(1) Dr. Swamidas, have you had any experience with venues like TED Talks™ and TEDx talks?
Even just one video on Youtube with a click-baiting title like “No, Science hasn’t ruled out Adam & Eve!” or “A scientist says that the Biblical Adam really could be your ancestor.” might greatly increase your traffic and thereby lead people to check out the PeacefulScience.org forum.
(2) Some film/video students are looking for projects in which to develop their skills (and even get course credit.) A student documentary-maker could weave together segments from your current inventory of video lectures and debates and interweave it with segments about your research and daily work regimen. Also, new videos of about six to ten minutes in each installment (extracted from existing videos) released every few weeks would help build up subscribers on your channel. (Bite-size topics are important. That is why your ASA lecture you recently linked was so outstanding. It focused narrowly and simply and gave most of the time to questions.)
(3) Public challenges posted as brief videos to Fuz Rana and Dennis Venema and Scot McKnight could definitely draw a lot of clicks on Youtube. I think that they would get publicity.
(4) All of the above are likely to get more bloggers discussing and linking to your webpages/channels.
(5) There may also be college students in P.R. related fields who need projects for their portfolio. I understand that “social media management” has become a career choice for a lot of business school students.
All of the above ideas have their drawbacks and pitfalls but it all comes with brainstorming.
If you could arrange to have a video like this produced, who would you want to be in dialogue with? The BioLogos folks, the RTB folks, and the ID folks all have access to resources, and RTB even has their own studio. Or, would you want to keep it independent somehow? Do you anticipate any video coverage coming out of the Dabar Conference?
You guys are very kind. The most effective thing you is make personal invitations to people, and give them reason to stay by treating the kindly.
I should not be the focus. I’m doing my thing, but really look for other scientists to invite here
Many are doing even more important work than me. @sygarte, for example, is becoming well known in atheist circles. He has a book coming out, where he tells his story of moving from atheism to Jesus. Look at him dialoguing with an atheist (with exact opposite journey, from Christianity to Atheism)…
He is also the editor the God and Nature ASA Magazine. He is a big deal, and I"m hoping he will tell more of his story here in the coming months. There is no organization out there to support scientists like him. Show them love, and they will grow our community. I do not know how this 70 year old did it, but he is legit twitter famous.
Sort of. Doing Veritas Forums all the time, and was just invited to do another top secret project. Stay tuned for details on that.
For TED, anyone can nominate speakers. https://speaker-nominations.ted.com/ In a venue like that, I would leave out the religious content, and instead do an introduction on genealogical vs. genetic ancestry. It is beautiful and surprising no matter what you believe about God. So feel free nominate me. It could be fun.
There is a much less ambitious project that needs to be done. I need someone to somehow organize all my disparate contributions on this into a single directory, with summaries. I’m making contributions in several places, and I haven’t even linked to more than half of them yet.
Once again, this isn’t really about me. There is no need for a documentary about me. Though, an orderly account my contributions would very helpful.
I’m not wanting to publcly challenge people =/. The only reason I posted about Dr. Fazale Rana is because he publicly commented on my work. He admits he has not even read it, but feels he is qualified to say it is wrong. For that reason, I publicly invited him to dialogue so everyone can know that I really want to talk to him, to help him understand the basics here, but he will not talk to me. This is a challenge he initiated not me.
You can submit articles here to new aggregators like RealClearReligion and RealClearScience. It is always received better from a third-party (not me). Passionate members of the public have real sway with journalists. Point them to quality work, and they will often link to it, or even cover it.
I have been fortunate. You can read about my scientific work here:
I need to get out a book on Genetic and Genealogical Ancestry immediately. My wife is pestering (in the most wise and kind way imaginable) about this daily. That is where the focus is. My personal story is not nearly as important as that. Maybe in a few decades, so my kiddos can understand their old man.
I did publish one important article recently, which is one part of my story. I was serializing on the blog for a while, but never got around to finishing it. What do you think of it?
Dabar is a private event, for good reason, with rules we cannot share too specifically. This is far more important than a video. It is far more important to build connections with a small number of key leaders than to attract a large crowd.
Both Andrew Torrance and Jack Collins agreed to let me share their response. In due time, that will be made available.
For those of you that care about cultural change, I would recommend reading this book. Would any one consider that? It has been very influential for me. The key point is that meaningful connections with small groups of the right people is far more effective than large groups of the wrong people.
In a populist culture we value all the wrong things. An atheist in the trenches like @Patrick, or a Christian in the trenches like @sygarte, objectively speaking, is far more potent a force than a celebrity, if they are wise in their associations. Understand why and how.
I doubt any of these are interested in giving me such a prominent platform.
Instead, I’d point you to my most important partner for years, Veritas Forums. http://www.veritas.org/
Encourage campus ministries you know to invite me as a speaker, in dialogue with a secular academic (usually atheist). This perhaps some of the most enjoyable and important work I do. I did six forums last year, and expect to do more next year.
If a campus near you invites me, come hang out with me for the day as an honored guest. @Guy_Coe did that this last January, and had a blast: Veritas Forums the Week Dad Died (January 2018). He got to hang out with Hugh Ross in that trip!
This, I think could have value. Is anyone interested in taking it up as a project? There is actually a very large amount of video, audio, and written material to draw from.
Josh - have you considered the webinar format? 2 or 3 way conversations on key issues might move issues forward in a face to face way that could go into the public domain.
That certainly would internationalise the thing - it was logistically impossible for me to get to the Dabar Conference (though I was invited), but the wonders of Skype solve some of those issues, as well as saving carbon.
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swamidass
(S. Joshua Swamidass)
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I’m up for that, and do that all the time with Veritas, though not usually on a genealogical Adam. I’m up for it, but we’d need to get funding and help.
Unfortunately, Dabar is closed door, no recordings. I’ll make sure to get you the non-confidential highlights. Just talked with Jack Collins at my tenure party. He thanked me for the paper. Let’s see how this goes, but I think we are facing a paradigm shift on the theological side.
