So you want to start a Skeptics in the Pub?

Two years ago, when still living in Wales, I learned of the existence of Skeptics in the Pub. Crispian Jago made it possible for me to go along to one with the fabulous "Jourdemayne", and I was instantly hooked.

As soon as I got into the "skeptical circle", a common cry was: "Why isn't there a Skeptics in the Pub anywhere in Wales?" which promptly progressed to: "Why don't you start one?" Because I didn't have a clue how, that was why! . . .

. . . well, eighteen months after that I found myself co-founder of both Cardiff and Hackney Skeptics - with Dean Burnett and James Robson respectively, and obviously I could never in a million years have done either without them - and occasionally am one of the criers of "Set one up in Place X!" to other people. So it occurs to me that I really ought to write about how to go about it.

It's pretty simple. You need: a venue, a projector, a screen, a microphone, a collaborator, some speakers and an audience.

There is of course no right and wrong recipe for a Skeptics in the Pub; you can vary the ingredients, adjust the baking time and present as whatever dish you please. So this recipe comes with a strong pinch of NaCl and plenty of freedom to suit your tastes. Just be sure to grease the pan with enough C2H5OH for your audience's liking (that can in fact be none, if they are not drinkers).

(Incidentally, these measurements are in imperial, not metric. That is, groups and accounts listed are British, not worldwide. There are worldwide groups, however, and if you are not in the UK I recommend getting in touch with them.)

Whilst Still Thinking . . .

If you're not already a regular somewhere, get a feel for what Skeptics in the Pub actually does. Check out what events are taking place (scroll down Simon Perry's website and check the "Events" table on the bottom right), see when a bunch of interesting looking ones are occurring, and take a few days off work and travel around the country. Talk to the organisers and to visitors.

Before you start . . .

Get your prospective Skeptics its own e-mail address. You will end up needing it for the following as well as to keep it organised and separate from everything else in your life.

This sounds trite, but set up a Facebook group. Call it something like "Skeptics in the Pub in...." [your local area]. If possible, don't be too restrictive about what your local area is. I chose "Wales" as an umbrella term, since I didn't know where it was going to be. Let the skeptical community know and ask them to join - post on their walls. (Here are Cardiff's and Hackney's if that helps. Search around with "Skeptics" and "SITP" and so on in the Search box.) Like as not you will find various people who come along saying "Oh I've been longing for one of these round here!" I actually didn't "do" Facebook until I thought I might try it out for the very purpose of setting this up, and was actually pleasantly surprised by the effectiveness of groups, if not the intelligence of some conversations. Still, if you most absolutely do not do Facebook, you probably have a friend who does.

Start a Twitter account. This is pretty simple. Tweet to the generic SITP account and do a Skeptics search and follow a bunch of people.

Important: personally, there's no way I could set up a Skeptics in the Pub by myself, so if you're like me, let people know you are looking for collaborators. (You don't have to say "yes" to anybody!) Of course, if you can do it by yourself, no need!

And, especially, contact Simon Perry (@Simon_Perry on Twitter) who has the keys to the master website. This is where you will be able to put up events. Make sure that the "contact form" goes to your SITP e-mail address, not to your personal one, or you will end up flooded if it's successful! Keep a special folder handy on your computer for all the speakers' pictures and any documents and fliers you make.

If anybody discourages you at any point, please read this. Apparently it's been helpful.

Choosing a Venue

Your ideal venue possesses all of the following characteristics:

- A separate function room;

- Wherever guests sit, they need a good view of where the slides will be;

- Be calm and friendly;

- Be fairly quiet - not go in for loud music, at least not while you're talking;

- Sound and projector equipment for talks (you'd be surprised how many pubs have these);

- Be near a train station and car park;

- Serve a variety of drinks and do food until relatively late;

- Smell nice;

- Be licensed for under-18s;

- Have staff who are all in favour of a regular meeting taking place;

- Not want all their customers to get raging drunk;

- Be clean and well looked after;

- Have disabled access;

- Have an awful lot of spare chairs;

- Not charge you

I don't think I've yet found anywhere with all these characteristics! When it's a pub that isn't looking to hold drunken discos, but rather maintains a mature, civilised atmosphere and welcomes some guaranteed income on a weeknight, that's the main thing. One pub said they would charge us £100 for the evening unless they made £500 off our audience. I don't know if they did make that, but after our first night they never mentioned charging us again, so they must be pretty happy with us!

If the bar staff are unfriendly or uninterested, if the manager doesn't seem keen on the idea, don't go anywhere near the place. Also, if it's loud or dirty, steer clear. If it doesn't serve food, look up nearby outlets that do.

Strictly speaking, the venue doesn't actually have to be a pub. (I once received an objection that holding it in a pub excluded people whose religious faiths forbade them to enter pubs, which of course is a problem!) Hackney, for instance, is an attic rather than a pub!

I have to confess, this isn't my strong point because Dean and James found the venues in our cases. When I arrived on the scene at Hackney, James had already found our attic. Dean however took me round Cardiff for a day of surveying eight different places. Both of us wore science T-shirts, making it the nerdiest pub crawl that had ever taken place in Cardiff. I cannot more strongly recommend a day of such a pub crawl, or a read of his blogpost about it.

What Day?

Most Skeptics in the Pubs run on a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday night. And most run regularly, such as the second Thursday of the month, or what have you. (Cardiff is the third Monday of each month, and Hackney the last Monday.)

Make a list of the nearest Skeptics in the Pubs to yours - or even all of them, if you have time - and write down when they are. Put them into a table and pick a day when you don't clash. (Sadly this is difficult in London!)

Monday is a very popular night, since it's an especially quiet night for pubs. I could not recommend a weekend night less. Pubs will be having other, noisier things to do then. So, probably, will your guests and speakers.

Check what is a good day for the pub, too. If they always hold a bingo night or a Happy Hour on Wednesdays, or invite bands along on Tuesdays, avoid this day.

I must apologise here to James, who had to change our day from Tuesday to Monday (and thus risk clashing with Westminster and London) because I have lectures on Tuesday nights. Well, he was crazy enough to take me on board as a co-founder . . .

Finding Speakers

You need to pick a few speakers well before you launch. In fact, I'd personally say always leave a few months between launching in cyberspace and launching in real life!

Pick a variety of different subjects - do not confine it all to one of, say, politics/the supernatural/alternative medicine/science. Don't shout out too loud that you are looking for speakers if you aren't prepared to cope with some possible slightly odd offers. If one of the talks you've seen seems to hit the perfect note, as Simon Perry's did for me for Cardiff's launch, then contact that speaker.

