Science versus Miracles: Leaping on Broken Glass.

B Premanand

The Hata Yogi leaps barefoot from a table onto broken glass. 

Experiment: 136

Effect: Leaping on broken glass.

Props: 50 to 100 kg of the bottom of soda water bottles or beer bottles. Roll them in a big sack to grind down the sharp edges and make the pieces smooth. A table.

Method: The more glass there is, the safer it is to jump, because the force is absorbed by the heap of glass which is spread out to cushion your weight. First practise with shoes, then with socks, and finally barefooted.

 *** *** ***

While uploading the present writing of the late B Premanand, we stumbled upon an interesting and detailed exposition on the same topic at www.howstuffworks.com. We reproduce the article below. The original article is here

How can someone walk across broken glass without getting hurt?

by Tracy V. Wilson

A magician or street performer walking barefooted across broken glass is a dramatic spectacle. If you have a close-up view, you can see the person's feet pressing against the jagged edges. Sometimes, you can even hear glass breaking underfoot. It's clearly dangerous, and some performers claim that it requires the utmost concentration or even mystical intervention.

It's possible to fake a glass walk or to boost your chances of completing it without injury. Breakaway glass, also known as sugar or candy glass, is an easy-to-shatter substitute for real glass. When you see an actor break a bottle over someone's head, the bottle is usually made from candy glass. Broken edges can still be sharp, but the pieces aren't usually strong enough to pierce the sole of the foot. However, some types of candy glass can become sticky or powdery during the walk, ruining the illusion.

You can also protect your feet instead of using fake glass. One option is to use an adhesive like spirit gum to hold a flexible sole to the bottom of your foot. Another is to use over-the-counter skin-toughening products to make your feet a little sturdier and less sensitive.

However, none of this is really necessary for an experienced performer. Although it's possible to be badly cut, there are physical factors that make it possible to walk on broken glass unharmed:

• Many glass walkers use broken wine or champagne bottles. Unlike broken bottle necks or drinking glasses, these pieces have a relatively gentle curve. You're not very likely to find a piece of glass with multiple sharp edges sticking straight up.
• The bed of glass is usually thick. When you step down, the pieces shift against each other, moving the edges away from your foot. Some people use a slightly padded surface under the glass, adding a little extra give.
• Glass walkers typically take slow steps, repositioning their feet if they feel very sharp points. This gives the glass lots of time to settle and adds an extra measure of protection against punctures.
• Tiny pieces of glass that are likely to embed themselves into the skin naturally sift to the bottom of the pile.­

­­­If you've ever stepped on a single piece of broken glass and hurt yourself, this might not sound like much protection. But the surface involved in a glass walk is not like your kitchen floor. In a glass walk, the weight of your body is spread out over lots of pieces, which have the freedom to move. When you step on a single sliver of glass, your weight is concentrated over that one sharp point. In addition, if you accidentally cut yourself on a piece of glass, the culprit is usually the movement of your skin along the sharp edge. Walking on glass, on the other hand, requires you to put your feet straight down onto the edges, not to slide them around on the surface.

Even though glass walking is possible, it's still a dangerous activity. Don't try it at home.

Read More

Science versus Miracles: Curing Blister through Yogic Power

A Yogi claims to have overcome pain through meditation. He takes a lit cigarette and bums his fingertip and shows the blister. He is smiling and in meditation. After a short time the blister vanishes.

Experiment: 135

Effect: Overcoming Pain while burning your finger.

Props: A car key and a lighted cigarette.

Method: With your right hand in your pocket, press the ring hole of the key with the thumb and the index finger. Ask for a lighted cigarette, take the cigarette in your left hand, take out your right band from the pocket and touch the index finger end with the cigarette depositing some ash on the hole mark and show it to the audience. It will look a real blister. Meditate for a few minutes until the mark disappears and show that by your psychic power you have cured the blister.

Read More

Live Burial in a Pit under Samadhi

B Premanand

Pilot Saba of Delhi is an expert in live burial. In 1988 he was to perform an underground samadhi for 7 days at Nagpur in a pit of 10' x 10' x 10'. He was challenged as to why he needs such a big pit if after samadhi all his body functions came to a stop. He then agreed to do the feat in a glass chamber just enough for his body to fit. This would be sealed and made air-tight after re­moving the air. However, he never showed up to demonstrate his yogic powers.

