With school start times targeting late August and early September, Brights Central is gearing up for the new school year, and we’ve amassed plenty of mailing supplies for the task.
Note: BC has learned from experience not to mail the Earth and Life: changes over time evolution posters while school staff are away on summer (Northern hemisphere) break.

Going by our teacher survey results, this [pictured] batch of posters alone will inform the understanding of over 41 thousand high school science students across just the next three school years. The “shelf-life” of these posters will last longer into a teacher’s career than that, since we’ve discovered from so many of their comments that science teachers tend to professionally laminate their poster when they receive it.

Example from one Oregon teacher writing BC upon receipt of her poster: “I plan on laminating it with a stiff plastic, so it will be protected and lay flat (for) a station that students will visit and gather information from as they explore evidence for evolution. This teacher, Jennie, closes her lengthier comments with gratitude: “Thank you very much for all you are doing to support teachers and facilitate the learning of accurate science information in our classrooms!” 

Brights who support this project can be proud and know that they are making a real difference!  Please join them, if you haven’t already.

The Center for Inquiry (CfI), a secular organization that stands in support of science, knows well that homeopathic medicines are just “bunkum.” CfI has tired of how some retailers place these “fake medicines” right alongside the science-based and FDA-approved chemicals, and it has set about to do something about it.

CfI is bringing a fraud lawsuit against CVS, the largest drug store retailer in the United States, seeking to stop its retail marketing practice of nestling these fantasy “remedies/cures” (pure pseudoscience) amid the valid products, corralled together in sections that point to various maladies (e.g., cold, headache, flu, sleeplessness, pain, etc.).

CfI claims that marketing the “natural” homeopathic “treatments” this way is tricking people into buying ineffective products. It asserts that drug retailers know that the items are useless, but sell them anyway.  The secular organization has produced a dedicated website and animated video to explain the basis for its lawsuit.

The book published (and translated into English) by Russian Brights has answers to that question and explores the contemporary conditions of secularism in the Russian Federation. It examines human rights violations regarding freedom of worldview choice in that nation from 2016 to the beginning of 2017.

The in-depth study assesses the observance of the principle of worldview neutrality at all levels of government. The researcher, Sergey Buryanov, Ph.D. is a legal specialist in the fields of freedom of thought and state worldview neutrality. Positioned in the Department of International Law and Human Rights at the Moscow City Pedagogical University, he has authored several monographs and many scientific and general articles on freedom of thought and state worldview neutrality, including in peer-reviewed journals.

Along with incorporating fundamental theoretical insights, Buryanov has looked to legal documents, human rights monitoring results, various materials from different civil organizations, mass media, and other open sources as the basis for his conclusions and recommendations. and investigated the activities of those fighting against the above-mentioned violations and their subsequent persecution in the Russian Federation.

The research is intended for scholars, teachers, graduate students, lawmakers, government officials, law enforcement officials, human rights activists, and anyone interested in global studies, issues of worldview neutrality, and/or freedom of worldview choice.

Hoped-for dissemination of the Russian Brights’ book is unlikely to happen unless the material is given helpful notice. It will need to be read and reviewed outside of Russia. Otherwise, the recommendations it provides to the international community will never be implemented, or even considered.

The Russian Brights would wish that any reader having knowledge, access or affiliations that could be beneficial would please act to help information on contemporary conditions of secularism in Russia see the light of day!

Please contact directly Eugene Tsygankov., coordinator of Brights Russia, if you can assist in some aspect of review and/or PR for the material.

This month's wee story of nature touches upon a major question in science: When in evolutionary history did animal communication become influenced by another’s (rather than one’s own) perspective?

The researchers in this study tested whether, in response to a snake model (danger) and under differing knowledge conditions (ignorant associates or aware associates), wild chimpanzees emit differing signals. They concluded that chimpanzees are aware enough of another’s perspective to target information toward ignorant group members. The results suggest that the integration of signaling and social cognition systems was already emerging in early hominoid lineages before the advent of more language-specific features, such as syntax.

Like previous stories from a Danish Bright, this little "Hotline Story," is available in both Danish and English languages).