Attend the World Atheist Convention in Dublin, June 3-5 2011

Michael Nugent

You can now buy discounted early-bird tickets for the World Atheist Convention in the O’Callaghan Alexander Hotel in Dublin, Ireland, from 3-5 June 2011.

The Convention, co-hosted by Atheist Ireland, will see the launch of the new Atheist Alliance International, the world umbrella group for atheist advocacy groups.

Click here for details of speakers, topics and early-bird tickets.

Galvasean

My birthday!

omg a kitty

Aw I got church on those days :rolleyes:

MrPudding

Galvasean wrote: »

My birthday!

Three day birthday? Respect to your mum.

MrP

strobe

Michael Nugent wrote: »

The Convention, co-hosted by Atheist Ireland, will see the launch of the new Atheist Alliance International, the world umbrella group for atheist advocacy groups.

Science help us!

Zombrex

Michael Nugent wrote: »

You can now buy discounted early-bird tickets for the World Atheist Convention in the O’Callaghan Alexander Hotel in Dublin, Ireland, from 3-5 June 2011.

The Convention, co-hosted by Atheist Ireland, will see the launch of the new Atheist Alliance International, the world umbrella group for atheist advocacy groups.

Click here for details of speakers, topics and early-bird tickets.

Seriously? I mean seriously? Have you not seen South Park? :pac:

Michael Nugent

Wicknight wrote: »

Seriously? I mean seriously? Have you not seen South Park? :pac:

Those are all breakaway groups from the future. They don't exist yet.

As an aside, the actual Atheist Alliance International predates the South Park variations. It was founded in 1991 as Atheist Alliance, and was originally an umbrella group for atheist groups in the USA.

It soon started accepting affiliates from other countries and became Atheist Alliance International, and from then has acted both as a USA-based national lobbying group and an international support group.

What is being launched in June is a restructuring of the organisation into two groups: a USA-based national group that will work on issues within the USA, and a solely international group that can work more effectively on an international basis.

Dades

Michael Nugent wrote: »

the new Atheist Alliance International, the world umbrella group for atheist advocacy groups.

I bet there's some serious braaaaaaaains in that organisation.

liamw

Wicknight wrote: »

Seriously? I mean seriously? Have you not seen South Park? :pac:

Any links to watch this?

pasta-solo

Thanks, just bought an early bird ticket! Never been to anything like this before, can't wait!

Mark Hamill

liamw wrote: »

Any links to watch this?

Its season 10, epsidoes 12 and 13. If you are in the us, you can watch them on southparkstudios.com for free (its legal, the site is owned the guys who make south park). Unfortunately its not available outside of the us, and the .co.uk version of that site only has a handfull of episodes.

liamw

Mark Hamill wrote: »

Its season 10, epsidoes 12 and 13. If you are in the us, you can watch them on southparkstudios.com for free (its legal, the site is owned the guys who make south park). Unfortunately its not available outside of the us, and the .co.uk version of that site only has a handfull of episodes.

Cheers. Episode12 is amazing.

Zombrex

liamw wrote: »

Any links to watch this?

All South Park episodes are on the Comedy Central website

If it complains about not being in America you need to trick the server into thinking you are coming from an American IP address

http://pbjbreaktime.com/2010/10/how-to-watch-comedy-central/

All this does is say in the HTTP header "Hi I'm forwarding this packet for a different address", which is super simple and I'm amazed Comedy Central haven't detected this yet (maybe they don't care) Doesn't work on services like Hulu or iPlayer which have more sophisticated methods of checking if you are in America/UK

http://www.southparkstudios.com/

liamw

Wicknight wrote: »

All South Park episodes are on the Comedy Central website

If it complains about not being in America you need to trick the server into thinking you are coming from an American IP address

http://pbjbreaktime.com/2010/10/how-to-watch-comedy-central/

All this does is say in the HTTP header "Hi I'm forwarding this packet for a different address", which is super simple and I'm amazed Comedy Central haven't detected this yet (maybe they don't care) Doesn't work on services like Hulu or iPlayer which have more sophisticated methods of checking if you are in America/UK

http://www.southparkstudios.com/

Wow, I was going to try use a proxy or SSH-tunnel but this works. I thought they would have detected the forwarding flag in the header... bizarre. Thanks.

MagicMarker

Wow, looks awesome!

€100 is a bit steep but really when you have access to all speakers it's actually quite the bargain!

IpreDictDeatH

Where would i see a break down of who's speaking on which days? Id love if there was day tickets because i can only attend sunday, id love to catch dawkins but id say he's on saturday. Anyway of finding out?

Also, should this be a sticky?

Dades

IpreDictDeatH wrote: »

Also, should this be a sticky?

Nope - but no doubt it'll be bumped a few times, and active closer to the date.

condra

Michael Nugent.

The Atheist Ireland website is great but for the love of dark matter, please do something about the main banner graphic. To be frank, it's ghastly. I say that as an friend, atheist, and graphic designer.

On a lighter note, good luck with the convention. I would love to go. I hope we see some video!

