Project Nim and Primate Think Tanks at the Zoo

The ethics of using Chimps for lab experiments has been in the news this month. Edd Doerr discussed one article in his posting Our Chimp Cousins . A troubling side of using chimps for experiments is shown in the new movie, ‘Project Nim’ by Director James Marsh. Marsh won an Oscar for his 2008 documentary, “Man on Wire” and the new film is based on Elizabeth Hess' 2008 book, "The Chimp Who Would Be Human." You can see a trailer of the movie here.

“Project Nim” recalls how in 1973, a 2-week-old chimpanzee was taken from his mother at an Oklahoma Institute of Primate Studies & sent to Columbia University to be part of a research project designed by Columbia Behaviorist Herbert Terrace. Humorously renamed Nim Chimpsky the animal was subjected to rigid, behavioral training on American Sign Language in an effort disprove linguist Noam Chomsky’s flat assertion that only humans have the cognitive capacity to acquire language. It was a Behavorist attempt to prove Chomsky wrong and not a very humane effort at that. Stephanie LaFarge, one of Terrace’s former graduate students, brought Nim into her mansion home and garden to raise. Human society was swapped for chimp society. To Behavorists this may not pose an issue, but there were many issues. One of many problems is that LaFarge doesn't actually know sign language. Raised by humans without good signing skills in a human setting, the movie documents a research project gone seriously wrong. For one thing Nim grows into a spoiled, diaper-dependent chimp. Education and social conversation is hardly his main concern. When good signers are employed, however, Nim quickly learned 100+ sign symbols. But he was still a needy brat and used signing largely to signal his needs in urgent pleas. One stream of signs read:

“Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you.”

The project was shut down after the main sign teacher left and a grieving Nim attacked the new teacher who hadn’t established a social relationship.

Nim’s later rescue by a primate studies researcher (and Grateful Dead fan), Bob Ingersoll is highlighted in the movie and was the focus of a story in the Washington Post. In contrast to Terrace’s project, Ingersoll took a relaxed approach to interacting with Nim. Instead of life in NYC they had friendly treks through the woods. Some of the interactions are captured in Ingersoll’s home movies from the late 70s as he Nim were getting to know each other in more natural settings. In these social engagements Ingersoll reports anecdotal evidence of intelligence such as Nim creating word combinations that most chimps couldn't. For instance, the infamous joint smoking gesture in the film is:

Stone Smoke Now.

"To me, that's pretty sophisticated," said Ingersoll. "I know it's comical, that he wants to smoke weed, but the reality is that we want to do things that are fun. And to give him a context under which he can ask to do things that are fun, seemed to me to be the right thing to do — if you want to get him to talk to you."

Chimps also have long memories. After Nim moved to a Texas animal sanctuary called Black Beauty Ranch, Nim and Ingersoll were separated for 12 years. But within five minutes of being reunited, Nim clapped his hands which was their own agreed-upon sign language for “Let’s play!”. Nim died of a heart attack in 2000 at age 26, but other chimps have lived longer. More recently, Ingersoll became reacquainted with Mona, whom he hadn’t seen in over 30 years. Ingersoll reports their initial interaction:

“At first she didn’t really recognize me, and I didn’t recognize her. Then I said, ‘Mona, is that you?’ And she immediately signed to me, ‘Bob. Hug hug hug.’ ”

A final word is that we have a great resource in DC to see primates like Nim living in good environments with wiser keepers and modulated experimentation. Our Smithsonian National Zoological Park (aka Zoo) is home to many primates. Orangutans and western lowland gorillas can be found at the Great Ape House. Smaller primates, including golden lion tamarins, Geoffroy's marmosets, and howler monkeys, can be found in the Small Mammal House. And a big treat is to see organgutans travel along the O Line between the Great Ape House and Think Tank on mild days. The zoo says that the time visitors are mostly likely to see these apes traveling on the O Line is between 11 and 11:30 a.m. See http://nationalzoo.si.edu/Animals/ThinkTank/default.cfm for details.

The Think Tank itself is a knockout for me. It is designed as a place to think about thinking, something we call meta-cognition. It is populated with primates doing what comes naturally to them (not Behavorists) in 3 areas: tools, language, and society. We are lucky to have a venue that exhibits a balanced side of primate life with science helping to understand our primate relatives as complex cognitive creatures. Currently, the Zoo has an ongoing research project on orangutan memory and you can watch a researcher testing an orangutan to learn how memories play into orangutan decision-making. All too human and human-like.

The Pain in Spain

by Edd Doerr

Headline in today's (8/16/11) New York Times: "Catholic Clergy Protest Pope's Visit And Its Price Tag". The story: Over 100 priests have signed a petition "deploring the pope's visit this week on many grounds -- from its cost (at least $72 million) to what they see as an inappropriate melding of church and state". The priests have joined with groups demanding a more secular state. The pope is coming to Madrid for World Youth Day. "Pilgrims will be allowed to sleep in public buildings like schools. And businesses will be able to get tax deductions for their contributions." Pilgrims will get 80% discounts on public transportation.

Background: Since the expulsion or forced conversion of Jews and Muslims after 1492, church and state were joined at the hip in Spain. The Inquisition was particularly brutal. With the advent of liberalism in Spain after 1800 conflicts over religion became more frequent. When the democratic Republic was established in 1931, church and state were separated. But in 1936 conservatives, fatcats, fascists and the church joined in supporting Franco's military uprising, which, with the indispensable help of Hitler and Mussolini, crushed the Republic and instituted a dictatorship that lasted until 1975.

Back to the 8/16 NY Times, which noted that a July survey shows that only 71.7% of Spaniards today declare themselves Catholic, down from 82.1% in 2001. Sunday church attendance has dropped to less than 10%.

