Ravindra Papineni

Godmen offer miracles. They sell illusions. They promise a direct line to heaven. Yet, their followers are not just the uneducated or the destitute. They are doctors, engineers, tech executives, and civil servants—millions of educated Indians who, despite their training in logic and reason, fall for what often amounts to little more than low-level magic tricks. Why does this happen? And more importantly, how can we steer ourselves and our society towards a path of rational thinking and...

For millennia, humanity has faced the same relentless enemies: plagues that swept through cities, famines that starved nations, and diseases that stole children in their prime. In the face of such overwhelming despair, the default response was often to kneel and pray for divine intervention. But history tells a different story about what actually works. It wasn't prayer that ended the reign of polio. It wasn't prayer that wiped smallpox from the face of the Earth. And it wasn't prayer that...

Pilgrims in river Ganges. Photo courtesy Getty Images. The Ganges River, or Ganga, holds a place of unparalleled reverence in Hinduism. For millions, a dip in its waters is a sacred act, believed to cleanse sins and bring spiritual merit. Yet, the biological reality of the river today stands in stark, dangerous contrast to its spiritual status. The truth is, bathing in the Ganges is a profound health risk, and the spiritual reward simply does not outweigh the physical danger. The Paradox of...