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

In countries like India where goddess worship is prevalent, the argument is often made that such superstition actually helps the cause of women’s rights. To feed the flames, more than a few Western feminists (such as Kathleen Erndl, Sarah Caldwell) have suggested that women in India should embrace these superstitious notions and derive strength from the myths, in order to the counter real prejudice that they face everyday. I disagree with this notion on two levels. Firstly, I don’t think that it is, in practice, possible to separate ‘good’ superstitious beliefs from the ones that are responsible for increasing suffering in society, since these are inter-dependent irrational sets of beliefs that defy logic. Secondly, these superstitious beliefs about goddesses and fairies prevent us from gaining a better understanding of the problem and finding stable long-term solutions based on reason. Furthermore, other feminists like Cynthia Humes have shown that there is a difference between the view of women as goddesses and the experiences of the majority of ordinary women in these cultures. Studying the reasons for this difference is, in my opinion, key to understanding gender inequality in such cultures.

I submit that the goals of the Freethought movement are aligned with those of the women’s rights movements in these countries, and that therefore there is a practical reason for Freethought groups to actively promote the feminist cause. Read the full story

This is the first in a series of simple introductory articles and videos on naturalistic philosophy.

Many of those of us who call ourselves freethinkers are aware that there is some fundamental difference between the way we view reality and the way the superstitious folks do. We believe in a naturalistic reality and the others subscribe to the supernatural. But what exactly is this difference? What does it mean to believe in a naturalistic reality? What is ‘natural’, and how is it different from ’supernatural’?

Note: I will avoid discussion of the nature of evidence in this article since it will distract us from our objective here.

The key to understanding the natural universe is understanding the notion of causality. This idea can be stated simply as the relationship between two dependent events, where one is the caused and the other is the cause. Science works only because the natural world exhibits causality. In physics, causality is more accurately viewed as interaction between two events, objects or situations, with each of the two being both cause and effect at the same time. Read the full story

Editor’s Note: Narendra Nayak will be writing a series of articles on Bhanamathi, a popular ‘black magic” superstition in the Hyderabad-Karnataka area. The following article, originally published in Mangalore Today, is a primer for the upcoming series.

If you think that sin and the Indian Railways have nothing in common, please stand corrected. The most recent entrants into the field of sinning are our railways! While Indian Railways is not exactly known for it’s secular image, of recent, it has been advocating a Hindutva line which could put many of our saffron brotherhood to shame. While we have the typical things like people wanting to enter Puttaparthi have to pass below the pictures of the “lotus feet” of the local thug turned prestidigitator turned god-man who goes by the name of Satya Sai Baba, people visiting the Bangalore railway station have to put up with the pearls of wisdom of one Pt. Sri Rama Sharma Acharya who has an affinity for sin that could put a Roman Catholic priest to shame. He says that sin brings along disease, grief and down fall too! All the science text books and those of medicine have to be thrown into the nearest dustbin as we have a brand new theory for the cause of disease- sin!! Read the full story

I see hordes of modern and educated Indians succumb to numerous blind rituals and religious schemes in India with more vigor than ever before. More and more Indians, especially those coming from the upcoming middle-class families and have studied at the premier institutes of India, are turning to ritualistic religion and its superstitions, joining cults, and wearing their dogma proudly as a badge for everyone to see.  I often wonder how come these globe-trotting, blackberry-typing, gadget-swinging Indians shut off all their mental faculties when it comes to certain superstitions and beliefs.

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Report by Sumitra Padmanabhan and Anindyasundar

Consider the situation in the 21st century in Medinipur, a district in the communist-ruled state of West Bengal.

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Rational thinkers have been pointing out superstitions and irrational concepts since the beginning of recorded history, but these ideas still abound.

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Religion and Medicine

I recently came across an article about a gentleman named Naresh, who lost both his legs in an accident at a very young age, and later studied at IIT and now works at Google. The article, titled “From banks of Godavari to Google on wheel chair“, is a very inspiring story of the triumph of human spirit against several odds. Hats off to Naresh.

One of the things that struck me as odd about Naresh is his superstitious nature. The fact that he has made it into IIT is proof of his capacity for rational thinking and scientific background. I have personally met several scientific minded people who are very smart, yet they are superstitious. I’ve read statistics which say that around 95% of the top scientists are atheists, where as 95% of the general public are believers. I have always been bewildered by how scientific minded people can be superstitious. I think I have figured out one possible reason and would like to describe it in this article.

cc:Suwaif

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Golu

My two school going daughters are now learning more about Indian mythology — in their schools, comic books, TV shows and cartoon movies. The fresh perspective they bring in when they are learning Indian mythology is very interesting. I’d like to share some examples here.

cc: Ravages

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