Thursday, October 08, 2009

Basava Premanand (1930-2009)

On October 4 of this year Basava Premanand died.

You may never have heard of Premanand, but in addition to physically reminding me a bit of James Randi, Premanand also had his own paranormal challenge and dedicated his life to debunking "godmen" of India. Just days before he died, according to a special release of the e-zine Bangalore Skeptic, he drafted and signed a statement attesting he was of sound mind and still as skeptical as ever. He didn't want any tales of death-bed confessions to haunt his reputation, after his death.

If you haven't ever heard of Premanand, I urge you to look him up and read about him and the sorts of problems Indian skeptics are addressing.

2 comments:

  1. I'll cheer anyone who goes out of his way to point out he has not had a death bed conversion.

    "Oh and by the way, I still don't believe...grrp". Classic.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I created an Xtranormal.com animation based on B. Premanand's deathbed testimonial (as transcribed on Pharyngula) and posted it to my YouTube channel here:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_nH6_pzVDg

    Enjoy!

    ReplyDelete

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