Noted Scientists Urge Fight Against Pseudoscience
A group of well-known Chinese scientists have urged the elimination of Falun Gong and other kinds of pseudoscientific phenomena and activities in China.
Falun Gong has deceived many people by taking advantage of senior citizens' hope of improving their health and undereducated people's ignorance, said Lu Yongxiang, president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).
If the absurd ideas fabricated by Li Hongzhi, founder of Falun Gong, are accepted, scientists need not develop medical science. And if the pseudoscientific ideas such as that water can be turned into petroleum, which emerged in China several years ago, are accepted, we need not exploit oilfields, Lu said in contempt.
He suggested that scientific knowledge should be popularized in China, and that scientific spirit be better advocated.
"China will witness more rapid development if a large number of the country's 1.2 billion population adopts the scientific spirit and attitudes," said Lu.
He emphasized that chicanery and activities violating scientific ethics should be banned in the academic field in China.
He Zuoxiu, an academician of CAS, who published an article criticizing Falun Gong in a magazine sponsored by Tianjin Normal University in April, said Falun Gong, with the aim of making money by cheating, has developed a large organization in China, and has been pursuing political ambitions.
"Falun Gong and other kinds of pseudosciences should be rooted out from China," said the 72-year-old physicist.
Zou Chenglu, an academician of the Institute of Biophysics under CAS, attributed the Falun Gong phenomenon to the lack of education in science.
"If scientific knowledge is not widely spread among ordinary citizens, and if the scientific spirit can not take root in the people's hearts, pseudoscientific activities will continue to deceive people, even after the banning of Falun Gong," Zou said.
Chen Jiansheng, an astronomer from CAS's Beijing Observatory, said superstition has all along taken shelter from the universe. Falun Gong preached many things about the universe that can not be known. Li Hongzhi alleged that he knows when the world will blow up or even can postpone the explosion by 30 years.
"It showed that Li is an ignorant cheater," Chen said, adding that the explosions of supernovas have been observed by scientists many times.
"But an explosion of the earth is sheer nonsense, for the earth has no nuclear burning process," said Chen.
He added that science, with the major task of exploring the future, progresses constantly. People should not deny science only because it can not answer all the problems we are facing now.
Zhu Lilan, minister of science and technology, said in a statement on behalf of the Chinese scientific circles Friday that scientists should shoulder the responsibility of promoting socialist modernization construction, and criticize Falun Gong and its leader Li Hongzhi's ridiculous ideas with large numbers of facts and scientific truths.
The ulterior motives of making money and disturbing social stability of Falun Gong should be further exposed, said Zhu in the statement.
Scientists are urged to explain the special phenomena of the universe and the human body to the general public and refute pseudosciences. (Xinhua)
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