News – Page 15 – Toronto Oasis, Secular Community

Sun Apr 17 – [Online] Gender Equity

This will be an online Zoom meeting. Please RSVP on our Meetup for this event to get access to the Zoom link. See our online meeting instructions at: https://torontooasis.org/online-meeting-instructions

Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm and you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am for our open social. Followed by an extended discussion for a half hour. Volunteers please join by 10:30 am.

We will watch and then discuss a TED talk by Canadian comedian, actress, former late night talk show host, and YouTuber Lilly Singh. The talk was selected and will be introduced by Tania Akon, a Toronto Oasis organizer.

This Sunday, we will also be featuring some live music!! Our guest musician will be Georgia Hathaway.

Inspired by the wild places, both inner and outer, Georgia’s blues-y folk songs are both intimate and expansive, haunting and joyful. She invites you into her world of organic expressions, weaving animal calls, nonsense syllables, and evocative lyrics, and combining delicate vocals with rootsy resonator and picked guitar. Through musings on mushrooms, butterflies, and the shape of feet, her music speaks about personal transformation, life, death and rebirth, and living for the moment.

Georgia Hathaway’s website: Georgia Hathaway Violinist — Music & Meditation

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/rpgzssydcgbwb/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

Sun Apr 10 – [Online] The Great Resignation

We will be watching and then discussing video clips about The Great Resignation that explain what this phenomenon is and some of the possible reasons behind it. The video clips were selected and will be introduced by Tania Akon, a Toronto Oasis Organizer.

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/rpgzssydcgbnb/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

Sun Apr 03 – [Online] A Revolution for Free Speech in Thailand

Thailand notoriously has a lese majesty law to prevent criticism of the monarchy. This has led to way more trouble than you would expect, including frequent coups, thousands of freethinkers forced to flee the country, 10 Thai political refugees recently assassinated (2017-2020), the persecution and dissolution of prodemocracy political parties, and a population of people with liberal views forced to live under dictatorship.

In 2020 mass youth-led protests began and the taboo against criticizing the monarchy has been dramatically broken, leading to freer speech. The protests have died back down due to COVID and repression, but permanent changes in attitude seem to have occurred. This may seem like an obscure topic, but Thailand is in fact a large country (by population it is almost twice as large as Canada), and so what happens there is important. The story is also a great object lesson about the importance of free speech anywhere.

Our featured speaker on this topic will be Ann Norman from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Ann has been involved with the Thai pro-democracy and human rights movement since about 2014. For several years, she was Executive Director of the Thai Alliance for Human Rights, and is now on the board of Act4Dem, which is an organization run by a famous Thai dissident, Junya Yimprasert.

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/rpgzssydcgbfb/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

This meeting has been recorded: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sw1FE4Vzzc3D3SXWVlEaCFgowbAazlU-/view?usp=sharing

Sun Mar 27 – [Online] Implications of the Placebo Effect

For our featured presentation this Sunday, we will be watching YouTube videos about the placebo effect by Stanford professor Alia Crum and Howard Fields who received his MD and PhD in Neuroscience at Stanford. The videos were selected by and will be introduced by Tania Akon, a Toronto Oasis organizer.

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/bhgwksydcfbkc/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

Sun Mar 20 – [Online] The Science, Politics and Spirituality of Human Composting

We will be watching and then discussing a YouTube video by Caitlin Doughty, a mortician who posts very interesting, entertaining, and compassionate videos on all topics related to death and caring for the deceased. She recently visited a facility near Seattle where human bodies can be composted after they die. The video is a lovely exploration of the technology, and what it can mean for people and the environment. It was selected and will be introduced by Lola Bradford, a Toronto Oasis participant.

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/bhgwksydcfbbc/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

Sun Mar 13 – [Online] The Role of Evolution in Domesticating Animals

NOTE: This week is the daylight savings time change for Toronto. (one hour shift forward)

For our featured presentation this Sunday, we will be watching some interesting YouTube videos, selected and introduced by Dan Cooperstock, about domesticating animals. Dan was inspired to put together this selection when he was reminded of an article he read a while ago about a decades-long experiment in Russia, breeding wild foxes to be tame, over many generations. The experiment ended up with them being friendly and with “domesticated” dog-like features. So fascinating!