Earlier, on October 1980, he had accepted a challenge to bury a person in a small pit just enough for him to sit in. He put Khareshwari Baba, a blind, deaf and dumb person, into a cemented pit of 10' deep and 3.5' square which was sealed. It was found that the helpless baba who did not know what was being done to him, had died inside and his putrefied body was infested with worms when he was removed. Though Pilot Saba had fixed a special contraption for oxygen he had forgotten to have an air exit. So pressure built up in the pit and the victim died.

Experiment: 47

Effect: Yogic burial.

A yogi sleeps on the ground near a pit of 6' x 3' x 3', goes into samadhi and becomes stiff. His pulse is checked and there is no pulse. In the stiff condition his body is lowered into the pit. The pit is then covered with planks or metal l' sheets and sealed with earth on the top. He comes out of the pit after four hours. 

Props: A pit of6' x 3' x 3'. One mat, a Turkish towel, 4' or 8' planks or metal sheets to cover the pit. Digger to spread earth on planks and to seal the pit.

Method: The volunteer lies down, becoming stiff in samadhi and there is no pulse. He is lowered in this stiff position into the pit and placed on the mat spread on the bottom. His face is covered with the Turkish towel so that the mud and the dust that falls when the earth is being spread on the planks do not get into his eyes and nose. The pit is closed with the planks or tin sheets and earth is spread on the planks and sides. The pit is completely sealed. After four hours the pit is opened and his body lifted out still in a stiff condition. He comes to life after a little while.

The air in the pit is enough for a person to remain sealed in for nine hours without any difficulty. Moreover, since the pit is not sealed completely with cement, air enters through the air holes in the ground; one hundred cubic feet of air is necessary for 24 hours. This has to be calculated after subtracting the body volume from the volume of the pit.

Experiment: 48

Effect: Live burial of head in a pit in shirshasana (upside down position). A small pit to fit the head of the mendicant, who does a head stand inside the pit. His assistant fills the pit with sand and he remains in this position for any number of hours.

Courtesy:
http://thehiddenlighthouse.blogspot.in

Props: A pit of 12" x 12" x 12", one piece of thin cloth and cotton.

Method: The cotton is loosely inserted in the nostrils and the head is tied with the towel so that sand and dust does not enter his nose, mouth or eyes. The sand is filled loosely and he gets enough air through the pores in the mud to breath by mouth while standing with his head inside the ground. If someone tries to stamp the earth, the mendicant would jump up as he will get suffocated. 

Read More

Levitation

B Premanand

The Godman of this century is Maharishi Mahesh Yogi who has exploited thousands of his disciples by offering to teach them levitation. In 1978 he held the first levitation demonstration of his students at New Delhi. The Supreme Court judge Y.R. Krishna Iyer had written an article that he had himself wit­nessed levitation by the students of Mahesh Yogi at Switzerland.

Maharishi Mahesh Yogi 

They were seated on 12" thick foam beds, and hopped up and down like frogs. According to Mahesh Yogi this was the first step in flying. Even after two decades of practising TM they have not gone beyond this hopping.

As a guru teaching others the art of levitation, it should be possible for him to fly himself. So we asked him to fly from New Delhi to Old Delhi to prove that levitation is possible. He agreed to prove that levitation is possible if we brought Rs.I0000/-. We were ready at his door-step the next day with this amount. His reply then was that his yogic siddhi of levitation was not for demonstration. We wondered why a person who could fly when ever he willed it should need half a dozen helicopters to get from place to place, and why he conducted the hopping demonstrations.

Experiment: 45

Effect: A yogi levitating

A yogi is seen sitting on a stool with his yoga-dand under one arm pit.  When he goes into samadhi his assistant removes the stool and he is seen to be suspended in mid-air.

Props: One three feet square and 6" high platform with a hole in the centre to hold the yoga-dand through it. A stool, a metal base to fit the bottom of the yogi with a rod upto his arm-pit, and a yoga dand.

Method: The platform is in the centre with the yoga dand fixed in it. The yogi sits on a stool with his hand on the yoga dand. He goes into samadhi. The metal base is inside his kaffni with the rod on the right side under the dress up to the arm-pit and fixed to the centre of the yoga-dand. As soon as he goes into samadhi the stool is removed by his assistant and he is levitating. With the back metal base fixed to Yoga Dand, he is hanging on the Yoga Dand.

Experiment: 46

Effect: Levitation using Hockey Sticks!

This is the best levitation trick I have ever seen without any props near the Red Fort in New Delhi. A bed is on the ground. A person comes and lies on it. He is covered with a very big bed sheet stitched like a mosquito net which has a hole for his head to see. Then he levitates slowly one foot up, then two and later to his height inside the bed sheet.

