a co-worker of mine introduced a book to me entitled, "hidden messages in water," by masaru emoto. the premise is quite simple. a so-called "doctor" in alternative medicines from the east performed some experiments with water crystals to see if water, in itself, has the ability to react to external variables--in this case, types of music, types of imagery, even select words such as "fool" or "cute." the hypothesis is simply that water, making up a substantial portion of our bodies, can be affected by positive or negative energies, and thus, react in a way that would affect our spirit.
the author presented images of the crystals that appear to react to these variables. water presented with symphonic melodies, or positive words such as "cute", formed crystals that were found to be symmetrical and harmonious. on the other hand, water presented with heavy metal or negative words such as "fool" spawned ugly, fractured crystals. some crystals, the author claimed, formed images of guns and children.
james randi, a skeptic who is known for offering large sums of money in exchange for paranormal proof, has offered one million dollars if emoto can replicate the results in a double-blind study--a feat that has yet to occur, no doubt as result of emoto's apparent popularity in the new age world of paranormal quantum faith healing.
like the "theory" of intelligent design, paranormal claims have attempted to infiltrate the realm of science, skew the results and ignore the grueling scientific method, in order to create false truths about life. and it's popular, as well. walk into any bookstore and compare the science section (usually small and tucked away) to the new age section, vast and littered with tarot cards and other paraphernalia.
some recent gallop polls have suggested that 25-40% of americans believe in at least one paranormal event, anything from ESP, astrology, ghosts or telepathy. even more recently, gallop suggested that 82% of americans believe in god, and another 9% believe in some sort of "universal spirit." mind you, that each of these subjects have zero scientific evidence. the common solution for believers of the paranormal is to claim that either "faith and god is beyond scientific understanding" or simply choose to distort and twist science so that it somehow concludes their point correct.
i find the latter to be more prevalent, simply because modern science is doing such a profound job at discrediting the supernatural, that it is almost impossible to ignore the evidence.
the "creation museum" has recently opened in kentucky, proclaiming the scientific truth of creationism--which usually represents the belief that the universe and the world was created by god not more than 6,000 years ago. this museum features (wait for it) humans walking alongside dinosaurs--even noah stored baby dinosaurs upon the ark (well, now that that's settled.) the blatant disregard for the facts, and ultimately truth, is so prevalent in our culture that it astounds me that we all still bear the psychological grounding to function together.
well, perhaps astound is not completely correct. god certainly gets plenty of lip service, but do people really believe in their so-called faiths? religion and new ageism had bridged the gap between us and our world in human infancy, filling it with gods and mysticism when the scientific method and technology was unavailable to us. there is much we know now--third graders know more about the universe than did the so-called great theologians of our past--st. aquinas, augustine and the rest. (it was of course, st. aquinas who taught the archaic belief that unsaved children are sent to a state of limbo, now just recently renounced. are these the types of things we should spent our years on this planet considering?)
no doubt, the belief may require no evidence, but it is clear that people want to believe--or as carl sagan put it, the "belief [is based] on the deep-seated need to believe." and obviously, most can't tell the difference.
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