Hello fellow sajha friends, 
      I assume most of you are educated, intelligent people. I wanted to have a discussion about paranormal claims and why do people believe these claims. I define paranormal activities as reading mind, predicting future, healing, and many other unscientific claims. I can understand people who are unaware of critical thinking believing these things but why do educated people believe these garbage. Let's have a talk about this. 

I am only trying to create skeptical thinking among us.

"I can understand people who are unaware of critical thinking believing these things but why do educated people believe these garbage."
"Small people talk about other people."  

Look, you started out by judging others by saying why educated people believe in this garbage. Now, you are saying 'small people talk about other people'. Right now, I am wondering who is small, you or these educated people. HUH????

 @Violet You are still attacking me instead of talking about the main issue at hand. 
"I can understand people who are unaware of critical thinking believing these things but why do educated people believe these garbage." - by me
  In the above statement I have not personally attacked anyone in specific, I have merely pointed out the trend I have observed. I have made these statement to question our education that does not teach the value of criting thinking.


Also, please talk to me about the paranormal claims and its validity and not about your or my character. 

I never experienced any kind of activities mentioned above. But I will not deny it either.

NepaliBabu,
why don't you believe in those claims?
is that because it is not proved by science yet?
or you  do not believe what you have not seen/experienced?

just wanted to hear your opinion.

I don't think it is the education that makes you believe or not believe in supenatural//paranormal things, it is your own critical thinking that determines the side you choose.

Nayanepalibabu, maybe you should go back and read what you have written in very slow motion to really get the meaning behind it.
I dont wanna break it down for you cause if i do, it might get nasty.

I have already given my 2 cents on this thread. And now, lets just say I dont wanna talk to dumb people.

"Don’t argue with idiots. They drag you down to their level and beat you with experience."

 I don't believe in these supernatural claims and pshysics claims because firstly I have never experienced it. Secondly, (hypethetical) if I do experience something unexpainable I would never jump to the conclusion that it is paranormal just because I don't understand and cannot explain. There are many things I don't understand and cannot explain. 
   So in this situation I would try to research and find out more about it and see if this experience contradicts well know scientific theories. There are many ways to proceed but I would not say it is done by god or something like that and stop exploring this matter. 

@footyfan i agree with you (I do not know who is the idiot here but well said).


Also for those of you out there with supernatural power  or powers you can win a million dollar, go to this website and prove your claim. It will be nice to see deservin nepali brothers or sisters winning the money :) 

http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/1m-challenge.html

I have a feeling he was referring to you.

 I must admit that I used to be really skeptical about "bhoots, prets, kala jadoos" etc until some event happened more than 10 years ago. I think I was in the 6th grade. That year's Laxmi Pooja (even though we don't celebrate Tihar) is probably one of the darkest nights of my entire life. Our house got broken into with an acquaintance turning into the culprit. How did we find out about it? 

Someone had my dad, a neighbor and I go to a "bir heraune" pundit. I can't even describe how mindblowing the experience was, even though I was barely a kid then. What's more, it was performed on my palms as it had to be done on some bachelor's palm. Little by little, I could see the images of the thief, his wife (accomplice). They climbed through the neighbor's house, entered my parents bedroom, 'appeared' to be using some sort of drug that made them unconscious, stole things and I even saw them walk into their home. What's even more surprising is the fact that we'd gone to the pundit within a couple hours since we found out that we'd been stolen of jewellery, cash etc., basically meaning that I wasn't imagining things that others had speculated. 

When we had the cop go to the guy's place, the dumb idiot had my dad's slippers right outside his door. 

That was such an awful experience as it led to another bigger stealing that we had to go through within the next couple of years which used to make me wish I was a grown-up adult who could beat the crap out of those thieves. 

All in all, I don't think "Why are people so dumb?" an appropriate title that warranted positive remarks. It was pure foolishness and hypocritical on your part. 

@ violet7
     It does not matter who footyfan was referring to. All I said is I agree with him/her.
       Also, Don't refer to footyfan as "he"  How do you know footyfan is a man. I checked footyfans profile. I did not see gender being listed. Don't assume that everyone you see is a man. I know chances of footyfan being male is high looing at other thread footyfan has replied (esp "would you marry namrata .... "  thread). but again I don't know. 

      All you do is attack me instead of talking about the issue. If you are done talking about the issue then that is ok. You do not have to attack me. This is not going to help anyone.
I want to hear from others regarding this issue. Regarding their belief or disbelief of paranormal claims and why. 

@ (eveyone/violet7) 
A good funny song :) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjOqU6GPf48

LoL! Nayanepalibabu, you just got a little dumber (dont know whether such a word exist).

