Cultural Wars on Religion

Yesterday after work I attended a seminar at the college that was put on for employees by some instructors. The purpose of this seminar was to discuss and debate this new culture of attacks on religion. With plenty of books emerging (Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion for one) it seemed like a timely topic. The discussion was very interesting with both sides being debated but a lot of the concepts that were brought up were over my head. Below is a sampling of quotes from my notes as well as links for various theories that I was unfamiliar with.

Faith is a belief that is grounded on no evidence.

Memorizing religious doctrine means it will stay the same over time - paraphrasing makes it easier to change the meaning. This is why religious doctrine is purposely so vague.

The onus lies with the person making the claim to prove its existence, not with the person refuting the claim.

The ultimate proof of God's existence is to have the most grandchildren.

The Convergence of Intelligences

Multiverses

American Heart Journal study of the therapeutic effects that intercessory prayer has on coronary bypass patients.
NY Times article on the study.

New Atheism

Newman's transcendence

Panentheism

BCLA 2008

Today after work I have the honour of representing LTAIG at the session planning meeting for the 2008 BCLA conference. At our LTAIG committee meeting last week our executive said they'd like to see more practical sessions and, of course, more sessions geared towards library support staff. I am certainly going to try my best to represent library technicians and assistants.

So, what I'm curious about is this; what would your ultimate conference session be? It doesn't matter what field you work in as long as it's something you are passionate about.

I think mine would have to do with how students with disabilities are served in African schools. Are they able to attend school at all? Are there any services for them or are they shunned by their community members? What about students with AIDS? Would include case studies and examples from people working in schools in Africa.

Who Moved My Cheese?

It's been a week full of conferences, workshops and seminars and while interesting, it can get tiring. I never thought I'd say that about continuing education as it's usually something I really enjoy but three days in a row has been a lot. For the third year I attended the Disability Resource Network conference and took in some very interesting sessions. In the morning I learned about organizational and personal change and how to identify my reaction to it. Then after lunch I sat in on a very interesting session about chronic pain led by Dr. Chan Gunn of the Institute for the Study and Treatment of Pain. Dr. Gunn's approach to treating pain is to target nerves that aren't functioning properly instead of looking at blood and organs. Apparently he has made a real breakthrough in the medical field and revolutionized how people approach chronic pain.

Wednesday CILS held a workshop to introduce new people to our services as well as refresh the knowledge of people who are already familiar with us. We also discussed web accessibility issues and what library staff and disability advisors can do at their institutions to help make resources more available to students with print disabilities. I was able to meet a lot of people I've been communicating with over the years and was also able to answer a lot of questions from the people at my table so, for me, it was a success.

Today and tomorrow are the college's reading days so there was a staff development day held today which gave support staff an opportunity to attend some sessions. The theme was "The Balancing Act: Having It All" so most sessions focused in some way on balance. I managed to get some exercise in by attending a cardio-funk class which was a lot of fun and then in the afternoon I tried to "Beat the Brown Bag Blues." That one wasn't as useful since I didn't really learn anything new. Apparently my lunches aren't as boring as I thought they were. Now it's Friday again and back to the daily grind.

Other than that everything is just kind of meh. My evenings perk up for an hour or two but after the daily call I'm usually asleep on the couch by 9:30. I need more of a life. Only 7 more days and then hopefully things will be better.