Centre for Inquiry Canada

Last updated
Centre for Inquiry Canada (CFIC)
Founded2007
TypeNot-for-Profit Educational Organization
FocusPublic understanding of science, secular ethics, skepticism
Location
MethodResearch, education, outreach, and advocacy
Key people
Current: Gus Lyn-Piluso, Seanna Watson
Former: Kevin Smith, Justin Trottier, Derek Pert, Michael Payton, Eric Adriaans
Website www.cficanada.ca

The Centre for Inquiry Canada (CFIC) is a not-for-profit educational organization with headquarters in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The Canadian organization was founded as a member and volunteer driven organization in 2007. It is the Canadian affiliate of CFI Transnational. Their primary mission is to provide education and training to the public in the application of skeptical, secular, rational and humanistic inquiry through conferences, symposia, lectures, published works and the maintenance of a library. [1]

Contents

History

CFI Canada was originally established as a branch of CFI Transnational in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in 2006. [2] Initially supported in part by CFI Transnational, CFIC is an independent Canadian national organization with branches in several provinces. Justin Trottier served as the first National Executive Director from 2007 to 2011, followed by Michael Payton until June 2013, and by Eric Adriaans from March 2014 to July 2016. [3]

Structure

CFI Canada is governed by a Board of Directors to whom the National Executive Director reports. The ancillary Council of CFI Canada is a quasi-governance body responsible for the election of the Board and for approval of changes to CFIC by-laws. Branch directors (leaders) report to the National Executive Director. [4]

Branches

CFI Canada has branches in Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Saskatoon, Calgary, Regina, Kelowna, Victoria and Vancouver.

Committee for the Advancement of Scientific Skepticism (CASS)

The Committee for the Advancement of Scientific Skepticism (CASS) was a science-focused working group of CFI Canada, acting as a national Canadian science advisory group that encouraged evidence-based inquiry into scientific, medical, technological and paranormal claims using scientific scepticism. [5] CASS conducts research,[ citation needed ] provided educational programs in schools,[ citation needed ] and published papers on a variety of scientific topics in a proactive approach to public outreach,[ citation needed ] and also acted reactively to non-evidence based scientific, medical, and paranormal claims in public discourse.[ citation needed ]

CASS was formed in 2010 to act as point of contact for science outreach for the organization. The committee was a volunteer driven panel of experts and enthusiasts. CASS was run by two co-chairs. Past co-chair members included Iain Martel, a University of Toronto contract lecturer with a background in the metaphysics of physics, Michael Kruse, a contributor to Skeptic North with a background in health. CASS activities were incorporated into the work of the Board of Directors in 2014.

Strategic Priorities

Drawing on the success of CASS, in 2014, CFIC developed the Committee For the Advancement of Human Rights (CAHR) and the Committee for the Advancement of Education. The three priority areas (human rights, education and science) are championed at CFIC's Board of Directors by the committee Chairs. In 2019, CFIC states that its strategic priorities include secularism, scientific skepticism, critical thinking and building community. [6]

Campaigns and outreach activities

CFI Canada branches host a public education series across the country featuring leading academics, scientists, authors, performers and artists. National campaigns on relevant themes are also a key focus for the organization's activities.

Secular library

CFIC houses a library of approximately 7000 secular books available for loan to members for research and study purposes. Large portions of the library were in storage from 2011 to 2014 with a repatriation of the full collection occurring in June 2014. The CFIC library was relocated to the Ottawa Branch in 2017.

Extraordinary Claims Campaign

The Extraordinary Claims Campaign was a series of planned advertisements developed in 2010 based on the Carl Sagan quote "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". [7] [8] It was designed to be a follow-up to the Freethought Association of Canada's Atheist Bus Campaign in 2009. The ads were to feature a list of "extraordinary claims" on topics of pseudoscience, religion, and alternative medicine, including Allah, Christ, Bigfoot, chiropractic, and many more. [9] The campaign also focuses on public education, running a series of events and publishing articles throughout the campaign that explored each extraordinary claim in more detail. The campaign received coverage in The National Post [10] and The Toronto Star. [11] However, as of 2017, these ads never went up.

10:23

CASS takes part in the annual 10:23 campaign, an international campaign aimed at raising awareness about what homeopathy is with the slogan: "There's nothing in it." [12] In cities around the world, individuals get together to take an 'overdose' of homeopathic pills to highlight their dilution and ineffectual nature. In 2011, members of CASS in Vancouver were featured taking their overdose on a CBC Marketplace episode dedicated to homeopathy called: "Cure or Con?" [13]

In March 2011, CASS sent an official complaint to Ontario Health Minister Deb Mathews (Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care), to express concern over a move in the province of Ontario to create a college of homeopaths as a regulated health profession. Key demands have been to ensure that the term "doctor" remain and be enforced as a protected term and to ensure public health safety with particular reference to the promotion of homeopathic vaccines.[ citation needed ]

Public education and events

During the Canadian federal election of 2011, CASS sent questionnaires asking candidates their position on public health as it relates to homeopaths and alternative medicine practitioners, scientific integrity and political influence, climate change, and critical thinking education. Responses received were posted publicly.

