Orange County Freethought Alliance  

DAN BARKER is co-president of the Freedom From Religion Foundation. A former minister and evangelist, Dan became a freethinker in 1983.  His newest book, Godless: How An Evangelical Preacher Became One of America's Leading Atheists, was published by Ulysses Press in 2008. A graduate of Azusa Pacific University with a degree in Religion, Dan now puts his knowledge of Christianity to effective freethought use.  He joined the Foundation staff in 1987 and served as public relations director. He was first elected co-president in November 2004.

More at FFRF.org

Paul Zachary "PZ" Myers is an American biology professor at the University of Minnesota Morris (UMM) and the author of the science blog Pharyngula. He is currently an associate professor of biology at UMM,^[1] works with zebrafish in the field of evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo), and also cultivates an interest in cephalopods. He is a public critic of intelligent design (ID) and of the creationist movement in general and is an activist in the American creation-evolution controversy.

more at http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/

John Shook is Vice President and Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Inquiry Transnational in Amherst, N.Y., and Research Associate in Philosophy at the University at Buffalo, since 2006. He received his PhD in philosophy at Buffalo, and was a professor of philosophy at Oklahoma State University from 2000 to 2006. He has authored and edited more than a dozen books, is a co-editor of three philosophy journals, and travels for lectures and debates across the United States and around the world. A forthcoming book is The Future of Naturalism, co-edited with Paul Kurtz.

Mr. Tabash graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.A. from UCLA in 1973 and earned his Juris Doctorate from Loyola Law School of Los Angeles in 1976. Mr. Tabash has participated in debates with many prominent religious spokesmen, including a successful 1999 debate with William Lane Craig before an audience of 1300 at Pepperdine University, and a debate with philosopher Peter Van Inwaagen, on the topic of "Does God Exist?"

see more at http://www.tabash.com/

Joe Nickell is the world's only full-time professional paranormal investigator -- the "Investigative Files" writer for Skeptical Inquirer science magazine who travels around the world investigating strange mysteries at the very fringes of science. His has a very varied background: former stage magician (Resident Magician at the Houdini Hall of Fame), private investigator (for a world-famous detective agency), and academic achievement (Ph.D in English, focusing on literary investigation and folklore, and author of some two dozen books)

Mr Nickel will be presenting a special seminar on how to use your critical thinking skills to investigate paranormal events or behavior.

William Lobdell, 47, is an award-winning journalist, author, blogger, speaker, college lecturer and media consultant.

He worked for 18 years with the Los Angeles Times and its sister newspapers. Lobdell covered the religion beat for The Times for eight years, first as a columnist and then as a beat reporter. He earned several national awards for his work before becoming a metro editor for the paper in 2006. He left the paper in 2008.

more at http://williamlobdell.com/

Brian Dunning is the host and producer of Skeptoid: Critical Analysis of Pop Phenomena, a popular weekly audio podcast dedicated to furthering knowledge by blasting away the widespread pseudosciences that infect popular culture, and replacing them with evidence-based scientific reality. He is also the author of the book of the same title.

see more at http://skeptoid.com/episode_guide.php

David Richards is the Coordinator of the Center for Inquiry -- Community of Orange County, and hosts those events each month. In addition he is a long-time member of the Independent Investigations Group (IIG). The IIG meets once a month in Hollywood and investigates claims of ESP, psychics, ghosts and other supernatural and paranormal phenomena, and offers a $50,000 prize for proof of such things. As a member of the IIG, David has been instrumental in several investigations, including a method for improving your eyesight without glasses; a location where things allegedly rolled uphill, and numerous tests of psychics and telepaths, including two preliminary tests for James Randi’s $1,000,000 prize.

David also created and directs an annual IIG awards program that recognizes movies and TV shows that promote science, and also expose those productions that misrepresent or do a disservice to science.  This program has recognized many well-known individuals in the skeptical movement, including Carl Sagan, James Randi, Joe Nickell, “The Mythbusers”, Penn and Teller, and others.

Stephanie Campbell is a naturalized U.S. citizen, born in England , and spent part of her childhood in Israel .  Having lived in three countries, two with an established religion and one with freedom of religion she is committed to the guarantees of religious freedom in our First Amendment based on personal experience and principle.

Ms. Campbell is the president and a founding member of the Orange County Chapter of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.  She is also a member of the National Advisory Council of Americans United.  She is very active in church/state separation issues at the local level in issues of keeping religion out of the schools and city councils and on the national level where she has lobbied our California Senators on a variety of issues including Supreme Court nominations.

Ms. Campbell is is a certified ACLU speaker on Church and State issues and also speaks on women’s issues and gay rights issues. 

Sarah's bio and photo will be added soon.

James Underdoen is director of CFI-West in Los Angeles.  His bio will be updated soon.