Laxmidas Khatau,
21, Subodhguru, Tagore Road,
Santacruz West, MUMBAI 400 054,
India.
Email :
ldkhatau@hotmail.com
Let me
first state that I am one of the millions of Deepak Chopra’s admirers.
He is the fourth Indian after Vivekanand, Osho Rajnish and Mahesh Yogi
who are admired and respected by the American people. It is not
the chicken soup but a heady cocktail he has brewed by mixing Vedic
philosophy with modern science for the consumption of New Age souls.
He has proved himself to be a very successful salesman in selling his
philosophic science mumbo jumbo.
In the
debate with Michael Shermer, he has tried to prove existence of that
proverbial non-existing black cat in the dark room. He has dived into
the bottomless ocean of darkest mystery of life after death. He has
emerged from the dark realm of conscious/mind field (mine field?) of
philosophical myths and jargons with a black hair and declares that
the black cat does exist. What is this mind field after all, the words
such as where, time and space are irrelevant in mind field. Deepak has
created a philosophical black hole out of his hypothesis of conscience
field and mind field.
Burtrand
Russell has said that philosophy is something about which we know nothing
but science is something about which we know something. Deepak has tried
with the help of science to create something out of philosophical nothingness.
While what Shermer has said about soul/consciousness, telepathy etc.
is purely based on scientific facts known to us. Shermer may not be
as well versed as Deepak in latest research of science but almost all
main stream scientists with highly advanced knowledge of science would
have agreed with Shermer’s views. You cannot brush them out as half
baked ignorant lot.
While
reading Deepak’s article in eSkeptic on life after death, scores of
questions and doubts would have arisen in the minds of the readers.
I have listed the questions on a separate sheet. I hope he would give
convincing replies without indulging in philosophical mumbo jumbo.
Some of
the facts in support of his hypothesis of survival of consciousness
are so ridiculous that one wonders how such a talented scholar cannot
see the futility in such facts. He has said that over 200 of these children
exhibit the birth marks that resemble the way that they remember during
in their most recent lifetime e.g. shotgun scar. It is not known whether
consciousness/soul is a field, wave or an element. But if we believe
what Deepak says about the birth marks, then consciousness/soul must
have a three dimension body which can be wounded also when physical
body is wounded by an arm! I have never come across such a ridiculous
notion and that even by highly talented man as Deepak. According to
a stanza of Gita, fire cannot burn, water cannot wet, wind cannot dry
and arm cannot wound the soul. Either Gita’s definition of soul is
wrong or Deepak is wrong in supporting the myths of body marks. However
according to my understanding of concept of soul, both are wrong. Fire
can burn, water can wet, wind can dry and an arm can wound soul because
soul is part and parcel of physical body
How a
person going through near-death experience can see his dead relatives
and personal deity? Does invisible consciousness/soul on the Earth becomes
visible in space in three dimensions resembling the appearance of the
dead relatives? And why a person experiencing near death syndrome sees
only his/her own personal deity? Simply because what he sees is not
outwardly but inwardly in his own brain. If Deepak believes that a dead
person’s consciousness/soul sees his relatives in physical forms,
then consciousness /soul is not a field, wave but it is an earthly three
dimension visible object in space.
It seems
that there is something wrong with diagnostic method of verifying clinical
death or brain death. If a person is really clinically/brain dead, how
it can be revived? It means that clinically or brain dead person is
not totally dead. There may be a spark of life somewhere hidden in the
brain which modern medical science cannot trace out. That one percent
live brain would experience near-death syndrome and when revived would
remember what he saw during near-death condition. What he would have
experienced in his brain was not outwardly but inwardly process within
his own brain.
While
commenting on mind over matter shows of Yuri Geller, James Randy, a
magician has said that the scientists also can be fooled by a smart
man. If Yuri Geller successfully fooled the scientists, Deepak can be
fooled by three psychics. How they fooled him is a matter of investigation.