Handy resources: the 21st Floor's List of Speakers and Hayley Stevens's She Talks. (Sadly the vast majority of Skeptics in the Pub speakers are male. You can decide for yourself whether or not you want to make a special effort to encourage women, or more young people or more ethnic minorities or what have you along.)

It's good to kick off with somebody fairly well-known - but these people may be very busy, and may also charge you a lot (not all of them, but some do!). Don't start off with a string of people coming from far away, as the travel expenses and staying over will come to a lot. If you're lucky enough to have a "local hero", make sure you snag them!

Advertising

So, you have your venue and plans - your Skeptics in the Pub is cooking! Now you want as many guests as possible!

I read a document - which I have since been unable to find - that your launch night sets the tone, and if only 8 people turn up to it, you're unlikely to have arranged much of a kick-off. I commented earlier that you should wait a few months between launching on the Internet and in real life. Pick a good time to launch: if it's just before Christmas or during the summer, everybody's going to be too busy. We timed Cardiff to kick off alongside the academic year to pull the students in. (In some places, students make up a large proportion of your attendees. In other places, there are virtually no students. It depends.) You may wish to include some fun gimmick for your launch such as a raffle or a competition to see who can come up with the most ridiculous idea for something or other.

When you've got your day, set it up as a Facebook event. Invite all your friends you think won't be offended. (Sadly, some will!) Tweet both the website event and the Facebook event like crazy. Mention it every day or two, at different times. Ask famous skeptics for a retweet. Don't hassle or spam anyone, but don't be embarrassed to say something you've already said this week.

Promote yourself through a variety of sources. Approach local newspapers. In fact, if you google "local newspaper [whatever area you live in]", you may come up with several more local rags than you even knew existed! Look for their contact forms and their events pages. List yours as an event. Write them a short note with some exciting or weird information - which the events are likely to contain! Put in very clearly what Skeptics in the Pub is. I personally like to explain that it's not about yelling "I don't believe you!" but that it is from the Greek word "Skepticos" meaning "to enquire or find out" - this was inspired by a beautiful interview with D J Groethe, which Tannice from Guildford Skeptics sent me.

You may well also find the council lists local events - add this. Approach the local radio (if you have any mates or mates of mates in radio or media, all the better). Print off some fliers - they can be hilarious or they can be very simple - and distribute them round shops, pubs, museums, libraries. Personally I feel very foolish and rude doing this. I have learned to have a look round, and then go up to whoever's behind the counter, smile very nicely, and ask if you can add your flier to their collection. If the person is remotely nice, invite them along!

Even supermarkets often have a "community noticeboard". I felt a particular satisfaction in placing an advert for Hackney Skeptics in my local Sainsbury's alongside an advert for psychic sessions. (By the way, do talk to the staff before you do this.) If you are a student, or know of any, see if you/they can get something into their student newspaper or find some other way to list it as a worthwhile event.

If you end up in an unfamiliar area - and quite a few organisers do - then make friends with local people to show you round and tell you where will accept fliers. I hope to meet a lovely lady named Sandra soon to distribute more Hackney fliers (which look amazing, by the way - not my artistry, sadly!).

Money

Usually Skeptics in the Pubs charge £2 or £3 for expenses. Many are exceedingly apologetic about charging anything - "Our events are free; we just ask for X to cover the speaker's expenses". I'm less apologetic, personally, probably because I travelled for 3 hours there and back to Cardiff Skeptics and never claimed expenses for my tickets or petrol. If you've done a load of work for this - which you should have! - and the speaker has come all this way, people can afford what usually amounts to less than the price of a drink! Besides, it irks me to be asked for money when I've been told that something is free.

Money might be collected before the talk, or during the interval, or after - perhaps in a pint glass or similar. This involves having to go round all the audience members, and try to avoid missing anyone out, which personally I don't enjoy doing. At Cardiff, we neatly combined ensuring that everyone paid with welcoming everyone, by having a table at the top of the stairs people climbed, with me and often another person - often Dean's wife Vinny - sitting behind it.

I liked this system because it ensured not only that everybody paid, but that we met and greeted all our members old and new. When they paid, we stamped their hand and had a laugh offering them a choice of stamps - a Bah Humbug, a gingerbread man, a star or a squiggly thing. (Except on the first night when I printed out a load of mini-tickets!) Have a float of pound coins ready as lots of people will give you a fiver or tenner. Have a greeting line ready for everybody - "Hi! How are you?" "Hi, thanks for coming, £3 please!" "Thank you very much indeed! Would you like a hand stamp so I don't ask you again?" At Hackney, the Picturehouse staff take care of that, which saves us a job but also removes some of the friendly personable aspect of it. (That also means that they take a fee from us, but in return they give us great service, a glitzy venue, free drinks for us and free food and drink for the speaker, so I'm not complaining!)

Have a nice big money jar, and for goodness sake don't do what I did every Cardiff Skeptics night without fail and leave it lying around. I once left it in the pub overnight. Thankfully, Dean got over there the next day and it was on the windowsill untouched!

Some places are incredibly conscientious and publish their financial records so people can see where their donations are going. I haven't been treasurer at either place, but I can say I've never once had anyone be the slightest bit suspicious of our finances or remotely resentful of paying.

Equipment

At least, you'll need a projector and cable - that preferably works with both PCs and Macs! - and a screen. You may be able to borrow these regularly, or may get donated old ones. (If you know of a good place to get them please let me know.) Before you launch, test them! You may end up needing the speaker's computer and the projector on a table in the middle of the front row of the audience. (There's nothing wrong with this. It gives the audience a place to put their drinks too.) Test it out, walk to the back of the pub and see how it looks from there. If, as in Cardiff, the speaker has the windows to the back of them, invest in a black sheet you can pin up!

Usually the speaker brings their own laptop - check this in advance - but it's good to have one of yours as well just in case theirs and your equipment refuse to speak to each other.

Also test the mike as these are notorious for failing. Another nice bit of equipment to have, if you've got/can afford one, is one of those clicky things the speaker can hold which moves between slides. (What's it called?) Of course, if it's a well equipped pub, they will have a mike and sound system of their own - the staff may or may not be willing to help you with it when it turns into a recalcitrant mystery!

Looking after the speaker

I give these tips more from the point of view of my own experiences as a speaker - which have on the whole been terrific; thank you to my many lovely hosts - than as an organiser. (If I fail on any, or I should add anything, let me know!)