In the summer of 2011, CASS sent a team of four members to speak on a variety of skeptical science topics at Polaris 25 in Toronto. [14] The panel was the first of its kind at a Canadian science fiction conference and was modelled after Skeptrack at DragonCon in Atlanta.

Good Without God Billboard Campaign

CFIC launched a Good without God Billboard campaign in 2013 with billboards appearing in Vancouver and Calgary. CFIC also supported a bus ad in Sudbury, Ontario. The campaign featured secular "verses" promoting secular ethics. [15] [16]

Kids For Inquiry

Kids for Inquiry was launched by the Okanagan Branch of CFIC as a program to bring the values of critical thinking and science education to families with young children.

Secular Seminar Series

In 2014, CFIC launched its Secular Seminar series as an educational tool targeted to increase awareness and knowledge of targeted topic of Canadian secularism. The first two seminars focused on Prayers in Public Spaces and Canada's Blasphemous Libel law (Criminal Code Section 296). Each seminar is a collaborative participation session where members learn while contributing new content.

Criminal Code Section 296: Canada's Blasphemous Libel

Following the brutal murders at Charlie Hebdo in France [17] and the imprisonment and torture of Raif Badawi in Saudi Arabia CFIC launched initiatives to educate Canadians regarding Canada's blasphemous libel law, Criminal Code Section 296. Between 2014 and 2017, CFIC called-upon the Canadian government to repeal Criminal Code Section 296 and was a leading organizer of the International Coalition Against Blasphemy Laws (ICABL), a group of organizations from around the world working together to educate and oppose blasphemy laws around the world. The International Humanist and Ethical Union collaborated with ICABL with the End Blasphemy Laws website. [18] [19] Section 296 was repealed in 2018 as part of a larger set of reforms to Canada's criminal code. [20]

Bangladeshi writers

During a period of turbulence beginning in 2013, there had been a series of killings of writers who were critical of religion in Bangladesh, including the murder of Avijit Roy. In 2015, CFI Canada called on the Canadian government to intervene in the case of Bangladeshi writer Tareq Rahim, whose wife lived in Montreal who was attacked and wounded. [21] Later in that same year, CFI Canada assisted Bangladeshi writer Raihan Abir and his wife to find sanctuary and claim asylum in Canada. Abir had not been attacked, but had feared he was next. [22]

Affiliate organizations

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Committee for Skeptical Inquiry</span> Organization examining paranormal claims

The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), formerly known as the Committee for the Scientific Investigation of Claims of the Paranormal (CSICOP), is a program within the U.S. non-profit organization Center for Inquiry (CFI), which seeks to "promote scientific inquiry, critical investigation, and the use of reason in examining controversial and extraordinary claims." Paul Kurtz proposed the establishment of CSICOP in 1976 as an independent non-profit organization, to counter what he regarded as an uncritical acceptance of, and support for, paranormal claims by both the media and society in general. Its philosophical position is one of scientific skepticism. CSI's fellows have included notable scientists, Nobel laureates, philosophers, psychologists, educators, and authors. It is headquartered in Amherst, New York.

Scientific skepticism or rational skepticism, sometimes referred to as skeptical inquiry, is a position in which one questions the veracity of claims lacking empirical evidence. In practice, the term most commonly references the examination of claims and theories that appear to be beyond mainstream science, rather than the routine discussions and challenges among scientists. Scientific skepticism differs from philosophical skepticism, which questions humans' ability to claim any knowledge about the nature of the world and how they perceive it, and the similar but distinct methodological skepticism, which is a systematic process of being skeptical about the truth of one's beliefs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Kurtz</span> American philosopher (1925–2012)

Paul Kurtz was an American scientific skeptic and secular humanist. He has been called "the father of secular humanism". He was Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at the State University of New York at Buffalo, having previously also taught at Vassar, Trinity, and Union colleges, and the New School for Social Research.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Dawkins Award</span> Award presented by the Center for Inquiry

The Richard Dawkins Award is an annual prize awarded by the Center for Inquiry (CFI). It was established in 2003 and was initially awarded by the Atheist Alliance of America coordinating with Richard Dawkins and the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science. In 2019, the award was formally moved to CFI. CFI is a US nonprofit organization that variously claims on its website to promote reason, science, freedom of inquiry, and humanist values, or science, reason, and secular values. The award was initially presented by the Atheist Alliance of America to honor an "outstanding atheist", who taught or advocated scientific knowledge and acceptance of nontheism, and raised public awareness. The award is currently presented by the Center for Inquiry to an individual associated with science, scholarship, education, or entertainment, and who "publicly proclaims the values of secularism and rationalism, upholding scientific truth wherever it may lead." They state that the recipient must be approved by Dawkins himself.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Humanists International</span> Secular humanism advocacy organization

