Small rituals still have tremendous power over us, even if we do not notice it.
We do not notice how we begin to step over the cracks in the asphalt, we do not notice how we begin to count the steps. Or "similarities" met. We try to completely cover ourselves with a blanket, because if we do not do this, then a monster will seize us. Small, fluffy, innocent games with yourself.
But sometimes these games can turn into grotesque monsters, like shadows at sunset. And these monsters are much more dangerous than we used to think.
There are pseudosciences that are based on our desire to find order where there is none. For example, all my childhood I thought that the number 32768 haunted me. I saw it everywhere, wherever I looked. Others probably had this feeling too. Only I lied to you. This number did not pursue me, and it could not. Because it's too big. We were all chased by small numbers. Just because fuck you, you will come across a house with number 32768.
All such numbers that supposedly haunt us are the most common ones that we meet a hundred times a day. But we do not pay attention to them. Until at one moment we find that for the third time in a week we meet the number 64. And then it turns out that once in childhood we went to school on the 64th bus, and our grandmother's phone number starts with 64. We have not noticed this before. But now the game has begun. We will pay attention to every occurrence of this number. We will remember, we will come up with nonsense explanations. Can even tell others around their crazy theories on this score. And then some clever guy will take and begin to assign characteristics to numbers, link them with the character and fate of people. It is with character and destiny, because it is pathetic, it is important for us, this is what we want to know. No one will believe you if you saythat the numbers depend on how many kilograms of potatoes you eat in your life. People will immediately have unnecessary questions. But it is worth declaring that the date of your death depends on your favorite number, all questions will disappear by themselves.
It's the same with feng shui. If you told people that their toenails grow faster from the fact that the sofa is in the wrong place, they would twist a finger at their temples. By the way, try to call a Feng Shui master. Let him arrange all the furniture according to the rules. And then call another for the same purpose. And then call both of them at once and tell them that you will sue the one who lied to you.
The same can be done with fortune-tellers. Just go to two different fortune tellers in different roles.
By the way, about fortune-tellers. It is strange that people who can predict the future cannot win themselves a lot of money in the lottery.
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The same applies to people who supposedly can read minds. A couple of nights at the poker table would make them millionaires.
Some may assume that they simply do not need money. But then it remains a mystery to me why they ask for more in one session than the most venerable psychologists.
Since we have touched on the topic of money, let me tell you about the James Randi Foundation.
James Randi is a former illusionist who has dedicated himself to exposing obscurantists of all stripes. His foundation offered a $ 10,000 reward to anyone who could demonstrate supernatural abilities of any kind in a controlled experiment. He created this fund in 1996, and in 2002, through donations, the amount of the award increased to one million dollars.
There have been many attempts to receive this award, but none have been successful. And just a huge number of people already widely known in this field flatly refused to take part in this project. Including the famous Vanga.
Fortunetellers. Have you ever wondered why fortune tellers cannot express their prophecies more clearly? They always get something in the spirit of "When the white elephants walk along the edge of the ocean of wild diarrhea, then vegetables will descend to the promised land, thirsting for revenge."
Yes, the fact is that it is precisely in the blur that the prediction lies. Speak vaguely and you will always be right in the end.
I can say, "In tens of years, bad people will go to war against good people and good people will win," and in a hundred years, some smart guy will interpret this innocent remark as a prophecy of any of the thousands of wars that will happen during this period.
Recently, a study was carried out on the prophecies of Wanga, which she gave to specific people. According to the results of this study, she was right 65% of the time. It would seem that the result is very good. But the fact is that these "studies" were carried out by the so-called academician from the scam with the proud name of the Russian Academy of Clairvoyance and Healing of the name … who do you think? Yes, the name of Vanga.
And now we come to a new topic. In our time, no self-respecting charlatan can do without the support of science. And demand creates supply.
The point is that the legal framework in post-Soviet countries regulates the terms "academy" and "institute" very badly. Anyone who has enough money can open an academy. And no one cares what he will do.
And this is really a problem. Because these self-named scientists sculpt fake research, which then end up in all kinds of magazines and newspapers, right after the proud phrase "scientists have proved." And then, poking in the nose with this phrase, some donkey is trying to convince you that sun eating is possible and fucking good for your health.
Even without this, journalists very often distort the research of scientists in order to suck the sensation out of their finger, and together with these pseudoscientists they have filled literally the entire information space. You open a newspaper and read about how to save a soul or cause diarrhea in people with the power of thought. It would be better if they wrote about unicorns there.
And serious uncles and aunts with higher educations believe this garbage. And then you ask one of them if he believes in Santa Claus or leprechauns. He rounds his eyes, and is indignant - "Do I look like a young idiot?" Well, actually it is similar.
Oh, by the way, let's talk about the soul.
It's amazing how many people think that man is a supreme being, in no way related to animals. Well, if they don't think so, then my question is brewing: do animals have a soul? What about insects? Bacteria, viruses? Where is the line and how to recognize it? Some people are dumber than some chimpanzees. And which of them has a soul and who does not?
The concept of the soul itself is pretty harmless. Well, people believe in the soul, and let them. Maybe it's easier for them to live and die this way. But the fact is that a holy place is never empty.
There will always be some trader who wants to make money on your faith. Just believe in God, the main thing is not to pay anyone for it. Nowhere to spend money? Donate them to space exploration or cancer research.
Cancer. Yes. Deadly diagnosis. But even here the most cynical of the obscurantists manage to make money. They always rely on the patient's belief in some shnyaga, and make medicine out of this shnyaga.
This is perhaps the most dangerous kind of charlatanism for a person. And more often than not, the point is not in the "medicines" themselves, which are fed to the patient for fabulous grandmothers, but in the fact that a person completely and completely relies on this shit. And it turns out that he drinks urine instead of eating penicillin. Well, from here it is not far from the old woman with the scythe.
I have such an assumption that urinotherapy was invented purely to test how far a believing person can go beyond common sense. Well, if this is so, it remains only to flaunt the author of this venture.
It's the same with homeopaths. Listen to the attempts of modern businessmen from science to fit a more or less scientific foundation under homeopathy. What they do not use, right down to quantum mech, which they understand hardly better than the average ninth grader who has read Dawkins and Hawking.
Not all of them are liars, some are simply schizophrenics, who have completely gone on the basis of "positive thinking".
Positive thinking. What is it? This is when a person is sincerely convinced that if you really want something, it will inevitably happen. Apparently, according to their ideas, 95% of humanity very much wants to be bio-waste.
In general, most of all it resembles the dense concept of the idealists-pussies: "being is determined by consciousness." More precisely, its most primitive interpretation. No, well, seriously, what sane person, born later than the middle of the 19th century, would believe that his thoughts can influence the surrounding reality in some special, mystical way, no longer characteristic of any matter?
And what about those who preach this attitude towards life? Have they achieved anything with their method? To their own - no, but they achieved others, as ancient as the world and quite working: feed all your shit to people who are dumber than you, and take from them as much as possible for it.