The Cross Canada Skeptical Smackdown - 2011

Once again the Cross Canada Skeptical Smackdown is finished for the year. (And this year it truly was Cross Canada.)


Last year it was really the “Western Canadian Skeptical Smackdown” with the only cities participating being Edmonton and Vancouver. But in 2011, seven different cities at least toyed with the idea. (Three did not actually have events for a variety of reasons, but we do hope they are all able to overcome their complications and participate next year.)

The four cities that were involved were: Vancouver, Edmonton, Ottawa and Halifax.

Vancouver competitors await the opening gun...

Halifax joined (making it a coast to coast event) with mere days to go, and as I understand it, the CCSS became the ice-breaker at the first ever Halifax SitP! (Haligonians please feel free to disabuse me of this notion if I am wrong.)

Vancouver’s event saw some real drama as the local lead changed back and forth more than once, and first place was determined by a mere two points. One team dropped out after the first round (having only received two points) and a table of legionnaires who had not come for the quiz, found themselves asking for spare answer sheets by the second round so they could play along.

Yours truly outlines the rules.

Quick rewind: The CCSS is a British style pub-quiz in five rounds focusing on science and skeptical subjects. 20011 was its second year and I dare say it is looking good already for year three. (If you think you might be interested in hosting an event in your city next year, do not hesitate to contact me (Send an email to my garbage email account – I check it irregularly – kgoodkey (at) hotmail (dot) com. You may need to be patient and persistent as sometimes I do go long periods without checking.)

The correct answers are announced.

If you’ve been following along… which I know is only a dozen of you… you know that last year in Vancouver we had a group of local skeptical heavy-weights banded together to make a dream team – “The Big Wang Theory.” And they kicked ass, winning the national title… which is nothing more than that – empty bragging rights. The question here in Vancouver was “were they going to reunite this year to defend their title.” It was a tightly guarded secret. Even I didn’t know until the last of them walked through the door 20 minutes to game time. Once again, they truly were the team to beat, but this year proved considerably harder. They lost the lead in the second round and didn’t get it back until the fourth, and in the final round there was real suspense - - did the upstart (and formed randomly there in the room that evening before the game!) “Everyone but Susan” manage to dethrone the champs?

As I mentioned above, it was a mere two point difference this year – the equivalent of one costly wrong answer in the fourth round – but Big Wang Theory did manage to hold on to their title locally.

The thrill of victory - Big Wang Theory

This year, unlike last year, where both events were held simultaneously, each city ran their event on a day and time of their choosing over the course of the (loosely speaking) weekend. All those events are now over and the scores have been compiled. There is some explanation worth adding at the bottom – hence the asterisks.

Big Wang Theory - 75.5 (VAN)
Everybody But Susan - 73.5 (VAN)
Chernobyl Babies – 69 (OTT)
Skeptics Not Septics - 64 (OTT)
Occam's Mach 3 - 63.5 (OTT)
Team Sexy - 60.5 (VAN)
Magnitude - 58.5 (OTT)
The Haligonians - 57 (HFX)**
Skeptical Believers - 56.5 (VAN)
Alliance of Unholy Eggheads - 56.5 (VAN)
Critical Mass - 55.5 (VAN)
13.37.Pi - 53 (EDM) *(70)
Three Wise Women and the Guy - 48.5 (EDM) *(64)
Chaos Riders - 44.5 (EDM) *(58)

*Due to time constraints the Edmonton event had to skip the fourth round (Too bad, it was my favourite!) The bracketed scores are what each Edmonton team would have finished with if they maintained the same percentage of right and wrong answers in the fourth round as they averaged in the other four rounds.

**The Haligonians – the sole Halifax team – was comprised from the entirety of Halifax SitP attendees that evening. As mentioned above it was used as an ice breaker with people coming and going throughout the event and answers being agreed upon by the ever morphing group as a whole.

The agony of defeat... Everybody but Susan narrowly misses winning the national title.

Four Dark Horsemen Brush on Past....

I am amused.

Sonja McLeod has posted scientifically legitimate information on her Little Mountain Homeopathy Blog.

Whatever you do, don't tell her.  She may feel the need to remove it.

Okay so quick bit of background.
Japan:  Earthquake - arrrrrrgh!
Japan:  Tidal Waves - Aiiieee!
Japan:  Nuclear Power plants in jeopardy:  Holy mother... have we learned nothing about nuclear power safety management?

So it certainly seems if you are following the news that while this situation is very un-cool (no pun intended) at Fukushima Daiichi, that the chances of serious amounts of fallout reaching our shores is currently very small, and there is every reason to expect that chance to dwindle.  Now, do not conflate that statement with the idea that there will be no effect on people half a world away from the plant.  No doubt someone will eventually do the math and come up with some estimate like (I am totally making this number up based on nothing more than a report I read on Chernobyl some years after it happened.) "The average lifespan on earth will be 7 minutes shorter as a result of Fukushima Daiichi." 

