Shaffer: How much does your soul weigh?

DURHAM -- For at least 100 years, the more oddball branches of science have struggled to answer this metaphysical head-scratcher: How much does the human soul weigh?

In 1907, a Massachusetts doctor named Duncan MacDougall settled on the figure of 21 grams – the average weight loss experienced by six terminal tuberculosis patients he strapped to a scale at the moment of death.

A dozen years ago, an Oregon rancher named Lew Hollander tried to measure the souls of one ram, seven ewes, three lambs and a goat. His findings: The animals actually gained weight as they shook off this mortal coil – anywhere from 18 to 780 grams.

Now this summer, the Rhine Research Center in Durham will host the latest experiment aimed at nailing down the intangible essence of mankind.

The method: 1.) Stand on a scale. 2.) Have an out-of-body experience. 3.) Record weight.

“We want to have irrefutable evidence to present to the scientific community,” said Jerry Conser, a Dallas oil man and psychic researcher who came up with the idea. “We’re going to have a hurry-up, quick-and-dirty series of experiments. If we can show consistently and repeatedly that every time somebody goes out of body, there’s a corresponding weight change ...”

I’ll finish the sentence. It would be awesome.

The Rhine Center, named for the psychic research pioneer J.B. Rhine, is famous for probing into the world of unexplained phenomena: ESP, near-death experience, poltergeists.

Rhine himself was best-known for his ESP queries, including one that involved a mind-reading horse named Lady Wonder. But he also dabbled in the geography of man’s inner identity, penning an article in 1946 entitled, “Scientific Evidence Man Has a Soul.”

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What happens when you die?

Alongside the age old question regarding the meaning of life, what happens when you die is another one of those, seemingly unanswerable, questions most of us will ask ourselves at various points throughout our lives. The reason for such a morbid question couldn’t be simpler; it’s going to happen to each and every single one of us.

Death is something we share with everyone and every living thing. We are born, we live, and we die. To understand what happens when you die, we must first understand what death is. The dictionary definition of death is as concise at it is stark: The end of life; the total and permanent cessation of all the vital functions of an organism. In times gone by, the end of life was determined to be when a person stopped breathing or when they no longer had a pulse.

This resulted in many instances of people being declared dead when they were not, with some “miraculously” coming back from the dead – and others being buried alive. More recently, end of life has been determined to be when brain function has ceased. When your brain is gone, you are gone so to speak. So, your brain has ceased functioning, you’ve stopped breathing and you have no pulse. To put it bluntly, you are dead. What happens now?

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Has science explained life after death?

by Josh Clark

In 1991, Atlanta, Ga. resident Pam Reynolds had a near-death experience (NDE). Reynolds underwent surgery for a brain aneurysm, and the procedure required doctors to drain all the blood from her brain. Reynolds was kept literally brain-dead by the surgical team for a full 45 minutes. Despite being clinically dead, when Reynolds was resuscitated, she described some amazing things. She recounted experiences she had while dead -- like interacting with deceased relatives.

Even more amazing is that Reynolds was able to describe aspects of the surgical procedure, down to the bone saw that was used to remove part of her skull [source: Parker].
What's remarkable (although not unique) about Reynolds' experience is that it is the combination of an NDE and an out-of-body-experience (OBE). HowStuffWorks has braved this territory on the edge of reality, explaining how near-death experiences work and how a person can have an out-of-body experience. Science, too, has made its own headway toward explaining these weird phenomena. Two studies on the separate aspects of Reynolds' experience were conducted in 2007. Each seems to explain how a person can have an OBE or a NDE, but do they hold up in explaining experiences like Reynolds'? ­­

As many as 18 percent of people brought back from death after a heart attack said they'd had a NDE [source: Time]. While many religious adherents might not be surprised by these accounts, the idea that human consciousness and the body exist distinctly from each other flies in the face of science. A brain-dead person should not be able to form new memories -- he shouldn't have any consciousness at all, really.

