This article originally appeared in the March 2010 edition of Himal Magazine.

The defeat of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in India’s general elections last year was greeted with relief by secularists and democrats everywhere. Not entirely unreasonably: they read the fact that the BJP lost a solid 3.4 percent of its previous poll share as evidence that Indian voters had rejected the majoritarian politics of Hindu pride and prejudice, peddled by the BJP and the rest of the Sangh Parivar. The general consensus is that the ideology of Hindu nationalism, or Hindutva, has lost its appeal among the urban youth and middle classes - that secularism has won and “God has left politics,” to borrow the elegant title of a recent essay by Delhi journalist Hartosh Singh Bal. Market reforms and globalisation emerge as the stars of this saga. Both the friends and critics of the BJP agree that it is the fervour for making money in India’s roaring economy that doused the flames of Hindu nationalism from the hearts of the middle classes. But that is not all. The ‘free’ market, we are told by a section of influential Dalit intellectuals, will not only free India from the menace of communal violence, but will also lift the curse of caste oppression. It is fair to say that the gospel of globalisation is gaining ground in India. Read the full story

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Introduction:

The recent trend in some sections of the Indian visual media is the topic of rebirth and associated quackery. In one of the channels the show started with sessions of ‘hypnotism’, taking people back to their past births, and ‘treatment’ for many of their problems of the present birth which are allegedly caused by deeds in the past life! Read the full story

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We have reported on many of the past challenges issued by rationalists to purveyors of supernatural beliefs. The challenger in many of these cases (1,2,3,4,5), Mr Narendra Nayak, president of the Federation of Rationalist Associations of India, has a long-standing challenge issued specifically for astrologers. Here it is in his own words:

“We shall provide the date, time and place of birth of 10 individuals along with the appropriate solutions. The challenger can cast the horoscope and state the following within 90% limits of accuracy- is the individual male or female, dead or alive. ” Read the full story

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“It is almost irresistible for humans to believe that we have some special relation to the universe, that human life is not just a more-or-less farcical outcome of a chain of accidents reaching back to the first three minutes, but that we were somehow built in from the beginning.”

-Steven Weinberg

“You are here to enable the divine purpose of the universe to unfold. That is how important you are.”

-Eckhart Tolle

1. Introduction

The impulse to see human life as central to the existence of the universe is manifested in the mystical traditions of practically all cultures. It is so fundamental to the way pre-scientific people viewed reality that it may be, to a certain extent, ingrained in the way our psyche has evolved, like the need for meaning and the idea of a supernatural God. As science and reason dismantle the idea of the centrality of human life in the functioning of the objective universe, the emotional impulse has been to resort to finer and finer misinterpretations of the science involved. Mystical thinkers use these misrepresentations of science to paint over the gaps in our scientific understanding of the universe, belittling, in the process, science and its greatest heroes.

In their recent article in The Huffington Post, biologist Robert Lanza and mystic Deepak Chopra put forward their idea that the universe is itself a product of our consciousness, and not the other way around as scientists have been telling us. In essence, these authors are re-inventing idealism, an ancient philosophical concept that fell out of favour with the advent of the scientific revolution. According to the idealists, the mind creates all of reality. Many ancient Eastern and Western philosophical schools subscribe to this idealistic notion of the nature of reality. In the modern context, idealism has been supplemented with a brand of quantum mysticism and relabeled as biocentrism. According to Chopra and Lanza, this idea makes Darwin’s theory of the biological evolution and diversification of life insignificant. Both these men, although they come from different backgrounds, have independently expressed these ideas before with some popular success. In the article under discussion their different styles converge to present a uniquely mystical and bizarre worldview, which we wish to debunk here. Read the full story

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Just like Astrology, this Numerology or the bogus idea of changing the first letter of your name, number of letters in your name, adding new letters to your name (or names of your new venture, movie, TV serial etc) to bring ‘good luck’ has gained popularity in the last few years in India. It includes car numbers, house or telephone numbers and so on…

For example — the name of your new serial is going to be ‘Pagal’ (means ‘mad’ or eccentric). Your numerologist tells you your lucky number is 6. How do you make it? You change the name into ‘Ppagal’ or ‘Paggal’ . Isn’t it interesting? Now you are not just mad, you’re quite mad!

This practice caters to people’s craving to know, influence or improve their future. Soothsayers, horoscopewallahs of all kinds thrive because of this human weakness. In fact our lives are influenced or molded by so many myriads of factors –things, people and happenings– that there cannot be and there has never been any way of   knowing, leave alone changing, one’s future. There can be no magic.

