Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30 am.
This Sunday our featured presentation will be a TEDx UTSC talk available on YouTube (about 17 minutes long) by Desmond Cole, a freelance journalist and activist. Tania Akon, one of the organizers of Toronto Oasis, will give us a quick intro and facilitate a discussion about the topic after we watch the video together.
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30 am.
This Sunday our featured presentation will be a YouTube video talk (about 18 minutes long) by Dr. Hannah Critchlow, author of the book: The Science of Fate: Why Your Future Is More Predictable Than You Think. Dr Hannah Critchlow is the Science Outreach Fellow at Magdalene College, University of Cambridge, and has been named a Top 100 UK Scientist by the Science Council for her work in science communication. She is listed as one of the University of Cambridge’s ‘inspirational and successful women in science’ and appears regularly on TV, radio and at festivals to discuss and explore the brain.
Tania Akon, one of the organizers of Toronto Oasis, will give us a quick intro and facilitate a discussion about the topic after we watch the video together.
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30 am.
Nationalism has been all over the news recently, but what exactly is nationalism, where does it come from and why are so many people ready to defend it with their lives? The purpose of this talk is to introduce the history of an important movement that has affected our modern lives and will continue to affect our world for many years to come.
Mark Turi
This Sunday Mark Turi returns for part 2 (the conclusion) of his talk on: A Brief History of Nations and Nationalism in Modern Europe. Mark holds a BA from Brock University and studies the History of Nationalism and Revolution in Modern Europe
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30 am.
This Sunday our featured presentation will be a YouTube video talk (20 minutes long) by Dr. Robin DiAngelo, author of the book: White Fragility. Tania Akon, one of the organizers of Toronto Oasis, will give us a quick intro and facilitate a discussion about the topic after we watch the video together.
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30am.
This Sunday our featured presentation will be a YouTube video talk (about 31 minutes long) by Nathan H. Lents about his book “Human Errors”. Dan Cooperstock, who has read the book, will give us a quick intro and facilitate a discussion about the topic after we watch the video together. According to Dan, while the book does not explicitly state that it is a refutation of the “intelligent design” approach of Biblical creationists, it certainly achieves that! Different sections of the book explain the many problems with various aspects of our body, our diet, our DNA, our reproduction, diseases, and mental errors, and the evolutionary explanations for them.
Dan Cooperstock is the Toronto Oasis Treasurer, an atheist Quaker, and a software entrepreneur, writing and selling software for churches and charities.
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 but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30am.
Nationalism has been all over the news recently, but what exactly is nationalism, where does it come from and why are so many people ready to defend it with their lives? The purpose of this talk is to introduce the history of an important movement that has affected our modern lives and will continue to affect our world for many years to come.
Our featured speaker on this topic will be Mark Turi. Mark holds a BA from Brock University and studies the History of Nationalism and Revolution in Modern Europe.
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30am.
Dave Warnock
Our featured speaker will be Dave Warnock, a former pastor who is now atheist. Diagnosed with ALS in February 2019, he has been traveling the country, talking about living and dying as an atheist, grabbing as many moments as he can. For more information, you can check out his website: https://daveoutloud.com/
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30am.
Over the past 20 years research has resulted in the concept of distinct right brain left brain functionality being discredited. However recent studies have shown that the dual functions of the brain do explain what happens when we dream or have intuition, and the dangers of trying to repress our dreams. In this talk we will learn a little about dreams and a lot about ourselves.
Phil Cheney
Our featured speaker on this topic will be Phil Cheney. Phil ‘Philosofree’ Cheney is awed by the Cosmos, and excited about human potential. He is a renaissance man who appreciates life, having worked in over 55 countries, including as a university lecturer in his native Australia, trade leader in Thailand, Government budget consultant in Papua New Guinea, software distributor in Zimbabwe, marketer in Germany, Building Construction in China, farm exporting in Japan and author in his current home in Toronto.