Humanists International is an international non-governmental organisation championing secularism and human rights, motivated by secular humanist values. Founded in Amsterdam in 1952, it is an umbrella organisation made up of more than 160 secular humanist, atheist, rationalist, agnostic, skeptic, freethought and Ethical Culture organisations from over 80 countries.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Center for Inquiry</span> American nonprofit organization

The Center for Inquiry (CFI) is a U.S. nonprofit organization that works to mitigate belief in pseudoscience and the paranormal and to fight the influence of religion in government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science</span> Non-profit organization

The Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science is a division of Center for Inquiry (CFI) founded by British biologist Richard Dawkins in 2006 to promote scientific literacy and secularism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Atheist Bus Campaign</span> Bus ad campaign that started in Great Britain

The Atheist Bus Campaign was an advertising campaign in 2008 and 2009 that aimed to place "peaceful and upbeat" messages about atheism on transport media in Britain, in response to evangelical Christian advertising.

Blasphemy Day, also known as International Blasphemy Day or International Blasphemy Rights Day, educates individuals and groups about blasphemy laws and defends freedom of expression, especially the open criticism of religion which is criminalized in many countries. Blasphemy Day was introduced as a worldwide celebration by the Center for Inquiry in 2009.

Justin Trottier is a political activist, former political candidate and founder of Canada's largest social-political movements for secularism and men's issues. He was one of several founding members of several secular organizations such as the Centre for Inquiry Canada in 2007, where he served as National Executive Director until 2011. He also founded the Freethought Association of Canada, which created the 2009 atheist bus campaign where Trottier served as one of the spokespersons. He also founded the Canadian Secular Alliance. In 2011, he was a Green Party candidate in the 2011 Ontario provincial election. Later, Trottier co-founded and has served as the chairman and spokesperson for the Canadian Association for Equality (CAFE), and was heavily involved in CAFE's campaign to open the Canadian Centre for Men and Families in 2014. He currently serves as the Centre's director.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Desiree Schell</span>

Desiree Schell is the host of the live Canadian call-in radio talk show and podcast, "Science for the People". An advocate for scientific skepticism, Schell is a strong advocate of critical thinking and is strongly interested in the promotion of skepticism publicly. In her work as a labour organizer Schell creates curricula and teaches courses on effective activism, drawing on the experience of other social movements.

Austin Dacey is an American philosopher, writer, and human rights activist whose work concerns secularism, religion, freedom of expression, and freedom of conscience. He is the author of The Secular Conscience: Why Belief Belongs in Public Life, The Future of Blasphemy: Speaking of the Sacred in an Age of Human Rights, and a 2006 New York Times op-ed entitled "Believing in Doubt," which criticized the ethical views of Pope Benedict. He is a representative to the United Nations for the International Humanist and Ethical Union and the creator and director of The Impossible Music Sessions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Underdown</span> American skeptic, paranormal investigator

James "Jim" Underdown has been the executive director of The Center for Inquiry (CFI) West in Los Angeles since 1999. The Center for Inquiry is a non-profit educational organization with headquarters in Amherst, New York, whose primary mission is to foster a secular society based on science, reason, freedom of inquiry, and humanist values. CFI West is the largest facility in the organization outside Amherst.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ronald A. Lindsay</span> American academic

Ronald A. Lindsay was president and CEO of the Center for Inquiry and of its affiliates, the Council for Secular Humanism and the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. He held this position June 2008 – 2016.

Alexander Aan is an Indonesian atheist and ex-Muslim of Minang descent. He was imprisoned in 2012 for posting comments and images to Facebook that were judged to be "disseminating information aimed at inciting religious hatred or hostility" by the Muaro Sijunjung district court. The sentence sparked national debate and caused Amnesty International to designate him a prisoner of conscience.

Ahmed Rajib Haider was a Bangladeshi atheist blogger. He used to blog in the blogging communities namely Somewhereinblog.net, Amarblog.com and Nagorikblog.com and used the pseudonym Thaba Baba.

