CEO – Magick stores
Head – Global Wicca Tradition
Head Priestess – Earth Healing Temple
This is how an internet portal describes her:
"Swati Prakash was initiated into the realms of divination, magick and transformation at the age of 11 when she spontaneously started creating spells and horoscopes, a skill inherited from her past lives. Her interest in the occult grew with several psychic insights that took her deeper into realms of Wicca, Dream-working, Past Life Therapy, Energy Healing and Tarot."
She was a charming person nevertheless she made some really absurd claims during the course of the workshop like about how her friend who practiced Wicca could memorize the Chemistry textbook without even opening it. She also mentioned a strange worm with beard and glasses that appeared for a week while she and her coterie were performing some Wiccan rituals.
It was preposterous to think that claims like these would not go unchallenged. Most people choose to express their disagreement by leaving the lecture hall. However I choose to ask her questions to give her a chance of explain her position.
I asked her if she would be willing to undergo a test administered by independent observers to verify her claims. After all it is the privilege of the shishya to demand proof if he is not convinced of the claims made by his guru. This probably came as a surprise to her, who had always encountered people willing to submit rather meekly to her instead of poking holes in her theories before accepting them. Visibly flustered she replied " You should learn to respect people who know more than you. I can prove them, but you will need to join us and I charge a very hefty fees for that."
Maybe she had some aversion to the scientific method or science. I decided to check her blog. I found an article explaining how Einstein had proved that mass and energy are equivalent and how we are nothing but energy. (The most obnoxious interpretation of his theory that I have come across.) She seemed to me a person willing to internalize the authority of science when it seemed convenient but never internalize its spirit.
After the lecture, I was determined to further explain myself so I wrote a long email to her at 2 am. Obviously, I did not receive any reply. Nevertheless, it was a long letter and I had spent half an hour of my precious time writing it so it would be a shame if it wasn't reproduced here to add to the voyeuristic delights otherwise offered only by Facebook.
Here goes.
_______________________
You might remember me as the guy who asked that particularly incisive question at your recent seminar in IIT B (Mood Indigo). Firstly, I would like to express regret and apologize if I came off as too harsh and rude. That was never my intention. In a battle of ideas, cults of personality should always take a backseat. Therefore, I urge you to purge all feelings of animosity towards me as a prerequisite to reading the rest of this letter. I expect you to remain highly skeptical of whatever I say in this letter as you should be, ideally. Please give due considerations to the points I have mentioned in this letter and respond to them, if you wish. I would like to hear your point of view in great detail.
Now, from what I have inferred there could be three situations possible. Also, it would greatly help if you considered my comments in each case separately i.e Comments in a particular case belong only if that case is true.
A] You are correct about whatever you say and I am mistaken. In this case, please read the rest of the letter and correct me. I am prepared to pay the hefty fees you mentioned if you can establish beyond doubt your case. I recognize the limitations of the 5 senses of Human beings, but there must be some experiment we could do that would yield observable results we could introspect upon. This is the one of the best ways to prove your case. Alternatively we can set up an experiment that will falsify your hypothesis, this will be the best way to prove my case. This is because a single negation is sufficient to destroy a general theory whereas an uncountable number of affirmations cannot completely prove a theory. Newton's classical mechanics theory was falsified by Einstein's theory in the same way. You may argue that there is no reason to learn something that is bound to be falsified in the future. Infact, there is. Atleast, we know what not to believe and what is untrue if we proceed like this.
If you are still angry with me, you can cast an evil spell on me that will wipe my existence. Even though I may be dead (in heaven or hell depending on where you want to send me) , I will be happy because you will have proved your point and corrected me.
B] You know that you are incorrect, and you are compelled to cheat/swindle others because of the strong economic incentives underlying it. You believe there is no harm in doing so, as ultimately people report feeling relaxed, happy because of your courses, and it justifies hiding facts from them.This seems the most likely case to me. If this is so, then there is a very strong probability that you will ignore this letter as it will raise some difficult questions. In general, my opposition to this continuing will base on the fact that infact, people are actually getting harmed by believing in this, especially young children whose logical/analytical skills arent yet developed and thus they depend on their parents to show them the correct path. By getting impressioned by concepts like Wicca and Witchcraft, they are prone to substitute development of scientific temper and rational thought which is inherent among children in a nascent stage (as they are prone to ask questions like "What is this?" , "How does this work?") with anti-skepticism, intellectual slavery and suspension of thought that aids discovery.For adults, this could grow really big and take the shape of a religion or a cult as most cults have developed and subject the next generation of children who ideally should be agnostics, to intellectual slavery. No doubt our present society has done its lot to suppress the inquisitive spirit in children by imposing taboos on questioning or acquiring certain kinds of knowledge especially taboos regarding sex, on questioning the authenticity of religion e.t.c. Some religions have gone so far as to impose death penalties on people abdicating their fold. I understand that questioning the authenticity of Wicca so ferociously is unjustified if you do not consider other religions. Infact, my points apply to other religions that impose taboos on questioning, free thought and inquisitiveness too in the same way as they apply to Wicca.
Intellectual slavery is a very dangerous thing as it engulfs entire swathes of people without them realizing it and gives rise to dogmas which are the anathema of civilization and contribute to its decay and consequently mankind's. The European Renaissance and Reformation would never have happened if there weren't bold thinkers who could resist the majority and stick to reason.
C] You are incorrect and you believe your theories to be correct based on the supportive testimonials of others.Equally likely. Its a well known fact that today's world has increasingly grown very stressful because of the pugnacious competition and the absence of love and warmth from people in general. People are seeking respite in things they find comforting and pleasurable. As a result, they would give credence to anything that helps them relax and that includes meditation (which is a powerful exercise to stabilize and relax the mind) , sweet smelling candles and incense and your pleasing personality when you accord them affection and warmth. There are other factors too but as I am not very conversant with Wicca, I cant comment on them.But clubbing them as a package and selling them as a worldview would be incredibly dishonest. These are things meant to be taken at their face value. Another factor in work is the placebo effect, which means that sometimes a cure or a therapy would work if people intensely believe in it. I would have gone in greater details about this but in the interests of keeping the letter short, I request you to read the Wikipedia article on this topic. A reason for the popularity of witchcraft could be the fascination for it and the mysticism behind it. As a big fan of mythological stories and legendary heroes and heroines, I can understand this. Also, another reason for believing in something is the way the psyche of human beings is constituted. They want to have a guiding hand or a protector to symbolize and recreate the ideal parent as most adults , all grown up suffer from some sort of insecurity or other. I am sure you would agree to this. You must have your own insecurities and I certainly have mine. A very wise person once said " The believer is happy but the doubter is wise" . This aphorism applies strongly here. Even Genghis Khan believed he was the scourge of God before he went on to massacre people, just like the modern day al-qaeda.
Again, I want to go deeper into this but I have limitations too. If you dont want to reply to me you can read or watch works of people like James Randi and Richard Dawkins.
I have deliberately kept this letter short and eliminated a lot of things to prevent it from being very boring. I could elaborate certain points if you wish or listen to counter arguments from you. I am a very reasonable man and I am amenable to changing my viewpoints if given sufficiently strong arguments. I hope you have as much pleasure reading about my thoughts in this letter as I had writing it. :)
Warm regards,
Pravin Sharma
Sophomore, IIT Kharagpur
Nice na?