In a tax check-off system similar to our US income tax form which allows us to check a box to give a small fixed amount for presidential campaigns, Spain allows taxpayers to check a box that allows the payer to designate 0.7% of their taxes to the Catholic church. But unreported in the Times is the fact that Spain offered the same deal to Spanish Protestants, Jews and Muslims, all of whom turned down the deal. How many Spanish taxpayers check the box to allow the church this 0.7% of their taxes? The latest figure I have is about 33%.

Since the end of the Franco era Spain has moved toward separation of church and state faster than any country in Europe. Divorce was legalized in 1981. Abortion is legal. Unfortunately, there has not been enough time to separate church and state in tax-supported education.

By the way, Spanish psychologist Pepe Rodriguez published major books in 1995 and 2002 thoroughly exploring the scandal of clergy sexual abuse of minors, books that I have reviewed in several journals in the US.

In my various sojourns in Spain beginning in 1981 I have found the country to be fascinating. I particularly its bookstores, where one can find more books by Woody Allen (in Spanish) than in a US bookstore.

Celebrating the Diversity of the Freethinking Species

By Gary Berg-Cross

Recently I was involved in a discussion of the relations of Atheism to Freethinking, Secular Humanism and allied concepts. One person proposed a common sense model with atheism at the center. The basic idea reflects the hypothesis that most people grow up in a religious culture, but for various reasons some move away from a family/childhood religious identify. The idea is that the natural tendency is to simply settle on some variant that calls itself atheism or agnosticism. There are other allied, freethinking positions such as skeptics, humanists, secularist or even secular humanists. Some people are exposed to these ideas and values in their family and/or education. But these represent a minority of the various groups that make up the allied complex of atheists and Freethinkers. In this view a complex movement like Secular Humanism is, by and large, not well understood even by freethinking people who move to and stay with the Atheism label and concept.

Trying to understand the diverse relations of freethinkers I started to think of a slightly different model for the various groups. While imperfect, and perhaps embarrassingly so, I found it amusing to play around with an Evolutionary Biology metaphor of species classification. In this rough analogy ideas (meme?) are organisms with bio-features. One could think of Atheism or Agnosticism as at the root node (call either of these the A-cell species). We can think of this as species made up of a single cell representing the idea feature – there is no god. The analogy is a certainly a bit jury rigged and can break down, but at least provides a way of talking about some phenomena and issues such as diversity. So as with Bio-species, religious cell populations (R-cells) can mutate into any one of these A-cells types and so the Atheist population can grow in this way too. This type of mutation is what happens in the world of ideas. There is also merging of ideas (cells) to form a new organism and some of these can reproduce as a new species.

Given the idea of Atheism as species we might think of this as a population of cells each having a meme for that Atheist idea. Some A-cells might mutate back into an R-cell. Bit this A-cell population can reproduce and can produce various non-branching types of Atheists populations. Some are militant others not. Some have allied ideas but still reproduce as an A-cell.

Biological populations and the implied dynamic of Freethinking thought then becomes somewhat analogous to what happens with the evolution of different species - there is a branching evolution of species. Isolation from the main population can also produce speciation. So if one population of atheists finds itself with tolerant religious populations it may emphasize a less assertive form of atheism than one that is an intruding religious population that is messing with the environment. Over time this becomes its own species distinct from the original A-cell population. The model represents various species as population descendents of the cell branch off of the A-node. As in Biology the later forms tend to be more complex – muti-cellulars made by aggregating additional ideas. These arise mostly from a series of step-wise, co-linear mutations, but not all new species survive and continue to reproduce. They may be only temporary, but lead to fitter forms.

Over time the Atheist tree looks different as some descendents thrive. Diverse richness is built slowly as some species fall away as intermediate forms. Those that survive are specialized reflecting selection based on environments that support additional ideas. These ideas provide some fitness advantage in some environment. So Atheism can exist in most environments, but a slightly more complex “organisms” like Secularism or Humanism formed over time can exist in dynamic balance with Atheism in a goodly portion of the environment. These will do better in environment that are less religious and provide some humanist or secular nourishment.

Reproduction is obviously a key factor and includes the idea of a merged mating as well as direct copying. Mating blends ideas but preserves the overall species design. There may be natural barriers to prevent individuals of one species from mating with another. For example there are various forms of isolation to overcome. Two individuals from different species may not have compatible behavior to allow merging. One thinks of examples of inharmonious freethinking positions clashing. Or the barrier may be that they don’t frequent the same territory (talk about the same ideas?). In the real world this is the case with tigers and lions. They don’t usually find them selves in similar environments. But they can in zoos. Lion fathers mating with tiger moms produce the exotic Liger.

Which brings me to that exotic specialized organism that is the product of Secularism and Humanism. I speak of Secular Humanism in the way that Paul Kurtz defines it using 5 ideas beyond the non-theistic idea that is the basis of simple Atheism:

1. Emphasis on methods rather than conclusions,
2. Naturalism & science,
3. Ethics,
4. Democracy, and a
5. Planetary scope.

One might add others and make finer distinctions, such as the idea if rationalism, the value of peace or detailing the caring for planet earth, but these features alone requires represent an evolved population and require a certain environment, such as valuing Science, to survive. Is this exotic creature, a philosophic counter to Religious species, on its way to being endangered or even possibly extinction? I think and hope not, but a challenge is always reproduction in the face of changing environments. Neither Secularism nor Humanism need spawn a Secular Humanist. And the reproductive rate for Secular Humanists seems not to be high as individual may not find each other to produce Secular Humanist children. Children may devolve back to one of the simpler forms. As a complex organism Secular Humanist have some advantages and we might expect much from this population. But it face various challenges including how do members of the population signal to each other in a teaming environment filled with other species of Freethinker? Members face reproductive issues – what is produced in mating with just a Secular person? Is it the species of Secular Humanism? Will a Liger-type species be produced or is Secularism a dominant form that results? Will the population help produce an environment more favorable to population survival?

