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Narendra Nayak
Narendra Nayak (born 5 February 1951) is a rationalist, sceptic, and godman debunker from Mangalore, Karnataka, India.Nayak is the current president of the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations (FIRA). He founded the Dakshina Kannada Rationalist Association in 1976 and has been its secretary since then. He also founded an NGO called ''Aid Without Religion'' in July 2011. He tours the country conducting workshops to promote scientific temper and showing people how to debunk godmen and frauds. He has conducted over 2000 such demonstrations in India, including some in Australia, Greece, England, Norway, Denmark, Sri Lanka and Nepal. He is also a polyglot who speaks 9 languages fluently, which helps him when he is giving talks in various parts of the country. Life and work Nayak was named after Swami Vivekananda (born Narendra Nath Datta). He has stated that seeing his father's business premises being repossessed by the bank and his father buying a lottery ticket on the a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mangalore
Mangalore (), officially known as Mangaluru, is a major port city of the Indian state of Karnataka. It is located between the Arabian Sea and the Western Ghats about west of Bangalore, the state capital, 20 km north of Karnataka– Kerala border, 297 km south of Goa. Mangalore is the state's only city to have all four modes of transport—air, road, rail and sea. The population of the urban agglomeration was 619,664 national census of India. It is known for being one of the locations of the Indian strategic petroleum reserves. The city developed as a port in the Arabian Sea during ancient times, and has since become a major port of India that handles 75 percent of India's coffee and cashew exports. It is also the country's seventh largest container port. Mangalore has been ruled by several major powers, including the Kadambas, Alupas, Vijayanagar Empire, Keladi Nayaks, and the Portuguese. The city was a source of contention between the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an island country in South Asia. It lies in the Indian Ocean, southwest of the Bay of Bengal, and southeast of the Arabian Sea; it is separated from the Indian subcontinent by the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait. Sri Lanka shares a maritime border with India and Maldives. Sri Jayawardenepura Kotte is its legislative capital, and Colombo is its List of cities in Sri Lanka, largest city and financial centre. Sri Lanka has a population of around 22 million (2020) and is a multinational state, home to diverse cultures, languages, and ethnicities. The Sinhalese people, Sinhalese are the majority of the nation's population. The Tamils, who are a large minority group, have also played an influential role in the island's history. Other long establ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indian CSICOP
Indian CSICOP is a well-known rationalist group based at Podanur, Tamil Nadu, India. Founded by Basava Premanand (1930–2009). Indian CSICOP is in the forefront of the rationalist campaigns in India which attempt to expose perceived miracles and to eradicate superstitions. Indian CSICOP is an affiliate of the US-based skeptical group CSICOP and it publishes ''Indian Skeptic'', a rationalist periodical. It is also affiliated to the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations, which is an apex body of about 65 rationalist, atheist and organizations aimed at popularization of science among laypersons. It is an associate member of International Humanist and Ethical Union based in London. One of the main targets of criticism by the ''Indian Skeptic'' are the miracles and magic of the guru Sathya Sai Baba Sathya Sai Baba (born Ratnakaram Sathyanarayana Raju; 23 November 192624 April 2011) was an Indian guru. At the age of fourteen he claimed that he was the reincarnation o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Times Of India
''The Times of India'', also known by its abbreviation ''TOI'', is an Indian English language, English-language daily newspaper and digital news media owned and managed by The Times Group. It is the List of newspapers in India by circulation, third-largest newspaper in India by circulation and largest selling English-language daily in the world. It is the oldest English-language newspaper in India, and the second-oldest Indian newspaper still in circulation, with its first edition published in 1838. It is nicknamed as "The Old Lady of Bori Bunder", and is an Indian "newspaper of record". Near the beginning of the 20th century, Lord Curzon, the Viceroy of India, called ''TOI'' "the leading paper in Asia". In 1991, the BBC ranked ''TOI'' among the world's six best newspapers. It is owned and published by Bennett, Coleman & Co. Ltd. (B.C.C.L.), which is owned by the Sahu Jain family. In the Brand Trust Report India study 2019, ''TOI'' was rated as the most trusted English newspap ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gulbarga
Kalaburagi, formerly known as Gulbarga, is a city in the Indian state of Karnataka. It is the administrative headquarters of the Kalaburagi district and is the largest city in the region of North Karnataka ( Kalyana-Karnataka). Kalaburagi is 623 km north of the state capital city of Bangalore. It was incorporated into the newly formed Mysore State (now known as Karnataka) through the States Reorganisation Act in 1956. Kalaburagi city is governed by a Municipal Corporation and is in the Kalaburagi Urban Region. It is called a Sufi city. It has famous religious structures, like the Khwaja Banda Nawaz Dargah, the Sharana Basaveshwara Temple and the Buddha Vihar. It also has a fort built during the Bahmani rule. Other Bahmani monuments include the Haft Gumbaz (seven domes together) and the Shor Gumbad. Kalaburagi has the world's largest cannon. Kalaburagi has a few architectural marvels built during the Bahamani Kingdom rule, including the Jama Masjid in the Kalaburagi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kerala
