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“Our time is burdened under the cumulative weight of successive debunkings of our conceits…. We live in The Cosmic Boondocks.”
~Carl Sagan
The Cosmic Boondocks is a podcast promoting science, freethought and humanistic values in India.
Episode #3 (29/5/2011) Shownotes
Stories:
1. 5-year long experiment confirms that dark energy is constant throughout the universe.
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/galex/galex20110519.html
2. More Americans are praying for health.
http://www.apa.org/pubs/journals/releases/rel-3-2-67.pdf
3. More water on the moon than previously thought.
http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-05-moon-interior-earth-upper-mantle.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/05/110526141400.htm
4. Naadi Jyothidam.
Sun TV expose. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mrup498kbQ
Prof Nayak’s article: http://nirmukta.com/2008/10/30/the-exact-science-of-nadi-jothidam/
Cold reading: http://www.skepdic.com/coldread.html
5. Drug helps reduce stress associated with bad memories by affecting recall of negative memories.
http://psychcentral.com/news/2011/05/27/drug-metyrapone-to-erase-bad-memories/26532.html
Announcements:
1. Prof. Nayak’s talk on rationalism to 100 children at Belthangady near Mangalore.
2. Links to previous visits by professor Nayak, for training programs in rational thinking for faculty of Periyar Maniammai University, Vallam.
http://nirmukta.com/2011/03/06/rationalist-club-of-periyar-maniammai-university-trichy-tamil-nadu-india/
http://nirmukta.com/2011/04/03/second-rationalist-programme-at-periyar-maniammai-university-vallam-trichy-tamil-nadu/
Quiz:
Last week’s question: When was rice first cultivated in India?
Answer, ~ 4000 years ago.
http://www.pnas.org/content/108/20/8351.abstract
This week, fallacy hunting:
Deepak Chopra:
“We think that many times patients feel healed even though they may die from a disease, if they learn to go beyond their personal fear of death, and you can never do that unless you have a patient…have a spiritual experience.”
Discuss here: http://nirmukta.net/Thread-What-fallacy-ies-do-you-think-apply-to-this-sentence-by-Chopra
Music:
Rising legends, by Epic Soul Factory
Warrior of the light, by David Palmero
Cherubs, by Josh Woodward
Tout sera plus comme avant, by OST
Corri, by Talco
8 Noves Fora, by Camerata Brasileira
Jim & Ruth, by The Wind Whistles
All music is distributed under Creative Commons non-commercial, attribution, sharealike license.
The audio link is probably not available.
Archive.org, the mp3 host, is down. If you use itunes you should be able to get it. It’s up on apple’s servers.
Archive.org should be back up soon… I hope 🙂
Hey, it’s up now.
nice listening…
Please avoid phrases like “What the hell…”, it doesn’t sound good.
Does Nirmukta have activity in Indore MP,
There’s nothing wrong with using such expressions. You know who actually opposes the use of the phrase? Fundamentalist Christians, who actually believe in hell. They consider it swearing. All languages use lots of mythical references to convey emotion, and such uses need not get the word police riled up.
No, we don’t have a regional group in Indore yet.
i’m not hardcore religious but i still believe in god