• OPEN DISCUSSION - For the first 30 minutes of the Thursday night forums we will have informal open discussion. This will allow for late arrivals, food & drink ordering, and new attendees to become acclimated.
• ANNOUNCEMENTS - Any events, news, or other items that you feel are of interest to the group can be announced at the start of Free Inquiry Forum.

TOPICS for Thursday (3/31/05) & Monday (4/4/05):

1. The Colorado Supreme Court threw out the death penalty in a rape-and-murder case because jurors had studied Bible verses such as "eye for eye" and "tooth for tooth" during deliberations. On a 3-2 vote, justices ordered Robert Harlan to serve life in prison without parole for kidnapping, raping, and then fatally shooting the 25-year-old victim .The jurors in the 1995 trial sentenced him to die, but defense lawyers discovered five of them had looked up Bible verses, copied them down and talked about them while deliberating a sentence behind closed doors. Do you agree with the Supreme Court's decision that the Bible constituted an improper outside influence and a reliance on what the court called a "higher authority"? Should jurors be allowed to refer to the Bible or any other religious texts during deliberations?
2. The Bush administration announced last week it would sell F-16 warplanes to Pakistan. It was also reported that the United States will compete for contracts to provide Pakistan's nuclear rival India with the same jets. The United States had banned weapon sales to both India and Pakistan in the 1990s because each had tested nuclear weapons. Should the U.S. be selling these warplanes to Pakistan and/or India? Will the F-16 deal upset the India-Pakistan peace process and balance of power?
3. For the past six months, in New York's Times Square, volunteers from the Church of Scientology have been using "e-meters" to offer free "stress tests" and for a "suggested donation" a copy of the book, "Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health." However, on Monday night detectives determined that the books were being sold, not given in exchange for donations, which is a violation of New York City Transit rules against unlicensed vending. Are these Dianetics booths actually commercial operations? Is Dianetics a scientific therapeutic technique to treat mental ills, as stated by L. Ron Hubbard? Or is it, as critics claim, a type of pseudoscience? Is Scientology a "Bait-and-Switch" fraud, as some have suggested? What lures celebrities such as Tom Cruise and John Travolta to Scientology?
4. OPEN DISCUSSION.

Quote of the week: "Scientology is a half-baked mix of discredited psychotherapy and regression therapy, idiotic and simplistic rules and bad science fiction presented as profound spiritual truth." [Richard Rockley, Skeptico Blogger - Source]

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