{"id":514,"date":"2009-10-04T21:07:29","date_gmt":"2009-10-05T03:07:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/?p=514"},"modified":"2014-12-29T20:36:45","modified_gmt":"2014-12-30T02:36:45","slug":"brainiacs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/?p=514","title":{"rendered":"Brainiacs"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"006x\"<\/p>\n

With Smoking Man from the X-Files<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The best part of the week was our trip to Burbank, California, for a conference on Darwin\u2019s legacy. There were about 500 people there to hear some incredible speakers: Richard Dawkins<\/a> and Daniel Dennett<\/a> were two that I was familiar with because John has read most all of their books. It was funny to see them – basically your college professors – be treated\u00a0like absolute rock stars. Bill Maher<\/a> received the Dawkins award, and he gave a great talk (geez, he\u2019s funny).<\/p>\n

I had heard Eugenie Scott\u00a0from the National Center for Science Education<\/a>\u00a0speak before at TAM, but it was good to hear her again, to be reminded of the absolute nonsense that creationists – sorry, I mean the \u201cintelligent design\u201d folks – are trying to have taught in schools.<\/p>\n

And I heard some wonderful new-to-me speakers, like Lawrence Krauss<\/a> who spoke on cosmology (not cosmetology), Sean Faircloth from the Secular Coalition for America<\/a>, and Carolyn Porco<\/a> (who showed some incredible photos of Saturn from the Cassini spacecraft) – just to name a few. Other topics included stem cell research and the Inquisition (and how those techniques continue to be used today).<\/p>\n

One of the other highlights was getting to hear the \u201cSmoking Man\u201d from the X-Files, William B. Davis<\/a> (pictured above). He talked some\u00a0about whether or not the X-Files hurt or helped scientific inquiry or if it had too much woo. He seemed like a real sweetheart, and hung out at the conference all weekend.<\/p>\n

It was\u00a0a super-busy week. I left late last Sunday afternoon to fly from Juarez to Monterrey with our local staff supervisor. We went to a conference sponsored by the U.S. Consulate there on international child abduction and how to comply with the Hague Convention. There were about 120 attendees, mostly judges who adjudicate the cases – very interesting. The best part was seeing several friends from the other Consulates and from the Embassy, including my good friend Cathy. After the conference ended mid-day on Tuesday,\u00a0Antonio took Ashley and me out sightseeing and shopping. An unexpected shower made us duck into a great little Oaxacan restaurant in Barrio Antigua (old town).<\/p>\n

During the week, we started working on logistics for the Ambassador\u2019s upcoming visit to Juarez. I\u2019m in charge of planning a party with the entry-level officers, which is fun.\u00a0<\/p>\n

John and I also had time to watch several episodes of \u201cRome,\u201d an HBO series that\u2019s addictive.<\/p>\n

So that was our week!<\/p>\n

\u00a0\"011x\"<\/p>\n

With Daniel Dennett, one of John’s heroes<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With Smoking Man from the X-Files The best part of the week was our trip to Burbank, California, for a conference on Darwin\u2019s legacy. There were about 500 people there to hear some incredible speakers: Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett were two that I was familiar with because John has read most all of their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=514"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3646,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514\/revisions\/3646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}