Bruin Alliance of Skeptics and Secularists

The following are the meeting minutes for our first meeting of the spring quarter! It occurred on Friday, 5-7 PM, April 3. Just like last quarter, weekly meeting minutes will be posted on this website for anyone who wants to see what they missed, or who just wants to reminisce.

Reminder: This website is a resource for all members of BASS. If you want to contribute anything, just contact us or talk to an officer. There are a lot of events going on this quarter, and we would be very pleased if any attendees could write about their reactions.

Announcements

On April 29, we are hosting a debate between Matt Slick and John Shook. The proposed topic is “Which is ethically superior, Christianity or Secular Humanism?”

UCLA’s Objectivist club, LOGIC will be hosting a panel called “A Critique of Climate Change Science and Policy” on Monday, April 13^th. BASS does not endorse the denial of anthropogenic global warming, nor does it endorse this event. However, we encourage people to attend and ask the panelists questions!

We are thinking of having a field trip in the coming weeks to the Church of Scientology’s “Psychiatry: An Industry of Death” museum. This is the same museum which was mentioned last meeting.

Meeting Discussion

Today, we discussed the Pope’s recent comments on contraception. The pope said that the distribution of condoms “aggravates” the problem of AIDS in Africa. Obviously, this has no basis in reality. Indeed, Catholicism’s position against contraception seems to be ignored by most Catholics, who use contraception anyway.

We moved on to the topic of Mother Theresa, who probably has a much better reputation than she deserved. In fact, from her own statements, her goal was never to alleviate suffering; suffering is good because it is Christ-like. When she accepted the Nobel Peace Prize, she took the opportunity to say “abortion is the greatest destroyer of peace.” At one point she accepted $1.25 million from a man named Charles Keating. When Keating was put on trial for defrauding investors of $250 million, rather than returning the money to the rightful owners, Mother Theresa sent a letter to the judge urging him to consider Keating’s generous donations. One wonders where all that money went, considering how poor the conditions of her missions were. They didn’t even have any medicine, except for aspirin.

We also discussed LOGIC’s panel about climate change (see above announcement). LOGIC approached us to ask us to promote it. However, based on the speakers, it seems that the panel is advancing the position that climate change is not caused by anthropogenic (ie human) sources. Most of us disagree with this position, so we cannot endorse it. We are skeptics, not nay-sayers—they are two different things. Nonetheless, Andrew made the point that it is worthwhile to listen to alternative viewpoints and know opposing arguments.

Other topics that were mentioned during the meeting:

The Quiverfull movement, which believes in having as many children as possible.
Baptizing the dead – Mormons have posthumously baptized Genghis Khan! And holocaust victims.
What do they put in our water that it creates rainbows?! That said, schizophrenia is a serious illness.
Are pheromones really involved in human attraction? Brief, but intense debate ensues.