Circular Reasoning

An archive site for the Skeptics' Circle. It includes a list of past Skeptics' Circles, future hosts, and announcements.

Thursday, July 31, 2008

The 92nd Meeting of the Skeptics' Circle: Team Skeptic at the Ideology Olympics

It's that time again, the time that comes around once a fortnight for skeptical bloggers and blog readers to gather together to celebrate that best that skeptics have had to offer since the last time they gathered. It's time for the 92nd Meeting of the Skeptics' Circle. This time, it's hosted by Martin over at The Lay Scientist and it tells the tale of Team Skeptic at the Ideology Olympics, starting with a press conference:

Team Skeptic Manager Martin gave a rousing press conference today as his team moved into their training centre in advance of the Ideology Olympics, but concerns remain over the novice skeptic's lack of managerial experience.
"I've been in the game for four... no hang on, what date is it? The 31st? Nearly five months, and I'm more than confident in my ability to lead us out against the assorted mystics, evangelists, conspiracy theorists, quacks, and celebrity spokespeople. Even Jenny McCarthy."

A BBC reporter asked the coach what his strategy was. "We're going to use logic and reason, plain and simple." When informed of a recent MORI poll showing that more than 72% of people believe that logic is a conspiracy invented by rogue mathematicians working for the Bush administration, the rookie coach unconvincingly responded "AHA!!! That's an appeal to popularity, which is a logical fallacy... I win!!"


Go forth and enjoy!

Next up is City of Skeptics, who will take up the challenge 14 days hence; so start writing to provide them with the great material that we've generally come to expect from this blog carnival. Also, if you're a skeptical or scientific blogger and think it might be fun to host one of these (and fun it is!), then check out the schedule and guidelines for hosts before dropping me a line to ask to be put on the schedule. You'll be glad you did.