Kerala ( ; ) is a state on the Malabar Coast of India. It was formed on 1 November 1956, following the passage of the States Reorganisation Act, by combining Malayalam-speaking regions of the erstwhile regions of Cochin, Malabar, South Canara, and Thiruvithamkoor. Spread over , Kerala is the 21st largest Indian state by area. It is bordered by Karnataka to the north and northeast, Tamil Nadu to the east and south, and the Lakshadweep Sea to the west. With 33 million inhabitants as per the 2011 census, Kerala is the 13th-largest Indian state by population. It is divided into 14 districts with the capital being Thiruvananthapuram. Malayalam is the most widely spoken language and is also the official language of the state. The Chera dynasty was the first prominent kingdom based in Kerala. The Ay kingdom in the deep south and the Ezhimala kingdom in the north formed the other kingdoms in the early years of the Common Era (CE). The region had been a prominent spice exp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Basava Premanand
Basava Premanand (17 February 1930 – 4 October 2009) was an Indian skeptic and rationalist from Kerala, India. He organised many tours around rural India for the promotion of scientific thinking, exposing alleged miracles and scams carried out by various charlatans and godmen while spreading awareness of dangerous superstitions. Premanand was the founder of the Federation of Indian Rationalist Associations, the convener of Indian CSICOP, and the owner-publisher-editor of the monthly magazine ''The Indian Skeptic'', which investigates paranormal claims in India. Early life In the 1940s, Premanand quit school to take part in the Quit India Movement. With that his traditional schooling ended. His next seven years were spent in the newly started Sri-Steila Gurukula, where the Shantiniketan-Wardha brand of education was imparted. He was strongly influenced by Helena Blavatsky in his early years and in 1976 met the Sri Lankan skeptic Abraham Kovoor during his Miracle Exp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kasturba Medical College
Kasturba Medical College, Manipal and Kasturba Medical College, Mangalore, together known as KMC, are two private medical colleges in coastal Karnataka, India, established in 1953.Manipal Education The colleges were established as a single unit and later became two colleges with their own teaching hospitals. KMC was the first self-financing medical college in India. The colleges are constituent units of Manipal Academy of Higher Education, formerly known as Manipal University, an [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Hindu
''The Hindu'' is an Indian English-language daily newspaper owned by The Hindu Group, headquartered in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. It began as a weekly in 1878 and became a daily in 1889. It is one of the Indian newspapers of record and the second most circulated English-language newspaper in India, after '' The Times of India''. , ''The Hindu'' is published from 21 locations across 11 states of India. ''The Hindu'' has been a family-owned newspaper since 1905, when it was purchased by S. Kasturi Ranga Iyengar from the original founders. It is now jointly owned by Iyengar's descendants, referred to as the "Kasturi family", who serve as the directors of the holding company. The current chairperson of the group is Malini Parthasarathy, a great-granddaughter of Iyengar. Except for a period of about two years, when S. Varadarajan held the editorship of the newspaper, the editorial positions of the paper were always held by members of the family or held under their direction. His ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rationalism
In philosophy, rationalism is the epistemological view that "regards reason as the chief source and test of knowledge" or "any view appealing to reason as a source of knowledge or justification".Lacey, A.R. (1996), ''A Dictionary of Philosophy'', 1st edition, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1976. 2nd edition, 1986. 3rd edition, Routledge, London, 1996. p. 286 More formally, rationalism is defined as a methodology or a theory "in which the criterion of truth is not sensory but intellectual and deductive".Bourke, Vernon J., "Rationalism," p. 263 in Runes (1962). In an old John Locke (1690), An Essay on Human Understanding controversy, rationalism was opposed to empiricism, where the rationalists believed that reality has an intrinsically logical structure. Because of this, the rationalists argued that certain truths exist and that the intellect can directly grasp these truths. That is to say, rationalists asserted that certain rational principles exist in logic, mathematics, ethics ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Astrologer
Astrology is a range of divinatory practices, recognized as pseudoscientific since the 18th century, that claim to discern information about human affairs and terrestrial events by studying the apparent positions of celestial objects. Different cultures have employed forms of astrology since at least the 2nd millennium BCE, these practices having originated in calendrical systems used to predict seasonal shifts and to interpret celestial cycles as signs of divine communications. Most, if not all, cultures have attached importance to what they observed in the sky, and some—such as the Hindus, Chinese, and the Maya—developed elaborate systems for predicting terrestrial events from celestial observations. Western astrology, one of the oldest astrological systems still in use, can trace its roots to 19th–17th century BCE Mesopotamia, from where it spread to Ancient Greece, Rome, the Islamic world, and eventually Central and Western Europe. Contemporary Western astr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lottery
A lottery is a form of gambling that involves the drawing of numbers at random for a prize. Some governments outlaw lotteries, while others endorse it to the extent of organizing a national or state lottery. It is common to find some degree of regulation of lottery by governments. The most common regulation is prohibition of sale to minors, and vendors must be licensed to sell lottery tickets. Although lotteries were common in the United States and some other countries during the 19th century, by the beginning of the 20th century, most forms of gambling, including lotteries and sweepstakes, were illegal in the U.S. and most of Europe as well as many other countries. This remained so until well after World War II. In the 1960s, casinos and lotteries began to re-appear throughout the world as a means for governments to raise revenue without raising taxes. Lotteries come in many formats. For example, the prize can be a fixed amount of cash or goods. In this format, there is ri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
