Indian Guru Baffles Doctors

[Puppycow]

Link to story on The Learning Channel site (http://tlc.discovery.com/news/afp/20031124/starvingman.html)

An Indian man who claims divine inspiration says he has survived 68 years without eating, drinking or relieving himself, baffling doctors who are unable to prove him an imposter.

Prahlad Jani, a 76-year-old whose extraordinary tale has won him a small band of devotees, took a dare and underwent round-the-clock surveillance at a hospital in Ahmedabad, the commercial capital of the western state of Gujarat.

Neurologist Sudhir Shah said Jani was under watch for 10 days, with a closed-circuit camera running, and that doctors were convinced he did not break any of his vows, although there was no way of verifying whether Jani has pulled it off for 68 years.

[The Don]

There's in depth discussion here:

http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=31177

[Darat]

See man doesn't eat/drink for 68 years (http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=31177)

[Darat]

Originally posted by The Don
There's in depth discussion here:

http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?s=&threadid=31177

I'd have beat you but I wanted my link to look more elegant.... ;)

[Yahweh]

The topic has been done a couple times, so why not gratuitously post pictures of adorable kittens...

http://216.218.248.155/datastore/80/94/b/8094b680592a9e1c0c58b376955304b2.jpg

[Puppycow]

Sorry if I posted something that was already being discussed. I read this article originally in The Japan Times, a respectable newspaper. I am not quite sure why it was newsworthy because the accomplishment itself seems very mundane. I think people have gone on hunger strikes for longer. and if you don't eat or drink, then you would naturally not need to relieve yourself (assuming you got it out of your system ahead of the test.

[!Xx+-Rational-+xX!]

This is false and full of fraudulent quackery! It can't be anything paranormal because the paranormal defies the superior skeptical view!



Only bright individuals have been ingenious enough to rightfully conclude that science denies the paranormal and the paranormal denies science since its trying to substitute the sum of what has been accomplished with the scientific method in place of rubbish claims and nonsensical quackery! - !Xx+-Rational-+xX!

[Darat]

Originally posted by Puppycow
Sorry if I posted something that was already being discussed. I read this article originally in The Japan Times, a respectable newspaper. I am not quite sure why it was newsworthy because the accomplishment itself seems very mundane. I think people have gone on hunger strikes for longer. and if you don't eat or drink, then you would naturally not need to relieve yourself (assuming you got it out of your system ahead of the test.

Don't apologise - no harm done! It's just that when we start discussing the same topic in several threads it gets a bit difficult to remember which thread you made which point in.

And I hadn't noticed you’re a new poster so welcome to the forum - hope you enjoy it.

[Zep]

Originally posted by !Xx+-Rational-+xX!
This is false and full of fraudulent quackery! It can't be anything paranormal because the paranormal defies the superior skeptical view!



Only bright individuals have been ingenious enough to rightfully conclude that science denies the paranormal and the paranormal denies science since its trying to substitute the sum of what has been accomplished with the scientific method in place of rubbish claims and nonsensical quackery! - !Xx+-Rational-+xX! You could do with a thorough soak, wash, rinse and spin-dry, towlie.

[MRC_Hans]

Originally posted by Puppycow
Sorry if I posted something that was already being discussed. I read this article originally in The Japan Times, a respectable newspaper. I am not quite sure why it was newsworthy because the accomplishment itself seems very mundane. [color=crimson]I think people have gone on hunger strikes for longer[color]. and if you don't eat or drink, then you would naturally not need to relieve yourself (assuming you got it out of your system ahead of the test. For 68 years?? Hardly. Oh, you mean the 10 days he was under surveillance? Well, that is typical woowoo type evidence: We watched him not eating or drinking for 10 days, so the 68 years he claims must be true!

Anyhow, being controlled by people who believe in him? :rolleyes:


Sorry. -- Yahve is, as often happens, right. Bring on the kittens! (http://ftp.sunet.se/pub/pictures/animals/cats/3kissar.jpg)

Hans

[mummymonkey]

http://www.ibrox.freeserve.co.uk/images/kits2.jpg

[Rolfe]

http://www.b5-dark-mirror.demon.co.uk/graphics/caramel.jpg

I'm just doing this because I like the picture. It was a perfectly sensible topic, it had just been discussed to death in two other recent threads.

