JOIN US at the 74th AHA Annual Conference, May 7-10, 2015 in Denver, CO! We’ll be honoring the following individuals who’ve contributed to the humanist community.
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Lawrence Krauss, 2015 Humanist of the Year(Please see AHA’s statement on sexual harassment allegations against Dr. Krauss here.) Lawrence M. Krauss is an internationally known theoretical physicist with wide research interests, including the interface between elementary particle physics and cosmology. He has investigated questions ranging from the nature of exploding stars to issues of the origin of all mass in the universe. He is currently Foundation Professor in the School of Earth and Space Exploration and Physics Department, and Inaugural Director of the Origins Project at , a national center for research and outreach on origins issues, from the origins of the universe, to human origins, to the origins of consciousness and culture. He received his Ph.D. in Physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1982), then joined the Harvard Society of Fellows. In 1985 he joined the faculty of the departments of Physics and Astronomy at Yale University. In 1993 he moved to Case Western Reserve University as the Ambrose Swasey Professor and Chairman of the department of Physics. He moved to take his current position in 2008. Krauss is the author of over 300 scientific publications, as well as numerous popular articles on physics and astronomy. He is the author of 10 popular books, including the international bestseller The Physics of Star Trek (1995) and most recently A Universe from Nothing (2012), which immediately became New York Times Bestseller. It argues that not only can our universe naturally arise from nothing, without supernatural effects, but that it probably did. He is the recipient of numerous awards for his research and writing and is the only physicist to have received the major awards from all three U.S Physics Societies. His Julius Edgar Lilienfeld Prize from the American Physical Society (2001) summarizes his impact “For outstanding contributions to the understanding of the early universe, and extraordinary achievement in communicating the essence of physical science to the general public”. In 2005 he was also awarded the Joseph P. Burton Forum Award from the American Physical Society for his work on issues of science and society. In 2012, he was awarded The National Science Board’s prestigious national Public Service Award for his many contributions to public education and understanding of science around the world. Hailed, by Scientific American as a rare scientific Public Intellectual, he frequently contributes to newspapers, including the New York Times and The Wall Street Journal and regularly appears on television and radio, and he has performed with the Cleveland Orchestra, and was a jury member at the Sundance Film Festival. Krauss is also the subject of a new full-length feature film, The Unbelievers, which follows Krauss and Richard Dawkins around the world as they discuss science and reason. In this regard he has dedicated his time, throughout his career, to issues of science and society and has helped spearhead national efforts to educate the public about science, ensure sound public policy, and defend science against attacks at a variety of levels. He serves as the chair of the Board of Sponsors of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and is on the Board of Directors of the Federation of American Scientists, and helped found ScienceDebate, which, in 2008, and 2012 helped raise issues of science and sound public policy in the Presidential elections in those years. |
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Kelly Carlin, Keynote SpeakerKelly Carlin is an author, speaker, performer and radio host. She began her dream of a showbiz life as a child while watching her dad take the stage everywhere from college campuses to Carnegie Hall. In her mid-20s while getting her B.A. in Communications at UCLA , Kelly discovered her voice as a writer, which lead her to a brief career in her 30s writing for film and TV with her writing partner and second husband Robert McCall. In the late 1990s, Kelly pursued her craft through various media such as writing/producing/hosting “Lost in LA LA Land” on the earliest online comedy channel Comedynet, and writing/performing her one-woman show “Driven To Distraction.” In 2001, after two decades in “the biz”, Kelly stepped away to investigate the deeper nature of the human psyche by studying psychology and mythology and receiving her masters in Counseling Psychology with an emphasis in Depth Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute. Currently Kelly’s conversations with iconic comedians can be heard on The Kelly Carlin Show on SiriusXM’s Raw Dog channel. Her weekly podcast “Waking from the American Dream” on smodcast.com is where she gets to dig into the depth of the comedy and tragedy of life with an eclectic list of guests. She is also selling out theaters nationally with her highly acclaimed one-woman show, “A Carlin Home Companion” about navigating through her life in the shadow of her father. And in September 2015, her memoir, also titled A Carlin Home Companion, will be published by St. Martin’s Press. You can follow her on Twitter at @Kelly_Carlin, and find out more about her at www.kellycarlin.com. |
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Jean Kilbourne, Humanist HeroineJean Kilbourne is internationally recognized for her groundbreaking work on the image of women in advertising and her critical studies of alcohol and tobacco advertising. She is the author of the award-winning book Can’t Buy My Love: How Advertising Changes the Way We Think and Feel and So Sexy So Soon: The New Sexualized Childhood and What Parents Can Do to Protect Their Kids. The prize-winning films based on her lectures include Killing Us Softly, Spin the Bottle, and Slim Hopes. She holds an honorary position as Senior Scholar at the Wellesley Centers for Women. |