So how can anything but a metaphysical explanation cover NDEs?
A study from the University of Kentucky has quickly gained ground among scientists as possibly the best explanation for NDEs. Researchers there theorize that the mysterious phenomenon is really an instance of the sleep disorder rapid eye movement (REM) intrusion. In this disorder, a person's mind can wake up before his body, and hallucinations and the feeling of being physically detached from his body can occur.

The Kentucky researchers believe that NDEs are actually REM intrusions triggered in the brain by traumatic events like cardiac arrest. If this is true, then this means the experiences of some people following near-death are confusion from suddenly and unexpectedly entering a dream-like state.

This theory helps explain what has always been a tantalizing aspect of the mystery of NDEs: how people can experience sights and sounds after confirmed brain death. The area where REM intrusion is triggered is found in the brain stem -- the region that controls the most basic functions of the body -- and it can operate virtually independent from the higher brain. So even after the higher regions of the brain are dead, the brain stem can conceivably continue to function, and REM intrusion could still occur [source: BBC].

This sounds like a good explanation for NDEs, but what about OBEs? Are they the same thing? Read the next page to discover the distinctions between near-death and out-of-body experiences.

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Reincarnation of Shanti Devi

In 1930, aged 4, Shanti Deva from Delhi, India, told her parents that she had once lived in a place called Muttra (now known as Mathura), that she had been a mother of three, who died in childbirth, and that her previous name was Ludgi. Because the girl continually related the story, her parents investigated. It turned out there was a village called Muttra, and that a woman named Ludgi had recently died there. They took Shanti to the village where she began to speak the local dialect and recognized her previous-life husband and children. She even gave twenty four accurate statements matching confirmed facts about Ludgi’s life. An impressive feat for a four year old.

One of the earliest and best-known documented cases of children who claim to recall a past life, that of Shanti Devi (studied by K.S. Rawat), also includes statements about her experiences after death and before her reincarnation.

Shanti Devi

In the 1930s when the idea of successive lives was not shared by the educated elite, the case of a 9-year-old girl Shanti Devi of Delhi attracted much public attention throughout India and soon its reports travelled far and wide in the entire world (Rawat, 1997). For the first time in history, a committee of fifteen persons, including journalists, was constituted to investigate the veracity of the statements made by the girl, claiming to be a Chouban (member of the Choubey family) of Mathura in her past life. Mathura, a town 145 kilometers from Delhi, never visited by the girl or her parents. Spiritualists and rationalists, scientists and laymen visited Delhi and Mathura either to investigate dispassionately or to support their religious beliefs or to entirely expose what they saw as a hoax. One such critic, Sture Lönnerstrand, came all the way down from Sweden to expose the ‘fake’ case. After completing his investigations he issued the statement: ‘This is the only fully explained and proven case of reincarnation there has ever been.” (Hunt, 1971.)

Shanti Devi was born in a middle class family of Delhi on December 11, 1926. She was just like any other ordinary girl, excepting that till the age of four she did not speak much. From the age of four, when she started speaking, she ceased to be an ordinary girl and her behaviour changed a lot. She started talking about her ‘husband’ and ‘children’. She would repeatedly describe her home and her husband’s shop at Mathura. She said she was a Chouban (member of the Choubey family) of Mathura and her name was Lugdi.

She would talk of the food and clothing she enjoyed in a former life. Her parents ignored her, but she persisted. Her parents got puzzled but she insisted on a visit to Mathura. For five years her parents tried to distract her mind but to no avail. At last, a sympathetic granduncle came to her aid. He asked her to give him the name and address of her ‘husband’ at Mathura. A friend, Lala Kishan Chand, wrote a letter to the address given by the girl. Soon a reply came, attesting that the statements of the girl were substantially correct. It was suggested that a relation of Choube Kedar Nath, Pt. (Pundit) Kanji Mal of Delhi might be allowed to interview the girl.

An interview was accordingly arranged. Shanti Devi is reported to have correctly recognized Pt. Kanji Mal as the younger cousin of her alleged husband. She gave convincing answers to the questions put to her by Pt. Kanji Mal. “After this conversation”, he wrote, “I was convinced that the girl was really my own relation, now personating in another body.” On November 13, 1935, Kedar Nath Choubey, along with his third wife (he had one prior to Lugdi) went to Shanti Devi’s house in Delhi.