Rolfe.

[WildCat]

Originally posted by Rolfe
[IMG]I'm just doing this because I like the picture. It was a perfectly sensible topic, it had just been discussed to death in two other recent threads.
Rolfe.
Hey, I though kitty porn was against the rules! Oh, what the hell...
http://home.mindspring.com/~turniton/payton08.jpg

[Iamme]

Wildcat---How did you get a picture of my (now dead) cat?!!!!!:c2:

[ceptimus]

Satisfy all your kitten picture requirements here (http://homepage.mac.com/darkle/kitties/).

http://homepage.mac.com/darkle/kitties/cat_0198.jpg

[DickK]

You guys really are so insensitive. My last cat died a while back from old age and now these pictures are making me...oh, great, now I have guilt! :(

[arcticpenguin]

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=757&e=10&u=/ap/20031202/ap_on_re_us/graveyard_garage


MICHIGAN CITY, Ind. - Officers wearing oxygen tanks to protect themselves from the stench removed 49 dead cats from a garage where they had died while waiting for a woman to find them new homes, authorities said.

[Psiload]

My kind of cat...
http://home.clara.net/arlev/kitbits17e1.jpg

[Iamme]

Psiload---How did you get a picture of my (now dead) cat?!!!!!!!

I am not making this up. Swear on a book of alien Bibles. I had a cat that looked JUST LIKE...EXACTLT LIKE...Wildcats picture, above. I also had as my second cat, which was a grandson of Wildcat's posted cat, a cat I named "Whitey", that looked JUST LIKE the cat you posted. I am NOT making these up. In fact, both cats weighed about what the pictures of each of these cats look like they would weigh.

[Puppycow]

Ok, I can play this game too. I submit the most evil cat. http://www.mycathatesyou.com/images/alice_110902.jpg

[!Xx+-Rational-+xX!]

http://www.student.smsu.edu/s/san232s/hardfunnypics/omfgcat-meyou.jpg

[!Xx+-Rational-+xX!]

!

http://www.student.smsu.edu/s/san232s/hardfunnypics/angrywetcatnotamused.jpg

[SteveGrenard]

Originally posted by Puppycow
Sorry if I posted something that was already being discussed. I read this article originally in The Japan Times, a respectable newspaper. I am not quite sure why it was newsworthy because the accomplishment itself seems very mundane. I think people have gone on hunger strikes for longer. and if you don't eat or drink, then you would naturally not need to relieve yourself (assuming you got it out of your system ahead of the test.

Welcome puppy to the forum. In response to your post above, nobody ever has gone on a hunger strike for longer than 68 years and lived --- since the world's record for a hunger strike prior to sure and certain death is 66 days and that world's record belongs to Bobby Sands, an IRA prisoner who died in Maze Prison, Northern Ireland after 66 days without eating. But he did drink before he went into a coma and finally died. It would be impossible for survive for more than a week without fluids and salts.

This case is pure and simple poppycock.
Nobody can watch this guy 24 x 7 for years to make sure he is telling the truth and ten days in the hospital under medical observation hardly comes near the record. Assuming he was carefully observed and ate or drank nothing given to him, he may've even recycled his own urine to obtain fluids and salts during that period.

[Ratman_tf]

Originally posted by SteveGrenard


This case is pure and simple poppycock.
Nobody can watch this guy 24 x 7 for years to make sure he is telling the truth and ten days in the hospital under medical observation hardly comes near the record. Assuming he was carefully observed and ate or drank nothing given to him, he may've even recycled his own urine to obtain fluids and salts during that period.

Who's being all closed minded now? ;)

[SteveGrenard]

My statement is based on scientific evidence and the record. The world's record for starving oneself and remaining alive remains with Bobby Sands, an IRA member and British political prisoner in Northern Ireland. If this guru is willing to suspend himself in a plexiglass box over the Ganges for the next 90 days without food or water, I will be happy to accept the new record. If someone does it for 180 days I would accept that and if someone does it for 60 years, I'd accept that. In the meantime Bobby Sands holds the longest verifiable record* and we can't take that away from him.

