The Scientific Method
Called to Question
presents
The Scientific Method:
How To Make Sense Of A World That Increasingly Makes Less Sense
with return guest speaker
Stephen Brown, Ph.D.
(Stephen completed his Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology/Cognitive Neuroscience in 2015 at Leiden University (The Netherlands). His dissertation focused on the role of the locus coeruleus, a small brainstem nucleus, and noradrenaline (a signalling chemical in the brain) in attention and learning.)
Can COVID vaccines make you magnetic? Why are eggs claimed to be healthy one day only to be identified as harbingers of terrible disease a while later? What is truth? More importantly: How do we distinguish what is plausible, and likely to be true, from what is not true? We have an outstanding and reliable system to make such decisions, called the scientific method. In this discussion, I would like to discuss what this method entails (e.g. Does all research allow you to infer causality? Is all research experimental? What does it mean for a scientist to publish something?), how this method can be used and how it should not be used. We will also create a mental toolkit to distinguish good research from bad research, and bad research from blatant nonsense.
Date and Time:
Saturday, 18th, 2021 at 7pm
Coffee and snacks provided.
*If you are experiencing any flu-like symptoms, stomach bug and/or respiratory sickness (or have been in contact with someone who does) within ten days of the event, we encourage you to skip out on this event. We'll catch you at the next one. Thanks for the consideration.
**Please let us know if you plan on attending as seating is limited.
3 comments:
Thoroughly enjoyed the evening and presentation. Always opens up other tangents that could be presented as follow ups.
Had a neat meme show up that seems a perfect follow up. I don't see a way to add a file here so will send it via email and you may want to distribute it to all who attended.
We learned more about the scientific process, however it seems as though the presenter only really thought the process had merit in the direction of supporting the jabs. He has a job that depends on having a jab at this point at this time, I imagine. But it was well-presented anyway. Thanks for having an interesting evening!
Miriam and Pete
I didn't get that at all. The evening really wasn't about jabs, and I found the presenter very careful to avoid sensitive topics except when directly questioned about them. It's hard for COVID topics not to become the subject of many of our thoughts, but I've found the scientific method is applicable to most facets of life. Interestingly, it was a psych prof twenty years ago who first impressed upon me the importance of critical thinking. And that involves always questioning your beliefs, whatever they may be at a given point in time. Otherwise you're not a critical thinker.
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