Props: Two hocky sticks hidden in his pyjama, one big bed sheet stitched like a double mosquito net with thick cloth, with a hole for the head to be seen, and a bed to lie down, and pillows.

Two Indian street magicians, Aas Mohammed and Babban Khan, 

performing the trick

Method: The person walks to the bed without anything visible. He lies on the bed and he is covered with the bed sheet after keeping some pillows on his body, his head protruding from the hole. While music and drums play he takes out the hockey sticks from his pyjama in his hands. He slowly raises the hockey stick inside the bed sheet along with raising his head. Then slowly he squats with the hockey sticks rising up along with him, gets to his knees and then stands erect inside the bed sheet with the hockey sticks in his two hands and his head only seen through the hole. He has levitated to his full height. Then he reverses, sitting on his knees, then squatting and then lying down. The hockey sticks are hidden and the bed sheet is removed and he comes out and waves his hands.

Read More

Yogic Siddhis – Stopping Pulse and Heart Beat

Godmen claim that when they are in samadhi all their bodily functions also stop like the pulse, heart-beat etc. The yogi asks the doctor to check his pulse. Then he goes into 'samadhi' and the doctor is surprised to find there is no pulse.

Experiment - 42

Effect: Stopping the pulse. 

Props: Two lemons or two handkerchiefs, a medical doctor.

Courtesy: Wikipedia

Method: Hold the two lemons in the two armpits. Or make a big knot in the handkerchiefs and tie them on either shoulder with the knots under the armpits. After the doctor examines the pulse, act as if you are meditating and going into samadhi. As you do so, slowly press the lemons or knots under the armpits. The doctor will note that the pulse is slowing down until it actually stops.

Pulse is the movement of blood in the artery. When the lemon or a knot under the armpit is pressed, the blood flow becomes slow and then stops.

A girl student of the Bhopal Medical College got the first prize in All India Yogic Competition at Kozhikode in Kerala for stopping her pulse through yoga. Some of my friends sent me the news report with her photograph. It was found that she had fooled the yoga examiners by simply pressing her hands against her chest muscles and thus stopping the pulse. Later, I found that she had earlier attended one of my lectures.

[Editor's note: A tennis ball too can be used instead of a lemon, as shown in the following video]

Experiment- 43

Effect: Stopping heart beat.

The yogi sits in padmasana and the doctor checks his heart beat. Then the yogi takes deep breaths, controls the breath, and goes into samadhi. The doctor finds that his heart beat is beating faster and faster and then slowing down until it has completely stopped.

Props:  Medical doctor with stethoscope.

Method: Fill the lungs with as much air as possible and keep the breath in by pressure in the abdomen and chest. An air cushion is thus created which absorbs the heart beats so that the doctor cannot detect them with his stethoscope.

Experiment - 44

Effect: Increasing the body temperature.

The yogi asks the doctor to check his temperature which would be normal. He sits in meditation and requests the doctor to check his temperature every five minutes. The doctor finds that within 15 to 30 minutes his temperature has risen to 104° F.

At the Occult Conferences at New Delhi and Bangalore in 1990, the press reported the claims of Dalai Lama that the Tibetan monk can control the cold through meditation. And that they remain naked without feeling cold. In the conference the above stunt was demonstrated as to how they increase the body heat and control the winter cold.

In reality, if the temperature of a person rises above the normal tempera­tures of 97.6°F., he is ill and suffering from fever. If the temperature increases to 102° F or above, he shivers even in hot weather. Thus the increase in body temperature cannot control the cold.

Cold is felt when coldness touches the skin and through the skin pores it gets registered in the brain. So, to control cold we wear warm clothes which do not absorb the cold. They thus help the body to retain its normal temperature. What really helps Tibetans is not the meditation but the application of yak fat all over their bodies which helps the body to retain its heat and also stops the cold from coming directly into contact with skin.

Props: Soap of 8 to 10 ph value of 50 paisa coin size and diameter. A cup of hot and very strong tea made with 3 spoons of tea leaves. A doctor and a thermometer.

Method: Ask the doctor to check the temperature. Chew the soap and swallow it. He will find it normal. Now drink the cup of tea, and act as if you are doing pranayama (controlling the breath). Request the doctor to check your temperature every five minutes. He will find that it is rising by 10 to 20 F every five minutes until it reaches near about 1040 F.

This is a chemical reaction. Heat is generated when alkali and acid come together. The soap is alkaline and tea has 35% tannic acid. When both these combine in the stomach a reaction takes place and heat is generated, which will go on until the reaction is over. After the demonstration drink as much cold water as possible to bring down the temperature to normal. 

Read More