(*He was in prison under 24 hour watch).

A physically living human being cannot extract all the water, electrolytes (salts), proteins, fats and carbs they need to survive for 68 years simply by breathing. Plants can obtain nutrients this way but no higher living member of the animal kingdom (that includes people) can do this for years and years. Maybe this guy is a plant? If verifiable evidence is ever presented to the contrary it can be considered and evaluated. Do you have any Ratman? I assume you do or you wouldn't have made this remark. Please present it.
Anything is possible.

Right now evidence in this case is not verifiable since no one has kept this guru under 24 X 7 physical observation for 68 years. 10 days in the hospital doesn't cut it. Let him check in for the next 90 days and let's see what happens. All I can say is that his doctors seem far too easy to baffle. If they researched the literature on starvation they would've known keeping him under close watch for 68 days would've been more evidential.

[Zep]

Well said, Steve.

And do you think this modus operandi is applicable to other extraordinary claims?

[SteveGrenard]

One must research and examine the published reports and scientific evidence for any claims and weigh the preoponderance of evidence for and against such claims to arrive at a conclusion.

There is a small but well verified literature on the subject of starvation. There are also excellent medical case histories involving patients who suffer from cachexia and anorexia as well that support such findings. The guru's doctors should have boned up (pun intended) on this prior to making any pronouncements based on 10 days of observation.

[CFLarsen]

Wrong.Originally posted by Zep
And do you think this modus operandi is applicable to other extraordinary claims?

I know why you are asking. You are asking, because Steve seems to be able to grasp how science is done in any other field than the paranormal. Schwartz, Josephson, Sheldrake and others exhibit the same double-thinking.

It is fascinating to observe.

(Btw, Laurence McKeown, also in Maze prison, refused to eat for 70 days and were then force-fed. He survived.)

[UnrepentantSinner]

Sheldrake is on Coast to Coast right now.

Anyone have any info on his dog telepathy study?

[CFLarsen]

Originally posted by UnrepentantSinner
Sheldrake is on Coast to Coast right now.

WOW!! I MUST HAVE HAD A PSYCHIC PREMONITION!!! SOMEBODY ALERT LUCIANARCHY!!!! :D

Originally posted by UnrepentantSinner
Anyone have any info on his dog telepathy study?

Do we have to listen to the show, or can we just tune in telepathically? :D

[Graham]

Originally posted by CFLarsen

Do we have to listen to the show, or can we just tune in telepathically? :D

Just get your dog to tell you what he says . . .

[Zep]

Originally posted by CFLarsen
Wrong.

I know why you are asking. You are asking, because Steve seems to be able to grasp how science is done in any other field than the paranormal. Schwartz, Josephson, Sheldrake and others exhibit the same double-thinking.

It is fascinating to observe.
Gosh, was it THAT obvious?? :D

I'm certain Steve was well aware of that nuance, and his answer would seem to indicate that is the case.

At least Steve is no idiot by a long chalk, and usually doesn't need to be told stuff twice, three times, four times, five.... Unlike a couple of of recent posters...

[CFLarsen]

Originally posted by Zep
Gosh, was it THAT obvious?? :D

It wasn't that subtle, let's put it that way :)

Originally posted by Zep
I'm certain Steve was well aware of that nuance, and his answer would seem to indicate that is the case.

Which is why his behavior is all the more fascinating. Why is it that a personal loss can make a person abandon rationality?

Originally posted by Zep
At least Steve is no idiot by a long chalk, and usually doesn't need to be told stuff twice, three times, four times, five.... Unlike a couple of of recent posters...

Could you repeat that, please? ;)

Oh, I dunno about Steve....he has a habit of reposting the same, tired arguments some time after they have been driven into the ground, in the hopes that people have forgotten.