Well in advance, ask them how they'd like to get there - by train or car or whatever. Lots will be very generous and book, or ask you to book, the cheapest train tickets available. Send them a map of exactly where the place is, so they can plan what time to leave. They'll probably want to arrive early to set up and get something to eat (or, if they're a new speaker, they may want to eat after the talk when they're less nervous!). Make sure you, or someone you trust, can arrive early too to meet them. Give them your phone number in case of emergencies (in fact, if you have a Skeptics talk of your own, don't give it at your own venue but keep it up your sleeve just in case the speaker drops out at the last minute!).

If they have travelled, they may need to stay over. If you or another organiser has a spare room, that's terrific. Some speakers, myself included, are happy to crash on a sofa - but not all. Look for fairly cheap hotels about the place - also feel free to post any good links to finding cheap rooms in the comments, please!

A travelling speaker will really appreciate having a map and directions from the station to the venue and the place they're staying in. Send these before the day they set off so they have time to print it out!

Ask in advance if and when they'd like to eat. If it's difficult to get from the station to the pub, and you have a car, it's really lovely to get picked up, though obviously only if this is feasible! If you're likely to arrive later than them, let them know. Upon arrival, ask them where they'd like to stand, so you can set up the microphone there, and check they're OK with the lights - it's awful if those are blinding or ruin the slides.

Before the talk - and I will love you forever if you do this for me - get a nice big glass of water they can reach when their throat dries up!

Be on hand for them. If the venue has several different rooms, don't scurry off with your mates into one whose existence they don't even know of so they spend the hour after their talk looking for you.

The Big Night!

Wow! It's actually happening! You're probably running around like a headless chicken - someone has to go and pick up the speaker from the station (their train has been delayed); you're either terrified that the seats aren't filling up (turns out twenty-odd of your audience are at the bar!) or delightedly bewildered that all your seats are full and there are still people coming in, and random pub visitors are asking "What's this?". Some clevercloggs turns up and responds to "Hi! Thanks for coming! Three pounds please!" with "I DON'T BELIEVE YOU!" or wants to discuss some minor objection or irrelevant philosophical point with you at extreme length. Everyone wants to know where the toilets are or where they can get food at once, interspersed with horrible moments of complete quiet where you feel you're standing there like a lemon supposed to do something and heaven knows what.

Don't start on the dot of 7:30 or whatever time you advertise - let people get last-minute drinks. It is a good idea to pop up to the microphone around that point and say hello everyone, thank you all so much for coming, we'll be starting in ten minutes, you can get drinks there and food there, toilets are that way, etc. Do go round and say "Hello, thanks for coming!" to as many people as possible. If they just smile vaguely and look blank, that's OK. If they look lost, it's OK to ask them "Hi, are you here for X Skeptics?" Don't talk to any one person all evening. It makes you look unapproachable.

When it's time to begin . . . Just get on and do it. I have started various introductions by hitting my teeth on the microphone and, once, when I was being introduced as a speaker, by walking into a projector and knocking my glasses to the floor. (A friend told me he once started a lecture by knocking over the lectern!) I have also tripped over the microphone wire, crashed to the floor, and had the microphone fall over and hit me. If someone as clumsy as me can do it, you can. It's your show.

Spend a couple of minutes introducing yourself and the idea of Skeptics in the Pub, how it began, how you came to launch this. Introduce anyone working with you. If you happen to know of other people also looking to start a Skeptics, ask them to raise their hands so they can meet each other in the break. Tell a funny Skeptic joke or story. Make any announcements that need making. Don't spend ages, but this is your moment set out your expectations for the evening and future evenings - you can establish, indirectly, whether you want this to be a shouty sort of group or a super-civilised one, for example. Tell the guests what's going to happen this evening - the usual format is introduction, speaker gives talk, 20 minute break for drinks, and then questions and answers; but of course there may be alterations or extras! It is also a good idea for the speaker's first slide to already be up by this time - either that or your own slide with a welcoming message and/or your website.

Then introduce the speaker, shut up, and let them get on with it!

There may be a bit of quiet hustle and bustle you have to deal with - people arriving late, or people jabbering at the back and preventing others from listening to the talk. Sadly you cannot focus your whole attention on the talk - keep an eye on your audience! If things go horribly wrong and they seem to be getting bored (unlikely!), have something up your sleeve for after the talk to make them laugh. This may also be your only chance to eat during the evening, and you will definitely need it.

Skeptics in the Pub is for dialogue and everybody is welcome to speak. But don't feel you have to let anyone abuse this. In the unlikely event that there's a troublesome person in the audience, don't leave it to the speaker to sort them out - you're in charge and have the right to run this how you like; tell them to either be polite or leave. The bar staff should be able to help you. (I once had an audience member who shouted annoying know-it-all comments throughout a talk I gave, but that's not nearly as bad as some scenes I've witnessed, such as an audience member giving a female speaker a lengthy flood of sweary abuse over the microphone.) Questions and answers is a particularly vulnerable time for this - establish with the speaker whether they want to pick the questions or whether you should. We once had a chap in the front row who kept asking questions without raising his hand, unaware that there were people behind him with their hands up and being made to wait for him again and again, and the speaker was too polite to ignore him. The speaker was conducting Q&A while I sat in the audience, so I opted to quietly go up up to him and tell him about the people behind him, and request that he wait. He looked annoyed, but didn't argue. Some people will frame an exceptionally long statement or complaint as a question - if this happens you may stop them and ask "What's your question?" If Questions and Answers drags on a long time - it once dragged on so long for me that I got a backache! - ask the speaker when they'd like to stop, and feel free to make some remark such as "Last question, please" or "Time for two more questions, and let's have them from people who haven't asked any yet."

If lots of people have come, celebrate this. If it's a few, make it cosy - for example, have everyone bunch up and speaker come and sit with them for questions and answers, and make each individual feel noticed and special. Tell the audience when the next talk will be and who it will be with (have this information on a slide). Encourage them to follow you on Twitter, join the Facebook group, and contact you if they can help with anything or have any suggestions. Have a notebook ready for e-mail addresses. Also have a not-too-tatty bit of paper and a pen ready for if anyone wants to be added to your e-mail list.

Thank the speaker and your audience for coming and bringing your dream into reality. You have collectively achieved something wonderful - especially you, the organiser - and you should be extremely proud.

And don't give up!

And another Skeptics in the Pub. Welcome Hackney!

Because obviously I haven't got enough to do at the moment, what with a course and a zoo and a bunch of talks coming up, last autumn I let myself be dragged into co-founding Hackney Skeptics in the Pub.

There are already two Skeptics in the Pub in London: London and Westminster. But there are over seven million people too, and James Robson, who works with exotic animals at the Horniman Museum and runs Science in the Pub with Paolo Viscardi, thought there was room for more. In other words, you can blame James for all this . . .

