Sci Fight is a quarterly science comedy debate, with your definitely qualified host, Alanta Colley (citation needed). Sci Fight brings together science folk and comedy folk, and makes them debate the big issues in a silly way.
At Sci Fight Science Comedy Debate, scientists and comedians come together to debate serious issues in a ridiculous manner.
This round's topic: Psychology is a Freud
Featuring award winning comedian Jude Perl, Martin Dunlop, magician and doctor Vyom Sharma, psychologist Kathryn Kallady, neuroscientist Elyas Arvell, and writer/editor extraordinaire Elizabeth Flux, and hosted by Alanta Colley, this is sure to be a fantastic evening.
Is psychology a science? An art? Or an ink blot of your parents fighting? If you ask a psychologist if psychology is a science, they pause, peer over their glasses, and ask you if you feel like it's a science or not. The only other science that involves this much deflection are satellite dishes. In a sea of Myers Briggs tests, brain biohackers, self-help gurus and buzz feed quizzes to discover 'what is your inner potato?’(I’m a tater tot) it can sometimes be hard to spot legitimate psychology amongst the charlatans.
After all, the history of psychology is littered with lobotomies, medically sanctioned orgasms, psychedelics, electrocution, and prison simulations that we can confidently point to as the reason we now have ethics committees. Not to mention making us all pretty uncomfortable with implications about wanting to sleep with our Dad. From this progeny of perverted renegades, could we possibly expect a legitimate science to be born?
But that was the past. Psychology now employs clinical trials, neuroscience, and a full suite of empirical data. We now have the tools to take us closer than we’ve ever been to understanding our inner being (My MRI scan confirmed I’m a tater tot).
6 May 2024
Neuralink will bring us closer together
Sci fight is a quarterly Science Comedy Debate where scientists and comedians come together to debate serious issues in a ridiculous manner.
This round's topic: Neuralink will bring us closer together
Elon Musk recently announced the first results from an in-human clinical trial of Neuralink; a brain-computer interface that decodes brain waves allowing humans to control anything from a computer, prosthetic limb, to an errant robot vacuum cleaner.
Which journal did he publish this in, I hear you ask? Twitter? No, I'm not familiar with that peer reviewed science journal.
The technology is an incredible opportunity for people with paralysis to communicate and interact at a greater level with the world around them. This is very cool.
But where is this technology heading?
What access to our thoughts will this give Musk in the future? I’ve tried to block him on Twitter, and yet, he’s always in my feed. Organic intrusive thoughts are bad enough; how does one block a pop up from inside your head? What happens if governments can see your thoughts? Are we heading for a police mental-state?
What would it be like living in a world where our insecurities, nasty thoughts and desires are on display? Would it herald the collapse of society as we know it? Or would the end of the final frontier in privacy invoke a new era of universal understanding and empathy? Would discovering your shameful secret of writing erotic parliamentary fanfic isn’t that unique after all?
Come and get neurological with Melbourne’s best scientists and comics at the brilliant Howler.
17 Feb 2024
Natural Selection is Over
Sci fight is a quarterly Science Comedy Debate where scientists and comedians come together to debate serious issues in a ridiculous manner.
This round's topic: Natural Selection is over.
Biotechnology and genetic research are barrelling ahead 100 miles an hour. It may soon be possible to produce babies from just one person, or six, or more. Scientists speak of a future where babies may be brought to term in artificial wombs, with the capacity to screen embryos for genetic abnormalities, disease, or even physical traits.
Are we as a species at the end of evolution? Are we now turning to Mother Nature and saying; ‘thanks for the ride lady; we’ve got it from here’? Could future humans be a curated, disease-free, race of super-humans? Will mankind be manufactured? Will baby building become a commodity?
Or are these the hubristic hallucinations of a bunch of self-assured monkeys in white coats? Are the powers of evolution and natural selection far more complex and powerful than we understand? For a species that can’t even wean itself off fossil fuels, is this a future state not even worth entertaining? Does nature always find a way?
Come to Howler for some fermented fruit juice while 6 scientists and comedians entertain this existential quandary.
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Podcast Authority Score: 25 / 100
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YouTube
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Engagement
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