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The 2014 American Humanist Association Conference & A Discussion of our Group’s Future

July 6th 2014

2014 Philad-AHA-600

Humanist Community in Silicon Valley (HCSV) members who attended the 73rd Annual Conference of the American Humanist Association in Philadelphia, Pa, from June 5 to June 8 will report their experiences, and reactions to the dynamic and expanding activities of the national Humanist organization of which HCSV is a proud chapter. The future of HCSV will also be a topic for this Forum. Please join us to offer your hopes and dreams for HCSV.

A Nuclear Weapons and WMD-Free Zone in the Middle East ? Prospects and Challenges

Jackie Cabasso

June 29, 2014

JackieCabasso (2) Fears and suspicions about weapons of mass destruction have fueled tensions in the Middle East for decades, and a nuclear weapons free zone in the Middle East has been on the United Nations (UN) agenda since 1974. Last December, an unprecedented assembly of current and former members of the Israeli parliament and local and international peace and human rights activists met in Haifa, Israel, to call for a zone free of nuclear weapons and all other weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East and for a world free of nuclear weapons. Jackie Cabasso (Executive Director of the Western States Legal Foundation and a lifetime member of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom) attended the December 2013 Haifa conference and a May 2014 meeting on the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty at UN headquarters, and will discuss these efforts. (Co-sponsored by the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, Peninsula branch – contact person: Lois Salo, lsa1o@aol.com, 650-493-8872.)

Click here for Jackie’s Presentation

Here are the articles Jackie refers to in The Guardian and the one from the Haifa Conference.

Humanist Community Forum (2014-06-29): A Nuclear Weapons and WMD-Free Zone in the Middle East? Prospects and Challenges from Humanist Community-SiliconValley on Vimeo.

Is the end of religion near ?

Alan Jeskin

June 22, 2014

Navy fighter pilot turned author, Alan Jeskin, will discuss and read an excerpt from his exciting new novel, Reason’s Fifth Dawning. Jeskin’s novel is an epic saga about how the lives of four very different people were set on intersecting trajectories that led to the beginning of a new age of enlightenment and the end of religion everywhere. Alan Jeskin served 21 years in the navy as both a nuclear submarine officer and a fighter pilot, and earned numerous awards for personal achievement and valor. His first book was Outgrowing God, Moving Beyond Religion. Both books will be available for sale at the event.

Click here to see Alan’s Presentation

Humanist Community Forum (2014-06-22): Is the End of Religion Near? (Alan Jeskin) from Humanist Community-SiliconValley on Vimeo.

Rawls, Civil Disobedience, and Edward Snowden

Martin Carcieri

June 15, 2014

Under what conditions does violation of law have the moral legitimacy of civil disobedience? If Edward Snowden were prosecuted in an American court for leaking classified NSA documents to journalists, for example, would his actions be justified under principles of civil disobedience as articulated by John Rawls, the most influential political philosopher of our time? In his third presentation of Rawls’ work to HCSV, Marty Carcieri (Associate Professor of Political Science at San Francisco State University) will present Rawls’ theory of civil disobedience and apply it to the case of Edward Snowden.

Humanist Community Forum (2014-06-15): Rawls, Civil Disobedience, and Edward Snowden from Humanist Community-SiliconValley on Vimeo.

Me and My Ego

Laura Mappin

June 8, 2014

Laura Mappin

The ego is the hardiest of all weeds — Robert Grant, author of Way of the Wound, http://amzn.to/LhZ4TZ

What kind of relationship do you have with your ego? How did you even get to learn that you had one? How do you manage it? Do you manage it? What tools or perspectives do you use?

For the first half of this forum, Humanist Community member Laura Mappin will share her trip in getting in touch with her ego and developing ways to manage it that now work well for her. This trip didn’t involve any religion or other pop self-help methods since she was quite wary of them.

For the second half, attendees will be invited to respond and share their stories along this topic.

Humanist Community Forum (2014-06-08): Me and My Ego (Laura Mappin) from Humanist Community-SiliconValley on Vimeo.