When most people hear the term ‘Alternative Medicine’ they tend to think that it is used to describe something that offers a tested, tried alternative to mainstream systems of medicine. In India we have three types of systems of treatment and diagnosis- the recognized evidence based one - the scientific system, the recognized but not evidence based ones under the acronym AYUSH- Ayurveda, Unani, Siddha and Homeopathy, and the third has a list that is almost never complete but contains common ones like electrohomeopathy, reiki, pranic healing, aromatherapy, music therapy, gem therapy, etc. The term ‘alternative medicine’ perhaps describes best the last class. (Note: Technically all those systems of treatment and diagnosis that are not science-based are designated as ‘Alternative Medicine’, but in the Indian context there are three categories because of the government’s endorsement of AYUSH.) The third class labeled ‘Alternative Medicine’ in India seems to be the favourite hunting ground for quacks of all types. Read the full story

This is Part - III of Dr. Kamath’s series on Heretics, Rebels and Revolutionaries. Read Part II here. Dr. Kamath’s article on The Great Nastik Revolt is part of his previous series on The Truth About The Bhagavad Gita, and can be found here.

Brahmins Claim To Control Cosmos!

By 6^th century B. C., the Brahmanic pretentions reached such ridiculous heights that Brahmins claimed to control the entire cosmos. This was based on the following logic: Vedic Gods controlled the Universe; Yajnas compelled gods to fulfill man’s desires; Brahmins composed Mantras (magical incantations) uttered at Yajnas to delude gods; and therefore Brahmins controlled the Universe. Believing this, Kshatriyas sacrificed grain, ghee and animals to compel the gods to grant them their wishes (power, wealth and heaven, BG: 2:43). The Brahmins extracted hefty fees from kings for performing increasingly exacting and complicated Yajnas. Naturally, ostentatious desire-driven Yajnas (Kamya Karma) became the hallmark of an aristocratic Brahmanic Dharma of post-Vedic India. Read the full story

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Episode 5 of the Nirmukta Radio Podcast features two pre-recorded online conversations that I put together. The first one is between myself and a couple of activists in India- Prof. Narendra Nayak, the president of the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations and Rakshi Rath, a co-editor at Nirmukta. Professor Nayak talks about his tours and recent television appearances. We also discuss a couple of contentious topics that came up on the forums. The audio quality of this first conversation is pretty bad because of the technical limitations (on the India side of the conversation, me being in the US at present) that we were working with. We are terribly sorry about the quality of this first part of the podcast. The second conversation is between myself and Hemant Mehta, the author of I Sold My Soul On Ebay and creator and author of the Friendly Atheist blog. Hemant and I talk about his work with the Secular Student Alliance (he was the Chair of the Board of Directors at the time of the recording), an organization who’s mission, according to the website, is as follows :

The mission of the Secular Student Alliance is to organize, unite, educate, and serve students and student communities that promote the ideals of scientific and critical inquiry, democracy, secularism, and human-based ethics.

This episode of Nirmukta Radio will be the last of this series. I’ve had a blast recording my conversations with the leaders of the Freethought movement, putting them into the podcast format and bringing them to the Freethought community in India. But it is time for the podcast to grow and represent what Nirmukta has grown into. Starting next month, September 2010, we will be posting a new series of Nirmukta Radio Podcasts, featuring an entire team of panelists and a new and exciting podcast format. We will discuss news and opinion on the issues that relate to science, skepticism, atheism etc.

Thank you for listening to the Nirmukta Radio Podcast. Nirmukta Radio is a production of Nirmukta.com. Music is Te Laudant by Cryptocrat.

Editor’s Note: The following messages is from Dr. Vijayam, Executive Director of the Atheist Centre in Vijayawada.

We are  happy to inform you that  the 8th World Atheist Conference will be held at Periyar Educational Institutions at  Tiruchirapalli city (also known as TRICHY during the British time) in Tamilnad, India  on JANUARY 7, 8 and 9, 2011 (Friday, Saturday and Sunday).

The details will be informed to you soon.

We cordially invite you to the Conference.

Gora, (1902-1975) founder of Atheist Centre conceived the idea of the World Atheist Conference and held the first Conference in 1972.  In Post Gora period the the Second, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Seventh World Atheist conferences were held at AtheistCentre, Vijayawada in 1980, 1996, 2005, 2007 and 2009 respectively. The Third World Conference was held at Helsinki in 1983. Now Dr. Veeramani, Chancellor, Periyar Maniammai University, leader of the Draviadrar Kazhgam movement and the Rationalist Forum of Tamilnad, invited to hold the Eighth World Atheist Conference at Tiruchirapalli.

Tiruchirapalli city is overnight journey  from Chennai. It is 337 km from Chennai Egmore Station and a number of trains pass through Tiruchirapalli . All Trains from Chennai to Madurai and Kanyakumari pass through the city.

Tiruchirapalli has an international airport. Even if you land at Chennai, you can come to Triruchirapalli by Indian Airlines flight  or by train or  bus.

If you need any other information, please write to us. The theme of the Conference and the Registration details of theConference will be informed to you in the next mail.

Looking forward receive for a positive response from you.