These are just a few of the issues that the metaphor promotes, but does not necessarily answer. As in the Biological world one can argue that species diversity represents a value in itself and is an implicit foundation for human existence. If the metaphor applies then the full range of freethinking species also represents a foundation on which ideas at the apex of the classification, like Secular Humanism is built. All are needed as part of a supporting rich mix.

I like the image of an ideational world with this diversity of freethinking species arising via something analogous to macroevolution. We can imagine the Freethinking Genus as network growing out of roots with founder populations represented by idea of Heracleitus & Protagoras. These evolve and radiate to later populations represented by ideas from Hobbes to the local American sub-species of Robert Ingersoll and on to Bertrand Russell, John Dewey, Corliss Lamont and the more recent Paul Kurtz, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris and Daniel Dennett. Perhaps we can have it all, but perhaps we need to think about endangered species and the role they play in the Freethinking web. I like the implied progress by advanced forms of freethinking such seen in this progress and as formulated more fully in Secular Humanism.

Clerics for Fascism

by Edd Doerr

Pruning one's library turns up interesting items. One such is the book, published in Spain in 1973 (Franco's fascist dictatorship ended in 1975), Daily Life during the Civil War on the Nationalist (i.e., Franco) Side, by Rafael Abella, published only in Spanish. Following are my translations of several paragraphs.

"The external signs of the adhesion of the church hierarchy is shown in ceremonies in which bishops and canons appeared with the [fascist] salute [like the Nazi salute] with the military authorities at the conclusion of some prayer or field mass to celebrate a triumph against the enemies of God. On Septembet 30 [1936] Monsignor Pla y Deniel, bishop of Salamanca, made public the first pastoral letter legitimizing the [Franco's] Uprising and giving a doctrinal interpretation of the war. Its title was 'The Two Cities' and in it appeared fragments like these:

"'On the soil of Spain today are fighting bloodily two conceptions of life, two sentiments, two forces that are ready for a universal struggle among all the people on the earth.... Communists and anarchists are the sons of Cain, fratricidal to their brothers, envious of those who make a cult of virtue, and they assassinate and martyrize them.' "[page 174]

"In September of 1936 [Franco's uprising started in July] the cardinal primate, Dr Goma, whom the Uprising surprised in Pamplona, far from his see in Toledo, made public this statement, 'The Case of Spain', in which he made clear the position of the Spanish Church. Its main points: 'The war is a punishment for the secularism and corruption imposed on the Spanish people by the highest politicians [by successive governments elected by the people several times between 1931 and early 1936] and bad political propaganda.' And Goma insisted that 'Jews and Masons poisoned the national soul with absurd doctrines, with Tartar and Mongol stories converted into a social ansd political system in the dark societies run by Jewish internationalism'." [p177]

"The tearing down of all secularist laws, such as those concerning education, will be shown by the tightest solidarity between Church and State. The new State, defined as 'ethical/missional', will make it difficult to discern where the temporal ends and the eternal begins. Religious content will impregnate the state structure so that the Church will surpass one of the hardest tests in its history'." [page 181]

Most Spaniards favored the elected Republican government, but British and US indifference and German and Italian help enabled Franco's forces to win. Let me recommend the Britisn film "Land and Freedom" (based on Orwell's book Homage to Catalonia) and the more recent Spanish film "Pan's Labyrinth".

Colorado: A Poorly reported Victory

by Edd Doerr

On Friday, August 12, Denver state court judge Michael Martinez ruled that a school voucher plan adopted earlier this year by Douglas County violates three separate sections of the state constitution. Douglas County is the richest county in Colorado (Republican dominated, of course) and one of the richest in the US. In his 68-page ruling Martinez noted that the recipient private schools, many of them not even located in Douglas County, are pervasively religious and that the program "provides no meaningful limitations on the use of taxpayer funds to support or promote religion."

County officials said they will appeal, but I can't see how they can possibly win, given the clear language of the state constitution -- clear for most people but perhaps not for Douglas County Republicans.

We might note that Colorado voters defeated vouchers 67% to 33% in a 1992 referendum and rejected tax credit vouchers in 1998 by 60% to 40%.

This victory for church-state separation, religious freedom, public education, and common sense is one small flash of good news in an otherwise rather bleak year.

The next voucher referendum is due in 2012 in Florida unless an ACLU lawsuit manages to quash the program imposed on the state by a GOP legislature and wingnut governor.

A reminder: tens of millions of US voters have rejected vouchers or their variants in over two dozen statewide referenda from coast to coast by landslide margins.

The Colorado ruling will be explored in detail in the next issue of Americans for Religious Liberty's journal Voice of Reason, along with other developments on church-state matters.

The Psychological Harm of Traditional Christian Belief

In my blog titled Responsible Atheism I argued that religious belief is psychologically harmful. I want to expand on my justification in this essay. My strategy is to simply use what we know about psychology, appreciating that the naturally negative effects of certain beliefs on the brain do not go away just because the object of our thoughts and emotions is a supernatural being instead of a human one. Time-tested principles of psychology do not permit a distinction there. Let’s look at some of these psychological harms one at a time.

Believing that you are born flawed, from sin, and that you must rely on someone else for your own salvation, is dehumanizing.

Depending entirely on someone else for your happiness or well-being can’t be healthy. You should believe in yourself – in your own resilience and abilities. It is perfectly acceptable and necessary to lean on others in times of trouble. One should study the life experiences and wisdom of others to grow intellectually and emotionally. That, however, is not the same thing as believing you are irredeemably defective without someone else. Being in a relationship where you think your mate is so morally or intellectually superior to you is a detriment to healthy self-esteem. When we see someone in a relationship like this, we think, “That’s sad; that person should have more confidence than that.” Those who constantly look outward for self-fulfillment will never get what they are searching for until they look inward and trust their own capacities for strength. Relying on friends and family, leaning on others, and gaining strength from their love and support is a beautiful part of life. Believing that you are born from sin is profoundly negative and not conducive to self-esteem. What is conducive to self-esteem is feeling unbounded in one’s capacity to learn and improve. As much as we learn and live, there will always be something we can learn from someone else. It’s not that we are defective or inherently sinful - we just can’t know everything. This is a much more empowering perspective because there is no inherent defect within us, only room for improvement. Is God like a Disney prince who has to come save us before we can have a fulfilling life?

