 and shows a drop in consumption. And more importantly, a rise in people seeking help to quit drugs and a drop in the lifetime prevalence of drug usage.
Food for thought.



The third speaker was Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

This fantastic lady actually had to video link into the conference as she could not travel from New York because of death threats (yes, death threats) directed at her. She is an activist for womens rights and religous freedom and has published several books on how she was able to free herself from her opressive society. She spoke about her hopes for the future of the world (way too much detail to retype!). I found her a little, how do you put it, wishy washy? A little too optimistic for my liking, but she had some great ideas, and her kind words and smile do bring hope to millions of women who have not yet been able to do what she has done.



The fourth speaker was Shane Koyczan.

Wow, just wow! Shane is a canadian poet. And he was amazing. He was so good we spent our lunch time buying two of his books, his cd and getting them signed ($60 well spent!). A great addition to the day, he bought tears to almost every audience member with his powerful performace. The poem he did at the end of his performance -




The fifth speaker was the one and only Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Mr Tyson is an American astrophysicist, our generations version of Carl Sagan, and one of the best minds in the world atm. Some of his talk I have seen before, but that would be expected since I have watched hours of him on youtube. There was alot I had not seen though and he did not dissapoint one bit. His talk was exceptional because not only is he smart, he is also witty and funny, he also involved the audience which was awsome. His talk was mainly on the decline of science in America, and how he believes that America will fall behind other nations in science and will never be able to catch up. Which is a bit sad when you think about it, alot of what we know today came out of America.




The sixth speaker was Michael Shermer.

Michael is the founding Publisher of Skeptic magazine, Executive Director of the Skeptics Society, and columnist for Scientific American. So his talk was mainly about skepticism and how that is vital in this day and age when religion (especially in America) is trying to make a comeback and sneak into the educational system and politics. He also spoke about why humans in the past believed in supernatural beings and why we do not need to believe in them now. While he wasn't the best speaker of the day, I certainly got interested and am looking at signing up for the Skeptics Magazine!



The seventh speaker who was suposed to be via video link as well was Christopher Hitchens. An auther and journalist you either hate him or love him. He was unable to make it due to a medical emergency (he is currently battling cancer) but he is well now, and I was not too dissapointed as we will hopefully see him next year at the GAC.

So then there was the Panel at the end where all the speakers sat down and took questions from the crowd. But there was another guest bought on as well which we had not seen talk during the day. Catholic priest Father Bob. Good ol Father Bob... what can I say about him... not alot sept that I thought he was absolutely fantastic! One of the most outspoken people of the day, he was up to date with issues, open minded, and funny as. He had the crowd in stitches several times and his views on the issues that mattered were so against his scriptures that it blew my mind. The kind of Father that needs to be in the media. One that understood what was what. If he ever speaks anywhere I will be there with bells on!
There was so many questions fired so quickly I didn't get a chance to note them!

But a few passing thoughts:
> Someone bought up that Australias contribution to climate change is only 1.5% of the total and asked does it really matter? Tim Flannery asked if they gave money to the poor in Africa (or any charity/organisation, ie breat cancer, daffodil day), and they answered yes, and he bought up the point that their donation of $2 isn't alot of money, but together with the whole, it makes a difference.
> That it was better in more primitive times to believe that the rustle in the grass was a predator and not presume it was the wind, as presuming it is the wind could get you killed when it was a predator, but presuming it was a predator when it was the wind will do nothing. And that we do not need to think like that anymore, as we have science.
>That out of the universe, there is 74% dark eneergy, 22% dark matter, and about 4% atoms. We only understand atoms at the moment, so out of everything in the whole universe, we accumilated knoweldge is a whole 4%. We still have a long way to go.
>Because of religion, one sixth (1.3 Billion people) are not doing any science research, are not on the frontier of science. That saddens everyone who is willing to really think about what that means. Those same 1.3 billion people are the ones that came up with our numbers, algebra, that named the stars! And now, they have thrown science out the window for faith. Imagine where we could be today if that hadn't have happened.
> That to beat extremists of any faith at their own game, we must not attack them only. We must focus our attention on their intended audience, get the the people first and the extremists have no ground to stand on.
> That humans have an inbuilt societal nature. Much like ants. Which is fascinating. We know this because society as we know it has risen 5 times independantly.

And the biggest thing I took away from this is that I do not know enough, that we must all strive to learn more, to educate ourselves further, to search for knowledge and truth. 

That we should be thinking of ourselves not as Australians, Americans, Canadians, but as citizens of the world. 

And that to be able to make the changes we need to make, to make sure the human race continues to florish and not kill itself, is to stop teaching our children what to think, and start to teach them HOW to think.