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Marci Hamilton, Religious Liberty AwardMarci A. Hamilton is one of the United States’ leading church/state scholars and holds the Paul R. Verkuil Chair in Public Law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University, and a tireless national advocate for the protection of children from sex abuse, abuse, medical neglect, pornography, and trafficking. She specializes in religious organizations and individuals who violate the law; the First Amendment’s Religion Clauses; the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) and its state counterparts; and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA). Hamilton clerked for United States Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor and Judge Edward R. Becker. She successfully challenged the constitutionality of RFRA at the Supreme Court in Boerne v. Flores, 521 U.S. 507 (1997), and is considered the leading national scholar and advocate for the victims of the RFRAs and RLUIPA. Hamilton is the author of God vs. the Gavel: The Perils of Extreme Religious Liberty (Cambridge University Press 2014); Justice Denied: What America Must Do to Protect its Children (Cambridge University Press 2008); God vs. the Gavel: Religion and the Rule of Law (Cambridge University Press 2005); and the co-editor of Fundamentalism, Politics and the Law (Palgrave Macmillan with Mark Rozell 2011). She is also a bi-monthly columnist for Justia’s “Verdict” column. Her blog with Professor Leslie Griffin on religious liberty, women’s rights, and children’s rights can be found at hamilton-griffin.com. She also hosts RFRAperils.com, which tracks free exercise statutes in all 50 states and the federal government, and sol-reform.com, which tracks the movement for legislative reform of statutes of limitation for child sex abuse survivors in all 50 states. Hamilton has been honored with the American National Crime Victim Bar Association’s Frank Carrington Champion of Civil Justice Award, 2012; the Freethought Heroine Award, 2014; the E. Nathaniel Gates Award for outstanding public advocacy and scholarship, 2008; and the Lifetime Achievement Award for Pro Bono Legal Service to veterans groups, 2001. She also was honored as one of the 2012 Pennsylvania Women of the Year. She will receive the American Humanist Association 2015 Religious Liberty Award. Professor Hamilton is a graduate of Vanderbilt University, B.A., summa cum laude; Pennsylvania State University, M.A. (English, fiction writing, High Honors); M.A. (Philosophy); and the University of Pennsylvania, J.D., magna cum laude, where she served as Editor-in-Chief of the University of Pennsylvania Law Review. She is a member of Phi Beta Kappa and Order of the Coif. |
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The Onion, Humanist Media AwardThe Onion is a well-known satirical news organization based in Chicago, IL. The “about us” section of their Facebook page appears below:
Accepting the award will be Onion Senior Editor Seena Vali:
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Lynn Rothschild: Isaac Asimov Science AwardDr. Lynn J. Rothschild is a senior scientist at NASA’s Ames Research Center and Professor (Adjunct) at Brown University and at the University of California Santa Cruz. Since arriving at NASA in 1987, her research has focused on microbial evolution. She has co-edited Evolution on Planet Earth: The Impact of the Physical Environment (Academic Press, 2003). Rothschild has also been influential in developing the field of Astrobiology. She founded and ran the first three Astrobiology Science Conferences (AbSciCon), was the founding co-editor of the International Journal of Astrobiology, and is the former director of the Astrobiology Strategic Analysis and Support Office for NASA. For a decade, she inspired students at Stanford and beyond with the course Astrobiology and Space Exploration. She has been a tireless advocate for the scientific and philosophical implications of the field, and never misses an invitation for a Darwin Day lecture. Since 2011, she has been the faculty advisor of the Brown-Stanford iGEM team, which uses synthetic biology to accomplish NASA’s missions, particularly focusing on the human settlement of Mars, astrobiology, and innovative technologies like BioWires. And in 2014, she conceived of growing a biodegradable unmanned aerial vehicle, a “BioDrone,” a concept that quickly went viral. Rothschild lectures frequently worldwide, and appears frequently on radio and television programs, including the National Geographic, Discovery Channel, and on Morgan Freeman’s “Through the Wormhole” on the Science Channel. Like Darwin, Rothschild is a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London, and also a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences and the Explorers Club. She has also been honored with the Horace Mann Medal from the graduate school of Brown University. |
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Isaiah Smith, Humanist Pioneer AwardIsaiah Smith is a 19-year-old student from Texas who, through the American Humanist Association’s Appignani Humanist Legal Center, has challenged various church-state separation issues in his home state. His activism has been featured in The Huffington Post, Dallas Voice, TIME Magazine, and other major media. He is the founder of the Universal Human and Civil Rights Union (UHCRU) with plans to gain NGO status with the United Nations and work with foreign governments to fight against discrimination and genocide. His goal is to become a lawyer and advocate for civil liberties, human rights, and the separation of church and state, and hopes to attend Harvard or Yale Law School in the future. |
Seena Vali is a New Jersey native who began contributing to The Onion, America’s Finest News Source, in 2011, and has since gained the nation’s highest honor of serving as a senior writer and sports editor. As a member of The Onion‘s esteemed staff, Vali helps to cover major political, economic, science, and international news, as well as overseeing all sports coverage. He is a graduate of Fordham University, where he studied mathematics, and he still harbors aspirations of one day spearheading The Onion‘s thermonuclear weapons program.