Join us for our weekly meeting at Fisher Student Center in the Sunset Beach Room (#1025) this Thursday at 5:30 PM.
Goals for this meeting:
- Announce that our next meeting will be in the library, and float the idea of a debate or possibly a “ask an atheist” event since it’s a larger space.
- Open Discussion
Minutes
- Pre-meeting playlist:
The Voidz — “Alien Crime Lord”
Tame Impala — “Feels Like We Only Go Backwards”
The Flaming Lips — “Do You Realize?” - The elephant in the “Do You Realize?” lead to the meeting opening showing video of elephants painting, or at least that is what it appears as. On the surface, we see elephants painting, but just behind the curtain lies the man standing just out of view guiding the elephant by the ear. As it turns out, it’s a lie, one that was easily accepted because we can actually see video of it appearing to happen.
- Discussed ideas for the next meeting. Concerns were voiced over inviting in those “outside” of the group might lead to privacy issues. No determination was made.
- Mentioned the two on-campus encounters with the Jehovah’s Witnesses by two members of ASC, the arguments being made from either side.
- Upon one member mentioning, “the ends justify the means,” went into taking as a group the MACH-IV: Machiavellism Test and considered and argued both sides of the more debatable questions. One point was to show that on the surface, there may be a gut reaction, but taking the time to analyze the question can completely flip an answer. As a group, scored a 69 out of 100.
Most question led to discussions, points being made that anything written with absolutes (“always,” “all,” “never”) tend to always have exceptions, that manipulation is normal if we all do things to make ourselves feel good, and that brutal honesty can allow for sidestepping questions with an ambiguous answer. One example was someone stating, “you never tell me that I’m pretty,” being answered with, “you know that you are pretty.” In that, the question manipulates the situation such that the asker reflects on how they see themselves and could assume that the answer was bolstering that, when in fact it could be simply a dodge to not openly admit that the answerer did not find the asker “pretty.”
- Discussion by one of the members who had a bit of a misanthropic world view. This lead to the a brief mention of ShoeOnHead’s latest videos on the “men’s loneliness epidemic,” which was not shown for more than a few seconds.
- This lead to the debate over gender and trans rights. The image of the development of sex organs in various stages of embryotic development was brought up, showing that all both males and females start with the same exact features, but develop differently with the ovaries and testes having the same initial structure, as for the clitoris and tip of the penis (glans). This combined with the knowledge that the brain develops later that the sex organs could lead to mismatches, thereby explaining one way of validating transpeople in the face of those who chose to dismiss them.
- Considering whether it should be anyone’s business what any does with their own body, the underground icon Genesis P. Orridge was brought up as an example of approaching gender as an artform called Pandrogeny. Gen and their spouse elected to both have plastic surgery to make themselves closer to the one person, including Gen getting breasts, much to the momentary consternation of Gen’s daughter who joked that she would have preferred that they bought her a new car instead.
- The future of humankind was discussed in terms of eugenics through gene editing via CRISPR. The ethical question was raised about eliminating diseases from the gene pool through gene editing, and whether that would potentially be detrimental. The idea that a brilliant mind might not exist or novel approaches might lessen with the homogenization of the species, referencing Stephen Hawkins (although was able-bodied in his younger years).
Warwick Davis, who played R2-D2 and an Ewok in Star Wars was brought up due to his dwarfism. Warwick started a family with his wife of similar stature and together they had 3 children who all inherited dwarfism, including one that died shortly after birth. They also suffered a second-trimester miscarriage. The question was raised if it was ethical to have children knowing that you will most likely pass down these traits, thereby almost guaranteeing that they will live lives with greater challenges in every aspect of life, from relationships to employment, and mental and physical health issues.
This lead to the mention of someone who saw aspects of their deafness as a benefit, that they can remove their hearing aids to block out the world at will, as well as the intrusion of well-meaning people trying to offer help. Perspective became the topic, and it seems common for us to cast our own feelings onto others rather than recognizing that we are all different. Some who are viewed as disabled or have uncommon conditions might be happy just as they are, and if there was a magic “fix,” they might not want it as it could erase part of their identity.