Shanti Devi recognized her husband and expressed motherly affection towards her son Nitlal who was now her elder. She burst into tears and sobbed for about an hour. Late at night Kedar Nath Choubey took Shanti Devi in a separate room, and put her some intimate questions. He was satisfied by her answers and moved to tears.

Shanti Devi continued insisting on a visit to Mathura. She added many more details about her house and other events related to her former life. On November 24, 1935, she was taken to Mathura by the committee of fifteen eminent persons appointed on the advice of Mahatma Gandhi to investigate the veracity of the claim made by the girl.

She was: “kept under close observation and all her movements and remarks were carefully noted” by the committee. Shanti Devi is reported to have recognized a number of persons, answered all the queries put to her and spotted out the significant places connected with her past life.

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Indian woman declared dead 'wakes up' as family prepare funeral pyre

Source: Phantom and Monsters Blog

In a bizarre incident a 72-year-old woman, who was declared 'dead', started breathing when her relatives were about to burn her 'body' on the funeral pyre on Wednesday. The woman is presently ailing since she has a severe blood clot in her brain and is undergoing treatment at a private hospital.

The incident took place at a village in Nawalgarh district of Jaipur. Hundreds of relatives of Magan Kanwar, a native of Dadi Ka Phatak in Jhotwara, had gathered and were preparing for the woman's funeral. When some women were performing the ritual of bathing the 'dead body', they realized she was breathing. Immediately after, her son Surendra Singh Rathore took her to hospital and in the afternoon she was admitted to another private hospital.

Divulging the details of the incident, Rathore said, "My mother had slipped in the bathroom on January 23. We took her to a private hospital in the city. The hospital authorities on the morning of January 24 declared her dead. We asked them to check again since she was on a ventilator and the doctors had diagnosed her with brain haemorrhage." Rathore said when the doctors verbally declared her dead, the family without seeking any death certificate took her to the native village for funeral on Wednesday.

"At the village while performing some rituals we found my mother was breathing and alive. Later, a doctor there told us everything, including her heart beat and blood pressure, was normal. The doctors had said she was unconscious due to severe blood clot in her brain and so we brought her here," Rathore added. He claimed the hospital that had declared his mother dead did not gave them a valid death certificate. "I did not get it since I was disturbed at the news of her death."

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Little big man

Another great case from The Survival Top 40 is the James Leininger reincarnation case. This story is sufficiently well known that I don't think I need to summarize it; anyway, Miles Edward Allen's excellent summary is readily available at this link (PDF).

Besides the strongly evidential value of James' statements about the plane he piloted, the ship he flew from, the names of his fallen comrades, etc., there are three aspects of the case that strike me as particularly interesting.

First, little James showed strong emotions when remembering his past life as a pilot. The whole episode began with James' nightmares, in which he struggled and screamed in bed. Whatever he was experiencing was obviously vivid and terrifying. Moreover, he showed flare-ups of righteous indignation that would seem more appropriate for a WWII flier than a two-year-old. As Miles Edward Allen recounts, when James identified his ship as the Natoma, his father replied that the name sounded Japanese. "Little James grew indignant and said no. It was American!" It's certainly credible that a patriotic serviceman would have that reaction; after all, it was the Japanese who shot him down. James, on the other hand, was probably too young to know or care about the Japanese through his own personal experience.

Second, James' description of the downed pilot, given while he was in the throes of his nightmare, was "Airplane crash! Plane on fire! Little man can't get out!" I don't know if this has been commented on by others, but I couldn't help wondering why James would describe the pilot as a "little man." After all, the pilot was a full-grown adult, considerably larger than James, a toddler. It occurred to me that the description would make sense if the pilot were viewed from a distance - that is, from an external vantage point. Looking down (say) on the struggling pilot in the cockpit, one might very well see him as a "little man." Such a perspective is commonly reported in NDEs and OBEs, when a person rises out of his body and looks down on himself from a height. There have also been reports of "dual consciousness" in such situations, where the person is simultaneously looking at his body from an external perspective and still experiencing the pain or anxiety of his physical body. If James was in fact remembering an event from a former life, it is possible that he was reliving the pilot's experience of separating from his dying body while still maintaining some connection to it. Naturally James was much too young to have been exposed to NDE literature or influenced by it.