Westminster is the place that focusses on media, law, policy, etc. So we thought we'd be "the Skeptics with a science slant". Like Science in the Pub, we hope to run the odd silly experiment during the interval (when I gave a talk there, for instance, people were invited to taste different wines to see if we could tell which were old, which were new, which were cheap and which expensive. I forget the overall result, but I certainly couldn't). We also differ from other places in another way, by being based at the Hackney Attic rather than in a pub. I personally love pubs (the kind with pool tables and room for conversation, anyway), but this is where we are, and a damn glamorous venue it is too.


It's the fifth floor of the Hackney Picturehouse on Mare Street, opposite the Town Hall and Hackney Empire and, as you see, in a street containing rather a lot of pretty lights. It's a fantastic venue for gigs etc and has a bar and comfortable chairs, and they serve food and can bring it upstairs - so that covers all the necessaries for Skeptics in the Pub without it strictly being a pub. Maybe that'll expand our audience. Maybe it won't make any difference at all. We'll have to see.

Let me digress into exactly what "Skeptics in the Pub" and "Skepticism" is, for anybody new coming along. It is not cynicism or pessimism, or people yelling "I don't believe you". There are various definitions of what Skepticsim is, and useful articles about where it's needed in the face of misleading claims, but a beautiful one was recently shown to me by Tannice, who runs Guildford Skeptics. It's by DJ Groethe, and he says:

"To me, the word is best understood by looking at its roots: it comes from the Greek word 'skeptikos', which just means to inquire or to find out. We say that skepticism is the best way of finding out the truth and is precisely the opposite way of just saying 'no' to others' beliefs . . . Critical thinking is continuous with skepticism – and with science, for that matter. It is simply thinking critically about claims and issues . . . Some people think the skeptic’s work is trivial, but we think beliefs matter very much. If the majority of people believe in the claimed supernatural ability of a TV preacher to heal their illnesses, there are real-world effects: the believers won’t go to real medical doctors."

From here - the whole thing is very well worth a read!

The Greek word may be why we call ourselves "skeptics" rather than "sceptics", although for many of us I guess it is just a habit, a joke, a special sense of belonging. Quite a few of us feel we don't belong among many others - with severities ranging from when all the people in the office are going on about how marvellous such and such a psychic is, to being the only atheist in your family and being constantly told you're going to Hell.

But the nights at almost all the places I've been to are cheerful and bonding. I used to co-run Cardiff Skeptics with Dean Burnett, which was an incredibly happy year - I lived in Wales just long enough to be there for our first birthday party before moving here to London and having to leave. I've given talks at half a dozen or so places, and all the events felt happy and full of learning. Granted, at the Questions & Answers there's occasionally the odd smartypants or shouter, but the evenings are carefully watched by the people running it (and the pub staff!) and I've never yet been to one where I didn't end up in several great conversations.

We're launching our first event of 2012 on Monday 30th January. The speaker is David Allen Green, better known as Jack of Kent. I thought he'd probably be talking about libel law or some other bad law, but he's decided to be more interesting - for that, read "stirrer" (in a smiling way). As we're "the sciencey place", his title is "Scientists do not have a monopoly on assessing evidence". In other words, while the scientific method is one of mankind's foolproof - yet counterintuitive - inventions, and has driven our progress for the last few centuries, history and law (and perhaps other things as well?) can be equally evidence-obsessed. He'll be talking to us about that.

We've got more events on the way - Ben Hardwidge to talk about "The Sharks Don't Get Cancer" myth in February, Alok Jha for an unconfirmed topic in March, Deborah Hyde on the origins of zombies in April (her talk was my introduction to Skeptics in the Pub!), and we have some cool plans for May and June too . . .

The challenge I've got this time that I didn't have in Cardiff is local advertising. My experience with this is limited to going round local businesses in Pembrokeshire and asking them if they'll have petitions to save Withybush hospital (the only hospital with an A&E in the whole of Pembrokeshire!), so I may make a complete hash of this. There is a Facebook group for "SITP Organisers" where I asked about advertising and was absolutely pelted with encouragement, ideas and advice. I'll be getting a day free this week - do get in touch if you even vaguely know me or plan to come to Hackney Skeptics and would like to accompany me on some poster-posting!

I hope to see you on Monday 30th!

What the hell I'm actually doing these days

No, I haven't forgotten to do a blog series about the conference in America. It was utterly wonderful - here's my Galaxy Zoo blogpost about it - but I seem instead of blogging to be finishing up work neatly, researching astronomy history, trying to get my head around maths, whizzing around doing various talks, daydreaming, procrastinating, puffin watching, trying to stay in touch with friends, and hiding from my duties in ridiculous and ancient computer games. Sorry!

I said finishing up things at work? Yes - I'll be leaving my charity in about five weeks or so. I've got a place at Queen Mary University to do MSc Astrophysics! After my undergraduate degree, and not passing the teaching course, I spent many years vowing never to do postgraduate anything. Deep down I didn't think I was clever enough. However, I've changed my mind. The initial trigger was realising that the research I'm doing really needs me to have a deeper understanding of scientific research and how to read a journal. The main reason, now, is that the conference opened my curiosity and confidence like a bursting dam. There's nothing more encouraging than finding you actually understand professional talks and posters, that people are happy to answer your questions - and then to be told by several strangers, "You ought to do a PhD, you ask very good questions." Pardon the pun, but I'm over the moon. It was odd to get the offer by e-mail on a Sunday morning. I have a picture in my mind of a zombified admissions team slouched red-eyed over their desks on a Saturday night, fuelled with fourteen cups of that milkless sugarless corrosive caffeine that professional astronomers call coffee.

In other words, if you don't feel confident about something, maybe you can do it after all. I hope other people who've been disappointed in other aspects of their education will get another chance, as I have.

As for the talks, I recently went to Aberystwyth - a delightful experience because Mark and Sam were such lovely hosts, and a strange, nostalgic one because I lived in Aberystwyth for a few weeks when I was nine. I recognised nothing - not even the street I'd lived on - except the seafront and Constitution Hill. Skeptic speakers, Aberystwyth may be a long way away but I seriously recommend you go there.

My next Skeptics in the Pub talks will be in Winchester (August 25th) and Skeptics on the Fringe in Edinburgh (11th August)! Look what an amazing picture Ash Pryce made - even though Michael keeping that close an eye on me and the fact that my chin has decided to take up half my face are both amusingly disturbing.


Hope to see you at one of these. Cardiff Skeptics is also on Monday, and we've got a fantastic team lined up for a chaotic evening of science comedy.

We did it.

