Reading about the “I Can Do It®” seminars, I was amused to see that Gregg Braden is still inflicting his nonsense on the credulous. I read his book Awakening To Zero Point several years ago after a friend said, don’t criticize it if you haven’t read it. Well, fair enough. I’ve read it now and I am free to say with some authority, it’s bad. In fact, it’s astonishingly bad. Not only is it just plain wrong, but Braden’s blatant manipulation of his readers shows he must know it’s nonsense.
Braden is typical of a lot of Newage authors in that he starts with science but distorts it to draw unwarranted conclusions. Braden also makes up stuff and says it is science too. In this book, Braden starts with the Schumann Resonance, a low frequency radio signal caused by lightning strikes in the upper atmosphere. How many times do radio waves travel around the globe in a second? 7.8 times. This frequency, 7.8 times per second (7.8 Hz), is the Schumann Resonance frequency. Braden says it’s speeding up (it isn’t). To justify this he quotes a range of Schumann harmonic frequencies: 14, 20, 26, 33, 39. But anyone who has ever strummed a guitar will know what harmonic frequencies are. And they do not mean the base frequency is changing.
Braden needs to confuse his readers further, so with much fanfare he introduces Fibonacci numbers: 8, 13, 21, 34, 55. Note they are close to the Schumann harmonic frequencies. Braden hopes you will think Fibonacci numbers and Schumann frequencies are the same, because for no reason at all, he then states the Schumann Resonance is about to change from 7.8 Hz to the next Fibonacci number of 13 (Hz). Even if it’s true (it’s not), so what? Well, the Schumann Resonance is electro-magnetic radiation (radio waves). Braden says the Earth’s magnetic field is about to flip. See the connection? No? That’s because there isn’t one.
Why would this matter (even if true, which it isn’t)? Because only those “tuned in” to this change (ie those clued in by Braden), will be able to move to the necessary higher state of consciousness when all this happens. It’s typical New Age nonsense.
I wrote a much longer review of this book for Skeptic Report - Zero Point to Gregg Braden – where I expose Braden’s technique in more detail. Read it to learn how someone could write a 200 page book based on such little substance.
His more recent work includes The God Code, where he claims our DNA sequence, when read by assigning Hebrew characters to the base sequence, spells out God’s signature in Hebrew. He justifies this with quotes from a Kabbalah text, and heavy use of numerology combined with biased data selection. And if you think this makes any sense you’re reading the wrong blog.
You can still get tickets for Las Vegas. Only $350 to hear Braden talk you through this crap. What a deal.
If the orginal frequency is 7.8,the first harmonic is not 14 it would be 15.6 all the other frequencies quoted are wrong too.
Posted by: latibulum | April 13, 2005 at 06:48 AM
They're quasi-harmonics.
Posted by: Skeptico | April 13, 2005 at 07:14 AM
It's ironic that all of these new age hippy dippy dumbass frosted flakes are published in/by/at a House of Straw (Hayhouse)- incredibly weak and flimsy not unlike soggy breakfast cereal.
Posted by: JC | April 13, 2005 at 09:04 AM