A Conversation with Abhijit Chanda

With over 1.4 billion people, India has the second largest population in the world, and is set to overtake China this year. Unfortunately, it has a culture steeped in harmful, irrational beliefs—making its people critically in need of skeptical outreach and good science-communication.
Unlike the US where the overwhelming majority of the population is unified in its understanding of a single language, the Indian people collectively speak a plethora of tongues; in fact, the Indian constitution recognizes 22 "scheduled languages."

These factors make the work of an Indian skeptic/science-communicator much more difficult than in any other large nation of which I am aware. Enter Indian national Abhijit Chanda.

I met Abhijit at CSICon 2022 and was immediately impressed. Because he came to Las Vegas from India—well over 24 hours of travel at great expense—I realized he must be really, really committed to the skeptical movement!
We had a long conversation, including details of his skeptical activism, and then I happily interviewed him for a Skeptic Zone podcast segment.

Abhijit has a YouTube channel and podcast devoted to helping his compatriots (and others of course) to become more “Rationable.” (“Be Rationable” is the name Abhijit uses for his media channels.) His work covers a variety of topics including critical thinking, pseudoscience, alternative medicine (apparently an even worse menace in India than in the US), and harmful Indian religious beliefs and traditions like the caste system.
Once we both got home from Vegas, I arranged to interview Abhijit for my Skeptical Inquirer column in an effort to spread the word about his vital work, so please enjoy our conversation!

Видео A Conversation with Abhijit Chanda канала Center for Inquiry