Tell me about your "Skeptics in the Pub"

[shawmutt]

I've been meeting socially with a meetup group called "Freethinkers" for a little over two years now. We've really grown, with 26 people showing up last night. It's nice to hang out a bunch of people who share the same skeptical world view (for the most part--being a meetup group we attract all sorts)

After talking with a few other regulars we agreed to try and expand the meetup group a bit with a "Skeptics in the Pub" second meeting. So now I'm brainstorming and Googling up a storm, and could use some ideas and advice. We want it a bit more directed, with either a topic or a speaker. I haven't a clue about speaker etiquette, and any advice here would be appreciated.

Tell me about your group--do you have speakers? How do you find them? How do you vet them? Do you get a private room or just mingle with the general population?

Thanks in advance!

[shawmutt]

Jeez...crickets. Don't worry I won't steal too many of your speakers

[Horatius]

Originally Posted by shawmutt

Tell me about your group--do you have speakers? How do you find them? How do you vet them? Do you get a private room or just mingle with the general population?

Here in Ottawa, we mostly get speakers based on recommendations from the members, which is most of the vetting as well! We also get private rooms/party rooms for when we have speakers, as you want something quieter than a full on pub. Being able to control things like the background music and the lighting is important.

We don't really have a set schedule for how often we get speakers, so we just work around what we do get.

Finding a good venue is probably the most important part, and the most difficult.

[arthwollipot]

We don't have speakers, except occasionally. The Canberra Skeptics host a monthly lecture anyway. Recently we've had special guests that are additional to our third-sunday-of-the-month regular get-togethers. We're pretty small. Sometimes we have only a few people, but I make sure I'm there anyway.

[TubbaBlubba]

The Gothenburg wing of the SSS regularly meet to discuss in the pub of my choice. Usually we mostly drink beer and crack jokes about dubious people, occasionally discuss meaningful stuff.

A few times a year (so is it planned - only one has happened yet) we invite speakers into the pub cellar, where everyone can listen. It takes something like 80 people, so it's quite an event.

Given that meeting in the pub is something like 80% of our non-board meetings, having speakers every time would be tiring. You might want to talk to someone you haven't seen in a while, discuss how to act against some pseudoscience speaker who's come to town, and so on.

[Lamuella]

Cambridge SITP (that's cambridge UK rather than MA) is a fun and active group that meets once a month for a guest lecture from an academic or a skeptic. These usually consist of a 45 minute talk, a half hour break, and then an hour long Q&A session. Our speakers range from academics (including several who have worked on the LHC) to notable skeptics such as Rebecca Watson, to campaigning journalists like David Aaronovich. We've also had former ghost hunters, stand up comedians, and UFO debunkers. While the speakers often promote lively discussion, they are rarely met with scorn or snark, and I don't think I've ever seen one of our discussions descend into an argument. Strangely, one of the best sessions we ever had was from a very christian biologist on the subject of creation. He said an awful lot of things I disagreed with, but he stated his case well, responded to questions well, and while I don't think he convinced anyone of his argument, he certainly convinced a lot of people of the value of respectful debate.

The organiser of our SITP also runs Bright Club Cambridge, a comedy night where local academics do standup routines about their work. The last one was hosted by Robin Ince, which was pretty great.

[UnrepentantSinner]

North Texas Skeptics has a pretty good showing (or it least it did when my schedule allowed participation) for it's two monthly activities - a speakers meeting during the afternoon on Saturdays and a dinner on Tuesdays. I cannot say for sure, but I appear to be one of the few if not only D-FW JREFers to have participated with them.

As far as JREFers go, the closest thing we have to Skeptics in the Pub is our annual (ish) breakfast meetup when the Tricky's come here for the North Texas Irish Festival and my attempts for annual (ish) birthday sushi.

[Skeptic Ginger]

Seattle Skeptics in the Pub has been an enormous success. We previously had a group called the Seattle Society for Sensible Explanations. That group met about every 2 months IIRC and we had some more formal but very good speakers and dinner. But the leadership position had a lapse when the current president got busy and no one else stepped up.

In the meantime, in a lonely back room at a Wallingford (Seattle neighborhood) pub a new leader, Case, was sitting and waiting. If you build it they will come. And we did.

After several months of only a handful of people coming, Case ended up at one of our SSSE meetings and invited us to come to the pub. With an idea to invite woo believers to the monthly event to present the reasons they believe, and a wonderfully polite yet challenging approach to discuss the 'evidence' with these people, skeptics started to show up. Challenging beliefs is fun but we also have our own skeptic members sharing their scientific knowledge and we attend local relevant events like the recent Tim Minchin concert and a while ago we went to the movie, "Expelled", together.

People have come to show us their "ghost box", the Discovery Institute sent reps to discuss the irreducibility of the mitochondria (since the flagella has been reduced ), YECers have come and many more. On the science side one of our members shared her visit to the Creation Museum with PZ Myers, one member recently shared her knowledge about paleontology in the Americas and how the interpretation of evidence has changed over time, Dr Hall spoke on Snake Oil Science, and I shared my TAM presentation on the subtle influence on our perceptions of Framing and Narratives in language. Those are just a handful of the topics.

Anyway, now the Seattle Skeptics at the Pub is so popular we overfill the room every month and need a bigger space. And it's great fun.