Had Deepak asked the psychic to contact one of his alive relative instead
of his dead father, the psychic would have been able to contact the
soul of a alive relative in space! I suggest him to play this trick
on any psychic. One American arrived in India who boasted that he can
contact the dead persons who had died in a earthquake. Two rationalist
activists approached him to contact their dead relative who actually
was alive. Surprisingly the psychic was able to contact with the spirit
of a live man! They reported to the police that, that psychic was a
hoaxer and cheating people. He ran away before the police can take action
against him.
If whatever
Deepak has said about mind field in support of telepathy, clairvoyance,
ESP. etc is a fact, he or anybody else can take the challenge of James
Randy who has offered some million dollars, who can prove that he/she
possess psychic talent. Several years have passed since this offer was
made publicly in The New York Times, yet nobody has come forward to
accept this challenge.
How can
Deepak accuse Shermer that he doesn’t understand or clarify what the
soul is? Deepak,please read again what Shermer has clarified in his
article that “In science we define our terms with semantic precision.
I define the soul as a unique pattern of information that represents
the essence of a person ..... likewise, neural pattern of information
that is our memories and personalities - our ‘self’ - is sensed
as a soul. In this sense, the soul is an illusion’.’ Let me elaborate
what Shermer means by the essence of a person. The soul is nothing but
the breeding of person in the family, society, culture and religion
he has grown up, knowledge he gains during his life time, the company
he keeps. Sum total of all the impressions recorded in his brain is
called soul. Soul has not its own distinct existence. The essence or
breeding of a person -soul/conscience dies as soon as a person dies.
The essence, breeding-soul dies with the death of neurons and memories.
When a vegetarian person takes non-vegetarian food for the first time,
it is said that his conscience objects it, but it is not his conscience
but his breeding that objects. Dr. Chopra, is it now clear what Shermer
has said about soul?
Scientific
philosopher, Dr.Deepak Chopra, Please speak in scientific terms only
and not in philosophical jargons when you answer the following questions?
1) Are
soul and consciousness words synonyms and two sides of the same coin
or have different meaning?
2) What
are soul and consciousness? Fields, waves, elements or a sort of energy
yet not known to science?
3) Have
soul and consciousness three dimensions?
4) Do
the unobservable soul and consciousness convert into physical form after
they depart from the body of a dead person? The question arises as a
person with near-death experience sees his relatives and personal deity
in a physical form?
5) Do
soul and consciousness possess body organs such as eyes,ears, tongues
etc? The question arises as the spirits of the dead persons speak with
the psychics.
6) Can
soul and consciousness of a person also be wounded when his physical
body gets wounded by a knife or a bullet?
7) How long, soul or consciousness remains suspended in space or field
before they are reincarnated on the Earth?
8) Who decides which soul or consciousness would enter into a fertilised
ovum of a particular woman? Have they freedom to make their own choice
to select their mother and place of birth?
9) How they know that a particular ovum in a womb of a particular woman
is ready to receive soul or consciousness?
10) Does
soul or conscious has sex? In rebirth, can soul or consciousness of
a maJe take birth as a woman or vice versa?
11) Can
a Christian soul or consciousness take birth as non-Christian or vice
versa?
12) Does
human soul or consciousness in rebirth be human only or it can be an
animal bird etc? What happens to consciousness of a human if in his
next birth he is borne as non-human being?
13) To
whom prayers are addressed? If not to any personal god to whom they
are addressed? If prayers are made by the Christians, will they help
non-christians, or vice versa?
14) The
experiments to prove telepathy, clairvoyance, ESP etc. have been carried
on since last 75-100 years. After every experiment, the researchers
declare that their experiments were encouraging, promising, partly or
sometimes astonishingly successful. But up to this date, nobody has
been successful to prove beyond doubt that telepathy, ESP etc, are not
myths but scientific facts.
15) How
many more years would be required to prove its validity?
Laxmidas Khatau
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