MagicMarker

What's the story with this, I bought a ticket as an impulse buy (kinda regret it now), are there actual tickets or what? Do I just turn up? I haven't heard anything since my beautiful money left my account.

nozzferrahhtoo

You should have paid with paypal correct?

The print out of the receipt you got with your pay pal transaction should be enough. You can log into paypal and print it again if you deleted the email.

I think they will be matching the transactions numbers against a list which they have on their side and ticking you off and giving you a name badge and the like.

condra wrote: »

and graphic designer.

Any donations you wish to make in the form of alternative graphics welcome

condra

nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »

Any donations you wish to make in the form of alternative graphics welcome

I'm on it.

nozzferrahhtoo

condra wrote: »

I'm on it.

Very kind of you. I can not gaurantee they will be used at all... but I know who to send them to to look at. Will likely put them before the AI members to vote on whether they like them better than the original so if you have any free lance graphic company you want advertised feel free to include your details so I can tout your name too

if ya want to mail them to me rather than post here just stick GMAIL after my username and you got my gmail address.

robindch

condra wrote: »

I'm on it.

Here's a thread on design alternatives to AI's census campaign:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056144251

guitarzero

What the hell would be worth saying/hearing at one of these conventions???? "Theres no god"...k, got that. Now giz 100euro. Scam.

rossc007

Sold out... why God... Whhhyyyyyyy!

nozzferrahhtoo

guitarzero wrote: »

What the hell would be worth saying/hearing at one of these conventions????

The schedule... who is speaking... and the topics they are speaking on.... are here if you are genuinely interested.

MagicMarker

guitarzero wrote: »

What the hell would be worth saying/hearing at one of these conventions???? "Theres no god"...k, got that. Now giz 100euro. Scam.

Spoilers ffs!!! :mad:

TheReverend

way to expensive

Bottle_of_Smoke

TheReverend wrote: »

way to expensive

What the f*ck do you expect. They're profit obsessed Athiests like.

Robert ninja

Being an atheist never cost me a dime and it's not about to start any time soon. Fk this over priced malarkey.

condra

Jesus Guys, its 100 quid for a convention with some world class guests, including Richard Dawkins. The venue has to be payed for, the speakers have to be payed, and the whole thing has to be organised.

guitarzero

I'm an atheist but I was happier when I kinda believed in god. I had that brief stint where I went around practically stopping Jehovah witnesses explaining to them how God is nonsense. Then after a while it felt like my soul had left me.

Atheism is really the endorsement of sience and reason. Would it not be better to just put money into science instead of a convention? From my experience of 'proactive atheists' I just imagine the most self riteous, bitter, pious a**holes discussing how stupid believers are and have a chuckle over it.

MagicMarker

guitarzero wrote: »

I'm an atheist but I was happier when I kinda believed in god. I had that brief stint where I went around practically stopping Jehovah witnesses explaining to them how God is nonsense. Then after a while it felt like my soul had left me.

Atheism is really the endorsement of sience and reason. Would it not be better to just put money into science instead of a convention? From my experience of 'proactive atheists' I just imagine the most self riteous, bitter, pious a**holes discussing how stupid believers are and have a chuckle over it.

WTF are you talking about?

Atheism is not the endorsement of science and reason, you can be an atheist and still be an irrational, scientifically illiterate retard.

What exactly is wrong with having a convention like this? Just because you're not interested in it doesn't mean no one else is. I'd rather pay 100 euro to see this than 80 to see Kings of fúckin' Leon.

Also, I hear Graham Linehan will be there.

Dades

guitarzero wrote: »

Would it not be better to just put money into science instead of a convention?

I get the impression you didn't really think about this before typing it.

tallaghtmick

athiests congregate in a building and fork out 100 quid each.....id rather go to mass and hand over 50 cent if i wanted to listen to someone talk about religion.

MagicMarker

tallaghtmick wrote: »

athiests congregate in a building and fork out 100 quid each.....id rather go to mass and hand over 50 cent if i wanted to listen to someone talk about religion.

Cool story bro.

Dades

Pay for I]insert something I have no personal interest in[/I?

I'd rather I]insert something else[/I.

Killer attack, that.

Denerick

What exactly happens at an atheist convention? It strikes me that too many atheists are too obsessed with religion, and the attempt to organise a lack of belief into a coherent political and social voice is highly misguided. I'll work with the humanist international because it is not explicitly atheist but these attempts by atheist groups to create a 'movement' out of something pretty irrelevant (You lack of belief in a deity) is sincerely misguided, and leaves you wide open for parody and abuse. I am agnostic btw.

MagicMarker

Denerick wrote: »

What exactly happens at an atheist convention?

What do you think?

Denerick wrote: »

It strikes me that too many atheists are too obsessed with religion, and the attempt to organise a lack of belief into a coherent political and social voice is highly misguided. I'll work with the humanist international because it is not explicitly atheist but these attempts by atheist groups to create a 'movement' out of something pretty irrelevant (You lack of belief in a deity) is sincerely misguided, and leaves you wide open for parody and abuse.

Is going to a convention being ''too obsessed'' nowadays? And do you honestly believe that religion is pretty irrelevant? Also if this very same convention was called World Humanist Convention instead would that mean you'd be all for it?

