Think Free or Die
Travis Roy
co-founder and president of Granite State Skeptics
Homepage: http://www.granitestateskeptics.org
Yahoo Messenger: Sc00t978
Jabber/GTalk: Sc00tz@gmail.com
AIM: Sc00t978
Posts by Travis Roy
SkeptiCamp New Hampshire
Sep 13th
UPDATE: Please see below, and the link to the SkeptiCamp Wiki for new details about this event.
SkeptiCamp New Hampshire is just over a month away! Please join us for the first such event in New England. Based off of the unconference model of BarCamp, SkeptiCamp is a dynamic event with lots of participation and interaction.
We will be holding SkeptiCamp at The Barley House in Concord, NH on Saturday, October 22nd from 11am-4pm. For those coming from Boston please look at Concord Coach Lines for the South Station <-> Concord bus line. It’s a easy alternative for those coming from the Boston area, especially if you don’t have a car.
Please note that due to the limited space, registration is required to attent. Registration can be done at our EventBright page. If you want to cancel your registration please let us know so that we can release the seat to others. Speaking slots are even more limited, so if you have a topic you’re interested in presenting please contact our event coordinator, Dale Roy.
This event is made possible by the co-sponsorship of the James Randi Education Foundation.
September Skeptics in the Pub
Sep 6th
This month we welcome our first return speaker. Bart Center, writer of “The Atheist Camel Chronicles” is joining us to talk about his new book “The Atheist Camel Rants Again!”
Bart is also the operator of Eternal Earth-Bound Pets, a website for post-rapture pet care.
So please join us, 7pm at The Shaskeen in Manchester on September 12th. More information can be found at the event facebook page. Please RSVP there or here in the comments.
John Edward Protest – A Recap
Jul 5th
On June 21st, The Granite State Skeptics put together a quiet protest outside the John Edward show. Our goal was modest: Make aware and Inform. For those that may be interested in doing something similar, I thought a full run down of our story from the very beginning to the end would be helpful.
Back in October, 2010. One of the founders (Andrew Cramb) sent me an email stating psychic John Edward would be performing at The Palace Theatre in June. I thought it would be a good idea to put something together, but till I had a good idea best to put it on the back burner. After all, there was plenty of time to do something. However, what I did do in the mean time, was come up with a pamphlet called “Rational Guide to Psychics”.
April Skeptics in the Pub with ParaTom
Mar 21st
For our April meeting we’ll be doing something slightly different. Our speaker will be Tom Lynch of ParaTom.Com. From his website:
“Tom Lynch is an internationally known and well respected freelance Paranormal Investigator based in New England and travels across the country to help his clients uncover the truth about what they believe to be paranormal activity”
His promo video can be seen here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pztn8Cz5cmw
Power Balance Against the Ropes
Jan 6th
By now you’ve all heard about the ACCC’s ruling against Power Balance, and the statement they had to put on the Australian Power Balance website.
This of course generated tons of buzz around the world. It’s caused enough of an issue that the US Power Balance website posted this statement.
Power Balance products work. The existing reports out there are fundamentally incorrect. Power Balance did not make any claims that our product does not perform.
We are committed to bringing our performance technologies to every athlete in the world from professional to amateur to recreational. Our community of believers continues to grow each week. While our previous claims in marketing ads are not up to Australia’s ACCC standards – we stand behind our products. The belief of thousands of consumers and athletes who wear our products are not wrong.
A preliminary study recently conducted on the product’s performance variables was commissioned and the findings have determined that the product does in fact provide a “statistically significant” result on the wearer’s performance. We are committed to further evaluating the product’s performance parameters so that we can continue to provide products that enhance the wearer’s lifestyle.
Numerous actual consumer testimonies supporting the wristbands’ performance were provided to the ACCC by Power Balance. Despite that, they requested Power Balance remove marketing claims until it could provide them with their narrow criteria of randomized, double-blind scientific studies that supports the use of those marketing phrases.
Power Balance voluntarily agreed to stop using those phrases. Power Balance believes and wants users to believe that we will do whatever it takes to appropriately, and with honor and integrity make our products available to every consumer in every market in the world.
Hrm, a study? I ended up emailing the company asking them for more information about this study. The reply was filled with lots of marking talk and skating the law about what they can actually claim, but here’s the important bit in the email I got from Power Balance.
Currently the only scientific studies that have been done were measuring lead content and also measuring radiation to insure there are no harmful effects. One done by a Professor at Yale Testing for radiation and the other by a Texas based 3rd party organization called Intertek. Both studies came back with no harmful effects.
So, the official website says they’ve done studies on the effectiveness, but when you email them about the studies, none exist. Only studies on safety have been done.
Power Balance products work. The existing reports out there are fundamentally incorrect. Power Balance did not make any claims that our product does not perform.
