Jose Lourenco's report on the function
 

This evening I attended the 2005 Goemchem Prize award function. Very interesting evening. A lot of good people, the genial Basilio Monteiro who conducted the event with warmth, Cecil Pinto, the man behind the scenes, Margaret Mascarenhas who moderated the discussion sensitively, Samir Kelekar fresh from his stimulating lecture to the Goa Chamber of Commerce the previous evening and many other people. And then of course the awardee, Andha Shraddha (anti-superstition) activist Mr.Nigalye and the Chief Guest Prof Alito Sequeira. There were less people than the first award
function, maybe on account of the heavy rains, but it was quite an intelligent and distinguished crowd.

The discussion on unscientific methods turned out quite surreal. To this gathering of diverse people, Mr.Nigalye termed pujas, astrology, intuition, ayurveda to be of dubious value (to put it mildly).

The learned Prof Alito Sequeira questioned the absoluteness of scientific empiricism, maintaining that what is non-rational also has a place in our lives. This set the stage for an electric tension in
the hall to which the audience also contributed. It was great to see different views being expressed.

What might have been an average awards event turned out to be a profound philosophical exchange. Margaret questioned the difference between superstition and religious ritual. Samir defended science against Alito’s attack. A learned museum curator spoke of the concept of social God and personal God with Sanskrit quotes. Another gentleman, I think he was a priest, asserted that religion and superstition have always been associated, but gently reminded us that a good religious attitude accepts a force greater than us and surrenders to it while superstition attempts to control and dominate in a negative way. Others agreed that superstition has been used as a weapon of control. Though the convict of the evening was superstition, religious beliefs also came under the hammer. Nigalye was charming in his simplicity and provided many light moments.

The Gandhian sage , Mr. Gurunath Kelekar exhorted Goans to become citizens rather than mere voters and outlined his NGO’s goals. Ms. Albertina Almeida spoke of modern superstition , questioning the Church’s stance on divorce.

No solutions were found to the world’s problems, but it was a truly stimulating evening. Many among the audience, nay the entire audience would probably have loved to debate the issues for another two hours, but time sped by and the event came to a close. Hats off to the Cyber committee members who put this together. It was a celebration of free-thinking and intellectual reflection. Cheers to Dr.Santosh Helekar and his friends !
 

Pease click on the thumbnail images for larger ones

Cecil & Margaret / Ramrao / Alito & Samir

Margaret / Nighale / Alito

Letter to Editor in Navhind Times dated August 6th 2005

Full text of Prof. Alito Sequeira's address at the Goenchem Prize Ceremony 

Allow me to congratulate Mr Nigale the recipient of this year Goenchem Prize. This is I think a special kind of prize. Controlled by persons who live far and wide, the prize is less amenable to the pulls and pressures of the immediate and local. I feel privileged to share my views with you on this occasion, also because the organizers have been more than gracious in inviting me knowing well that I may not share entirely their perspective on issues they espouse. Thank you for your generosity.

I did my schooling in a Catholic institution in Goa. There the students who were Hindu or Muslim were as a matter of course referred to as 'Non-catholic' in documents such as the time-table, handbook etc. Much later in life, I have come to learn that to call persons non-catholic is to categories persons by what they are not (an absence) and hence erase and deny what they are. Today's topic begins with the term '' Unscientific methods and practices'. Once we have categorised the practices by the absence of science, what legitimacy can we discuss, except to make the rather banal statement that each practice has its own rationality, take it or leave it.

It is not incidental that Science and Religion share similar discourses and modes of addressing the other. The Term 'superstition' comes from the long tradition of Western religion (from Cicero) and as defined by St. Thomas is the worship of false gods or the improper worship of true gods. When science began to see itself as substituting religion as the final arbitrator of all knowledge it too burrowed the term 'superstition' for all practices that did not conform to its tenants.

What I propose to share with you today is my own muddling efforts of coping with Science, Religion and what those two term as superstition.

As an adolescent, struggling to cope with my own questions of identify and self confidence I felt rebellious towards the norms and values that came to be from the outside - particularly my family and school. The sixties were drawing to and end and, anti-establishment vibes was all over the place. The church as institutional monolith and the family as disciplining institution were the symbolic targets for my rebellion. It was easy to expose the inconsistency in the devout Catholic family I belonged to. My church venerating aunt would, in the quite of the evening pull out her instruments and 'remove disht', whenever any persons returned from visiting a new or strange place. My uncle who had spent years in a Trappist monastery would visit the Ghaddi when faced with any piquant circumstance in his business matters. The priests in the family would turn a nelsons eyes to these superstitious practices while coming down with a heavy hand on the younger generation that questioned the faith. It became clear to me that Science was the only way out, the only edifice that could lead to valid and certain knowledge. Science which relied on reason and empirical evidence was what we needed to put an end to this charade. I took to Marxism that pushed Science one step further and promised that the application of Science could transform society, liberate it from superstition and eradicate conflict and poverty.