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2 Angels are taking away the soul of the dead child

This amazing video were sent by pastor Igor Shvedov.

Amateur video has unexpectedly photographed angels. On the screen, visiting angels of one of the apartments of an apartment house is visible. Afterwards, we found out it appeared at the time in the house a child has died. Angels are behind the soul of the child.

Video is taken in the city of Semipalatinsk (Kazakhstan).

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Near-Death Experiences Explained by Science

Charles Q. Choi, ScientificAmerican.com Date: 12 September 2011 Time: 04:14 PM ET

Near-death experiences are often thought of as mystical phenomena, but research is now revealing scientific explanations for virtually all of their common features. The details of what happens in near-death experiences are now known widely—a sense of being dead, a feeling that one's "soul" has left the body, a voyage toward a bright light, and a departure to another reality where love and bliss are all-encompassing.

Approximately 3 percent of the U.S. population says they have had a near-death experience, according to a Gallup poll. Near-death experiences are reported across cultures, with written records of them dating back to ancient Greece. Not all of these experiences actually coincide with brushes with death—one study of 58 patients who recounted near-death experiences found 30 were not actually in danger of dying, although most of them thought they were.

Recently, a host of studies has revealed potential underpinnings for all the elements of such experiences. "Many of the phenomena associated with near-death experiences can be biologically explained," says neuroscientist Dean Mobbs, at the University of Cambridge's Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit. Mobbs and Caroline Watt at the University of Edinburgh detailed this research online August 17 in Trends in Cognitive Sciences.

For instance, the feeling of being dead is not limited to near-death experiences—patients with Cotard or "walking corpse" syndrome hold the delusional belief that they are deceased. This disorder has occurred following trauma, such as during advanced stages of typhoid and multiple sclerosis, and has been linked with brain regions such as the parietal cortex and the prefrontal cortex—"the parietal cortex is typically involved in attentional processes, and the prefrontal cortex is involved in delusions observed in psychiatric conditions such as schizophrenia," Mobbs explains. Although the mechanism behind the syndrome remains unknown, one possible explanation is that patients are trying to make sense of the strange experiences they are having.

Out-of-body experiences are also now known to be common during interrupted sleep patterns that immediately precede sleeping or waking. For instance, sleep paralysis, or the experience of feeling paralyzed while still aware of the outside world, is reported in up to 40 percent of all people and is linked with vivid dreamlike hallucinations that can result in the sensation of floating above one's body. A 2005 study found that out-of-body experiences can be artificially triggered by stimulating the right temporoparietal junction in the brain, suggesting that confusion regarding sensory information can radically alter how one experiences one's body.

A variety of explanations might also account for reports by those dying of meeting the deceased. Parkinson's disease patients, for example, have reported visions of ghosts, even monsters. The explanation? Parkinson's involves abnormal functioning of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that can evoke hallucinations. And when it comes to the common experience of reliving moments from one's life, one culprit might be the locus coeruleus, a midbrain region that releases noradrenaline, a stress hormone one would expect to be released in high levels during trauma. The locus coeruleus is highly connected with brain regions that mediate emotion and memory, such as the amygdala and hypothalamus.

In addition, research now shows that a number of medicinal and recreational drugs can mirror the euphoria often felt in near-death experiences, such as the anesthetic ketamine, which can also trigger out-of-body experiences and hallucinations. Ketamine affects the brain's opioid system, which can naturally become active even without drugs when animals are under attack, suggesting trauma might set off this aspect of near-death experiences, Mobbs explains.

Finally, one of the most famous aspects of near-death hallucinations is moving through a tunnel toward a bright light. Although the specific causes of this part of near-death experiences remain unclear, tunnel vision can occur when blood and oxygen flow is depleted to the eye, as can happen with the extreme fear and oxygen loss that are both common to dying.

