The list of speakers was just beyond my expectations. The Australian Atheist Foundation was able to get all these amazing people together in one place. These people who identify as scientists, philosophers, academics, free thinkers, humanists, atheists, agnostics, skeptics, politicians, lawyers, journalists, activists and people who simply care about the world we live in. I'm not sure how to go about this so I might just talk about each day, otherwise I'll be all over the place!
Friday night:
The opining of the Celebration of Reason was all about laughs. Firstly there was the opening speech from the president of The Australian Atheist Foundation, David Nicholls.
Then the laughs started. Not surprisingly, comedians have a lot of jokes about religions and religious people, they are somewhat easy targets at times. I was not entirely impressed by the comedians, they were alright and I laughed, but I would not have had them on stage with the amount of money I knew was being spent on tickets. Mikey Robins and Ben Elton were good, they seemed like they had a good time on stage. Jim Jefferies stepped on a lot of toes during his performance and has coped a lot of slack from his content on the night. But the stand out for the night in my opinion, by far, was Stella Young. I was very excited when I saw her name on the list of speakers and she did not dissapoint! (I have tried to find a recording of her speech but one does not seem to be on YouTube at the moment.) For people who do not know who she is she holds a degree in Journalism, is a comedian, a disability advocate and Editor of ABC's Ramp Up, an online space for news, discussion and opinion about disability in Australia. Stella had the whole crowd in stitches. Funny, honest, open and to the point her talk was one of the highlights of the weekend, so much so I forgot to take notes!
Saturday:
With a speakers list of Dan Barker, Daniel Dennett, Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Richard Dawkins I knew it would be a fantastic day. Peter Singer (a philosopher and ethicist) was up first in the morning, I had never heard of this man but I will be keeping a close eye out on anything he gets involved in now. He talk was based around Reason and Ethics and talked about how far we have evolved as a community and socially. I will most certainly be looking up some of his work on animal welfare, abortion and the ethics of food consumption.
Next up was Leslie Cannold, another name I had not come across yet, which amazes me as she was the 2011 National Humanist of the Year. Leslie could have had us chanting if she wanted. Her talk on Separating Church and State: A Call To Action was empowering, motivational and a kick that us atheists need to actually get out there and do something. She spoke about how it is hard to get atheists together in one spot, likening it to herding cats. And considering Aussies tend to want to avoid conflict we need to make a concious effort to take a stand.
Dan Barker talked about Life Driven Purpose. He spoke about the fact that it life is its own reward. That there need to be purpose OF life, but purpose IN life is what we should be striving for.
There were two panels over the weekend and the first one was today, The Intersection of Religion and Politics. The speakers included Fiona Patten (CEO of the Eros Association and founder of the Australian Sex Party), Dick Gross (a blogger for Fairfax Media), Colleen Hartland (representative for the Western Metropolitan Region for the Victorian Greens), Marion Maddox (a theologist and political philosopher), and the panel moderator Derek Guille (ADC local radio presenter). The one thing that stood out in the discussion on the panel was Marion Maddox, the only theist on the panel, telling the atheist community that we are weak, and lack drive, and that we should not stand for how people are treated and that the 'moderate' religionists need us, and we need them, to stand up for wrongdoings.
If you have never heard of Daniel Dennett then look him up! His talk on How to Tell If You Are An Atheist was thrilling, very funny and thought provoking. He also enlightened us on Deepity's (an apparently profound observation that is ambiguous) ie: Love is just a word!
A. C Grayling is a philosopher, Master of the New College of the Humanities, and a Supernumerary Fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford. With such a beautiful voice I was engrossed in his talk about What Next for Atheism? and did not actually take notes on it. The AFA have also not put his video up yet so all I can say about his talk was that it was great!
Lawrence M. Krauss is a name I have heard before but since I knew he was a cosmologist (along with a scientific educator, defender of reason and skepticism and the director of the Origins Project at Arizona State University) I didn't really bother to pursue any of his work because I presumed it would go right over my head. Well his talk on A Universe Form Nothing has inspired me to learn more about the universe. He was able to, somehow, explain very complex matters in a way anyone would be able to understand. The shape of the universe, how it could have started, what nothingness is and what it all means to us was all touched on in his small amount of time on the stage and I think every person walked away with a more knowledge then they walked in with.
The Inaugural Christopher Hitchens Memorial Lecture was given by Geoffrey Robertson. Head of Doughty Street Chambers, Uk's largest human rights practice, a Master of the Middle Temple and servicing on the UN's Justice Council. Delivering ground-breaking judgements on the illegality of recruiting child soilders and the invalidity of amnesties for crimes against humanity as the first President of the UN War Crimes Court in Sierra Leone. A moving and passionate talk about what it takes to get things done on the global scale. He most certainly came across as a powerful individual who knew his stuff, and you could see the care and compassion on his face and in his demeanour. This is a man that wants to, and can help, to change the world.
The second last speaker of the day was the beautiful Ayaan Hirsi Ali. I do not like to idolize people, I think it is silly. But I idolize this woman. She is a resident scholar of the American Enterprise Institute in Washington DC and currently researching the relationship between the West and Islam. She established the AHA Foundation in 2007 to help protect and defend the rights of women in the West against militant Islam. Her talk on The Arab Protests of 2011: A Secular Spring or An Islamic Winter highlighted the fact that Western liberals, crippled by political correctness, guilt and a romanticised view of Islam, are leaving atheists and Christians bereft in the ”Arab winter”. It has encourage me, and I would imagine many others, to not be afraid of the title 'Islamophobia' and start holding to account Islam for what it does. I am in the middle of her first autobiography Infidel. It is the most moving book I have ever read, if you are not reading anything at the moment, go hire this book out from the library!