The belief that God has a plan for everyone diminishes the feeling of obligation to intervene where there is suffering. (Why do something so pompous as to interfere with God’s “great” plan?)

Theism implies outsourcing moral and intellectual responsibility. With God at the wheel, why try to steer too? Still, some ambitious people will steer society, and sometimes they do it in God’s name. The rich and powerful have notoriously championed belief in a divine plan in order to keep the weak and disadvantaged complacent. The institution of slavery is a fine example of how belief in God’s plan kept millions of people in abysmal circumstances. Besides the fact that slavery is explicitly condoned in both the Old and New Testament, the belief that what happens to you is part of a divine plan could obviate one’s responsibility to take action. There were slave rebellions; it is not surprising that people would rebel against others’ interpretations of God’s will. Plenty of slaves understood that their subjugation was wrong. They either knew it despite the Bible and its pro-slavery passages or they attended to Bible passages that condemned slavery (parts that championed the plight of the weak, such as “the meek shall inherit the earth”). So with a book as inconsistent as the Bible, we still have to use our own knowledge of right and wrong. If God has a plan, no one can really know what it is, even when using the same holy book as a guide. So we are far better off using our own brains to figure out morality and justice. Thankfully, we do this most of the time anyway, believers and non-believers alike. To believe that God has an ascertainable plan has had, and will always have, deleterious consequences.

Belief in an afterlife necessarily devalues life here on earth and would diminish motivation to change the status quo.

I was once told by a religious person that life would have no meaning if there was nothing beyond it. Not all believers take such a morose view. However, if there is infinite joy or bliss (or whatever this psychologically impossible state is), to be had when one leaves this earth, why worry too much about worldly states of affairs? It’s unfortunate that the environment is going to hell, so to speak, but thank goodness earth is temporary housing until the great beyond – an environment nothing short of perfection! “Heaven” and “hell” were manipulative tools invoked by those in power long ago to diminish social or political protest. Ultimate justice is a very dangerous promise to believe in because it makes people complacent when justice is not achieved here on earth. Millions of people have gone through their lives not challenging their oppressor or abuser because they believe God would punish them. I couldn’t make the point better than self-liberated slave, abolitionist, author, and intellectual Frederick Douglass, who famously said “I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs.”

Belief in heaven and hell causes life-long anxiety for many believers.

Some religious believers live with unrelenting existential anxiety. They aren’t sure whether their virtues and good deeds merit eternal reward, damnation, or purgatory. For example, a college friend of mine was a really good person and she feared that she’d go to hell because she was gay. She had lived with that anxiety since she was quite young, having been raised Catholic. I tried to tell her how a god who would send her to hell for being herself cannot be a good God. Her reply was that she couldn’t know God’s reasoning, but he is all-knowing so his logic had to be right and hers mistaken. How sad and confusing. The Bible says we should stone homosexuals. Even though stoning is now considered a barbaric punishment (except in a few countries), discrimination is alive and well. Many people brought up in religion, especially young children, live in fear that they may do, feel, or think something that would keep them out of heaven. Questioning God’s existence or Christ’s love is a cardinal sin. Some Christians catch hell from friends and family for daring to question their religion. No one should have to worry they’ll go to hell for their thoughts. People are terrified of losing the approval of their friends and family, so they suppress what they really think to avoid rejection. Thinking and questioning makes us human and it is necessary for psychological and intellectual health.

Belief in God offers false hope and, when prayers to help others aren’t answered, this can lead to feelings of profound guilt that one didn’t pray hard enough or in the right way.

When a believer’s prayer doesn’t seem to have been answered, he/she will have to find some complicated explanation as to why, even though what was specifically asked for didn’t happen, God has brought about different circumstances that are even better in the long run. When prayers do seem to be answered, this is nothing more than what psychologists call “confirmation bias”: the psychological tendency we all have to seek out information that confirms what we already believe to be true and filter out conflicting data. This incidentally is one of the same principles behind the “Design Argument” for God. Believers want to credit God for the lovely features of this planet like the pretty blue sky and gorgeous mountain ranges, but not for the countless horrors that befall the earth and its inhabitants (e.g., natural disasters; diseases that have taken billions of lives, including hundreds of millions of innocent children). Somehow the pretty skies and flowers are supposed to make up for tsunamis and tornados and cancers that wreak havoc on the earth and its inhabitants. If a believer could count up how many times his prayers were seemingly answered and how many times they weren’t, he would see that overwhelmingly they are not. And if the believer insists that they were answered in some way, but we just can’t know God’s plan, this is a meritless response because there is no evidence for divine intervention (by definition). Belief in prayer is especially psychologically harmful for young impressionable people who want something badly. If they don’t get what they pray for - for natural reasons, not divine ones, - they may feel immensely frustrated and confused about why God won’t help them. They might conclude that they aren’t praying hard enough, or in the right way, or that God is rejecting them by not helping. Worse still, consider a believer praying for someone else’s life condition to improve. If no help comes, again due to natural reasons, the believer may feel profound guilt that there is something wrong with them because god didn’t answer their desperate heartfelt desperate prayer. (Did that person not deserve the help?) Telling people to pray is offering them false hope. We all agree that false hope is a bad thing because it makes failure hurt so much more, and the energy spent on false hope could have been spent in productive ways.

Worship of any being threatens human integrity. Unqualified subservience and devotion are not commendable; such subjugation is dangerous.

