Superstition Eradication Organization

[Kevin Saldanha]

Reading the message just posted by SOMU reminded me to forward this
thread to the group as my introduction and to thank you for allowing
me to be a member here.

I will also foward the original message in the subject line below as
appears to but been removed on this thread.

Kevin

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Kevin Saldanha <veg...@gmail.com>
Date: Mon, Sep 1, 2008 at 11:00 PM
Subject: Re: [GoenchimXapotam] Re: Fwd: Paul Kurtz to Embark on
Speaking Tour of India
To: Goenchi...@yahoogroups.com

Hi Chinmay,

Any organisation that is named 'Superstition Eradication Organization'
seems to be working in the right direction. Their target audience
would be mainly Hindu given that they operate in a predominantly Hindu
community and I am assuming they are much more conversant with that
ideology and superstitious tradition.

I have been accused of being anti-Catholic in my anti-religious
postings but the Roman Catholic flavour of Christianity is the
religion I was brought up with and am most familiar with their
superstitions. It is difficult for one person or organisation (other
than national or international ones like Centre for Inquiry or
International Humanist and Ethical Union) to be totally impartial to
specific faiths. I was pleased to find that one such international
organisation is based in India - Rationalist International
http://www.rationalistinternational.net/

We need to rid the world of superstition wherever it exists.
Unfortunately, many believers consider it synonymous with faith
although they may deny any connection. An interesting article about
Sanal Edamaruku defying tantric yogis death threats is documented on
the site as well as at http://tinyurl.com/6xg75s

I can see why the credibility of an organization targeting ones own
religion may be 'low'.

Kevin

On Mon, Sep 1, 2008 at 8:41 PM, Bhandare <chinmay...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> Dear Kevin:
>
> When you partner with any organization promoting rationalism in India kindly
> ensure that they are not targetting any one religion over others...ANS is
> know to target only hindus while remaining conspicuously silent about the
> superstitions and irrational practices being carried out by adherents of
> other faiths..
>
> as such their credibility in the eyes of average people is low and to the
> best of my knowledge they arent taken seriously by most people. ( i am open
> to correction on this one)
>
> just my 2 cents
> c
>
> --- On Mon, 9/1/08, kevin.saldanha <veg...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> From: kevin.saldanha <veg...@gmail.com>
> Subject: [GoenchimXapotam] Re: Fwd: Paul Kurtz to Embark on Speaking Tour of
> India
> To: Goenchi...@yahoogroups.com
> Date: Monday, September 1, 2008, 5:46 PM
>
> Thanks Santosh.
>
> Do you have an address? Phone number would be great too, if possible.
>
> The IHEU is looking to update their international directory of
> organizations that encourage free thinking.
>
> Our group (Halton Peel Humanist Community) is interested in partnering
> with an educational group in a developing country. Scientific-temper
> looks interesting. I just joined. Do you know if there are any
> mainstream educators onboard?
>
> Kevin
>
> --- In GoenchimXapotam@ yahoogroups. com, "Santosh Helekar"
> <chimbelcho@ ...> wrote:
>>
>> Hi Kevin,
>>
>> The name of the organization is Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti
>> (Superstition Eradication Organization) . The man to contact is
>> Yadneshwar Nigale, Porvorim, Goa. I don't have his phone number at the
>> moment. But I can try to get it for you. He does not have an email
>> address, as far as I know.
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> Santosh
>>
>> --- In GoenchimXapotam@ yahoogroups. com, "Kevin Saldanha" <vegvet@>
>> wrote:
>> >
>> > I was just wondering if anyone on this list knew of any formal
>> organization
>> > of the rationalist/ humanist type in Goa?
>> >
>> > Kevin
>> > cc. Secular Goa mailing list
>> >
>> >
>>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
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[Pravin Sabnis]

Welcome, Kevin!
You will definately add depth to our discussions.
I also hope Santosh will be active, too.

Six years ago, I too (like Chinmay)
found the "Anti-Superstitions" guys to be shrill and patronising...
... worse I found them following meaningless rituals in personal life.
But connecting to Somu Rao changed all that.
My consciousness opened to a huge revolution
undertaken by B Premanand, Dr Narendra Nayak and their rationalist
tribe.

I teamed up with Somu to connect to a mission
to connect students and teachers to the attitude of scientific
temper!
We conduct over 100 workshops every year.
We have also conducted "Train the Trainer" workshops
to train young persons to conduct training for students...
This discussion group was created to help all of us
to share and discover fresh questions & answers

BTW my professional competencies as a Corporate HRD Coach
are enhanced by my use of activities and concepts that
come from my workshops on environment, theatre and scientific
temper...
What I seek to underline is the fact that
Scientific Temper does WORK for everybody.
It makes life, a lot more exciting with the journey of discovery
and empowers self belief, possibility thinking
and the use of both right and left brain.

All of us need to connect to Mother Nature,
we must learn the skills of responsive communication
and most importantly we must develop scientific temper
in thought as well as behaviour.

While some activists of Andh-shraddha Nirmulan Samiti
are more reactive than responsive in their approach.
But there are others who are proactive and positive.

cheers
Pravin

> organisation is based in India - Rationalist Internationalhttp://www.rationalistinternational.net/

>
> We need to rid the world of superstition wherever it exists.
> Unfortunately, many believers consider it synonymous with faith
> although they may deny any connection.  An interesting article about
> Sanal Edamaruku defying tantric yogis death threats is documented on

> the site as well as athttp://tinyurl.com/6xg75s

> I can see why the credibility of an organization targeting ones own
> religion may be 'low'.
> Kevin
>

[chimb...@gmail.com]

On Sep 2, 9:14 pm, Pravin Sabnis <pravinsab...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>Welcome, Kevin!
> You will definately add depth to our discussions.
> I also hope Santosh will be active, too.
>

Hi Pravin,

I would be happy to participate. My limitations, however, are that I
do not like to preach to the converted, and I also do not want to
subscribe to any ideology. I have therefore confined myself to
contributing to general purpose mailing lists that are populated by
people who are by and large not impressed by the rational approach or
the scientific method.

Cheers,

Santosh

[Kevin Saldanha]

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving to all on this list...

 

I was completely flabbergasted by a recent conversation with a Grade 12 student who is doing a co-op placement with me at the clinic who completely believed that the earth is less than 10,000y old and that dating on rocks that are billions of years old probably are asteroids.  I don't know why I was so surprised since I have met professional veterinarians (Christian Veterinary Missions) and a pediatric neurologist who have exactly the same beliefs. 

 

Most of the students had no idea of general ages of the universe, earth and life on earth... basics that I thought every high school student should know among the details of the periodic table etc.

Kevin