It would be wonderful if the Numerologists themselves explained how exactly their thing works. How anyone’s name can possibly affect the future, or the total of the digits of their dates of birth have anything to do with their good fortune? In fact, it is the claimant’s duty to explain and establish their claim. But they will not do so. On this ground anybody can claim anything. For example - I can say ‘God sent me a message that you would do better if you …’ or ‘I had a dream that you should name your child Gobardhan’. Who can stop me? I do not have to explain! Read the full story

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A pandemic is something to be welcomed in our country, for those with vested interests. Perpetrators of all kinds of superstitions have a field day. Added to that hoarders of things starting from masks (most of them totally useless) to manufacturers of drugs and medicines (effective or not) are out to make profits. In India where bearded saffron wearing gurus are considered to be very epitomes of wisdom- worldly as well as otherwise pronounce cures and preventives for diseases whose names also cannot be pronounced by them. Added to this a government whose spokespersons do not have the spine to commit themselves on claims of such including the proponents of so called alternative systems of medicine add to the confusion. Read the full story

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As the accompanying blurb (the text-box below) containing the image of the ad from Care Plus (a non-invasive medical center) says that cancer is the third leading cause of death worldwide. Care Plus has listed the causes for it! I am particularly interested in cures for cancer because two people who have influenced me the most in my life have had cancer. My mother died from it about 15 years back, while Premanand whom I consider as my ideological guru is suffering from it. Since the disease is dreaded and its occurrence is wide-spread, there are many lines of treatment for it which are recognized and approved. But, a number of unscrupulous elements have tried to exploit this and have lined their pockets with the hard-earned money of the patients and their relatives. The treatments may vary from anything to specially consecrated water to secret remedies unknown to modern science but are the result of “research” and also supernatural powers! Read the full story

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Deepak Chopra is a modern day Shaman who promotes mystical notions of reality to millions of people by slipping magic into the gaps in our naturalistic understanding of the world around us. He always begins with a naturalistic assertion usurped from science and follows a fuzzy metaphorical interpretation of the argument to a supernaturalistic end. The hook is his claim that these ideas are on a higher truth level than that which science can access.

In reality, the motives behind Chopra’s science distortion are not very idealistic. The fantasies he promotes form the marketing strategy behind a vast business enterprise selling magical cures to every ailment imaginable.

The harm done by such New-Age Shamans as Deepak Chopra is avoidable. What is needed is for scientists, humanists and all concerned people to expose these lies that are repeated everyday in the popular media.

In the video that follows, I analyze Chopra’s strategy to show how he distorts science using metaphors in order to profit from selling quackery. If your internet connection is too slow for streaming the HD quality video, you can try accessing a lower quality version here, or the lowest (cell phone) quality version here.

Please enable Javascript and Flash to view this Viddler video.

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Editor’s Note: When powerful organizations promoting pseudo-science are threatened with exposure, they often react by suing their accusers. These groups have realized that the only option left to them when confronted with the lack of evidence supporting their wares is the suppression of the right of scientists and journalists to reasonable criticism. This is true in the case of Simon Singh, a British science writer who is being sued by the British Chiropractic Association for exposing the dangers of and lack of evidence supporting the efficacy of chiropractic healing techniques.

Source: Skepacabra

The case in question begins with the publishing of an article by Simon Singh in The Guardian, in which he points out the lack of evidence for many of the claims of  chiropractors. The British Chiropractic Association, instead of providing The Guardian with the evidence they requested, has decided to sue Simon Singh for libel. The case has gained a lot of attention among skeptics, medical professionals and those concerned with the right to criticism of ideas that are not based on evidence. Hundreds of blogs and newspapers have written about the story, mostly in support of the science writer. Celebrities like Ricky Gervais have come out in support of Singh. Here is more news on the public reactions to the case.

The main strategy involved here is intimidation. The BCA wishes to scare all those who dare to question the evidence (or lack thereof) into cowering down. These are tactics often used very effectively by cults like Scientology. Narendra Nayak, in shining light on the failure of the psychic claims of the Dhyan Foundation and Yogi Ashwini, was threatened to be sued by the goondas in that organization.  We proudly reported on that story. When Johann Hari’s story in The Independent sparked a controversy in India when it was republished by The Statesman, and the Editor and Publisher of that newspaper were arrested in Calcutta, we published that story and urged others to also reprint it. This is now an important aspect of websites that are critical of protective ideologies that use the muscle of the law rather than free and open discourse in order to silence science-based dissent. The point is to make these organizations aware that their tactics will only lead to an increase in the publicity that these stories get. The pseudo-science will be scrutinized by millions and evidence-based criticism of the pseudoscience will be promoted to all corners of cyberspace by the work of an army of diligent rationalists. Continuing in that tradition, I implore all readers  who write blogs to publish the entire article (The original has been deleted but a cached version is available online here) in support of Simon Singh and in support of removing legislative intimidation in disputes involving the scientific analysis of ideas.

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A Skeptic Vs. Psychic event is set to take place in Bangalore on the 31^st of this month. The meeting will attempt to resolve a challenge proposed by Yogi Ashwini of the Dhyan Foundation to rationalist Narendra Nayak, president of the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations. The Yogi claims that his representative from the foundation can accurately diagnose the health-condition/disease of people from just their photographs. Here are the details of the event:

Date: 31^st May, 2009 at 11:00 AM.

Venue: Ashoka Shishu Vihara at Shankarapuram, Bangalore.

Description: The psychic will attempt to accurately diagnose the current health of 10 people, from their photographs alone.

Contact: Narendra Nayak: 94482 16343

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