Watch and Skype Party – Revisiting Carl Sagan

12 April 2020 by

Due to the ongoing Covid-19 outbreak, all physical events were cancelled and the Humanist Society adapted by launching our Humanism At Home initiative, consisting of Skype discussions (‘Skype Party’) and Watch Parties on Facebook.

Related image
Voyager 1, which had completed its primary mission and was leaving the Solar System, was commanded by NASA to turn its camera around and take one last photograph of Earth across a great expanse of space, at the request of astronomer and author Carl Sagan. The phrase “Pale Blue Dot” was coined by Sagan himself in his reflections on the photograph’s significance.

Watch Party

A series of Carl Sagan videos (~60mins) were curated from Facebook videos, and around 20 followers and members of our Facebook pages joined the Watch Party. Participants discussed in the comments on the human nature of exploration, and pointed out that (perhaps contrary to common thought) some of the greatest space / exploration achievements were made in times of war and not peace.

File:NASA-Apollo8-Dec24-Earthrise.jpg
Earthrise, taken on December 24, 1968, by Apollo 8 astronaut William Anders.

Participants also discussed topics related to the Fermi paradox – are there advanced intelligent alien civilizations? If so, will they colonize us or leave us alone in peace?

Skype Party

21 7 continents (3) | The map does not have the Far East on … | Flickr
A typical scratch-off map. Source

The Skype video conference chat begin with a quick catch-up with familiar faces and curious chat about a scratch-off map on one of the participant’s wall. Interestingly, some participants expressed preference to NOT scratch off the COUNTRIES they visited as they thought doing so will be inaccurate, instead, they scratch off the AREAS OR CITIES they have visited. And of course, there was a quick discussion on why shapes nearer the North and South poles are greatly distorted in a Mercator projection.

The group goes back to Carl Sagan’s role as a science educator – that “the people have to be educated and they have to practise their skepticism and their education”. Participants agreed that the education approach Singapore had in the past was economically-oriented and more could have been done. However, all is not lost, experiences of our generation is not accurate of the future state as past teachers were less formally trained as scientific educators, but current and future generations of teachers are well equipped to nurture scientific knowledge and critical thinking.

Enjoyed our Watch and Skype Party writeup? Here’s some tips for holding a good Skype discussion:

  1. Set a strong and interesting topic to attract participants
  2. Consider breaking up into smaller groups in the later part of the discussion.
  3. People who are not speaking at the moment should mute their microphones to minimize interference from external environments.
  4. Facilitators should always try to diversify the discussion, proactively intervening to free up air time for the quieter ones.

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