Now Praise Intelligent Design (Daddy, Don't Go Down Quote Mine) was the last talk of the day by Richard Dawkins and was a nice uplifting talk to end the day on. Dawkins encouraged the atheist, skeptical and free thinking movements to take back the words that should be ours. Intelligent Design, Pro Life, Spirituality, Technology being among the words we should be owing and using. He also touched on eugenics, animal welfare and the psychological predispositions that make us prone to indoctrination.
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| This was lunch on the Saturday, well one third of it, it goes around the corner in the distance and also behind us there were more people. An amazing sight. |
Sunday:
With the first three speakers up for the day being females, I wonder how some people in our own community can say that there is not a big enough female presence in the atheist movement. Starting off the last day of the convention (where did the days go!) we had Eugenie Scott. The Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education Inc, a pro-evolution non-profit science education organizaion in the USA. She is a leading critic of young earth creationism and intelligent design. Her talk on Reason and Creationism drew clear lines in the difference between Evolution, Creationism and Intelligent Design. She also called for 'creationist' and 'intelligent design' 'scientists' to not fight their culture wars on the backs of high school students.
Tanya Smith, President of the Atheist Alliance International, touched on a subject many people in the audience wonder about all the time, How Do We Change The World?. She spoke mainly about the AAI and what they do, about the importance of organisations like the AAI, FFRF and AFA. With organisations like these we can mobilize and change the world.
Freedom From Religion Foundation co-president Annie Laurie Gaylor had a short talk on God Fixation Won't Fix Any Nation. She spoke about America's political parties fixation on god and how detrimental that is to the nation. "There is a time when religion ruled the world, it was called the Dark Ages."
The next speaker drew screams of adoration from the females in the crowd, and I was one of them! Sam Harris is a Co-Founder and CEO of Project Reason, a non-profit foundation devoted to spreading scientific knowledge and secular values in society. He has a degree in philosophy and a PH.D in neuroscience. I am addicted to his blog. Harris' talk was supposed to be on An Illusion of Free Will, however he changed it at the last minute so he could speak about death. (This seemed apt since we would have a sort of memorial at the end of the day for Christopher Hitchens.) He goes on to say that death is the only subject he has found that depresses people more than the thought that they have no free will. He also talks about trying to find 'now' and living in the present instead of in the past or in the future. Near the end of his talk he leads 4 000 atheists and free thinkers in a Buddhist meditation, he thought that was funny, and so did I. I found his talk fascinating and will most certainly be reading more of his work instead of just watching YouTube videos of him.
We were all very privileged to be able to watch the premiere of Parrot, an atheist movie about family and loss.
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The spokesperson for the Atheist Foundation of Australia and the President of the Freethought University Alliance, Jason Ball, got a chance to speak briefly on what he has been doing and how others can achieve the same in their Universities and High Schools. Speaking about A Fresh Generation of Free Thinkers Is Among Us, he encouraged people at Uni and school to put themselves out there and find like minded people so they can start to make a difference in their community. Here Jason Ball is trying to tread water through stupid and aggressive questions being thrown at him by someone who obviously has his own agenda:
P Z Myers was the last solo speaker of the day and he was going to base his talk on Scientists! If you're not an atheist then you're not going it right! But changed at the last minute to Sacking the city of God. He is a public critic of intelligent design (ID) and of the creationist movement in general and is an activist in the American creation-evolution controversy and is currently an Associate Professor of Biology at UMM, works with zebrafish in the field of evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo). His blog is updated very regularly. Instead of speaking about what he spoke about here is his transcript of his talk.
The very last talk of the convention was the Four Horsemen Panel with Ayaan Hirsi Ali. A very, very exciting moment but also an extremely sad one. There was a memorial video for Christopher Hitchens which had a lot of good stuff from him in it (personally I have seen slightly better ones on YouTube but anyways) which bought tears to many eyes in the audience.
Then Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins spoke about the wonderful mind that has left us wanting. Then for a little over an hour four of the most amazing and powerful people in the 'atheist movement' sat on the stage and just talked. Richard Dawkins, Daniel Dannett, Sam Harris and Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Everyone was terribly sad that Christopher Hitchens was not able to take his place on stage with them. The Four Horsemen got their name from a talk they did a few years ago in Hitchens' house in which Ayaan Hirsi Ali was supposed to participate in (which would then have been called The Five Pillars) but she got called away at the last minute. It was amazing to see them all on stage at one time discussing various topics together.
It was an amazing weekend filled with laughter and joy, thought provoking talks and a sense of belonging. I couldn't have been happier to take part in this weekend and will do it again in a heartbeat!
Unfortunately there was protesters there though. The Saturday there was christian protesters with signs and megaphones outside. Most people ignored them but there were a few that stopped to debate and argue.
On the Sunday there was muslim protesters there, while we had a walk around the complex we heard what I would imagine was half the people at the convention outside chanting at the muslim protesters, everyone was very high strung. I was extremely unimpressed by their lack of respect for our right to hold a convention. Especially when holding up this sign:
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| Religion of peace my ass. |
If you want to view some crazy, here is a video of the spectacle that was lunch on Sunday at the convention. I didn't participate in this. I would have loved to see every person just walk straight past all the protesters both days and completely ignore them. But I also understand the need to tell these types of people off so I understand this behaviour while not condoning nor encouraging it.
There isn't a lot left to say now, other than what a fantastic experience! I listened to some of the best minds in the world and they all inspired me.