Skeptics in the Pub arrived in Wales on Monday night. I'm absolutely gobsmacked at how many people came along. And I'm pretty sure it's going to grow fast.

Dean had the sense to nip over to the Promised Land earlier that afternoon to arrange rows of chairs. I arrived some time after six with Ray, who's set up the West Wales Skeptics, and was on the same (delayed) train as me from Swansea. We were bemused to find a sheet and bag of drawing pins on the windowsill, but put it down to Dean's mysterious comedy routine.

It turned out Simon wanted them. He preferred to project his talk onto a sheet rather than use the rather giant TV-like screen. We had to wait until it got dark, as the daylight shone through the sheet. Oh well. Each to their own. (For those who can't see the big grin on my face while I type, the TV-like screen wouldn't have shown some of the gloriously funny detail on Simon's slides!) Simon and Dean looked highly amusing pinning a sheet up to the window.

They got their revenge, though. I was grabbing a bite to eat while they were doing the heavy work, and Dean said, "Don't tire yourself out, Alice." That did make me feel guilty, looking at all the rows of chairs, the microphone in place . . . Oh well. I'd had an entirely out-of-proportion fight with the Mac and printer to print off some sweet little tickets (not something I'd ever seen at a Skeptics in the Pub before, but I thought they'd encourage people to pay up!), and came with a big plastic jar to collect the money in.

I was beginning to wonder where everybody was when one of the bar staff popped upstairs to say: "Some people arrived a while ago, shall I start sending them up?"

After that it was a steady trickle - with the occasional whooshing flood that kept half a dozen folks at a time queueing on the stairs while I fiddled with change and tickets. After a while I had to fish between notes to get out change (what a good job my nice mum had given me a little float of £1 coins!). There wasn't much time to think clearly between the meeting and greeting, judging who needed reminding that they needed to pay, who needed reassuring that we'd be friendly, who needed urging to rush and grab a seat, who I ought to recognise . . . Looking back, my memory supplies me with lots of members of both sexes, lots of various ages, and lots of different colours. I couldn't be more pleased with this. Skeptics are coming in for a lot of bashing these days, mostly from ourselves, and one of the criticisms is that there seems to be a white male majority. The other thing that excited me was so, so many folks arriving who I didn't know. They weren't coming to please me or anything. They'd heard about us and were interested. Which is so much better!

One of the first people I knew was Rhys Morgan plus his dad. Then there was PaulNUK2O1O, Hayley, Andrew Holding who will be our January speaker, Rhys Philips who interviewed me and Dean on the radio for Pythagoras's Trousers, and - albeit late due to council activities - Councillor John Dixon whose #stupidscientology hearing is Tuesday 28th (oh, and if you haven't seen Crispian's take on #stupidscientology, it's a must! Sorry, any scientologists reading this, but . . . .). Who else? I bet I've forgotten someone. What I'll never forget is that even my parents came along. It was a long journey for them, especially after a working day at the hospital.

We were sadly missing the illustrious Jack of Kent, whose legal work was consuming all his time - it would have been a long journey for him too. He'll come and give us a whole talk another time. Dean and I filled in for him. After the fire alarm had finished going off, that is. I'm still uncertain why it went off, other than that it got exceptionally hot in there. The windows didn't open far and the road was being dug up (yes, at eight o'clock in the evening!) - reminiscent of Alicia's first Maths lecture in "A Beautiful Mind". The first time it went off, everyone just looked around uncertainly and, well, sat there. There was no commotion downstairs either. There was a cheer when it stopped, and a roar of laughter when it went off again! I think they put the air conditioning on after that!

Dean did the official health and safety routine, warning us about the elephants in the loos or something like that, and reminding us to leave the building if there actually was a real fire. Then I made a prat of myself trying to explain what Skeptics in the Pub was by telling silly stories about it and keeping on remembering one more thing to say. My parents did not look at me while I did. Afterwards my mum said sympathetically that it was a good thing that I got Dean to do most of the speaking and that I would eventually get better at it. Well, I wasn't helped by a dear friend of Dean's who decided to spend a few minutes howling pitifully on the stairs!

Dean then took over again, shortly followed by Simon, who told us that he'd been a troublemaker for a long time and gave us an example of a complaint he made to a supermarket because their "Taste the Difference" Cumberland sausages all tasted the same. Then things descended from there. Even though I'd seen his talk before, I was slightly miffed to miss even five minutes of it by sneaking downstairs and asking if they could turn the music down. I'd love to blog about it in detail as I did Jourdemayne's, but . . . they're different. Jourdemayne's is special whether you've read it or not. Simon's contains a lot of special surprises which I don't want to spoil by revealing! I can't resist one more snippet, though. A thoroughly ridiculous, misleading and generally illegal product was defended on the grounds that it conformed to standard this stroke that stroke the other stroke thingummybob. Simon looked up said standard, and found that it was only part of a huge list of such standards to which it should also conform. The single one to which it did was merely that they'd filled out a form about it . . .

Anyway, general hilarity reigned! Rhys Morgan (who got a special cheer - he's been written about by Martin Robbins now, and the Kenyan newspapers are issuing warnings about that horrific pseudo-medicine being peddled there) was picked as a prop for a demonstration. A lot of people were standing, and a couple of them were chattering away distractingly at the back (but I think Dean had a Quiet Word with them). I was near the back and it was hard to hear. Bodies absorb an awful lot of sound. I tried sitting on the floor but I was the only person who did, so it felt silly. (Not to mention worrying among all those legs, and I couldn't hear a thing). I wonder if we can borrow twenty-odd folding chairs or so. Perhaps some kind fan might have some . . . ?

Simon got a very big clap and we had a break to grab a drink before Questions and Answers. In Manchester he'd got some tough questions such as whether his crusade against scam products ever made him feel guilty for those who were trying to earn a living, and whether it was morally right to deprive people of placebos. The questions in Cardiff were, to my surprise, all very supportive. Somebody asked him: "Given the events of the last few days, would you say you're a militant atheist?" which got a roar of laughter. Simon suggested that Dawkins is actually doing a useful job by being what seems to many of us aggressive, because he demonstrates just how moderate most atheists are by comparison - and therefore what "moderate" actually means. In fact, he suggested that there is a continuum between religious fanatics and atheists, with religious fanatics at the most warlike end, atheists at the most peaceful, and "moderate" religious folks in between. Food for thought there. You can make up your own mind what you think of that one.

It was actually my mum who pointed out one of the nicest things about Simon's talk and his questions and answers: that his answers were so incredibly honest. For example, someone asked him what his family thought of his crusades, and he simply told them. No soundbites, no dodgings, none of the evasiveness and condescension we're so used to. Just honesty. And fun.