[Ed]

Originally posted by DickK
You guys really are so insensitive. My last cat died a while back from old age and now these pictures are making me...oh, great, now I have guilt! :(


I will help you communicate with your dead cat for $12.50.

Results guarenteed.

[SteveGrenard]

Originally posted by Zep
Gosh, was it THAT obvious?? :D

I'm certain Steve was well aware of that nuance, and his answer would seem to indicate that is the case.

At least Steve is no idiot by a long chalk, and usually doesn't need to be told stuff twice, three times, four times, five.... Unlike a couple of of recent posters...


I am not as pessimistic as many biologists and medical scientists who want to throw out the baby with the large quantity of new-agey water that has accumulated up to now but I, like many others, understand the desire to do so. People do draw a line between what they are just willing to believe
and what they consider utter nonesense and do so at different places. Being closed minded has nothing to do with it. This was a claim I drew the line on.

There seem to be people commenting here who think they know what my limit is. I will tell them since they could not possibly know. It is determined by subjective and objective factors. Starvation case histories are just that, case histories; they are anecdotal and therefore subjective and yet I appeal to these in my refutation of this guru, whose claim is one of the places I draw the line (and I will explain why below). Objective confusion and, therefore, well justified unease, is created by the temptation of those who might accept this gurus claims or, any new idea, to explain what is novel quite carelessly and without personally verifiable evidence. This carelessness is extended to new terms (e.g. breatherian) and concepts which have absolutely no clear and well understand definitions in mainstream science. Some protagonists of such new agey ideas adopt terms and concepts which are clear to establishment science but these have to be carefully evaluated in the absence of evidence as well. If I were living back in the times of the Fox Sisters and Stainton Moses, without what we know now about quantum theory, I would be lining up squarely on the side of the naysayers.

Nonetheless the scientist or, in this case skeptics (since all the pseudononymous posters here do not claim a professional scientific background or occupation) should, for their part, resist the temptation to declare it all nonesense because of their neglisence in examining the evidence for themselves. I think this is partly the result of the internet generation, a unique, pop information age, that gives quick and non-critical appraisals to almost anything one can think of. There are millions of people out there with their own points of view and who are not shy about extolling their viewpoints. In fact I am one such, doing so right here as have others.

The true skeptic and scientist should, to the best of their ability, attempt to translate back from the alleged phenomenon (which may necessitate circular reasoning) to the originally observed facts and begin with their own hopefully more well founded considerations there. This is what I have done with respect to the claim of this guru who says he has not eaten or drunk a single molecule of food or water for 68 years.

However, room should be permitted to present the full intellectual scope of modern science in such well founded interpretations as follows......

Insofar as the specific details of this guru's claim, I have noted the following. That he says he has not eaten food or partook of water for 68 years. If this is his exact claim, it is spurious since one CAN survive for a hundred years without "food" or "water" but rather other fluids, nutrients, minerals and so forth. If this is merely a semantic game this ascetic is playing and I suspect it is, than the world press and his doctors have been suitably and properly duped.

As to why I think the claim is spurious, it is precisely because of all people, Sheldrake's theories could not be possible without the intake of fuel
(food) to provide the metabolism which produces the energy required to make Sheldrake's claims even remotely viable.

The possibility of macroscopic quantum structures (coherence) developing in enegy-pumped systems (e.g. living animals including humans) suggests going beyond inanimate systems in nature. This suggests that the entire phenomenon of LIFE (a subject we have been grappling with elsewhere) just might be connected directly to the newly discovered (by physicists) fundamental holistic structure of reality.

Biological systems might, in fact, function similarly to a laser. For this you need to predicate such an understanding on the work of Franz-Albert Popp(*) and his disciples on the biofield, especially that part of the biofield evidenced by the existence of biophotons. Such open systems require a continuous input of energy and they obtain this from their metabolism fueled by the ingestion of food By means of a sufficiently strong energy pump, it might then be possible to create thermal disequilibrium states in molecular systems exciting low frequency oscillatory modes coherently and with great power. Bose-Einstein condensation would allow for this. Examples, I am told, have been given of this in quantum field theory which may be suitable for an interpretation of living systems.

