Poet Prophet of Alternative Medicine

Alternative Medicine
1

Time Magazine recently called Deepak Chopra one of the top 100 heroes and icons of THE CENTURY. His Quantum Healing is still one of the Amazon.com bestsellers after 25 years. I have read his book very carefully because I wanted to discuss it with my class - I am a physics professor - to make my students aware of the kinds of nonsense that make it to the top of popular bestselling lists. Here are some of the things I discovered:
–The second “edition” of Quantum Healing came out only one years after the first. The only difference between the two is the removal of the name of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi.
–Chopra uses discoveries of the scientific medicine to reach a point where there is no immediate answer to a medical puzzle, then he attacks scientific medicine for not being able to answer that puzzle!
–He cannot distinguish between parts and the whole, and concludes that a sugar molecule is intelligent!
–Using his line of reasoning for the power of mind over body, you can show that a sneeze can cause an earthquake!
There are many other absurd discussions and syllogisms that prove the emptiness of the “scientific basis” of alternative medicine - in this case Ayurveda. I have posted several articles here] that may be of interest.
Sam

2

I have to assume they included him under the category of icon because that doesn’t really mean much. An icon is just someone who is in the public consciousness even though that person may be a total idiot. Its hard for me to believe anyone at Time actually thinks of him as a hero. Still its scary that the public shows much interest in someone who is a complete fraud

3
I have to assume they included him under the category of icon because that doesn't really mean much. An icon is just someone who is in the public consciousness even though that person may be a total idiot. Its hard for me to believe anyone at Time actually thinks of him as a hero. Still its scary that the public shows much interest in someone who is a complete fraud
Even Hitler can be identified as an icon. It doesn't mean "hero." As you point out it is just someone or something who is in the public consciousness, for either good or bad reasons. Lois
4

The iconic Hitler led an entire nation to fascism. The iconic Chopra and others are leading an entire nation to ignorance. Can - should - we do anything about it? In a very small way skepticaleducator.org] is trying!
Sam

5

Chopra is peddling easy answers to hard questions, and there is a large audience for that kind of thing. He attacks medical science for not having all the answers, a common argument against science by the religious as well. What he and his audience don’t grasp is that science never claimed it had all the answers and doesn’t expect to. The more we know, the more we realize we don’t know.
Not everyone is buying what he’s selling. There is a sizable part of the population that will never give his claims a second thought. His claims would crumble, and his book sales would plummet if were taken seriously on a larger scale because his claims can’t survive that much scrutiny.

6

PS, the label icon is nothing more than marketing by his PR people. Time magazine seeks fantastic headlines to sell its publication. They would never stoop so low as to give an honest evaluation of anyone or anything.