Altogether, scientific evidence suggests that all features of the near-death experience have some basis in normal brain function gone awry. Moreover, the very knowledge of the lore regarding near-death episodes might play a crucial role in experiencing them—a self-fulfilling prophecy. Such findings "provide scientific evidence for something that has always been in the realm of paranormality," Mobbs says. "I personally believe that understanding the process of dying can help us come to terms with this inevitable part of life."

One potential obstacle to further research on near-death experiences will be analyzing them experimentally, says cognitive neuroscientist Olaf Blanke at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne in Switzerland, who has investigated out-of-body experiences. Still, "our work has shown that this can be done for out-of-body experiences, so why not for near-death-experience-associated sensations?"

This article was first published at ScientificAmerican.com. © 1905 ScientificAmerican.com. All rights reserved.

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Girl who could communicate with the dead

Master Oregon note: The following story has been edited for correctness and clarity.

This is a reader contribution from our reader, Walter Parks, who can be reached at hparks@cfl.rr.com

My friend Dr. Robert (Bob) Russell said that he knew a girl that could communicate with the dead. I didn’t believe him. He invited me to an “encounter” to prove it.

We went to a very weird old house where a Paranormal Investigative Team was working. The team was led by the girl Amy, about 25 or so. She had another girl and 2 guys about her age as the rest of the team.

They had some pretty sophisticated equipment. Their equipment recorded the event in detail.

The temperature sensing equipment showed significant and rapid temperature drops when the "entities" appeared.

Their electromagnetic sensors recorded the spikes of appearance and higher than normal levels as their presence continued.

Their infra red cameras detected image hot spots that varied in size from small orbs to life size wisps of bright energy.

Their acoustic equipment recorded static "noise" and varying levels of frequency specific hums with their presence.

Amy and one of her other team members, Ted could detect all of this much faster than the other two team members and my friends Bob, Mike and I could.

They could also understand communications when the rest of us could only detect the static noise and hums.

Amy and Ted could also see people when the rest of us only saw varying sizes of orbs and bright un-discernable images.

But Bob, Mike and I saw enough to know that we experienced a real paranormal encounter.

The machine that measured temperature and its rate of change proved to be most interesting. Amy explained that when “entities” came over into our world that they need energy to materialize. That’s why it gets cold when ghosts, or whatever, come on the scene. They suck up the energy from the room or area so they can come into being.

The more energy that they are able to absorb, the more visible they become.

Mike and I were initially skeptical.

Amy asked if I believed that people had souls. I told her that I was taught to believe that in my southern Baptist upbringing, but I had drifted away as I studied and worked in the physics based aerospace industry.

Amy stared at me for a moment and then the detail explanations began. We discussed the soul, ghosts, paranormal events, parallel universes to the point that we all became believers.

I became so convinced that I set out on a data collecting research project to try to determine the science behind paranormal events. I tried to determine that, if there is a soul, how can it exist and be described scientifically.

I used my findings along with the inspiration from the paranormal encounter to write a film script about the paranormal encounter. This imagined script is included in this book: Paranormal Portal to a Parallel Universe.

Read the book and you will become a believer.

Walter Parks
UnknownTruths Publishing Co.
UnknownTruths.com

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Hindus Welcome Miley Cyrus’ Belief In Reincarnation

Hindus have welcomed American singer-actress Miley Cyrus’ reported belief into the concept of reincarnation.

Cyrus’ July 17 Tweet said: Dear Universe, For my next life can I please come back as some form of marine life? Such a great day. The water makes me feel so free :)

Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that it was kind of endorsement by Cyrus of an age old Hinduism concept, which we had been stressing all along. Zed invited Cyrus to look deeper into the rich philosophical thought which Hinduism, oldest and third largest religion of the world, offered.

Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, says that ancient Prashna Upanishad and Amritabindu Upanishad talk about rebirth. Brihadaranyaka Upanishad explains it beautifully: As a caterpillar, reaching the tip of a blade of grass, draws itself together and reaches out for a new foothold, so the Self, having come to the end of one life and letting go of ignorance, gathers in his faculties and reaches out from the old body to a new.