With warm greetings

Yours humanly

Vijayam

Dr. Vijayam, Ph.D.,

Executive Director, Atheist Centre &

Editor, Atheist Monthly

Benz Circle, Vijayawada 520010, INDIA

www.atheistcentre.in

atheistcentre@yahoo.com

positiveatheist@gmail.com

Tiruchirapalli Railway Station

Uttar Pradesh (UP) is the most populous state in India and is known to be one of the most backward too. In National politics it is always said that the party that comes to power in UP will eventually rule the center (a bellwether state, as they say in the Uniter States). It is hence necessary that a strong rationalism movement is built up in UP if a national level impact is to be effected. Read the full story

Bihar is one of the largest and most populous states in India. It also happens to be the most backward. However, the state has had a relatively glorious past. Bihar is well known for its intellectual achievements right from the time of Buddha. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi started his freedom struggle from Motihari in this state. One of the most well known movements of the post independent India against the authoritarianism of Indira Gandhi was started by Jayaprakash Narayan who was a Bihari.

In spite of such a progressive history, Bihar has become a state riddled with superstitions and obscurantism. For the past five years we have been associated with running a campaign in Bihar to inculcate scientific temper among people. It all started when a Minister of State for Science and Technology of the Government of India and the Member of Parliament from Navada, Sanjay Paswan, honoured tantriks at a public ceremony. Read the full story

Everybody Bake Jesus Day was celebrated on July 3^rd, 2010, to protest the Spanish government’s violation of musician Javier Krahe’s freedom of speech. The event generated enthusiastic response on facebook. Scroll through the slideshow to see how folks around the world commemorated the day.

Videos:

Nirmukta has recently crossed the 1000 member mark on facebook, and our team has decided that its time to celebrate by hosting an online event! This event will be held on Saturday, the third of July, at 7:00 PM, IST. All you will need to participate in the event is to go to http://tinychat.com/nirmukta at the scheduled time and sign in using twitter or facebook connect.

Tom Clark, director of the Center for Naturalism, will speak to us live on the influence of worldview naturalism. He is the the author of Encountering Naturalism: A Worldview and its Uses, and has written various papers and articles on the influence of the naturalistic worldview on our lives. You can read more about Tom’s work at http://naturalism.org and on his blog at http://centerfornaturalism.blogspot.com/.

Go here for a Naturalism FAQ. Here is an excerpt:

Q. What is naturalism, anyway? And keep it straightforward!

A. Ok, naturalism is simply the understanding that there exists a single, natural, physical world or universe in which we are completely included. There are not two different worlds, the supernatural and natural. Since we are completely included in the natural world, there’s nothing supernatural about us. For instance, we don’t have immaterial souls that survive after death. We are fully physical, material creatures, and everything we are and do can be understood without supposing that we have souls, spirits, or any other sort of immaterial supernatural stuff inside us. Your thoughts, experiences, feelings, decisions, and behavior are all things your brain and body does. How they do all this is of course a very complicated story that’s still being discovered by science, but naturalism says there’s nothing non-physical involved. That the material world has produced creatures that are conscious, can reason, feel emotions, and ask questions is a pretty amazing fact. The “merely” physical isn’t so mere after all. Naturalism re-enchants the physical world.

During our conversation with Tom Clark we will explore some of the major implications of worldview naturalism on concepts such as god, religion, morality, justice, free-will, retribution, consciousness, etc. Since this will be a live streaming event, questions can be sent to us in real time through twitter and chat. Relevant questions from listeners will be selected and posed to Tom Clark throughout the entire duration of the event.

Date: Saturday, July 3rd, 2010, 7:00 PM, IST.

Venue: http://tinychat.com/nirmukta

Our twitter account: (for sending us your questions) http://twiter.com/nirmukta

RSVP on facebook: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=120028841375938&index=1

Scroll below image for login instructions and known issues with tinychat.

Designed by Bala Bhaskar

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This is the story of a little girl of fourteen and the ambitions of her mother whom we met at the studios of Live India TV channel on the evening of 18th June. The story begins on this date, when I received a call from the channel asking if I could visit their studios if I was in Delhi. When the call arrived, Shubrum, Rakshi and I were on our way over to their house, after a very important and successful meeting with the present director of Vigyana Prasar Network, Dr.Anuj Sinha. Since Shubrum had a meeting, Rakshi and I decided to go for the live broadcast to investigate the case of this girl, Ranjana. It was the claim of her family and some others that she had the unique power to see blindfolded. Some of these folks also accompanied her to the studio. It was claimed that she had been given a certificate by the Ministry of Human Resource Development that she had the power of seeing with a cloth tied over her eyes! That was supposed to be in recognition of her ‘unique talents’. It was quite clear that this girl who was from a village near Varanasi wanted to go places! Read the full story

In my previous article we discussed how Sai Baba satisfied his sexual appetite by abusing innocent children with complete disregard to consequences to their welfare. Sexual abuse serves another purpose for Sai Baba: Dominating these children and converting them into his lifelong devotees and henchmen. In a sense, the sexual abuse is ritual castration by means of which he is telling them literally, “From now onwards I have you boys by the balls.” In a highly shame-oriented society such as India, victims feel great deal of shame to admit that they are sex abuse victims, and they are fearful of exposing such a powerful and revered person. This is further made difficult because of social pressure from victim’s fearful well-wishers; fear of corrupt police who do not hesitate to torture or murder accusers in cold blood; distrust of incompetent prosecutors, and lack of faith in the judiciary incapable of separating state and religion. Read the full story