Category: The Bazaar

  • New Age Link

    Wikipedia has an entry on New Age, and uses “New Age” as a category container for related entries. Wikipedia entries evolve. The main entry seems to have started in December 2001. The current version deals with the New Age, both as a social event and as a set of ideas, in an accurate and descriptive…

  • Seances, Carlos Castaneda etc

    Following the links from an essay, featured at AL Daily, published in the San Franciso Journal called “Leaving the Left“, I reached the web site of Keith Thompson, a writer in California. His site includes some of his freelance articles and essays including his interview of the writer and fakir Carlos Castaneda, and a magazine…

  • Mediums get Small grant

    A quick peek at the news from New Zealand – spiritualists get a civic grant to fund a counselling service.

  • Novel Perspectives???

    Yesterday, I posted a link to The Onion’s satire about fictionology. today, a perfect example of an intelligent person who chooses a value system that lets her choose fiction over fact because it helps her to feels better about herself. Check out this essay by Martha Montello, Novel Perspectives on Bioethics at the Chronicles of…

  • For a laugh

    Since this is from The Onion, I guess it’s satire. It’s an unfortunately believable story about cults and postmodern ideas about making up the religion you want. It’s called “Scientology losing Ground to New Fictionology.”

  • Holy Comets

    A Russian astrologer is suing NASA because a space mission, Deep Impact, is going to fire an explosive impactor into the Tempel-1 Comet. It’s against her religion. The story from SciAm Perspectives, the Web log of the editors of Scientific American, and from MosNews an English language Russian News service.

  • Cleansing

    There was an ad in the first section of today’s Free Press (Sat. March 5/05) for herbal and fiber “cleansing” products. It talked about getting rid of toxins by 7 cleansing channels – didn’t say which channels. The two channels that get the most attention in the marketplace are colon (aka bowel or large intestine)…

  • Fakir on Tour

    Last week the Free Press was running ads for Deepak Chopra’s visit to Winnipeg among the movie ads in the entertainment section. The show is called “An Evening with Deepak Chopra”, it’s at the Concert Hall on April 21, and ticket prices are from $45.00 to $150.00. Chopra is a best-selling author, an inspirational speaker,…

  • Moses and the Nice Commandments

    British broadcast journalist Jon Snow of TV4 has run a poll to have Britons vote on a modern restatement of the 10 commandments. The new list seems to run to 20 and includes try your best, be honest, be true to yourself, enjoy life, nothing in excess, live within your means, appreciate what you have,…

  • Healing Energy

    A story from the Guardian about the practitioners of energy medicine and faith healing questions studies that claim to show this stuff works. The writer treats New Age therapies like Reiki, some forms of Asian traditional medicine, and prayer as different versions of faith healing and that’s a reasonable approach. They all “work” by mysterious…