The Bible depicts human beings as perpetual children, constantly dependent on a father god. I’m an adult and, even if I was a child, I was raised not to submit to authority without evidence that the authority knows best. Believers say God is the one exception: we can submit to him because he is omnibenevolent. There is no good evidence for this and, if you look around at all the pain and suffering in the world compared to what is good and just, the evidence is clearly against an all-good god. Let us remember that a parent who doesn’t intervene to prevent evil is no parent at all. So we shouldn’t be impressed by a believer’s claim that God doesn’t cause suffering because only people do. There is nothing stopping an omnipotent and supposedly omnibenevolent being from offering counsel to those who err; this would not jeopardize something like free will. He also could have created us to be more ethically robust human beings, with brains better able to resist selfish or violent impulses; this would be no threat to freedom of choice - on the contrary it would increase it! He could have created the earth to make it more resilient against natural disasters. Furthermore, just because he created us, God doesn’t automatically get our respect. Respect must be earned, and I submit that the traditional Christian God does not deserve our respect. Again, if the response from a believer is simply circular reasoning that “God is all-good so he should have our respect,” this is not a rational argument as there is no evidence for God in the first place.

We have to use our own brains to work out our own lives, together. So let us get off our knees already, and walk upright as we evolved to do. Believers: stop looking up into the sky and look at each other, because we are all we’ve got. Quit praying for miracles, and use your hands to make a real difference in someone’s life. Realize that the only power out there is just your own character within. The more you think that you depend on God’s strength, the more your psychological health weakens.

God created recently

The immigrants from India are constructing temples and worshipping a new god. Some Hindus in Maharastra state in India created this new god around 1920s near Bombay. Originally the person was a muslim sufi living in a dilapidated mosque. But some cunning hindus propagated as though he was hindu and spread concocted myths, stories which the gullible believers accepted as true. A trust was created and statues erected . This process started during early 1920s and slowly spread among the people. Now this new god created by few people influenced some believers  in Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh states.In the name this new god lot of corrupt practices went on, some temple trustees were arrested and put in prison. Yet the god business is spreading.

      Now the same new god  is also becoming popular among some Indian immigrants and hence new temples are constructed in USA. In this context, rationalists and Humanists from Pune went and studied. They found the facts and placed before public. This was written by Mr Prabhakar Nanawathy, editor of Thought and action magazine, from pune.

Innaiah Narisetti

Shirdi Sai Baba – Myth and Business

P.K.Nanawaty

There is a climax shot in popular Hindi film Amar, Akbar, Anthony of erstwhile era. Akbar is

singing at the top if his voice in front of Saibaba’s giant statue. Two bright and colourful rays emerge

out of the eyes of statue and enter in the eyes of Akbar’s blind mother. Mother shouts: “I can see

now! God blessed me!” All the spectators in the cinema hall are excited.

“Saibaba is a GOD’ ‘What a wonderful thing to happen’.... Saibaba of Shiridi has become

a symbol of money-spinners for film industry people. Without his blessing neither film shooting will

start nor a completed film will be released in the cinema halls. While travelling to Shirdi, a place

regularly visited by the film industry people and thousands of devotees from all over India. We will

hear the dialogues like “We are devotees of Baba for last twenty years’. His blessings saved me

many times. “The Great Saibaba!’ There is no point in arguing with devotees since all of them have

immersed in Sai miracle. The impact of this strong belief will not allow one to think nationally or

think at all. While travelling one can observe many people reading loudly ‘Sai Charit”. Late Govind

Raghunath Dabholkar has written this book. This book is mostly about the miracles performed by

Saibaba. The followers vow that they have read the book 20-30 times. The contents have been

impregnated in their brains permanently if you just glance through the pages you will find miracles

like Saibaba taking out his intestine, drying it in the air and again pushing it inside the abdomen.

One will get nausea while reading such miracles. But the book had been reprinted more than 20

times in the last 50 years selling thousands of copies. Saibaba Trust officially publishes this book and

glorifies such nonsense.

Dadasaheb Khaparde’s son had swelling on his skin and was in severe pain. His mother

rushed to Saibaba . Saibaba told “Don’t worry, it will rain”. Saibaba started taking out his clothes

and mother saw the swelling on Saibaba”s body. Saibaba said that he suffers all the pains of his

followers. The author, Govind Dabholkar was a magistrate and he confirmed that all these events

have happened in reality and no one should doubt about them. One co-passenger started babbling:

’my daughter-in-law had some problem while delivering. I took holy ash from the Sai temple and

pasted on her stomach and within five minutes she delivered a healthy baby.”

As soon as we enter Shirdi town, handouts and cards will start passing through the

windows. “Sai Shankar Flower Merchants: All items required for Pooja and Abhishek are available at

reasonable prices”. However there is one more precautionary sentence for the benefit of devotees:

Beware of thieves. One cannot imagine that in miracle of Saibaba. Meantime a few people

practically try to drag you saying

In the year 1838, a Phakeer (Muslim priest) lands here. For want of any other name the

local goldsmith calls him Saibaba. Shirdi was a small village consisting of dilapidated houses.

Villagers had great fun to see such a stranger in their village. Most of them were farmers.

Nowadays the farming has been set aside and every one is engaged in only one industry.... Sai baba

industry.

Sai is business for this town

Enter any shop. By paying Rs.25 one will get all the essential items of Abhiskek. Talkative

shop owners murmur ; Saibaba blesses you. ‘How to get Darshan?’. Innocent question but difficult to

answer. Abhishek is performed at 9 ’O’clock in the morning. For this you should stand in queue right

from early morning at 5 ‘O’ clock . Satyanarayana Pooja will be at noon 12 ‘O’ Clock. In the evening

there will be Aarati will be at 10 pm. He listed the timetable. ‘Will it be possible to avoid standing in

queue...’

‘You need right contacts at highest level. Or you should be political bigwig like MP, MLA,

Minister or Govt. Bureaucrat from secretariat. Permission is granted to enter the main temple to

these influential persons only. But if one is ready to pay huge donation, say Rs.50,000, will open the

gates of main Mandir immediately. Money has more miraculous power than Sai.

