Talks

Join us for our monthly social event.

Our socials follow on directly from our board meeting (starting at 7pm) which you are also welcome to attend. After that there is no formal agenda or schedule, just a group of existing or would-be friends meeting up to talk about whatever catches our attention.

We always have a good mix of regulars and first timers so please don't be shy, we're always friendly and welcoming so don't worry about attending on your own or bring your friends along too!

It seems like the term ‘trauma’ is everywhere now; it has become one of the central lenses through which we view our experience. However, trauma as a medical diagnosis – PTSD – is very young. It only entered the diagnostic mind in 1980, based largely on research from the Vietnam War. The returning soldier is a familiar character across American popular culture forms, especially film and television. And their depictions follow a narrow model, both instantly recognizable and mostly inaccurate.

This talk addresses the direct representation and erasure of traumatized veterans, while also considering the wider representation of trauma at play in popular culture. Beginning with a brief overview of the relationship between the Vietnam War and trauma, I show how vets are either ignored or painted in offensive, inaccurate ways. And finally, I will attempt to answer the question ‘so what?’ What does this mean for vets, for comics, and for our understanding of trauma?

Content note: some images of combat and violence; sustained discussion of trauma and PTSD.

Join us for our monthly social event.

Our socials follow on directly from our board meeting (starting at 7pm) which you are also welcome to attend. After that there is no formal agenda or schedule, just a group of existing or would-be friends meeting up to talk about whatever catches our attention.

We always have a good mix of regulars and first timers so please don't be shy, we're always friendly and welcoming so don't worry about attending on your own or bring your friends along too!

For almost 20 years, Michael Marshall had been investigating those who claim to have psychic powers. He has had his palm read by suspect psychics in Blackpool, gone undercover to report from mediumship shows and spiritualist readings, and scientifically tested the ability to talk to the dead. Here he will tell tales of what happens when you begin to crack the surface of the pseudosciences that surround us – revealing the surprising, sometimes-shocking and often-comic adventures that lie beneath.

From best-selling books to viral TikToks and food documentaries, ultra-processed foods (UPFs) have become public enemy number one in the world of nutritional ‘wellness’. But is the panic justified – or are we being fed a different kind of harmful message? In this talk, registered dietitian Maeve Hanan will break down what UPFs actually are, the roots of UPF panic and what the evidence really says about them. We will also explore how the cultural obsession with purity and perfection in eating can do more harm than good, all too often spiralling into food anxiety and disordered eating. This talk challenges black-and-white thinking around food, encourages a more balanced perspective, and asks: what if our fear of food is more dangerous than the food itself?

Misinformation is one of the biggest challenges we face today, it shapes what we believe, how we vote, and even how we see the world. So, helping young people learn to spot it is more important than ever.

But most educational programmes about misinformation are designed for young people, not with them. That’s where Project Real comes in. We work with young people to co-create engaging, research-based activities that build their skills in spotting misinformation through lesson plans, comics, and even games.

In this talk, Yvonne Skipper will share some of the key interventions we’ve developed together with Education Scotland, Police Scotland, and social media influencers. She will also talk about what we can learn from working side-by-side with young people – and how involving them directly can make a real difference in helping them (and us!) stay smart, safe, and resilient in an increasingly complex online world.

Please note we are at a different venue than usual!

The Denbigh Castle is a couple of minutes walk from Moorfields train station right in the heart of Liverpool City Centre. Please see the map below for full details on where to find us

Scientific research in medicine has led to many groundbreaking discoveries, from the development of vaccines to the treatment of many previously fatal diseases. Today our chances of surviving serious illness are better than ever, thanks to significant advances in medical knowledge. Yet history is littered with sham doctors, charlatans and quacks peddling bogus medicines and preying on those people desperate for a cure. It is also no coincidence that the ‘Mad Scientist’ trope has remained popular since the most famous iteration in Mary Shelley’s ‘Frankenstein’ – Science itself is not infallible and flawed research can have disastrous consequences, such as Andrew Wakefield’s retracted autism study. In the age of social media and in the wake of COVID-19, the distrust in scientific experts has resulted in a new wave of fake medicines, false information or flawed medical research that is spread at a rapid pace.

In this talk, Dr Jenny Lange delves into the history of grifters who capitalised on a lack of medical knowledge, as well as discussing where scientific research has gone wrong. From John R. Brinkley, the bizarre ‘goat-gland doctor’, to more recent fake medicines such as those promoted by the ‘Church of Bleach’, and the disastrous trachea implants developed by Paolo Macchiarini, this talk will examine how easy it is to fall prey to medical misinformation even today.

Please note we are not in our usual venue this month. We are in Frederiks instead. This is directly over the road from The Casa so if you've come to one of our previous events you'll know roughly where to go.

Join us for our annual March Megamix, an event that we showcase our own local, talented members. The event will comprise of 8 talks, each around 15 minutes long.

Our speakers and their topics are:

• Emma McClure - Prison Sentence Inflation
• Kat Ford - The Only Skeptic in Glastonbury
• Phil Armstrong - Heads You Lose - Understanding the heading ban in youth football
• Michael Marshall - Joe Rogan: The AIDS Denier
• Mark Horne - Thor Heyerdahl
• Bob Brady - In Search of Certainty - The uses and limitations of Ground Penetrating Radar
• Rebekkah Healey - Harlots, Hammers, and Hallucinations - 2500 Years of Technological Anxiety
• Tom Williamson - When Russia Fucked Up - The Russo-Japanese War 1904-1905