James Randi has announced his retirement from the JREF. The JREF has banked largely on Randi’s charisma, so this could be a difficult transition — and who replaces him could be a significant signal for the direction the organization takes in the future, and for its future viability.
But best of luck to Randi!
I’d cheer if his rapist pal Shermer was retiring too. But as it is, I can’t wish him good luck.
I just hope whoever takes over will listen to scientists on climate change. Randi isn’t a skeptic. He’s just selectively gullible.
Well, that’s interesting. The JREF has been in kind of a bad way for some time, from before the sudden and still (officially) unexplained departure of Grothe. They’ve cast off the forum (which I will be visiting momentarily) and the entire staff, according to the JREF website has consisted of Randi and Sharon Hill. I guess this just leaves Hill.
Even the membership of the board isn’t listed. Adam Savage was rumored to have joined but I haven’t seen this confirmed. Anyone know who is actually on the JREF board?
Again?
I hear DJ Grothe is available.
This quote from Randi is ambiguous. “Just once more?” Does he mean that this will be his last TAM — or does he mean this will be THE last TAM?
If he means the former, then there is probably something very wrong indeed with his health, since I can’t imagine him not even wanting to show up. He was even in a wheel chair one year.
If he means the latter, then there is probably something very wrong with the JREF. Or it is going to “refocus.” Or both.
I have attended every TAM, including the first one in Fort Lauderdale. Will I go to this one? That will partly depend on my own health, I think, and maybe other factors. Whatever issues I’ve had with some of the leaders/speakers, the convention itself always contains multitudes. Besides, what’s not to like about Vegas in July?
Without Randi or Grothe steering the ship, is there any foundation left?
@6: Just Sharon Hill, as far as I can see.
And all of this could have been prevented if, oh, I don’t know… they might have actually been PROACTIVE in trying to fix problems instead of “la-la-la-i-can’t-hear-you”-ing all the way to the bank.
But of course the ‘Pit-types are just too far up their own asses to make this sort of connection.
For me, CSIOP led me to the million-dollar challenge which led me to the JREF which led to the Bad Astronomer who led me to Pharyngula who led me to atheism. So he was an important step on the chain for my philosophical evolution, and I’ll miss his voice.
@9: Almost my story, except for the first item, which wasn’t where I started, and the last item, which happened first.
Someone at the former JREF forum speculated that a merger is pending between JREF And The Skeptic Society. That’s Shermer.
After the way the forum was handled I can’t say I’ve got a lot of love left in the bucket for Randi.
The reference in Randi’s goodbye post to all the other organizations that have sprung up is, to me, a strong hint that the JREF will be folding or merging with some other entity, perhaps Shermer’s organization as Trebuchet alluded to.
The same could be said about literally anyone alive.
If you dislike Randi, fine. If you think he’s wrong about things, fine. But there are no people who apply critical thinking and strict scrutiny to everything equally. If you think there are, you just haven’t talked to them long enough.
What about the million dollars?
chigau @14,
Good question. It seems to me that the JREF has three real “assets,” other than Randi himself: (1) the million-dollar endowment; (2) its donor/mailing list; and (3) the Amazing Meetings.
I assume that (2) and (3) will get sold/transferred to some other organization. What will happen to (1) probably depends on the terms of the gift and/or the donor’s wishes, and whether the “other” organization wants to operate the million dollar challenge or not.
If it’s a merger with Shermer, then meh, goodbye, no further interest.
The interesting outcome would be somebody new, who’d take it in a different direction. Considering the cloud of people most active in the JREF and TAM, though, I don’t have high expectations of anyone progressive taking the helm.
Randi’s wishy-washyness on science drove me from JREF long ago.
“We just don’t know!” What a cop-out (borrowed from his Libertarian buddy, Penn Jillette).
Randi certainly did some good in this world debunking various sorts of woo, but he was a disappointment, to put it mildly, on the biggest scientific issue of our day. I hope he is comfortable in retirement, but if he hasn’t stopped waffling on global warming, at least let him keep still about it.
What the hell? It is almost as if JREF is embarrassed by DJ antics. The comments on the announcement are closed. It’s almost as if JREF is afraid of empowering the “Freeze Peach” brigade.
Personally, I do not see the JREF surviving after Randi. Unless, with a merger of another group. as was stated, the JREF was Randi and his personality it what made JREF. I am sure that the diminished TAM diversity figures was in no way related to when Randi stepped back to work on his book.
I do miss the weekly SWIFT when Randi was the editor. Things for me started with that small change. Oh well, heady times.
brucegee1962
28 January 2015 at 11:54 am
too funny….for me it was Bad Astronomer, to skepticism, to JREF, to Scienceblogs, to Pharyngula, to atheism, to Skepchick, to FtB, to SJW (Level: Paladin)
To be fair, comments on all posts at the JREF site have been closed for quite a long time, probably because of Mabus/Markuze.
Sastra@5:
I can think of about 110 reasons…
If JREF merges with Skeptic Society, it won’t be because of Shermer. It will be because of their positive bonds with other people in Skeptic, plus the academic association with Caltech.
In my opinion.
Sastra:
So what? All those positive bonds, other people, and academic association happily support and associate with a known rapist.
nich@21
Don’t you mean 43 reasons to not like Vegas in July? What with that corresponding to a more sensible temperature scale. Or 316 reasons if you want it to be both impressive sounding and metric.
Never happen in a million years, but what if Rebecca Watson was put up as a successor? Imagine what a difference that would make. Young. Clever. Creative. Fun. Smart ass.
Anyone else seems boring and safe by comparison. Boring and safe is going to leave the organization preaching to a smaller and smaller choir, and all but irrelevant in 5 years.
