“Scientists suggested explanations” indicates befuddled skeptics groping for generalized answers with which to force the inexplicable into a materialist framework. To refer to the statement above as merely misrepresentative may be overly kind. A widely used college-level World Religions textbook states in its 2011 edition, referencing the 1995 incident: “Scientists suggested explanations such as mass hysteria or capillary action in the stone, but the phenomenon lasted only one day.” Nor has the lasting insistence that the Milk Miracle remains a mystery unsolved been confined to willfully credulous Hindus. Faithful supernaturalists have proved predictably unwilling to abdicate their miracle to non-magical explanations. The 1995 “Milk Miracle” hysteria spread throughout the world within the span of several days and has seen recurrences in the years since, despite the oft-repeated claim that the phenomenon was mysteriously confined within a 24-hour span. I fed a cup of coffee to a statue of Jawaharlal Nehru (India’s first prime minister) right before television cameras,” he said, “Even bricks are drinking milk.” When hysteria regarding milk imbibing statues struck again in 2006, the president of the Indian Rationalist Association, Sanal Edamaruku, was quoted in the press, “Forget deities. To illustrate this, the scientists colored their milk with a dye that remained apparent as it coated the statue. Representatives from India’s Ministry of Science and Technology arrived on-scene to demonstrate that what was being witnessed was simple “capillary action”: The surface tension of the milk created an upward pull upon contact with the surface of the statue before the liquid ran downward in a transparent film, while some was absorbed into the porous stones. Some believers may well have been unamused - especially those within the ranks of the afflicted and dying - that the gods had chosen such a valueless display with which to affirm their continued beneficent authority, but it was the science-minded unbelievers who were predictably the least impressed… Nor did it take long to figure out what was really going on. Police reinforcements were deployed by necessity to restrain outbreaks among the fevered milk-bearing mobs. The World Hindu Council hastily declared it a “miracle”, and by noon hopeful herds across North India stampeded to the temples leaving trampled bodies wounded underfoot. By what bizarre urging the first pilgrim to report this phenomenon was compelled to test whether a milk offering would pass the lips of a statue is unclear, but the idea rapidly took hold, devolving into a frenzy. Statue idols, it seemed, had taken to drinking milk being fed to them by spoon. Sound thinking and critical reservations were abruptly cast aside in New Delhi during the early morning hours of September 21st, 1995.
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