We are committed to bringing our performance technologies to every athlete in the world from professional to amateur to recreational. Our community of believers continues to grow each week. While our previous claims in marketing ads are not up to Australia’s ACCC standards – we stand behind our products. The belief of thousands of consumers and athletes who wear our products are not wrong.
A preliminary study recently conducted on the product’s performance variables was commissioned and the findings have determined that the product does in fact provide a “statistically significant” result on the wearer’s performance. We are committed to further evaluating the product’s performance parameters so that we can continue to provide products that enhance the wearer’s lifestyle.
Numerous actual consumer testimonies supporting the wristbands’ performance were provided to the ACCC by Power Balance. Despite that, they requested Power Balance remove marketing claims until it could provide them with their narrow criteria of randomized, double-blind scientific studies that supports the use of those marketing phrases.
Power Balance voluntarily agreed to stop using those phrases. Power Balance believes and wants users to believe that we will do whatever it takes to appropriately, and with honor and integrity make our products available to every consumer in every market in the world.
FDA Warnings – A Skeptical Tool
Oct 20th
Over the past few months I’ve been using a new tool in my skeptical toolbox. The FDA Warnings Website. This website is a wealth of information and can help the average skeptic in a number of interesting ways.
The first, and of course the most obvious is to get a feel for what’s going on and what the FDA seems to be cracking down on. It does seem to come in waves, recently there was a large amount of “detox” items getting letters, this week it seems to be chelation therapies.
Another thing is to see what can be reported. You can see who crossed the line and how. You can use this information to find other people in violation and report them to the FDA.
But the real power with this tool is awareness. Using the website you can sign up for email alerts and you will get 1-2 emails a week telling you that the list of offenders is updated. You can then send this information out to friends that may use the products or post them on a blog. What I do is post them on Google SideWiki. You don’t need to have Google toolbar to use this Google product, they also have a bookmarklet.
While Google Sidewiki is not in widespread use, it is helpful just to keep track. There have been more than a few cases where I’ve gone to put in a new FDA Warning to find out that they already had one or two. If they’re the same complaint I will usually shoot the FDA an email to remind them that they have already notified these people for the same offense.
In closing, the FDA Warning website is an easy tool to use and another to throw in your skeptical toolbox in order to combat pseudoscience on the web.
Halloween Event
Oct 19th
The Granite State Skeptics invited Martha Taylor of the Henniker Historical Society to talk to us about the infamous ghost of Henniker, Ocean Born Mary. We will meet at 6:00 pm at Daniel’s Restaurant on Main Street, Henniker, on Sunday, Oct. 31. After the talk, we will visit Ocean Born Mary’s grave at the Town cemetary.
This event will be limited to the people that RSVP. To do so email me to let me know how many travis@granitestateskeptics.org
November SitP with Bart Centre
Oct 17th
Join us on Monday November 8th at 7pm for speaker Bart Centre, otherwise known as Dromedar Hump. Author of The Atheist Camel Chronicles and creator of Eternal Earth-Bound Pets
We will be at:
Wings Your Way
1181 Elm Street
Manchester, NH
Please RSVP on our Facebook Event Page or Meetup Page
Granite State Skeptics Tour of Salem
Sep 20th
Granite State Skeptics will be doing a tour of Salem, MA on Sunday October 3rd. We will be meeting at the Salem Visitors Center at 9:30am. There should be plenty of parking in the parking garage and parking lot near the visitors center. If coming from Boston you can take the Newburyport/Rockport Commuter Rail from North Station that leaves at 8:30am and gets to Salem at 9am.
Please sign up at our Facebook events page. If you don’t have Facebook, just RSVP here so I can get an idea of how many people will be coming.
Special thanks to Jeff Wagg and Liz Gaston for their help preparing and researching this event.
Remote Speakers – How we do it, and you can too!
Sep 19th
A couple months ago we did our first remote talk with Richard Saunders all the way from Australia. It went very well and since then we’ve also had Tim Farley. Now that the word is getting out there people have been asking me about our setup. It’s not very complicated and as long as your venue has good wifi you can do it too.
First a quick pic of our setup:
As you can see, it’s nothing fancy. I of course hope to replace the bucket with a more proper stand. So the laptop to the left of the bucket (in this pic it’s my wife’s MacBook Pro, for Tim Farley’s talk it was my work PC Laptop) runs the presentation. The video for that is jacked into the flat panel TV above. I’m able to control it via wifi using my iPod Touch with either Keynote Remote or Airmouse. The laptop on the bucket has the presenter, full screen, via Skype. They can see us and hear us, and the audio is plugged into the TV above.
Originally I was going to have a microphone, but due to technical problems the first night I couldn’t but Richard ended up being able to hear questions just fine and it gave him the ability to hear anything going on in the room and he even ended up talking to our waitress for a bit.
So if you have speakers a few states away or on the other side of the planet that you want to give a talk at your local SitP, but can’t afford to have them travel this is a good alternative. Nothing would replace having the speaker there live of course, but this is a workable alternative.