In any case the point being that there is no current reason to be taking potassium iodide in B.C.  That part she gets wrong (and if you read the comments it is because "What the CBC says is not gospel to me!" - fair enough... but she's walking up to the paranoia threshold.)

It is also clear upon reading that she is more in favour of other alternative means of preventing radiation (including x-ray) damage... of course, right at the bottom - she could not resist.... homeopathy.

Ugh.

I'm still looking for the place where he's a Dick...

Interesting piece on Skeptic North this morning.
I think my headline kind of sums up my position well.
How exactly is he being a Dick? Is the simple fact he approached a relation with this argument the reason? It seems so.
I've said before that being a jerk about skepticism is best left behind when talking with those you love. Erih sucessfully does this. His argument is clear, direct, well reasoned and even tempered.
As skeptics we must be able to approach those we care about most. It doesn't mean we will be successful, but if we can't try to nudge them, the people who trust us the most, in the direction of reason, then.... I don't know what, but then something is fundamentally wrong, don't you think?
Eric does everything right here. If this constitutes being a dick, then we truly must all be dicks, or do nothing at all.

Quit boring me please!

Skeptics are not scientists. There are scientists who are skeptics but skeptics are not scientists.
We are NOT doing science. Our role is to communicate science to the public - largely at a grassroots level. For the most part that means talking to people at their level, touching the message in terms that speak to them.

I've said this all before.

I just read a post by a blogger who I have some personal connection to who time after time writes the most soulless, robotic feeling posts.  I don't wish to call them out personally - this isn't about that. I don't want to get petty with the in fighting.
What it is about is that my ire has been tweaked.

We are NOT communicating in scientific journals to scientists. Very few non scientists have any patience for flogging through BMJ abstracts. Skeptical outreach cannot read like that. It must entertain as much as it informs.

Many of us skeptics are outrageously enthusiastic. Enthusiasm is fun and infectious - write like that.  Many skeptics are fantastically clever, capable of great wit - write like that.  Many skeptics are masters of untangling mysteries. That is compelling! (How many books, films, & tv shows are about mysteries?) Write like that!  People respond to values-based language.  You can write like that without misrepresenting facts.  Write like that!

For crap sake! Quit doing a disservice by writing in a tone intended for a minute specialized audience. I know you feel the need for precision and specificity. Newsflash: the public could not care less. The scientists have done their job. You don't have to do it over again. What you need to do is translate it. Simplify it. Make it entertaining - for a large diverse audience.

Put some life into it!

Asshole Skeptic Honour Roll #7 - Justified Disgust

If you haven't heard Tracey Spicer's discussion with Meryl Dorey about anti-vaccination and the declaration by the BMJ that Andrew Wakefield is a fraud on Australian radio, you have to do yourself a favour.

So often false balance is given to the opponents of reason.  You can't say that here.  It feels a little dirty that Spicer cuts Dorey off, but why give her any more opportunity to publicize her website?  Why give her the opportunity to gish-gallop away from the facts?

Ah... how refreshing.

For that I put Tracey Spicer on the Asshole Skeptic Honour Roll.

On a related note... check out Anderson Cooper serving Wakefield himself a nice helping of derision.  Do you get the feeling that beneath his well justified ire that Anderson is enjoying the shit out of himself?  "I'm not here to have you pitch your book.  I'm here to have you answer questions."  Tee hee.

And more... "we believe in facts here at 3-60."

Not Wakefield specifically, but more of the pastiche.  You know - the FACTS.

Oh wait!  Some Doctor on (no-longer a) Doctor action.

I could keep on posting links from the same series of related stories, but they are all on the same page as the videos above.

Star Wars vs. Armageddon

Courtesy largely of Phil Plant, there is a habit among skeptics to malign the bad science of Armageddon.

This chart puts it in starlight relief... as bad as it's science is, Armageddon only gets as much wrong as the widely beloved Star Wars gets right.

Image from The High Definite.

Sent from my HTC

An Open Letter to Bono

Hey.
So we've been having a one sided conversation for approaching 30 years now.
U2 is undoubtedly the most important band in my life, and you have been many things to me including idol and insufferable. At least you have an awareness and sense of humour about the latter. (Unlike that prat Sting who is second only to George Lucas in the degree he has ruined the piece of my youth that he also made so tremendous.)
I appreciate and even admire the work you do, but at times I do kind wish you'd just STFU - case in point, your TED Talk. Fuuuuuuuuck.
And specific to this season, I laugh overtime I hear the words "Tonight thank God its them instead of you." It always sounds just a bit meanspirited to me - which is not only out of character, but utterly opposed to the actual intent, I know.
I kind of suspect that if we were to discuss a range of skeptical subjects my opinion would descend, for at the very least your faith.
But... I just wanted to say...

THANK YOU FOR TELLING OPRAH TO STICK IT.