Dan Cooperstock is a Toronto Oasis organizer.

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/bhgwksydcfbrb/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

Sun Mar 06 – [Online] Healthy Eating and Classism

We will watch and then discuss a YouTube video: Jamie Oliver’s War on Nuggets by YouTuber Folding Ideas. The video will be introduced by Ryan Zhang, who thinks it presents an interesting perspective on how society thinks about healthy eating. Ryan Zhang is a Toronto Oasis participant and volunteer.

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/bhgwksydcfbjb/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

Sun Feb 27 – [Online] Thoughts About Teachers

Did you have a teacher that you’ll never forget? Someone who positively influenced you in grade school, high school, college or beyond? Someone who taught in an unorthodox and creative way? Or perhaps a teacher who helped you experience positive achievement in a subject you ‘were no good at’? Have you ever wished you could go back and thank them?

This Sunday we will have a community moment presented by a Toronto Oasis member on their own memories of a special teacher, and we’ll also watch a few short videos, selected & introduced by Kristen Gane, that address the topic from different angles.

While it’s a rich and complex topic, it can be easy to romanticize the role of teaching. In reality it is an incredibly challenging job, particularly now as the pandemic has cast light on the paucity of adequate support and resources for teachers and the education system in general.

Join us this Sunday February 27th to share your thoughts as we explore the universal topic of teachers.

‘The best teachers are those who show you where to look but don’t tell you what to see.’ –Alexandra K. Trenfor
‘Teaching might even be the greatest of the arts since the medium is the human mind and spirit.’ –John Steinbeck
‘The job of an educator is to teach students to see vitality in themselves.’ –Joseph Campbell
‘I cannot be a teacher without exposing who I am.’ –Paulo Freire

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/bhgwksydcdbkc/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

Sun Feb 20 – [Online] Crisis of Humanity in Afghanistan

This Sunday, our featured speaker will be Fika Taillon. Fika Taillon was born in Afghanistan and is a published poet/author, artist, activist and public speaker with a background in political science and education. She is the founder/organizer and moderator of “Minds&Hearts Without Borders,Int’l”.

Here, in her own words, is the description of her talk:

“As we woke up that faithful August day, horror unfolded in that small landlocked country on the other side ! The terror of what befell people of Afghanistan that day was the news of something far worse to come!

As that woman, born in Kabul and forced to leave behind absolutely everything myself I will lend you my eyes- in this talk- to see the unforgiving humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan. The told and the untold stories of the forgotten nation!”

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/bhgwksydcdbbc/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

This meeting has been recorded: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1qYNI2ksettl9QXRg1BiqcEAjpVbNA3qg/view?usp=sharing

Sun Feb 13 – [Online] What is Consciousness?

What scientific evidence do we have about consciousness? Is there a signature of consciousness in brain activity? Do some animals have a kind of consciousness?

Our featured speaker, Dr. Mark Reimers, will discuss results from studies of brain activity during conscious perception, effortful thinking, inner conflict, and day-dreaming. While these studies don’t give final answers to the deep questions, they do build on empirical evidence to point us in useful directions.

Dr. Mark Reimers works as a computational neuroscientist: studying brain function by applying statistical methods to look for patterns in large-scale and high-resolution recordings of brain activity and behavior. He applies these methods to understand normal brain function in memory and to shed light on mental illness.

Dr. Reimers has worked at the US National Institutes of Health, the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, and at the Virginia Institute for Psychiatric and Behavioral Genetics in Richmond, and now does research and teaches at Michigan State University. His broader aim is to ground our understanding of feeling and thought in the facts of biology.

Dr. Reimers was the leader of the Richmond Humanists in Virginia for five years, and now leads the UU Forum in Lansing, and speaks frequently at humanist and science outreach events in Michigan.

Please RSVP on meetup: https://www.meetup.com/Toronto-Oasis/events/bhgwksydcdbrb/

Looking forward to seeing familiar faces and perhaps some new ones!

This meeting has been recorded: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1amciLl5OegpfnAQtQOnmu2gHaBJsHvrr/view?usp=sharing