A board is displayed in the office of Sai trust about the special category for Darshan. Some

are more equal than others even here too. Whom do you complain? The trust has built a big hall

for devotees anxious for Sai Daeshan. Marble benches have been provided to take rest. Close

circuit TV has been installed to view the Pooja performed in the main temple by other devotees.

Most in the waiting are fully satisfied with this virtual reality. All the walls in the hall have been

painted with the scenes showing Saibaba’s miracles.

Miracle 1. When the villages were infected by cholera, Saibaba put jowar flour around the

village and cured cholera affected people. Miracle 2. Chandbhai who brought Saibaba to Shiridi,

wanted to smoke Chilum (sort of handmade pipe). He couldn’t find fire anywhere nearby. Phakeer

touched the green grass and fire was lit! 3. A river started from the toe of the feet of Saibaba.

4. Thousands of lamps were lit on the water while Saibaba is standing on the shore.

If someone stands in a queue surrounded by such scenes, one will certainly start believing

anything. Mind will be conditioned to accept anything without thinking. The books like Sai Charit

or Sai Leelamrit are continuously glorifying the miraculous power of Saibaba. The glorification

of anything has become a core theme of Indian society. The believer will become helpless and

intellectually week and starts losing confidence in himself and his efforts. Anything good that

is happening in his life will be attributed to God, Guru or somebody except himself . Anything

determined will be result of his fate. No one wanted to go into details of these miracles have

been described never bother to give any references and historical evidences. Perhaps there may

not be any base. Everything is just for these miracles. Everything is just imagination to make

money. Even the photographs displayed are fake or created by Imaging. On enquiry at trust

office, the concerned official said that there no original photographs of Saibaba anywhere. One

starts wondering how the cult is is being built around such imaginary things and the market force to

flood the photographs of Saibaba. In one of the books published in 1914, there is a reference that

district collector Desai has taken a snap shot. But the reference does not have any credibility. Trust

released a photograph in 1922. But the trust also took the miracle route.

The serpentine queue has moving snail’s speed. The devotees were mostly from Gujarat.

Every 10-15 minutes you would hear the shouting in unison: Bolo Sainath Maharaj ki Jai, Jor se bolo

Sai bolo. Every one is holding a plate with flowers and other items of worship. A saffron scarf was

used as headgear. Queue as moving slowly. Even the toilets have been provided for nature call of

devotees. If some miscreant tries to jump queue, people will express their anger by shouting the

slogan with higher pitch. Some one said “Sai will punish the intruder”.

Meanwhile, someone started selling Laddu for Rs. Two. The devotees are expected to put

Laddu at the feet of Sai’s idol at main Mandir and eat as Prasadam, which is blessed by Sai to wash

away the sins committed by devotee knowingly or unknowingly . On an average four thousand

devotees are visiting every day. On Thursdays this figure will rise to sixty thousand. So you can

imagine the turnover in a place like Shiridi, Satyanarain pooja will cost twenty five rupees. The Pooja

itself must be fetching straight away more than 20 lakh per week. At the basement 15-18 huge

sealed steel boxes are kept to receive the donations. No receipts are demanded for the donations

deposited by the devotees. Some times the total collection goes upto Rs. Fifty lakh per week. In

this money collecting game, one day Shiridi Saibaba will surpass Tirupati Balaji.

After going through all the hasseles, battering by the security guards and the anxiety, at last

one enters into the main Mandir where the devotees can physically touch the Sai Idol. Suddenly a

few in the queue roll on the floor and beat their head as through possessed by some invisible thing.

Devotee hands over the plate. The priest touches the plate at the idol’s feet in a flash and hands

over back to the devotee. Devotee is not satisfied. He wants to be kept longer time. Everything

needs to be charged by the Sai power. The priests start protesting. However, some one pacifies

both the parties. Queue has to move. There are 24 priests who work in two shifts. These priests

are middlemen between God Sai and the devotees. The total staff consists of 45 persons who

are attending Sai round the clock. Out of 24 priests, 9 of them are holding diploma certificate

from Tryambakeshwaar School of Veda , which conducts regular courses of 3 years duration on

priesthood. This includes idol worship, offering flowers, Satyanarayan Pooja and various Mantras

to be chanted at various occasions etc. Even the priests have to go through the shifts to earn their

livelihood like any industrial worker though all of them are so near to Saibaba and everyday seeing

him in person. Sai Idol is made of Italian marble. There is a throne embedded with designed

carved in silver and gold plates. The Idol has been dressed with red and saffron coloured garments.

A pearl necklace is around the neck. Like in any other temples, there is no mound of coconuts near

the Idol but heap of dry flowers occupy the major portion of floor space.

Dabholkar, Deshpande and Saagasrabuddhe trio initially started the flourishing business of

Saibaba idol worship about hundred years ago. If one critically tries to analyze the stories and myths

propagated, one will start doubting whether such a person was really alive or was it a figment of

imagination of a few gangsters to rob the gullible public. A Phakeer comes to remotest village,

says in a sort of mosque, and taken names of Allah. It means the person was never a hindu. In

fact the person had a very abnormal pattern of behaviour. He was a smoker of chillum (a sort

of pipe). He wandered all around the place on rivar banks and hill tops, always wearing torn

clothes. Most of the time he stared at the sky without blinking the eyes. Villagers called him a mad

phakeer. Beggars stole his food. Bayajabai cooked food for him. But he was never regular for his

meals and got irritated very quickly. Sometimes he used to dance on the streets, Once he out his

hands in the fire. He used obscene language whenever women approached him. No one was

able to make sense of what he was saying in the undertone. All these details are available in the

biographies published by the trust. While going through his biography one gets convinced that there

is a deliberate attempt by Dabholkar, Despande, Dasganoo etc. to project Saibaba as Hindu saint.

