This week’s report from the front lines of the War on Common Sense concerns a kind of “faith healing” known as “gazing.” The guy in the video, Braco (it’s pronounced brahtso), doesn’t make any claims himself — but he’s got a host of people who’ll do it for him. He gets up on a stage, stares at everyone while new age music plays, for something like ten minutes. Then he goes on his way, and everyone talks about how he’s healed them from everything from epilepsy to a stuffy nose. It even works via YouTube, but he warns everyone: don’t stare for longer than seven seconds, or you’ll be overcome by his power.
Karen Stollznow did a full writeup on the guy back in 2011 over at the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry that’s well worth the read. Or, of course, you could just experience it for yourself.
Happy Monday, everyone.
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Richard Ford Burley is a writer and doctoral candidate at Boston College, as well as an editor at Ledger, the first academic journal devoted to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. In his spare time he writes about science, skepticism, feminism, and futurism here at This Week In Tomorrow.