Philosofree is a mystic who is curious about integrating science and the metaphysical. He has published 8 books, 5 CDs of original music and won awards for software design and clinical practice in medicine. His education background includes degrees in Economics, Business Administration and Information Technology. Phil prioritizes his wife, daughters and grandchildren, and loves to sing and dance with them.
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30am.
Our featured speaker will be Tim Mt. Pleasant. Through a non-legal frame of reference, Tim will speak about the emerging challenges of requesting information and receiving health care services about Medical Assistance in Dying within Canada. While health care is constitutionally the responsibility of the provinces and territories, the Criminal Code of Canada, at times, precludes the health care practitioners’ duty to their patients. Tim will speak to MAiD, in Ontario specifically. This will touch on the challenges faced by the conception of palliative care and the prohibitive language that continues within Canada’s Criminal Code concerning the counselling of suicide. Tim will utilize patient and practitioner illustrations to provide an alternative to the single-story that we are sometimes subject to, through popular media and current political discourse. The Philosopher Margaret Pabst-Battin is someone who questioned whether suicide could ever be a “rational act.” She would later participate in her own husband’s request for the cessation of medical treatment while lying by his side in bed after a traumatic downhill biking accident. Tim posits that patients, MAiD practitioners, and a large proportion of the population either support or question what MAiD means to them.
Tim Mt. Pleasant
Tim Mt. Pleasant is a First Nations member of the LGBTQ2S+ and Disabled community from Six Nations of the Grand River First Nation and is currently studying Philosophy at Ryerson University. His experience comes from work in the Long-Term Care (10 years), Mental Health/Addictions (8 years) and Public Service Sector during the last 22 years. Tim has an interest in the area of Bioethics and in the values that one assumes when entering various systems, the fluidity of control and capacity, in addition to the new realm of Medical Assistance in Dying (MAiD).
Tim volunteers in areas that allow him to advocate for those with Mental Health or Addictions challenges, including marginalized populations and those that get lost in various systems, specifically within Health Care and Social Services sectors. He has served on the Board of Directors of PFLAG Canada, the Canadian Bioethics Society, ARCH Disability Law Centre, Community Resource Connections of Toronto, Toronto Distress Centres, and the Native Canadian Centre of Toronto. Tim is also a member of and currently sits on the Equity Committee of the Canadian Philosophical Association and Ryerson’s Research Ethics Board. Tim recently completed an Undergraduate placement in Bioethics @ Princess Margaret Cancer Centre / University Health network and is working to complete his final year of Philosophical studies at Ryerson. Tim plans to pursue graduate work in Public Health and Bioethics or Philosophy and Law. This next year will be one where these rather large decisions will be made.
Our program will run from 11 am to 12:30 pm but you can join in to the meeting starting at 10:45 am. Volunteers please join by 10:30am.
Featured Speaker: Marc Schaus
Climate change is the existential threat of our time, but incredible new advancements in science and engineering can still allow us to avoid the worst repercussions of global warming as we work to reverse it over time. Scientists of even ten years ago would not have imagined that in 2020 we would already have solar panels capable of producing clean drinking water for one’s home while simultaneously producing power. Or that labs would be capable of generating jet fuel from landfill trash. We could not have predicted that “smart highways” designed to charge electric vehicles as they drive would be in trial testing. Or, for that matter, the existence of indoor vertical farms managed by hyper-efficient artificial intelligence reducing water use by up to 90 percent and growing crops entirely without pesticides. Join our featured speaker, Marc Schaus, in exploring the new and upcoming innovations in green technology poised to prevent the climate apocalypse―and usher in a sustainable, livable world.
Cover photo of Marc Schaus’ upcoming book: Our Livable World
Marc Schaus is a professional research specialist and science writer. He is the author of Post Secular: Science, Humanism and the Future of Faith, and has written articles that have appeared in Areo Magazine, Free Inquiry Magazine,The Huffington Post, Patheos, and the academic journal Antennae. His new work Our Livable World: Creating the Clean Earth of Tomorrow will be out in October through Diversion Books. He currently resides in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.