Denerick wrote: »

I am agnostic btw.

And what does that mean to you?

nozzferrahhtoo

Denerick wrote: »

What exactly happens at an atheist convention?

The schedule of the talks, and the talk titles are here which should give you an idea "what exactly happens" and whether the aims and goals are worthwhile or not. They appear from the talk titles to be a lot more than merely organising around a lack of belief in gods, and in fact there are many secular theists that would share many of those goals.

As for the ticket price, so far (this one included) all of the annual AAIs have made a financial loss except one which I am led to believe almost broke even.

condra

If theists can build temples in every village on the planet, ring out bells every few hours, hijack our television, educate our children (amongst other things), and gather every Sunday to talk about myths, then I don't see anything wrong with a handful of atheists gathering in a hotel conference room once a year to talk about facts.

Regarding the organising of atheists being "like herding cats" or indeed "pointless":

I strongly disagree with the argument that organising atheists is like herding cats. There is clearly a massive new atheist movement, fueled by the internet, and galvanized by increasingly organised cells around the world.

As for being pointless, I think it is in the interests of atheists to form lobby groups and get legitimate political representation.

Denerick

condra wrote: »

I strongly disagree with the argument that organising atheists is like herding cats. There is clearly a massive new atheist movement, fueled by the internet, and galvanized by increasingly organised cells around the world.

As for being pointless, I think it is in the interests of atheists to form lobby groups and get legitimate political representation.

Its this 'atheist movement' I hold issue with. I worry about those atheists who get so caught up in politics, they tend to baloon their lack of religion into more than it is. The fact is that if atheists need to organise themselves along political lines and along the basis of their lack of religious beliefs, then there is something very wrong there and its echoing the herd mentality of religious organisation. Two atheists are generally unalike, the only thing that binds them is the fact that they are atheists. It weirds me out when they begin to organise along these lines.

And yes, I believe the humanist cause is a worthy one and is defined not by atheism or even secularism but rather the cause of humanity, the protection of human dignity, and generally a celebration of human intuition and design. Plenty of laudable goals there with roots far beyond the internet age.

I think the modern atheist movement is profoundly misguided.

Now I'm off to watch that south park episode that mocks the future atheist society.

Denerick

MagicMarker wrote: »

And what does that mean to you?

It means that for all intents and purposes I'm an atheist, but I lack the boorish conviction and certainty of atheists, and I also lack the desire to 'convert' people of religious belief to 'the enlightened path'. Deep down I wish I could believe in a deity, but I feel it would insult my intelligence if I did so.

MagicMarker

Denerick wrote: »

I think the modern atheist movement is profoundly misguided.

How?

Denerick wrote: »

It means that for all intents and purposes I'm an atheist, but I lack the boorish conviction and certainty of atheists, and I also lack the desire to 'convert' people of religious belief to 'the enlightened path'. Deep down I wish I could believe in a deity, but I feel it would insult my intelligence if I did so.

You're an atheist, call yourself whatever you like but you're still an atheist.

Denerick

MagicMarker wrote: »

How?



You're an atheist, call yourself whatever you like but you're still an atheist.

Yah, I'm not really interested in a long back and forth today (The intellectual equivilent of us both headbutting the pavement quite severely) so I'll allow you the last word.

MagicMarker

Denerick wrote: »

Yah, I'm not really interested in a long back and forth today (The intellectual equivilent of us both headbutting the pavement quite severely) so I'll allow you the last word.

All I was looking for was for an explanation on why the ''modern atheist movement is profoundly misguided'', if you won't or can't provide one then off you go.

Dades

Denerick wrote: »

And yes, I believe the humanist cause is a worthy one and is defined not by atheism or even secularism but rather the cause of humanity, the protection of human dignity, and generally a celebration of human intuition and design.

Humanism is plenty about secularism and the rejection of religious dogma.

(Also - did you really use the word "design"? :pac:)

HAI wrote:

Humanism is a view of life that combines reason with compassion. It is for those people who base their interpretation of existence on the evidence of the natural world and its evolution, and not on belief in a supernatural power. In this, Humanism continues a tradition which has existed for over 2,500 years and which still flourishes today. Humanism encompasses atheists and agnostics, but is an active philosophy in its own right and not simply a negative response to religion.

A Humanist believes that the happiness of individuals and of humankind depends on people, rather than on religion and dogma.

http://www.humanism.ie/website/hai-aims-and-objectives

nozzferrahhtoo

Just as an FYI the Irish Times covered the upcoming conference today.

tallaghtmick

feck it im gonna end all this athiest/religion hatred and just worship boobies whos with me:D

Turtwig

tallaghtmick wrote: »

feck it im gonna end all this athiest/religion hatred and just worship boobies whos with me:D

Culturally speaking Boobies weren't always regarded as sexually arousing. Only with the abrahamic religions did they get the sexual status that they now enjoy today. Can't hate religion for that now can we?

*Not sure what the meme is for this again*:o

Dave!

MagicMarker wrote: »

All I was looking for was for an explanation on why the ''modern atheist movement is profoundly misguided'', if you won't or can't provide one then off you go.

last word