Another question was "Don't you ever worry that you might wake up with a horse's head in your bed?" Simon told us a story about a rather huge and aggressive-looking aromatherapist who nearly attacked him in public - Simon was examining this chap's wares; the chap asked him what he was looking for and got the reply, "Oh, I was thinking of reporting you to Advertising Standards, actually."

When the questions were over, Simon got a big round of applause - and then was kind enough to raise one for me and Dean for putting this all together. I remembered to remind everyone of the next one: How to be a Psychic Con Man with Ash Pryce, 18th October, same time, same place. Then it was time for beer and photos!

View from the back (standing at the front include Rhys Morgan, Cllr John, Andrew and I think the Aberystwyth folks):

View from the front:

According to Dean, Simon and Cllr John must have been debating about who's caused the most trouble of the two of them . . .

. . . but they seem to have reached an amicable compromise!

Here are Dean and Andrew, whose huge number of chemistry corrections for my #Bleachgate post I really must go through one by one:

The three woo botherers debate best tactics . . .

And everyone here in this picture is a Skeptics in the Pub founder!
(Andrew is Cambridge, Ray is Swansea/West Wales, and Simon is Leicester.)

My mum told Simon he reminded her of one of our cats, Izzy - small, lithe, innocent-looking and absolutely impossible to discipline. That must be one of the more unusual compliments Simon has received in his time!

One of the best bits was Simon coming up and asking me how we managed to get so many people - he's been to Skeptics in the Pub in larger cities that have been running longer, with far fewer people. Judging by our takings, we got an audience of about 60. I honestly don't know how we did it. We've got our webpage, and we went on Twitter and Facebook, and I am sure Dean spread the word around Cardiff. I'd be fascinated to know how you heard about us - do let me know!

I think Andrew was the person who came from furthest away, namely Cambridge. (He very kindly timed a holiday in Wales to coincide with this!) We also had folks from Aberystwyth and Swansea, who I thought to get to wave at each other so they could all join up and discuss things later. In fact, one of the folks from Aber came up to me after Simon's talk and said, "That was brilliant! I've decided, we've got to do it in Aber!" There are rumours of Skeptics starting in Bangor too. I have an image in my head of several lines of dominoes placed across Wales . . .

Sadly, I had to go earlier than most, so as to get back to Pembrokeshire. We then managed to miss the last fast train and had a half hour wait, and got home just before two in the morning. It was a long time after that that I got to bed, because lots of great messages were already waiting on Twitter and Facebook! The best included: "Great talk last night on quackery and being an alt-med-botherer by Simon Perry. Well done @CardiffSITP", "Looking forward to more jam-packed Cardiff Skeptics meet ups, great talk from @Simon_Perry" and "Very much enjoyed @simon_perry talking at the @CardiffSITP event this evening. He is the @markthomasinfo of the skeptic world! Hilarious." Despite very little sleep, I woke early next morning still grinning my head off.

Dean put some of the meeting (not Simon's talk, obviously) on youtube. One of my colleagues found it and played it at top volume in the office yesterday. I ran and hid in the kitchen. I haven't dared watch it, but he tells me I fidget too much, which is probably true and useful to know. I've lived in Spain you see, and picked up the habit of waving my hands around when I talk! At any rate, that's my excuse!

Anyway, you know? I've been a teacher and I've learnt to care a lot less how I look when I talk. The thing to do is just get on with it. None of us got covered in eggs or rotten fruit, and all in all, as Dean put it, "I think that worked."

I hope to see you next time!

Welsh Skeptics head west

Is "sorry I haven't been blogging lately" the most tedious way to begin a blogpost? Probably. I'm writing an article about Cassini. This is exciting in a different way from my Galaxy Zoo one, because this is a subject I know very little about. Which is a great challenge, and allows me to prove my worth as a researcher of new things. I never knew I could get so fascinated with the intricacies of elliptical orbits and dust damage prevention . . .

Anyway, wonderful news: it looks like Wales is suddenly getting very interested in skepticism! Look - there's now a West Wales Skeptics, who have also set up a blog. These folks will actually be easier for me to get to (harder for speakers, though, I fear) than Cardiff, which of course is mine and Dean's. I am thrilled, folks - many congratulations, please use me as a speaker (I have a topic brewing . . .); and if you're in west Wales and could attend or indeed be a speaker, do please get in touch with them.

Here's their current logo, though they're looking for more - among other things. You can follow them on Twitter at @SITPWestWales. Now that Skeptics in Wales is actually splitting into regions, we've renamed our @WalesSITP twitter account to @CardiffSITP.

And Cardiff? We kick off five days from now! I'm beginning to get nervous. But realistically I shall be genuinely surprised if the night doesn't turn out to be wonderful. We'll have Simon Perry and Jack of Kent as speakers; we'll have Councillor John Dixon of #stupidscientology and Rhys Morgan of #bleachgate as guests of honour. (Cllr Dixon, have you got a preferred link for me to use to describe you? There's a lot more to everyone than who decided to launch stupid complaints about them!)

If much of the above might as well be in Outer Mongolian to you, don't feel left out, please just come along anyway - Simon's talk is absolutely hilarious; you'll learn a lot about science, evidence, trials, and how to be evil; and it's a nice social evening too. You can chat or just listen as you please. I'll make every effort to come and say hello. Dean is also a great comedian, even if he is planning to fling Rhys out of the window if he repeats too many counterarguments. You can have dinner while you're listening to the lecture (or before or after, of course). It's £3 per head, which we hope to reduce with time - we're getting two speakers in from far away and may have to pay for the room too, so right now we need to get some funds in!

On another totally unrelated subject, today's Internet trophies include a funny-smelling planet and a bunch of animals that want to join in sports games. And the Zoo limericks are starting to involve Biblical adventures. More seriously, if you haven't yet, you should read about the proposed science cuts. A great many other countries are not doing this because science is a major contributor to the economy - 45% according to Brian Cox! I have nothing to say besides what's already been said by so many people; the only new angle I can possibly come up with is this: although I want projects like the Zooniverse to become even more a part of science and education than they are, I hope they won't be expected to pick up the pieces. Because then we'd probably have to be cutting costs and jumping through somebody else's hoops. That's my gut feeling. I could be wrong.

Yes, my life is as chaotic as this post right now. Random, I know. I haven't given up plotting with the Pembrokeshire Tea Company either . . .

Hope to see you on Monday evening. 7.30 p.m., the Promised Land pub, Cardiff. We'll keep slightly better on topic than this post has. Maybe.

