Debunking
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Reading With Your Eyes Shut?The “Mid-Brain” Mystery
Children in blindfolds read books and name colours, and their trainers say a course has “activated” their mid-brain. Parents pay thousands of rupees for it. With a scarf, some cotton and a paper bag, find the secret gap, and the simple test that has exposed this trick again and again. Ages 9–14. Try the activity…
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An Activist’s Guide to The Demon-Haunted World
Carl Sagan’s 1995 masterwork, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, stands as one of the most vital manifestos for critical thinking ever written. While framed around scientific skepticism, its message is profoundly radical: without the tools to spot deception, question authority, and resist pseudoscience, a society cannot remain free.
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Pendulum Dowsing and Ideomotor Response
In this hands-on demonstration, B. Premanand illustrates how simple subconscious focus can trigger physical movement through the ideomotor response. By guiding readers through a classic pendulum experiment, he reveals how micro-muscular contractions—amplified by a simple thread—generate apparent mysteries, debunking the supernatural claims behind pendulum dowsing, water divining, and Ouija boards.
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Curing Jaundice by Psychic Power
In this exposé, B. Premanand unmasks a widespread medical hoax where faith healers claim to extract jaundice using spiritual powers. By demonstrating how simple mustard oil mechanically emulsifies with saliva to produce a thick, bile-like liquid, he exposes the chemical illusion behind the fraud and highlights the urgent need for scientific temper in healthcare choices.
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Psychic Surgery
In this exposé, B. Premanand dismantles the fraudulent practice of “psychic surgery,” where healers claim to extract diseased organs bare-handed. By revealing how sleight-of-hand, hidden animal blood, and folded skin create a graphic illusion, the article exposes the grave dangers this medical hoax poses to vulnerable patients seeking genuine, life-saving care.
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Election Results and Predictions
During the 2008 Karnataka elections, the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations offered a 1-million-rupee challenge to forecasters claiming supernatural abilities. Out of 140 entries, astrologers and psychic predictors failed miserably, scoring as low as zero. The highest-scoring entrants relied purely on political exit polls, proving supernatural claims entirely unscientific and baseless.