The secular movement refers to a social and political trend in the United States, beginning in the early years of the 20th century, with the founding of the American Association for the Advancement of Atheism in 1925 and the American Humanist Association in 1941, in which atheists, agnostics, secular humanists, freethinkers, and other nonreligious and nontheistic Americans have grown in both numbers and visibility. There has been a sharp increase in the number of Americans who identify as religiously unaffiliated, from under 10 percent in the 1990s to 20 percent in 2013. The trend is especially pronounced among young people, with about one in three Americans younger than 30 identifying as religiously unaffiliated, a figure that has nearly tripled since the 1990s.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Asif Mohiuddin</span> Bangladeshi blogger and activist (born 1984)

Asif Mohiuddin is a Bangladeshi atheist and secular activist, religious critic and feminist. In 2012, he won The Bobs-Best of Online Activism award from Deutsche Welle, who stated that "Asif's blog was one of the most read web pages in Bangladesh and is known for its strong criticism of Islamic fundamentalism in Bangladesh's "anti-people politics", his blog was later blocked and banned in Bangladesh by its government. On 15 January 2013, he survived an assassination attempt by Islamic extremists. A few months later, he was imprisoned twice by the Bangladesh Government for posting "offensive comments about Islam and Mohammad". Due to sustained international pressure, Mohiuddin was released, after which he fled from his country to Germany in 2014. In 2015, he received the Anna Politkovskaya Prize for Journalism, awarded by Italian magazine Internazionale.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">CSICon</span> Annual skeptic conference in the United States

CSICon or CSIConference is an annual skeptical conference typically held in the United States. CSICon is hosted by the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry (CSI), which is a program of the Center for Inquiry (CFI). CSI publishes the magazine Skeptical Inquirer.

References

  1. ↑ "About". Center for Inquiry. Archived from the original on 2012-06-23. Retrieved 2012-06-18.
  2. ↑ "Ditching God". www.nationalpost.com. 2007-07-23. Archived from the original on 2014-05-12. Retrieved 2012-02-17.
  3. ↑ "History and Mandate – Centre for Inquiry Canada". Archived from the original on 2017-04-19. Retrieved 2017-03-09.
  4. ↑ CFIC website: cficanada.ca Archived 2014-02-06 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ↑ "Committee for the Advancement of Scientific Skepticism | Centre for Inquiry". Cficanada.ca. Archived from the original on 2012-07-14. Retrieved 2012-06-18.
  6. ↑ "CFIC Core Areas of Focus – Centre for Inquiry Canada".
  7. ↑ "Skeptics plan to bring controversial atheist ads to Calgary buses". Globaltvcalgary.com. 2010-12-02. Retrieved 2011-01-17.[ permanent dead link ]
  8. ↑ "Encyclopaedia Galactica". Carl Sagan (writer/host).Cosmos. PBS. December 14, 1980. No. 12. 01:24 minutes in.
  9. ↑ "Extraordinary Claims". Extraordinary Claims. 2010-09-21. Archived from the original on 2012-07-01. Retrieved 2012-06-18.
  10. ↑ "Kelly McParland: Atheists' only faith is in not having faith | Full Comment | National Post". Fullcomment.nationalpost.com. 2010-12-03. Archived from the original on 2012-06-03. Retrieved 2012-06-18.
  11. ↑ "New bus ads to take on Bigfoot, Christ". The Star. Toronto. 2010-12-07. Archived from the original on 2012-01-10. Retrieved 2017-08-25.
  12. ↑ "Homeopathy: there's nothing in it | The 10:23 Campaign | #ten23". 1023.org.uk. Archived from the original on 2011-02-05. Retrieved 2012-07-16.
  13. ↑ "Cure or Con?". CBC News. Archived from the original on 2012-02-28. Retrieved 2012-02-17.
  14. ↑ IFRS Learning says (2011-06-25). "Skeptical Track at Polaris 25 « Critical Thinking « Skeptic North". Skepticnorth.com. Archived from the original on 2012-04-06. Retrieved 2012-06-18.
  15. ↑ "Atheist billboard ads rejected in Vancouver". CBC News . 7 December 2013. Archived from the original on 2017-03-09. Retrieved 8 March 2017.
  16. ↑ "Atheist message circulating on city bus". 2014-01-14. Archived from the original on 2017-03-12. Retrieved 2017-03-09.
  17. ↑ "In wake of Charlie Hebdo attacks, secularist groups to seek end of Canada's blasphemy law". National Post. Archived from the original on 2017-06-18. Retrieved 2017-05-15.
  18. ↑ "Atheist groups join forces to call for end of blasphemy laws around the world". National Post. Archived from the original on 2016-07-14. Retrieved 2017-05-15.
  19. ↑ "Why Is Blasphemy Still Illegal in Canada?". Vice. 2015-01-20. Retrieved 2017-05-15.
  20. ↑ "Consolidated federal laws of canada, Criminal Code". 2019-09-19.
  21. ↑ "Montreal woman pleads for help after extremists attack husband in Bangladesh". Global News. Archived from the original on 2017-04-09. Retrieved 2017-06-21.
  22. ↑ Chowdhry, Affan (20 December 2015). "Couple finds sanctuary in Canada to escape killings of writers in Bangladesh". The Globe and Mail . Archived from the original on 2017-03-09. Retrieved 8 March 2017.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.