Unfortunatley, we know none of the people involved in these decisions have an ounce moral courage or vision between them.
futurechemist@21:
If my great grandpappy hadn’t died on the shores of Iwo Normandy, ya’d be measurin’ temperature in German!!!
Er somethin’…
Durn it, I fergot to convert the comments numberin’ system ta standard measurements so that shoulda been futurechemist@24! Consarned metric system done it ta me ag’in!!!!
The sound of all the ‘skeptic’/he-man woman haters club members’ heads assploding would be heard around the world.
Dear Franny Maccy…
Go away and don’t come back.
@25 I like it. Rebecca Watson has the experience of running a whole skeptic organization, not just being a middle manager like Grothe was an CFI before joining the JREF as president. Imagine how *amazing* TAM would be with her in charge! Gasp! There might even be an FtB booth there!
Apparently Franny Maccy has been disemvoweled. And disemconsonanted, too. Can’t help wondering what he said.
Guessing it was a pitter sighting.
The core of JREF’s membership right now are openly libertarian assholes. Putting Rebecca Watson in a prominent role would cause such a spectacular meltdown that I can’t imagine it happening…and I also can’t imagine Rebecca wanting to be put in the middle of that kind of shitstorm.
It sure would be interesting. Which is why it’s not going to happen.
I’ve been visiting the former JREF forum, now International Skeptics Forum, for a couple of months now. There are a fair number of right-wing morons there to be sure. And others. I think the JREF has probably had it.
JREF needs a respected, accomplished person of integrity and it also needs a competent, honest business manager. Those probably have to be two different people.
For the first, Steven Novella would be a great choice, except he’s already super busy. Including his work on making science-based medicine a thing, which is probably far more important than anything JREF will do in the near future.
For a business manager, they should cast a wide net in the professional non-profit sector and do a scrupulously open and rigorous hiring process. No friends or insiders.
Hal Bidlack would have been a good choice to take over the JREF. He might have been diplomatic enough to patch up some of the rifts and return TAM to be a convention that all factions of the Skeptical Movement could enjoy. He applied, but wasn’t selected. His jokes weren’t that bad. ;)
I could see the JREF folding after this last TAM, but I could be wrong. They ticked off forum members with the switch, and kept the rifts going in the skeptical movement. Being known as the right wing skeptics can only take a group so far. It seems like the JREF was pretty much set up to promote Randi and his work. Without him, there’s noting to promote.
@ Trebuchet:
I have Franny’s comments in my email. They aren’t worth it. Those comments being removed was for the best. I’d be happy to give you a one-word summary, but I won’t without PZ’s permission.
Isn’t that what I said?
Same difference.
I know they’d never give to her, I know she’d never want it, and I’d never wish it on her. But I met an enthusiastic Rebecca about 8 years ago that would’ve dreamed of the job. Imagine an alternate timeline where she wasn’t mistreated. Think of what a different landscape we’d have for advocating rationalism and science. Instead of reading names of total creeps as likely leaders, maybe we’d be discussing someone fun and savvy.
That we ended up in the place we are now is depressing.
We used to use an emoticon of a laughing dog on the JREF forums to indicate we found an idea hilarious. Imagine I posted it in response to this comment.
I’ve heard that Penn Jillette is taking over and plans to convert the JREF into a full time bacon and donut club with strippers.
It’s possible that I made that up just now to scare myself, though.
JREF (and Swift in particular) was a stepping-stone for me in becoming a more active skeptic/freethinker, but I recognise (with some sadness) that it was just that, a step, which clearly belongs in the past. I had a slowly-growing feeling of discomfort around the libertarianism, but it was the climate-change denial that finally forced me to say goodbye for good. Luckily, by that time I’d already discovered Pharyngula (via. Bad Astronomy, I think). So yeah, it’s sad that the JREF ends this way, but it’s clear that it does have to end, now.
Looks at Ryan’s #25 and nods in agreement.
Best wishes to Randi on a well-deserved retirement! He is truly amazing!
If it weren’t for the money, I’d say that JREF would die with Randi. But there is money. Most notably the capital for the $1m challenge.
gondwanarama #43 wrote:
I don’t get this. I must be out of some loop. My recollection is that the speakers at TAM have been almost uniformly pro-climate change — and there have been a lot of people who focused on just that topic, including Genie Scott. The few exceptions involve a comedian who kept bringing it up in early years and has now retreated to saying “I don’t know” and “I’m changing my mind on this part, yeah” … and a climate-change denying UFO expert who was put on a panel with actual experts in the field of climate science and who was consequently as thoroughly trounced as anyone I’ve ever seen. The audience loved it. Iirc Randi himself has admitted he was wrong. He did this a while back, to applause.
There are some libertarians (and Libertarians) in the JREF, but I wouldn’t characterize the position of the organization itself as climate-change denial, but the exact opposite — based on what they present at the conventions. But maybe I’m missing something. I was never active in the Forums, for one. I’m not privy to what goes on in the back rooms of power, either. Maybe the relentless push for pro-climate change is all a cover for a conspiracy against it. Or maybe I’m missing something else.
Get enough people together and you find advocates of woo even in skeptic groups. The important distinction I think is that the polite view that we don’t “challenge” other people’s deeply held beliefs in public is gone. Say something stupid in a public area at TAM and people don’t just look uncomfortable and change the topic to something less controversial. Say something stupid and you’ve started an impromptu discussion group … one in which you’re badly outnumbered, outclassed, and out-argued. You’re wrong; you lose.
In my opinion that’s what happened to the climate-change deniers in the JREF. They lost.
Sastra #43,
I’m willing to believe that. I’m just recalling that at the time I stopped participating (probably 6-7 years ago at this point), I got an impression the other way. It’s what pushed me over the edge.