Infact Saibaba stayed al l his life in a dilapidated mosque and prayed Allah in Muslim style. But

most of the Hindu Traditionalists imagined him as incarnation of their favourite God or saint. Some

worship him as Swami Ramdas of 16th century era. Some say he is a Avataar of Shankar. Some

vouch that he is incarnation of Dattatreya. Some had gone to the extent that he is an incarnation

of Akkalkot Maharaj of 18th century. There is neither logic nor consistency in these biographies. Sai

baba’s famous slogan is Allah Malik Hai. But in spite of all these supporting evidences that he is

not a Hindu, every devotee assumes that there is an ardent. Hindu but behaved a bit abnormally.

The prestigious gang, who elevated Sai to God’s status to fulfil their vested interests, have given him

a new dimension of Hinduism. Chandorkar went to an extent saying that he had assisted Saibaba

during his bath and confirmed that Sai’s ears were punctured like in Hindu tradition. Thus, an aura of

Hinduism was built around Sai. Infact Saibaba had nothing to do with Ram Navami festival. This was

started by the trio to make money. The tomb built on his death body was also in Hindu tradition.

SAI BABA SECULARISM IS FRAUD

If one goes through the historical details of Saibaba’s life there was not even a single

Muslim devotee. As per Muslim religion worshipping an idol is banned. As per Muslim religion

worshipping an idol is banned. As such the secularism attached to Saibaba or to his place is an

outright fraud. No Muslim visits this place. No Muslim priest performs prayer. Even then media

advertises this temple as a symbol of secularism. Secularism in the world of faith is a complex

concept. Both Hindus and Muslims have to come to an agreement to evolve a methodology

without hurting the religious feelings. However, vested interests have dominated and Hinduism is

flourishing.

One will realize the extent of exploitation while coming out of the temple and look around it.

Gullible Hindu devotees have contributed whole-heartedly to build mansions and high rise buildings,

now owned by the Trust. The property may be 7-8 crore rupees worth. The building projects are

still continuing and everyone except the devotees is benefited.

A Neem tree with thatched roof is nearby. The legend says that the leaves of this Neem

tree are very sweet. However, you can’t confirm the same since one is not allowed to pluck the

leaves from the tree for eating. However, Hindu religion has a solution for any Catch 22 situation!

You can eat the leaves fallen on the ground. If they are not sweet, it means you are not a pious

person. God is not blessing you. One of the trust official announced that a German scientist was

not able to explore the secret of sweetness. After asking for the report, he expressed his inability to

produce the same. There is a very small lane passing through this place. The lane is crowded with

the beggars. At least 800 beggars might have been there out of which 50-60 are women. If you

just wait for a while, a bread seller will pop up with 4-5 loves of bread and request you to distribute

bread to beggars. Each loaf will cost Rs.20 or more. Like him 5-10 bread sellers are standing among

beggars to give an opportunity to feed the beggars. The beggars are earning at least 400 Rupees

per day; most of them are bank account holders. In this economically liberated era everything

has become ‘instant’ : instant beggars, instant food in the form of bread chunks. Instant sellers.

Everyone wants to make a fast buck.

Across the road there is a place presumed to be where Sai baba distributed the holy ash.

The place is popularly known as Chandorkar Chavadi. Inside, there is nicely carved wooden plank;

above which a notice board is hung indicating Baba’s sleeping place. If you keenly observe, the plank

might have been carved 5-6 years ago. There is also a notice board, which warns that no woman is

allowed inside. In fact as per Saibaba’s biography, Bayajabai took care of him throughout his life.

But no one could explain why such a ban or discrimination towards women in these days. It appears

even in 21st century some one wants to follow the dictates of age old Manusmriti.

Saibaba’s contemporary, Abdul Baba’s house is very near to this place. An old man, poses

of photographs that look exactly like the portraits of Saibaba. He pointed to holy book and other

items and told that all these belong to Abdul baba. Devotees are coming inside and Rahimbaba

blesses them. They put a few coins in return.

“Have you seen Saibaba?”

‘I don’t lie and I don’t want to talk on this issue. Everything is commercialized nowadays. Who is

bothered about Saibaba and his whereabouts?‘ He vented his sorrow. ‘Is there any original snapshot

of Saibaba?’

‘You see, Abdulbaba was his contemporary and we have his genuine photographs. I don’t know

about anything else. No place for the truth, Sir”.

There is one more place known as Dwarakamai’s Mosque. The items, like wheat bag, bath

stone, Chulha etc. have been displayed in this place like in historical museum and people come to

this place with all the reverence, The wheat bag has fresh look as though purchased very recently

and certainly not 100 years old. The Chulla is painted in various colours. The fireplace is still burning.

All devotees bow in front of each item very piously expecting blessings from Saibaba. No one

seems to have any doubts in their minds about whether these artifacts are genuine or fake. No

one displays inquisitiveness while looking at these almost fake items. Thinking power, rationality,

spirit of enquiry are totally absent. The manipulators of religious values have made everyone slave.

Baba has all the remedies for any problems. He can cure all the diseases. Ashes given by him (or

his cronies) is an ultimate medicine for diseases ranging form common cold to severe type of

cancer. Tatyasheb Noolkar recovered from blindness. Padmanabh Swamy was able to hear

clearly through he was deaf right from the birth since he had received blessings of Baba. Balasaheb

Shimpi recovered from Malaria fully just feeding the food to dog by Baba. Shrimant recovered from

diarrhea.

Like these, there may be thousands of myths percolating every generation and at every

place. No one dares to doubt Baba’s glory, his super power and his compassion. Mahadevrao

Deshpande was cured of his piles by eating peanuts given by Saibaba. Just by exhauling, Baba cured

the snake and scorpion bites. Swallowing the holy ash cured Dattopant’s stomachache. Though the

whole village was suffering from plague. Chandorkar’s friend was saved because she had put holy

ash on her face. TB patient of Malegaon could recover by just applying the holy ash all over the

body.

