Witam,
Bartek is interested in opening a discussion list on adjani for
something like a "sceptics' society".
Sceptics' societies around the world are a mix of scientists and
ordinary citizens curious about claims of events seen outside of
the laboratory which seem to violate the known laws of physics,
e.g. walking on hot coals and not having your feet burnt, UFOs,
crop circles, etc.
Have a look at http://www.skeptic.com and you'll see that even the
aliens are convinced that the skeptics exist ;).
The goal is to show to society that scientists are not just "dogmatic
believers" who refuse to believe in events outside of our "narrow-minded"
way of thinking, and to treat the claims seriously, and this way educate
the public into the scientific method, maybe help develop better intuition
of statistics and probability among ordinary people.
There is a prize of Aus$100 000 (about 250 000 PLN) waiting since 1980
for someone able to prove they have psychic or paranormal powers:
http://www.skeptics.com.au/features/challenge.htm
There is also a US$1M prize (about 4 000 000 PLN):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Randi#The_.241_million_challenge
Some astronomers (e.g. Jayant Narlikar in India) are strongly supportive
of skeptics' societies.
And, who knows, a skeptics society might just possibly discover a real
effect showing the next step beyond the Standard Models of physics and
cosmology. (OK, personally i'm rather sceptical, but my mind is open, in
principle...)
Since this *could* be controversial, and i'm trying to implement
consensus-method decision-making, here is the proposal:
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PROPOSAL: new list for skeptics discussion DEADLINE Thu 11 Nov 18:00
We'll open a mailing list on adjani with a name like
sceptyk-l at cosmo.torun.pl
and Bartek will be the list admin.
Purpose of list: discussion group to see if people in ToruĊ,
especially scientists, are willing to spend the time setting up properly
controlled experiments, writing them up properly, doing the proper
statistical analyses, communicating them in public meetings etc., and
communicating with other skeptics' groups around the world - especially
if someone wants to try for the 250.000 PLN Australian prize money
or the 4 000 000 PLN James Randi Foundation prize money.
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Like any discussion group, IMHO it is most likely to be efficient if it
is self-organising, and it will only work if there are enough people willing
to spend enough time on it. But it can't hurt trying.
pozdr
boud