In short Zep yes I don't need to be told anything more than once, or at all. I have my own rationales for the conclusions I reach and they often supravene those of the very ill-informed prejudicial points of view of individuals who would throw out the baby with the bath water. If I am wrong and it can be shown to me, I will say so. If it is something that remains uncertain, as a true skeptic, I will say so as well.

edited to add refs:

For a complete bibliogfraphy as well as links to several on-line papers, click on:

http://www.lifescientists.de/ib_003e_.htm

Click Complete Bibliography Link inside yellow box on this page.

Popp,F.A. et al: 1992. Recent Advances in Biophoton Research and its applications. World, Singapore.

Popp,F.A. 1983. Coherent excitations in biological systems in Frohlich & Kremer, eds. Berlin Springer.

Popp,F.A. 1979. Electromagnetic Bio-Information. Munich.

[CFLarsen]

Originally posted by SteveGrenard
There seem to be people commenting here who think they know what my limit is. I will tell them since they could not possibly know.

No, no, Steve. We are pointing out that you choose to disregard your otherwise excellent ability to discern between good and bad data, when it comes to paranormal subjects.

Originally posted by SteveGrenard
The true skeptic and scientist should, to the best of their ability, attempt to translate back from the alleged phenomenon (which may necessitate circular reasoning) to the originally observed facts and begin with their own hopefully more well founded considerations there. This is what I have done with respect to the claim of this guru who says he has not eaten or drunk a single molecule of food or water for 68 years.

But you will not do the same with mediums?

Originally posted by SteveGrenard
However, room should be permitted to present the full intellectual scope of modern science in such well founded interpretations as follows......

Founded on what?

Originally posted by SteveGrenard
As to why I think the claim is spurious, it is precisely because of all people, Sheldrake's theories could not be possible without the intake of fuel (food) to provide the metabolism which produces the energy required to make Sheldrake's claims even remotely viable.

Which theories of Sheldrake - if any - do you find "viable"?

Originally posted by SteveGrenard
The possibility of macroscopic quantum structures (coherence) developing in enegy-pumped systems (e.g. living animals including humans) suggests going beyond inanimate systems in nature. This suggests that the entire phenomenon of LIFE (a subject we have been grappling with elsewhere) just might be connected directly to the newly discovered (by physicists) fundamental holistic structure of reality.

Please point to the experimental body of data that shows - or even hints - at the existence of "macroscopic quantum structures". WTF is that, anyway?

Originally posted by SteveGrenard
Biological systems might, in fact, function similarly to a laser. For this you need to predicate such an understanding on the work of Franz-Albert Popp(*) and his disciples on the biofield, especially that part of the biofield evidenced by the existence of biophotons. Such open systems require a continuous input of energy and they obtain this from their metabolism fueled by the ingestion of food By means of a sufficiently strong energy pump, it might then be possible to create thermal disequilibrium states in molecular systems exciting low frequency oscillatory modes coherently and with great power. Bose-Einstein condensation would allow for this. Examples, I am told, have been given of this in quantum field theory which may be suitable for an interpretation of living systems.

Please point to the evidence of "biophotons".

Please explain what Bose-Einstein condensation is.

Please explain why Bose-Einstein condensation would allow for a "thermal disequilibrium states in molecular systems exciting low frequency oscillatory modes coherently and with great power".

Originally posted by SteveGrenard
In short Zep yes I don't need to be told anything more than once, or at all. I have my own rationales for the conclusions I reach and they often supravene those of the very ill-informed prejudicial points of view of individuals who would throw out the baby with the bath water. If I am wrong and it can be shown to me, I will say so. If it is something that remains uncertain, as a true skeptic, I will say so as well.

You are not a skeptic, Steve. But you do have your own rationales for the conclusions you reach.

[CFLarsen]

Bump for Steve.

[T'ai Chi]

*bump* so people can reminisce(sp) about 2003.

[CFLarsen]

*bump* so people can reminisce(sp) about 2003.
Unsolved issues.

You have a problem with that?