Definitely think this is a good idea. My first question was going to be “why Baconmas?” (as opposed to Newtonmass, or other potential holidays). You say in the blog that it specifically fills a holiday gap—curious if that was part of the original intent or if it just sorta worked out. For my purposes, I think the 22nd is actually a little too close to New Years—I like holidays to stand out from one another.
Most of my thoughts actually go up a few levels of meta—I’m interested in having a collection of holidays that reflect worldviews I care about, and I’m interested in them not just being individually optimal, but in working together to produce a whole better than the sum of their parts. The solstice celebration almost went down an alternate path which would have officially been called Newtonmas, but would have celebrated the rise of rational thinking, starting with Socrates and hitting various high notes throughout history. Other possibilities include Pi Day/Tau Day and Charles Darwin/Abraham Lincoln’s Birthday.
I’ve also been wanting to do a science party for a while. The first one I tried suffered from trying to do “real” science, which as it turns out is really boring. (Few people contributed experiments because of the work involved in doing them “right”). Food oriented experiments seem like a more fun starting point. Blind taste testing seems like a good framework because you can try different things each year.
I’m vegetarian, and pigs ARE particularly smart and I’m not sure whether I should in good conscience be encouraging holidays that are bacon themed in particular. I suspect that most people would eat meat on any given holiday no matter what so I’m not sure it matters.
The first one I tried suffered from trying to do “real” science, which as it turns out is really boring. (Few people contributed experiments because of the work involved in doing them “right”). Food oriented experiments seem like a more fun starting point. Blind taste testing seems like a good framework because you can try different things each year.
I’m trying to collect science demos that are fun for parties while actually being worthy of thought- here are a few examples I’ve found. I desperately want to find more!
I’m vegetarian, and pigs ARE particularly smart and I’m not sure whether I should in good conscience be encouraging holidays that are bacon themed in particular. I suspect that most people would eat meat on any given holiday no matter what so I’m not sure it matters.
It probably will result in slightly more people eating poorly raised pigs, all told. I decided that the benefits of a science-themed holiday, times the added popularity that it would have if I made it bacon-themed, outweighed that disutility. I understand if you disagree. (Also, I don’t think that it’s a bad thing to have a pig raised on a farm, have a reasonably good life, then die and be eaten. But most pigs don’t live lives of high quality in our current food-system.)
I think we more or less agree about pigs. I’m fine with humanely raised and killed farm animals.
I actually encouraged Calamari at the Solstice party, and squids seem at least as intelligent as pigs. I was thinking we’d be having meat anyway so it might as well be something on theme and any single instance of meat-eating doesn’t really impact overall consumption of a species. As it turned out squid is hard to cook and wasn’t really worth and I’m glad, because in retrospect, if it HAD become popular, I’d feel pretty bad. The squid also ended up being eaten in ADDITION to a more traditional roast, and probably would have been in future Solstices as well, if it became popular.
Dates that rely on a specific formatting are a bit lame for some portion of the world (i.e. 14⁄3 isn’t really significant), and it would be nice not to alienate people.
Definitely think this is a good idea. My first question was going to be “why Baconmas?” (as opposed to Newtonmass, or other potential holidays). You say in the blog that it specifically fills a holiday gap—curious if that was part of the original intent or if it just sorta worked out. For my purposes, I think the 22nd is actually a little too close to New Years—I like holidays to stand out from one another.
Most of my thoughts actually go up a few levels of meta—I’m interested in having a collection of holidays that reflect worldviews I care about, and I’m interested in them not just being individually optimal, but in working together to produce a whole better than the sum of their parts. The solstice celebration almost went down an alternate path which would have officially been called Newtonmas, but would have celebrated the rise of rational thinking, starting with Socrates and hitting various high notes throughout history. Other possibilities include Pi Day/Tau Day and Charles Darwin/Abraham Lincoln’s Birthday.
I’ve also been wanting to do a science party for a while. The first one I tried suffered from trying to do “real” science, which as it turns out is really boring. (Few people contributed experiments because of the work involved in doing them “right”). Food oriented experiments seem like a more fun starting point. Blind taste testing seems like a good framework because you can try different things each year.
I’m vegetarian, and pigs ARE particularly smart and I’m not sure whether I should in good conscience be encouraging holidays that are bacon themed in particular. I suspect that most people would eat meat on any given holiday no matter what so I’m not sure it matters.
Thanks for your thoughts!
I’m trying to collect science demos that are fun for parties while actually being worthy of thought- here are a few examples I’ve found. I desperately want to find more!
It probably will result in slightly more people eating poorly raised pigs, all told. I decided that the benefits of a science-themed holiday, times the added popularity that it would have if I made it bacon-themed, outweighed that disutility. I understand if you disagree. (Also, I don’t think that it’s a bad thing to have a pig raised on a farm, have a reasonably good life, then die and be eaten. But most pigs don’t live lives of high quality in our current food-system.)
I think we more or less agree about pigs. I’m fine with humanely raised and killed farm animals.
I actually encouraged Calamari at the Solstice party, and squids seem at least as intelligent as pigs. I was thinking we’d be having meat anyway so it might as well be something on theme and any single instance of meat-eating doesn’t really impact overall consumption of a species. As it turned out squid is hard to cook and wasn’t really worth and I’m glad, because in retrospect, if it HAD become popular, I’d feel pretty bad. The squid also ended up being eaten in ADDITION to a more traditional roast, and probably would have been in future Solstices as well, if it became popular.
Dates that rely on a specific formatting are a bit lame for some portion of the world (i.e. 14⁄3 isn’t really significant), and it would be nice not to alienate people.