Steven Novella, Daniel Loxton, Barbara Drescher, and Jamy Ian Swiss sitting on the “Skeptical Scope and Mission” panel discussion at The Amazing Meeting 2013 conference (July 11–14, 2013) in Las Vegas.
The James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) has begun to move video content from their Amazing Meeting 2013 conference onto YouTube.
I was honored that year to join in a panel discussion with magician Jamy Ian Swiss, Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe host Steven Novella, and INSIGHT’s own Barbara Drescher, with Doubtful News creator Sharon Hill serving as moderator. The topic—the question of the “scope” of scientific skepticism—was an old one. But the conversation that emerged on stage may (in my opinion) be one of the most serious, positive, and forward-looking discussions this topic has received in years.
I was tremendously gladdened by that. I’ve often written about the focus, utility, and moral value of scientific skepticism. See for example my 2007 op-ed “Where Do We Go From Here?” (PDF), 2013 historical exploration “Why Is There a Skeptical Movement?” (PDF), or my 2014 speech “A Rare and Beautiful Thing” (read the text or watch the video).
It’s important to me. Important personally.
I’ll admit something a bit silly here: I often begin my days with a running gag, telling my wife and young children, “Well, I’m off to fight some crime!” (My wife sometimes replies, “Have fun storming the castle!”) What I’m actually going to do is walk 15 feet down the hall and type something, or possibly draw a picture. Yet in my innermost heart, I’m not joking. Not entirely.
For better or worse, the reality is that I’m a kind of True Believer. I believe passionately, obsessively, deep in my marrow that the work of scientific skepticism is worth doing—and worth doing well. I want my children to know that I hope to make the world a bit better with the work that I do. I wake up in the morning thinking about how to do that work more effectively. I fall asleep thinking about the challenges ahead. And I dream, as we discuss in the video, of what the discipline of scientific skepticism could one day grow to become.