Cardiff Skeptics now has a website

Just a quick announcement that Cardiff Skeptics now has its own website - please take a look!


We hope Cardiff will be the first of many Welsh towns or areas. There have been a few Facebook murmurings about Swansea, and some promising tweeting about Aberyswtwyth.

29 people have so far announced that they will come to our launch on Monday 20th September, and a lot more will do their best. Our speakers will be Simon Perry and Jack of Kent, and one of our guests of honour will be the local Councillor John Dixon whose claim to honour is best expressed here.

Dean was infuriated when he woke up with (he claims) every intention to sort the website out that day, only to find I'd finally got my head round how to put it together myself. He should blame Simon. I'd been so kindly leaving it for Dean, who was cruelly thwarted by Simon e-mailing me at 1am the other night to prod me to get on with the wretched thing. Which he paid for, by the way, by spending the next hour sending dozens of one-sentence e-mails back to my stupid questions!

Although there's been a lot of criticism of skeptics (mostly by skeptics) lately, you can't say we don't work well together . . .

I hope to see you at Cardiff!

Skeptical Jaunts

You've probably noticed that Skeptics in the Pub invariably takes place in a city. For us rural oiks living at the end of the world - at least, until we create the Skeptical Nomadic Circus - that means a bit of travelling. We're not the only ones, though: I know people on Twitter whose work shifts clash with their local Skeptic evenings, for example.

My solution to both is to take a couple of days off work when you can, and travel to several events taking place in quick succession! You can find a list of all Skeptics in the Pub events on the bottom right of Simon Perry's website. Train tickets are cheap if booked well in advance, and you don't have to stay at an expensive hotel - youth hostels are fine in my experience, and more often than not a nice skeptic will happily put you up. You could of course combine all this with any Galaxy Zoo meet-up or other science events. And visit all these various places you've been planning to visit for years, and throw in the odd museum or restaurant or whatever takes your fancy. I actually love this. I enjoy travelling alone, which gives me immense space and freedom, and it really doesn't work out that expensive. It also allows me to compare one Skeptics with another and see which ones I like best, as well as meet a great many excellent people.

Anyway, I've just got back from one of those jaunts. The first event was Talkfest, which was much talked about on Twitter including at the time. There was a large screen behind the panel, onto which all talkfest tweets appeared (transcript here) - some witty, some snide, some interesting. Excellent and fresher-than-this summaries are at Noodlemaz and Jon Butterworth's blogs - update: I have to add this brilliant and thought-provoking reaction from Stephen Curry. It also included very interesting cakes - chocolate, pink and green, with glittery icing! I hope our toilets don't get too sparkly. The chocolate ones were delicious, the pink decidedly odd. It was lovely to catch up with some Twitterers and meet others I'd only exchanged 140-character sentences with! It was a free event, and we were all issued with badges which gave our real names, our Twitter names and our workplaces. My workplace did not make much sense - I might put "Cardiff Skeptics" or "Galaxy Zoo" next time. I had a laugh with the girls about how we weren't supposed to be looking at each other's chests all the time. We were also asked, in the online form, to put our favourite blog; I put Jack of Kent, whose taking-apart of Gillian McKeith's latest weirdness and delicious dissection of Hackney Council's clumsy abuse of libel law I very strongly urge you to read - though that did not get onto our badges!

The subject was science blogging. The panel began by telling us about their favourite blogs. I was most gratified to note that two or three of the panel specifically mentioned "a great community" or "a civilised atmosphere" as a blog's special asset - it's not only Galaxy Zoo that appreciates that, then!

Alice Bell, the organiser, then opened the questions. These - and the subsequent talk - focussed heavily on "why"s, and little on "what"s and "how"s of blogging, so I think there's scope for another great evening. The first two, sent in by e-mail, were "Why do you blog?" and "What impact does your blogging have and how can you tell?" Profound reasons to blog included wanting to put information out into the public domain, and wanting to engage people with science who would like to be engaged but haven't the privilege to be involved.

We were encouraged not to let anyone tell us our blog was trivial. I was reminded of a wonderful e-mail I had nearly 18 months ago from one of my readers who went to the library and got out books about astronomy, which he'd never have done were it not for my writing. Ed Yong beat me hands down, though, with a story of a priest who left the Church to go and study particle physics!

Jack of Kent asked some delightfully provocative questions. We got to the point where the media came up - how they are often pushed with deadlines and have to make a story quickly, while a blog can admit not having an answer yet. (Now if that was relaxed in the media, science could be represented far better!) He asked: What is impact? Does it in fact drive the media, rather than follow it - that is to say, does the media sometimes follow up something from the blogosphere? There have certainly been cases - such as the Trafigura scandal and Simon Singh versus the BCA! The next question, towards the end of the evening, was even more fun: are science bloggers particularly different from other bloggers? History and law, for instance, should be doing exactly the same as science: constantly checking sources and evidence, as he was inspired to do by science blogs . . . Dr Petra pointed out that the general public doesn't know how peer review works. I didn't know, either, despite a four-year science degree, until the zookeepers were kind enough to explain it on the Galaxy Zoo Blog.

There was quite some discussion about the media - what it can and can't offer, how being edited is exceptionally helpful (and how blog comments are also helpful), and whether bloggers would benefit from media experience. David Waldock asked why science is not represented in "engagement" sections of newspapers, i.e. the agony aunt columns. There was then the question: Who would you trust to pay a science blogger? Dr Petra told us how much of her time blogging can take. Once you have enough readers, you find yourself using more and more of your personal time in obtaining references, answering questions - she would like it to be part of her job; but departments - including one she used to work in - can be openly hostile about their members having blogs. Going to conferences should be free, but she usually has to pay for childcare. There are PhD students who feel a duty to engage with the public and who end up cramming their writing at 1am. (I'm writing this at 2.30 a.m., but that's because I was tired earlier and didn't get round to it.) Dr Evan Harris disagreed that that is what scientists should spend their time doing - some may be great communicators, but others may be far better at research or teaching. Fair enough!

I spent the next day wandering around London. I met a Twitter friend for lunch, who is going to end up being interviewed on the Young Astronomers website hopefully soon - she used to work in zero gravity! Besides that, I went to the British Museum - an absolute must, I don't remember ever having gone before and it's mind-blowing. I'm going to have to go again, several more times, as I could never see let alone absorb the whole thing in one day. (That's one great thing about free museums - you can keep going back!)