 @ footyfan Maybe you should tell this "bir" person about the million dollar challenge. Here is the link again. (Also, I have already explained myself plenty of time regaring the choice of tittle.) 


http://www.randi.org/site/index.php/1m-challenge.html



@violet7   I will stop replying to your comments from now on. You have the right to free speech so continue to attack me or divert from the main issue.  

You know why I am attacking you. Because when people tell you why they believe in such stuffs, you keep telling them that they are wrong and call them things like 'foolish educated people".

Everyone has opinions. I know that but why are you trying to disprove something that someone else have seen or experienced?

Jezzz at first i though this thread gonna "actually"go somewhere with logical discussions.......but then i forgot it is shjha.com where threads usually ends with abuse and fights. Carry on people, Do what we are good at....

Footyfan,

If I may. I also have personally experienced "Bir heraune" and I thought it was really mystifying at the time. But now I understand there's nothing magical or factual about it. It mostly depends upon people who believe in it. In my case, my sibling already had a pre-conceived notion about who stole the money (from our house), and it was not suprising (now) that she saw the same person in the hand. But when the pandit had me try it, it just didn't work. And he gave a vague explanation that I was not concentrating enough or I do not have the ability to see bla bla bla. It is purely a self fullfilling prophecy like any other con-artistry.

Our mind is a delicate and a beautiful thing. It has reasoning, quantitative, and qualititative powers, but it also often plays lot of tricks with us, especially if we have a weak psychology. I am not trying to reason what you believe in, but there are many simpler explanations of what you might have experienced.

James Randi is an absolute brilliant magician. To this point, noone has able to stake his 1 million dollar challenge. I think the person who should try is this con-artist in Kathmandu who claims to create miniature statues inside his mouth. But what can you do, people are all gaga over him. Sad!

 NepaliBabu, 
I am not trying to convince you that those things that you have not seen/experienced exist but there are things science cannot explain, or explained it wrong. Also there are things you have to believe without seeing. 

you never saw Apollo 11 landing on the surface of the moon , but you believe it coz you wanted to ( remember some scientists didnt accept the fact that it acutally landed in moon)
If you have gone through all the details on that journey ( including the secrets that were not told at that time) , that flight encountered unidentified flying objects which science cannot explain and it was not any thing from earth .The same astronomers who claimed to land on the mooon claimed the ecounter of UFO. This counts as paranormal too as it is beyond the expalanation of science.
About believing the things that you saw or experienced only, I am certain that you did not see or experienced any thing when you were in the womb and during the birth( and the entire process). But you believe she is your mom and her husband is your dad, coz you are ready to believe it. 

Talking about if science explains or matches any hypothesis, you cannot rely on them either. Science has gone wrong lots of time. Remember that sun used to revolve around earth and earth used to be rectangular. 

 If you believe on only what other (science) explained, you could be wrong about your concept of critical thinking.

Great points, Pulsar_beat. I guess I can't really say that whatever I 'saw' were mere imaginations but again, my experience was a tad different than your sibling's because mine wasn't a "pre-conceived" notion as we had no guesses on who could've stolen. 

Believe it or not, the thief confessed stealing money and jewellery in the exact manner as I 'saw' it. So idk what to say.

What about this one? 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=12tEFfVeztk

 Actually this one blew my mind... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hl89y5S8hno

Footyfan,

I remember one interesting paradox from my college professor:

Apparently, many people believe that reindeers can fly. So to test this theory, if you take 10 reindeers, for e.g., and push them off the top of Empire State Building and you notice none of them can fly, can you really prove that reindeers can't fly. No, you only prove that those 10 reindeers can't fly. So in essence, the notion that reindeers can't fly may still be incorrect. You cannot disapprove a negative. I hope you get the drift.

Going back to Bir, I truly believe your experience. But I still think its a self-fulfilling prophecy. Because you saw what transpired, you believed it, but what if it didn't occur (for me for e.g.) for 99 other people. Again I quote Carl Sagan in that when you have made such an extraordinary claim, you need extraordinary evidence too to back the claim up. If UFO, GHOSTS, PARANORMAL are all too real, it would be a common place, the fact that you've to hunt for lifetime for one shred of evidence makes it pretty unreal.

If you've read horoscopes, how often we get astounded that the horoscopes really matches with your daily life. But then, if you observe closely, you quickly realize that your brain biases against things that pertains to your life and ignores facts that doesn't. That's why they appear so real.


But having said all that, nothing is absolute. I agree with the thread starter that all I am trying to use is logic, reasoning and critical thinking :). But one is free to come to their own conclusion. But then, even if billions of people believe that universe is only 1000 year old, doesn't make it true!

 Thanks Pulsar_beat I am gald to have some ally (Sajha seemed like a cold lonely place until now), I will reply to some of the comment in the last 5-6 comments later. Tonight I will do some hoomework :)