When I joined post graduate education I chose Sociology. I decided to keeps miles away from the woolly Sociology of Religion and dived into the Sociology of Science. Here I was introduced to the New Philosophers of Science through the works of Karl Popper, Imre Lakatos, Thomas Khun and Paul Feyerband. Through these authors I learnt that the empirical evidence given by science was not in the ultimate analysis beyond doubt and as the philosopher W V O Quine put it 'the Greek's worldview of Homeric gods is as credible as the physicists' world of electromagnetic waves'. I also came
across Godel's undecidability theorem which proved that in every formal system there exist propositions that can be neither proved nor disproved. Though at times the extrapolation to other domains of knowledge is suspect, from all this it became clear to me that the belief held in my earlier years that system of Science could prove its superiority over other systems of knowledge or its certainty was well ...superstition. This however does not preclude the possibility that one could still choose science over other systems, but then that is matter of preference.

Consequently I was introduced to the popular works of Werner Heisenberg, Douglas Hofstadter's 'Godel Escher and Bach', Fritjof Capra and Roger Penrose all of whom apply the insights of sub-atomic physics to the realm of consciousness. I was also looking for ways to validate my own experience and feelings and found comfort in the existential psychology of R D Laing and David Cooper and the literature of Fyodor Dostoevsky. For me Science was no longer omnipotent and the romanticism of existentialism which so attracted me did not provide the certainty that I would have love to have.

When I started teaching in Goa, I began working with an anthropologist who was studying Goa's native religiosity. I helped him and was also attracted by the magic and mystery of the deochar, the kaul prasad, bhar and such other ritual practices. I have spent some time in trying to make the strange familiar and in the process have seen different beliefs and practices and their consequences. Over time curiosity has given way to a degree of respect. I have also observed that these practices are not restricted to less educated villages but are part of normal every day life around me. A senior university teacher doubles up as a part time astrologer and another Professor of the hard sciences rushes to his Kul dev to take prasad, whenever he is confronted with a decision he needs to take. Yet others have joined new age religions and sects. I too occasionally peep into the astrology columns or consult with my astrologer colleague when I fell anxious about future events in my life. So what I experienced as duplicity in my childhood was writ large both within me and outside. Lest you think that this is a malady of the less developed world, Cecil recently forwarded me data of a gallop poll in the US which showed that 75% of the Americans were firm believers in paranormal phenomena.

Permit me to share with you the sense I try to make of this? I will do this through Illustrations:

From times earlier, persons in Goa are visited by Shantadurga Fotorpekin in their dreams. She makes all sorts of demands which her devotees are pleased to oblige. Since Freud we now know that dreams open us to realities within us which are not in our conscious awareness but deeply effect the way we behave, choose and live. The difficult with Freud's psychoanalysis is however that it tries to bring the unconscious to the conscious and assumes that it can do so through reason. As I have learnt from Anjali, Jung seems to offer a less reductive approach in allowing the unconscious to live and create through us rather than attempting to rationalise it through the conscious. It appears to me that our native systems of knowledge were alive to these realities and found what were then and at
times today appropriate ways of coping with these realities outside our conscious awareness.

Again ritual practices through agents such as Ghaddis and the Bhar are rituals that open us up and out to different states of consciousness. In modern psychotherapy a whole range of therapies from dance to art and even drugs invite us to explore these different states of consciousness. What I am suggesting is that the practices that are at times dismissed as superstition are ways of coping with the realms of consciousness and realms of the non-rational that modern practices, scientific and otherwise are themselves exploring. I call these "non-rational" practices because they don't defy logic as "irrational" arguments do. They simply don't use logic at all.

Stephanie L. Hawkins has suggested: Our science is a drop, our ignorance a sea. Whatever else be certain, this at least is certain-that the world of our present natural knowledge is enveloped in a larger world of some sort of whose residual properties we at present can frame no positive idea.

Sometimes in the late eighties I recall an advertisement in a local paper which invited Hindus who would like to eat beef to join an occasion. This was an effort by some rationalist to debunk the food taboo among Hindus. There are also demonstrations and television serials that expose the miracles of Sadhus and such others. I doubt such exercises would take us far if only because these efforts are simply incapable of dealing with the non-rational in every day life.

Of course there are practices attributed to tradition that violates our contemporary sensitivities and values. And these must be dealt with. But let us also not forget that science in its practise generates its own myths and superstitions. When I was admitted to the GMC with acute bout of jaundice, the consultant prescribed Liv 52, an aurvedic drug which did not have the support of allopathic double blind testing. Much more serious is the myth of development and progress where all less developed countries aspire to live the life styles of a few countries in the West. Planners and experts all trained in their respective sciences tell us what we should or should not do to reach that state double fast. What is obvious is often forgotten, namely there is just not enough energy on the planet for the rest of us to sustain the high consumption life style for all.

As modern life becomes more complex and more uncertain, the non rational and unconscious is called upon to deal with much. Sammit, in a recent exploration has suggested that the rise of militant and violent Hindu Nationalism has something to do with the construction of the History of Indian which is enveloped and rooted in what he termed as "primordial shame". When we ignore our non-rational and that which is not conscious it erupts and takes rather fantastic forms. If there is a rise in the number of new age cults, god man and other practices it is not because we are irrational but rather because we avoid dealing with the non-rational and unconscious within us and our society. The problem is not too little science temper in society but rather too much scientific hegemony - to put it differently the privileging of science over all other forms of knowledge, eclipses the non-rational and that which is outside our conscious awareness.

Our selves as individuals and cultures are made up as much by our reason and awareness as by that which lies outside our reason and awareness. We are, I suggest all called to live and create with the tension of this paradox and not to privilege one over the other.

Alito Siqueira