Breaking news: ASC is now the Rocky Mountain Atheists!

Recently, the ownership of our website domain and related Internet channels was

disputed and we were unable to retain them. This required immediate action on the part

of the board, so we decided to change our name to Rocky Mountain Atheists (RMA).

With this change we plan to enhance our efforts to promote critical thinking, science

education, and contributing to our community. The Rocky Mountain Atheists will

continue to provide an open, welcoming secular community for non-believers.

RMA is the latest iteration of a group that has existed in Calgary for almost 15 years. It

is primarily a group of skeptics and free-thinkers. Although the name has changed, the

primary purpose of this group remains: to create a community of people who value

humanism, evidence-based practice, and the promotion of scientific knowledge.

As we continue to grow our community, it seems more important than ever to redouble

our efforts to promote critical thought. We live in an age of misinformation, false news,

and political polarization. How do we sort out what is valid? Evaluate evidence?

Separate fiction from fact? Decipher information from media outlets? Today, as we

honour the contributions of Carl Sagan, I find myself reflecting on his ominous prediction

from 1995:

“I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing

industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers

are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even

grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or

knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously

consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what is true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness...

The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive

content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance”

― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

It may feel as if we have arrived at Sagan’s dystopia. But I know that he would not have

us throw our hands up and surrender. It is exactly groups like the Rocky Mountain

Atheists who should take up the reigns and forge ahead in the promotion of scientific

literacy and evidence-based decision making.

In that vein, we will continue to offer opportunities for like-minded individuals to come

together, to learn and grow through events like our Book Club and our inaugural

Western Canadian Reason (WeCanReason) Conference in May 2023.

Thank you, and welcome to the Rocky Mountain Atheists!

― Janalee Morris, President, Rocky Mountain Atheists