So I followed it up with the Wellcome Collection which was decidedly weird. They're currently doing an exhibition on skin. I went up to a gallery which included the various things Henry Wellcome collected in his life, which - the sign said - included Japanese sex toys and Napoleon Bonaparte's toothbrush. Obviously I went off looking for both of these and was unable to contain my laughter at the little note that stood in the place of the latter: "Napoleon Bonaparte's toothbrush has been lent to a Dutch museum. We apologise for any inconvenience."

Sir Wellcome must have been a very eccentric and fascinating man - he did a great deal for medicine and seems to have collected all kinds of paraphernalia, which I hope his house was big enough to contain. But that paraphernalia also included, for example, a torture chair. Its seat was three blades, pointing upwards, as was its footrest. Its wood was lovingly decorated. I go cold thinking about it. (This is what I think of torture, if you're interested.)

Later in London, I saw seven rickshaws - I hadn't seen one of them outside Tintin and the Blue Lotus. I also did a bit of plane-watching. It always strikes me how slowly the low-flying ones seem to move across the sky. As if it takes several seconds for them to cover their own length - like a bicycle moving very, very slowly. Do they really move that slow, or is it a trick of our eyes? It suddenly occurred to me that if I compared them with something still, I could work it out. The ideal opportunity for this came with a particularly low-flying plane disappearing behind a wall. From its nose appearing to touch the brick to its tail took, I think, just over 1 second. I kept thinking of first contact, second contact and so on during a solar eclipse. The less ideal part of this opportunity was the fact that this occurred while I was crossing a road, but it was only a bicycle that nearly ran me over. Now I must find out how long a plane is, and watch several more (yes, from a safe place, I promise).

The second event of my travels was seeing Simon Singh speak at the Hay Festival in Bristol. I'd hoped to meet Hayley Stevens there, but something came up and she couldn't make it. I attempted (and failed, I fear) to cheer her up with texted reports, such as that Brian Cox's double works in the Old Vic theatre. It was lovely to meet Chutzpah84, anyway. I arrived early, not knowing how long it would take to get from the youth hostel to there, and bemused the bar staff by ordering coffee and later tea. I went and sat down in what I hoped was an unobtrusive spot, only to be warned that that was the book-signing table and someone might come and ask for my autograph any minute now! I was tempted, but just managed to resist. Simon himself then came past, and stopped right in front of me when a voice from a long way off cried "SIMON!" I got a chance to say a quick hello before someone rushed to him, threw his arms around him and said "I haven't seen you since you won!" I was delighted to be wearing my Keep Libel Laws out of Science T-shirt.

I think, though am not sure, that it was Simon's friend who introduced him on stage. This chap began by asking us if there were any of us who were not familiar with Simon's tussle with the BCA. Nobody raised a hand, which, as he joked, allowed us to get on with things faster! As he said, lots of people know what a great speaker Simon is, "but few people realise what a nice guy. The thing that's happened to him today that made him happiest is that he saw a seagull . . . . catching a mouse."

Simon gave a quick talk about the book he co-authored with Edzard Ernst, Trick or Treatment - and the thing that inspired him to write a book about alternative medicine, a BBC program from 2006. He showed us a clip of a lady in China having major open heart surgery - who was conscious. Her eyes were moving and aware, and her arms were covered with acupuncture needles. The claim was that the acupuncture was sufficient anaesthetic. To cut a long story short, after a great deal of investigation it turned out that she had been given a local anaesthetic and a massive cocktail of other drugs - but none of this was even hinted at, which to say the least gives the viewers a rather misleading impression.

The next part of the talk was, of course, on the BCA case - how, at every step, he'd had to consider throwing in the towel, and how the odds are stacked against the writer - but how much support he'd had from the science and blogging communities. He's likely to recover perhaps 80% of his costs; the time which he could have spent writing another book and enjoying himself, he will never get back. He is concerned that for every libel case that makes it to trial, there will be a great many more that never go to trial because the writer caves in and apologises (so as to be out of thousands rather than tens or hundreds of thousands); and for every case like this, there will be dozens more that never get published or even never get written due to self-censorship from the worry. The editor of the BMJ, he tells us, has dozens of articles that should be published and are in the public interest - but which would only invite these crippling lawsuits. His talk was quite short, in order for us to ask him lots of questions. Naturally, a lot of these were about the BCA case!

My question was economic. In the UK, libel cases are 140 times more expensive than they are in the rest of Europe. (Scroll down to the bottom of this page to see.) This is one major reason - besides very illiberal laws - that it is much worse for a writer to be sued for libel in London than elsewhere, and why the powerful use London as their suing venue whenever they can. But why? What makes them so? And what can we do about that? I'm sure Simon would rather have talked about physics, but he took a lot of trouble to answer my question. For one thing, libel cases have to go to the High Court, and are almost invariably seen by Judge Eady or a jury, rather than a simple tribunal. (That is also why they take so long.) The no-win, no-fee cases mean that the other side bears the cost - although I'm still confused by this; if you lose, you don't have to pay your lawyer, but then how can the winner do so? Someone enlighten me, please. Also, rather like house prices, the wealthy can drive up prices simply by having a lot of money to offer. "Here's a million pounds in advance, go and sue these people." It's hardly a level playing field.

Some of the laws relating to suing are especially archaic. There's an example from at least the Victorian era, if not before (I forget) - the Duke of Brunswick, anyway. A publisher had printed a pamphlet criticising him. Now, libel laws say you have to sue within a year of publication. This Duke was six years too late. However, he sent his manservant to London to obtain a new copy of this pamphlet - and he sued and won, because this method of obtaining it counted as a new publication. It is this tradition which has now had an impact on the Internet: every download of a document, no matter how old, counts as a fresh publication! So now, I suppose, an organisation could be sued for something written 200 years ago.

It was a terrific talk, well worth an uncomfortable next day sitting around on trains and waiting over an hour at Cardiff and over half an hour at Carmarthen in the rain. I bought a copy of Trick or Treatment for Simon to sign, as did several others. He let me buy him a (soft) drink - I told him I felt I owed it to him, as his case may have paved the way for making my life as a science writer easier in the future. His decision to fight, which came at a great cost, was a sacrifice that must have benefitted thousands! Simon's just as nice a chap as the person who introduced him said he was. He urged me to return to teaching. But I'm not going to do that, at least not for some years. I think my niche is getting to people outside schools and, indeed, outside formal education altogether (it is one of my bugbears that people are ordered to stay in education until they're 18, but once they're older than that, it's very difficult and expensive to return). I, and others, wanted to know what book he's going to write next. He doesn't know yet (or if he does, he wants to keep it to himself). But he is going to come and do Cardiff Skeptics for us any time from December onwards!

A wonderful couple of days full of skeptical learning - and my purse did not get stolen this time!