New meeting dates and location: Fourth Saturday of each month at 10:30 a.m., Mesa Main Library, Main Branch, 64 East 1st Street (East of Country Club Way at the intersection of N. Centennial Way -- N.W. corner)

President Obama's second book will give us more insight into our new president as he disusses politics, values and his vision for America.

Our HSGP member Jim Richardson was born in NYC in 1931. He holds the B. A. from Iona College and a Ph. D. from New York University. Between college and graduate school he was in the U. S. Army from 1952 until 1954, including a year in Korea with the 27th infantry regiment. He taught from 1955 until 1997, specialing in American urban and immigration history. From 1997 until 2004 he worked as a financial planner, holding a Certified Financial Planner designation. He and his wife Marie moved to Fountain Hills in 2005 to be close to two of their five children (the other three are scattered around the country). In the last few years his serious reading has been devoted to evolutionary psychology and the history of philosophy.

Robert J. McWhirter is Assistant Federal Public Defender, District of Arizona. He received his Juris Doctorate from Arizona State University College of Law in 1988. Upon graduation, Bob clerked for then Vice Chief Justice Stanley G. Feldman of the Supreme Court of Arizona. He has been an Assistant Federal Public Defender since 1989, representing Native Americans and other clients in a broad range of Federal cases including homicide, sexual abuse, and bank robbery. In addition, Mr. McWhirter has developed a specialty in criminal immigration law, having published articles in the Georgetown Immigration Law Review and the Criminal Practice Law Report. The American Bar Association has published his book The Criminal Lawyer's Guide to Immigration Law: Questions and Answers. Mr. McWhirter also teaches criminal immigration law and immigration consequences of criminal convictions nationally for Criminal Justice Act Panel Attorneys (with the program sponsored by the Administrative Office of the United States Courts), as well as the history of the Fourth Amendment.

Bob McWhirter is one of our most fascinating speakers, and we were thrilled to welcome him back for a fifth time!

We were pleased to welcome back Eleanor Eisenberg as our guest speaker -- this was Eleanor's seventh time addressing the group! In the past, Eleanor has spoken to us in her capacity as executive director of the local ACLU chapter, as executive director of Naral Pro-Choice Arizona, and as president of the Arizona Death Penalty Forum. This time, Eleanor addressed a topic of special interest to all Humanists -- Civil Rights for Non-Believers (yes, we have them!).

New meeting location: Chandler Main Library, 22 S. Delaware St. (South on Arizona Ave to Buffalo, East on Buffalo, South on Delaware.

From Publishers Weekly: "It was cosmologist Fred Hoyle who coined the term 'big bang' to describe the notion that the universe exploded out of nothing to kick-start space and time. Ironically, Hoyle himself espoused the steady state theory, positing that the universe is eternal and never really changes. Former BBC producer and science writer Singh (Fermat's Enigma) recounts in his inimitable down-to-earth style how the big bang theory triumphed. Readers will find here one of the best explanations available of how Cepheid stars are used to estimate the distance of other galaxies. Singh highlights some of the lesser-known figures in the development of the big bang theory, like Henrietta Leavitt, a volunteer 'computer' at the Harvard College Observatory who in 1912 discovered how Cepheid stars can be used to measure galactic distances. Singh shows how the creation of the heavier elements was a major stumbling block to widespread adoption of the big bang until Hoyle (once again boosting the theory that he so fervently opposed) proved that they were created in stars' nuclear furnaces and strewn throughout the universe via supernova explosions. Readers who don't need a review of the early development of cosmology may wish that Singh had adopted a somewhat less leisurely pace. But his introductory chapters hold a lot of worthwhile material, clearly presented for the science buff and lay reader. There's no better account of the big bang theory than this."

HSGP members Bruce Stiles and Ann Marie Eisentraut hosted a Pot Luck event to “Celebrate Charles Darwin’s 200th Birthday.”

It had been five years since Ed Sylvester last spoke to us about the latest findings in brain research. He gave us an update on what has been discovered since then.

Ed Sylvester teaches science writing and the core undergraduate and graduate news courses. As a science writer, he has written four books for popular audiences on subjects ranging from the prospects for genetic engineering — as the field was first developing in 1983 — to the efforts of neuroscience doctors to discover the secrets of the brain in order to rescue their most seriously ill patients in his latest book, “Back From The Brink,” published in January 2004.

He has moderated a popular presentation with Barrow Neurological Institute physicians on new developments in stroke treatment and brain health. He has written magazine articles for several national publications, op-ed pieces for USA Today, and book reviews for The New York Times.

Sylvester joined the ASU faculty in 1980 from the Los Angeles Times, where he was San Diego County government reporter. Before going to the Times, he had worked as a reporter and editor for 10 years at newspapers, including the Arizona Daily Star, the (Newark, N.J.) Star Ledger, The (Bergen County, N.J.) Record, and The (Paterson, N.J.) Morning Call.

At ASU, he was a Knight Fellow during the program’s inaugural year of 1995, teaching computer-assisted reporting at The Oshkosh (Wis.) Northwestern. He received a publishing grant from the Freedom Forum in 1996 to write a series of articles on the U.S. Epidemic Intelligence Service.

He received the Burlington Faculty Achievement Award for teaching in 1991. Earlier, he was founding co-director of the Cronkite School’s seminars for journalists on computer-assisted reporting, which were among the first on the subject.

Professor Sylvester holds a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Princeton University and a master's in creative writing from City College of New York. He was a member of Joseph Heller’s fiction workshop at CCNY.

Dr. Elliott Goldstein is Associate Professor of Biology at ASU, where he has taught since 1974. He received his Ph.D.in 1972, from the University of Minnesota. He teaches courses in Genetics and Molecular Biology, with specialization in control of messenger RNA during development of Drosophila, recombinant DNA, and Drosophilia oncogenes' role in learning and memory. Dr. Goldstein is the author is numerous articles and publications in his area of specialization.

This marked Dr. Goldstein's third appearance at HSGP!