All these miracles printed in Sai Leelamrit, are told, retold, modified, glorified and improved

so that no one will have an iota of doubt about its truthfulness. Everything is described as though

narrator was invisibly present all the while and at all the place till the end. Mind is conditioned

and devotees are addicted to listen to such trash. If the diseases can be cured by Darshan or

by applying the holy ash, why has trust built an ultra modern hospital? The hospital incurs Rs.25

lakh loss every year since it subsidizes the medical bills of ‘poor’ devotees. Why is Saibaba not

able to prevent any diseases? Why is he not able to cure poor without any medical assistance? If

the place and person are so powerful. Why do you need diagnostic centres, operation theatres,

surgical facilities, ICUs, trained medical staff, experienced surgeons? Shamdas Foundation owned

by a devotee of Saibaba had built an ultra modern hospital at Hong Kong. Hundreds of medical

experts from all over the world are attending this Hospital one or other capacity. In spite of all these

modern facilities and blessings received from Saibaba, the recovery rates are at par with any other

hospitals of the same caliber. Saibaba did not make any difference, inspite of all these statistical

probabilities, realities and apparent evidences, the Trust still publishes various types of miracles in

its monthly bulletin Sai Leela. One can understand the illiterate devotees may not be aware of the

process of spread/origin of diseases or may not know the nuances of diagnostics, immunization,

recovery process, or healing methods. However one thing is clear that anything good that is

happening in the life is attributed to Saibaba. This mindset is playing a major role in the spread of

curing power of Saibaba. Nowadays the patients suffering from polio, cancer, and heart ailments

are visiting in large numbers. Couples come here very often to be blessed with a child. Offerings

are made at the spur of the moment. Enourmous amount is promised if the wish is granted without

taking into consideration the financial conditions. To fulfil the vow one has to be in the clutches of

pawnbrokers. However, main beneficiary is the Trust which is hoarding a large sum donated by the

gullible devotees. The stories of miraculous curing power of Saibaba plays greater role in amassing

wealth. Trust goes on printing and reprinting the books, magazines and other materials depicting

the miraculous power of Saibaba, just changing names here and there. All stories read alike.

Sometime back KS Pathak, an IAS officer was nominated as receiving officer of the Trust.

He found that misappropriation of large fund by the local trustees. They were looting the

public. The golden and silver ornaments, belonging to the Trust, were found in the houses of

the trustees. When police raided their houses, they threw the ornaments in the nearby fields.

Charity commissioner imposed inquiries. CID officials investigated the frauds. Trustees tried their

best to put political pressure on the receiving officer and charity commissioner to stall further

investigations. A few of the trustees were punished and put into jail.

In spite of these headlines in the media, the devotees are deterred to visit. ‘Saibaba is

great! He will take care of our sins’. That is the attitude of the devotees. Political leaders come

here to enhance their ‘power’. But sometimes they to suffer badly. Ex-President Shankar Dayal

Sharma paid a visit with all its pomposity: within a few days after the visit he was suffering with

severe ailments. Sharad Pawar visited the temple while he was experimenting with like-minded

parties. Three months after the visit his experiment utterly failed. Shankarrao Chavan, Vasantdada

Patil also suffered very badly. P.V. Narasimha Rao came to this place as a Prime Minister, but by

the time he returned Delhi he was no more a minister! This may also be a miracle of Saibaba!

Even if we keep aside the devotees and their problems, the trustees and local population are

at daggers head. Each party wants its share of flesh in this money game. One of the trustees was

arguing that villagers don’t know what they are missing since too much familiarity breeds contempt.

Villagers argue that Trust has turned whole villages into five star hotel with money flowing like

water. Highrice buildings, asphalt roads, even airport but local population is still deprived to basic

necessities... Trustees want that local people should cooperate (in looting) with trust so that they

too can get benefited. Villagers erected shanty shops all around the temple and started earning

their livelihood by selling the goods required by the devotees. This irritated the trustees. They

wanted these ugly structures should be removed immediately. For years together this confrontation

is continuing and sometimes the situation is turning violent. If Saibaba cannot solve these problems

amicably how can one expect him to take up problems of some individuals? Nowadays devotees

have to take care of their belongings, cash etc. Since Saibaba is favouring pick pocketers, thieves

too. Even while one is inside the main temple bags, purses etc. are stolen. While devotees

are gathering on auspious days like Ram Navami, Guru Purnima, Dasera it becomes very easy for

thieves to do their own business! But ardent belief in Saibaba gives the devotees to absolve these

misdeeds.

To overcome the minor problems trust has started ‘Sai Darshan’ on internet. The

prominent message on the internet is “If you look at me, I will look at you”. Devotees from

distant places can have instant Darshan and get blessed by Saibaba. A few foreigners’ e-mails

pasted on the website make very interesting readings . Varah Appikatla is an NRI staying in US.

He took ‘Darshanam’ of Saibaba and managed to secure top position in IBM. Now he is ready to

send huge donation to the trust. The assistance of advanced science and technology is sought to

strengthen their superstitions. Saibaba cult is a sort of contagious disease and is not restricted to

only Maharashtra region. In the south Puttaparthy Saibaba has surpassed the original Saibaba in all

respects. Dharma Sai Seva Trust has already spread its tentacles asking for huge donations to feed

the children of downtrodden and marginalized poor people and to construct Hindu nationality and

Veda teaching school.

People from all over India come to Shiridi. All of them are emotionally choking while they

visit this place. Each one’s story is quite unique. But if one probes deeper, the devotees have lost

their self-confidence and are afraid of everything – the wealth, luxuries, people around them, the

place where they stay, family members etc. They are not in a position to trust anybody. A sort of

mental disease has taken over these devotees. From outside they all look normal human beings

can believe all these legends, miracles and power of blessings and artefacts like amulets and charms.

While returning from a place like this, even a rational human being will start doubting whether this

society is normal enough to realize in what trap it is bound.

Once again you are amidst

“Saibaba Bolo ... Saibaba Bolo...”

(Author is an active Rationalist and Humanist, Editor of Thought & Action-Internet monthely, Pune, Maharastra, India)

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