British Columbia Day (in Canada) kickoff with Baba Brinkman’s Kickstarter campaign and a science rap

This year’s BC (British Columbia) Day is today, Aug. 4, 2014*. In celebration I am posting a number of fun items, all to do with science and none with nanotechnology, although one item does feature ‘nano’ in the title.

First off, BC-born, Baba Brinkman reports back from the 2014 Edinburgh Fringe Festival where he is previewing his new ‘science’ rap,

Greetings from the Edinburgh Fringe Festival! Today I performed my second Rap Guide to Religion preview at the Gilded Balloon, and this afternoon I launched my Kickstarter campaign to fund the creation of an animated rap album by the same name. I already have eight songs written and recorded, and I want to create another 6-8 for the full album, and then commission animators to produce a series of animated shorts to bring the story to life. The campaign will run for precisely 40 days and 40 nights, and I’m excited to see that we’re over $1K already, just 12 hours in!

The Rap Guide to Religion is my latest “peer reviewed rap” album and show, detailing the story of how religion and human evolution coincide. I’m summarizing work from the field of “evolutionary religious studies” in rap form both because I find it fascinating and also because I think an appreciation of how and why religion evolves can help to rebuild some burnt bridges between religious groups and between believers and nonbelievers.

You can stream three of the first eight songs from my site at music.bababrinkman.com, and all eight comprise a short “album preview” EP I put together for the fringe, which will be exclusively available to Kickstarter backers. The opening track “Religion Evolves” offers a pretty good overview of my personal perspective as well as the questions I want to explore with the record. …

Before moving on to the Kickstarter information, here’s what David Bruggeman had to say about the new work and about supporting Baba’s projects in a July 31, 2014 posting on his Pasco Phronesis blog,

… You can also listen to two tracks from the album (if you contribute, you will receive downloads of all eight tracks).  My favorite of the two is “Religion Evolves”.

The usual assortment of rewards (copies of the album, t-shirts, custom raps) is available for whatever you’d be willing to contribute.  My past experience with supporting his projects allows me to say that he will deliver.  If you want proof, look for me at 2:53 in his video for “Artificial Selection”

Baba’s Kickstarter campaign titled: The Rap Guide to Religion (Animated Rap Album) has a goal of $20,000,

An animated rap album about the evolutionary origins of religion. It’s time to eff with the ineffable!

Have you ever helped to crowdfund a rap album? How about a rap album that communicates SCIENCE? Or an ANIMATED rap album about the scientific study of RELIGION? Well, that’s what I’m working on right now, with the help of some friends.

Theologians and philosophers have sought the meaning and purpose of life for thousands of years, often finding it in religion. Then Darwin’s theory of evolution turned the world upside down. The supernatural was discarded as the source of answers to the natural world and replaced by the blind force of evolution. And now, with decades of scientific research on hand, we can finally make sense of religion using the tools of evolutionary thinking.

The field is called “Evolutionary Religious Studies” and I’m using my talent and love of rap and science to share this research with a wide audience by recording a rap album on the subject. I’m also teaming up with an amazing group of animators and illustrators led by Dave Anderson from http://bloodsausage.co.uk to create a series of animated shorts (approximately 20 minutes long in total) based on the album, so we can make the songs maximally entertaining and accessible.

There is a nine second sample of an animated music rap from the Rap Guide to Religion Album on the campaign page. Surprisngly, Baba and his colleague have not made the sample available for embedding elsewhere so you’ll have to go there to see it.

* I failed to properly schedule publication (I forgot to change the date) of this post and so it bears an Aug. 1, 2014 publication date. Today is Aug. 15, 2014.

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