Today was SkeptiCamp Colorado and I had a very good time. I was a bit late too it, since I didn't drag myself out of bed until I should have been catching the bus. I did my own little talk, which was a 30 minute free-style ramble about stratigraphy and why the idea of "Flood Geology" makes my brain melt. I think everyone had fun. I spent the rest of the time sitting by Elaine and Hal, so that was also very cool.

All of the presentations were interesting, and the subjects were varied. One guy talked about why it would be a Very Bad Idea to license naturopaths, while another lady talking about so-called "Attachment Therapy" (and showed us a very, very creepy video of an actual therapy session, which is basically child abuse on video), Reed talked about the rules of rational discourse, and... lots of other stuff.

My favorite was a guy who did a presentation on the conspiracy theories regarding DIA (it's the western command post for the NWO! And stuff!) while wearing a tin-foil hat. I laughed so hard. He had an aerial shot of DIA and its runways where he assured us he was just "connecting the dots" and showed us just how many swastikas he could draw in to it with a little creativity, followed by how you could connect points on the terminals to make a star of David or a pentacle, depending on how you did it. All obvious signs of the NWO/masons/illuminati/Zionist conspiracy. And so on. It was lovely and delivered with a level of straight-faced, subtle sarcasm that I haven't encountered in years.

The other really interesting presentation was by the Rocky Mountain Paranormal Research Society. Which I know sounds bizarre, since this was a Skeptic thing. But, for all those familiar with Joe Nickell, think in that vein. Basically, their thing is to investigate possible paranormal events using the scientific method, approaching with an open, skeptical mind. (Which is to say, they go in without believing that it is a ghost, or that it is nothing; they see what sort of evidence they find.) And for the most part, what they do is debunk or damage control on what previous "ghost hunters" have done. They apparently get a lot of "ghost" pictures or videos that they attempt to recreate so they can discover just how they were faked or made by mistake. Another thing I really thought was cool was when they described their method of investigation; they'd go in somewhere and start by taking baselines, then re-take them every hour. Which is not something I've ever heard of any other supposed "ghost hunter" doing. And they had a couple examples of things that they'd come across that they couldn't explain as of yet. Like a recording of a conversation that the people in the room had heard (none of them were talking) and that had also been simultaneously picked up by their video camera and audio equipment. (As they put it, they like corroboration.) The played it for us, and followed by saying, "Do we know what caused this? No. Would we call it a ghost? No." Like I said, very, very cool. I think they do a very good job of showing what being a skeptic and investigating ought to be about.

So yes, all that was a lot of fun. That's pretty much been my day. Mike bought me a burrito for dinner because once we were done cleaning, it was late. And he got the impression that if I had to look at the kitchen right now, I'd destroy the world. Mike gets five billion good boyfriend points.

And this also made me feel less like destroying the world:
Dead Kitty
AWWWWWW

I'm off to bed soon, since I have kung fu in the morning and I think my dinner's finally digested.