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Contact From Beyond the Grave Through Dreams

The loss of a loved one is a very serious thing, and so when one passes beyond, it’s always good to hear a final message of assurance from that other side. Skeptics have often addressed this phenomenon by suggesting that dreams involving loved ones who are no longer with us are a sign of distress and come purely from the memory. But what if the truth was somewhere between that interpretation and the purely spiritual one?

Perhaps one day the final mysteries of the paranormal will be in relation to the mind and its complex myriad processes. Though we can estimate the neurons and even get generalized ideas of the regions of the brain surrounding each emotion and even mental state, it’s difficult to take an objective look at how the brain works and say just what is going on. In fact, when it comes to the true deeper mechanism behind the brain it’s more mystery than fact.

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I am aunt''s reincarnation: Lady Gaga

London, Feb 20 (PTI) Pop superstar Lady Gaga believes that she is a reincarnation of her aunt, who died of lupus at the age of 19.

The ''Poker Face'' hitmaker said that she has two souls and her aunt, Joanne Germanotta, who died before the singer was born, is living through her now, reported Sun online.

"I really believe I have two hearts. I think I actually carry two souls in my body and that I''m living out the rest of her life and goodness. She died a virgin, she died never having experienced all these things we all get to love," said the controversial popstar, whose real name is Stefanie Joanne Germanotta.

The 24-year-old singer is a believer in ghosts and reportedly uses a ghost-busting device to sweep her concert premises and rid them of evil spirits.

The singer had earlier said that she saw a ghost while performing at London''s O2 Arena last year and has since worn protective talismans to keep them away.

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Incredible Nepal Living Buddha

A Nepalese boy whom some believe to be a reincarnation of the Buddha emerged after more than a year in the forest.


Picture is (C) copyright to Palden Dorje

Dubbed “Buddha Boy” by the press, and dismissed as a charlatan by some, the teenager first garnered headlines in 2005 when tens of thousands of devotees travelled to see him as he sat crosslegged amid the roots of a tree for nearly ten months without, it was claimed, food or water.

His Journey is amazing


[Click here finish his story]
[Official Biography]

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Scientific Evidence of Reincarnation

IS rebirth possible? Are there any scientific bases for believing in rebirth? Since time immemorial, man has been struggling to find a solution to this mystery but conclusive evidence has thus far eluded him.

Now, in probably the first-ever case of its kind, a Patiala-based forensic science expert has sought to scientifically prove the phenomenon. Putting forward for debate his research in a case involving the rebirth of a child who lived in Chakkchela village of Jalandhar district in his past life and now lives in Alluna Miana village of Ludhiana district, Vikram Raj Singh Chauhan claims to prove on the basis of the comparison between the handwriting of the child in his previous and present births, the theory that rebirth is possible. His findings have been hailed at the recent National Conference of Forensic Scientists at Bundelkhand University, Jhansi.


Picture is (C) copyright to krishna.org

A couple of months ago, a six-year-old boy Taranjit Singh of Alluna Miana village near Payal in Ludhiana claimed to remember his previous life. In fact, according to his economically weak parents, the boy had been claiming this since he was two years old and used to attempt to run away from home. The boy said he was born in Chakkchela village in Jalandhar district in his past birth and his real name was Satnam Singh and his father’s name was Jeet Singh. He said he was a student of Class IX in a school in Nihalwal village at the time of his death. On September 10, 1992, he was returning home on a bicycle from his school along with his friend Sukhwinder Singh when a scooter-rider named Joga Singh of Mirajwala village, Shahkot tehsil, hit him. He received serious injuries on his head and died the following day.

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Transferring the Memories and Feelings of a Dead Person into Ours

From: HypeSeek@AsiaParanormal

In the movies, often we see detectives with metaphysical abilities that connect them with the dead to solve a mystery case. So can we really embed the memories, including the feelings of a dead person into ours whom we absolutely have no connection with? Historing Tan, a writer on science offers to share a logical reasoning to the question.



Psychologists who studied the memory of human thought, speculated that memory were preserved in the protein molecules of the brain cell.

On the other hand, physiologists who studied the structure of human body found that nearly 98% of the cells are changed once a year, and the protein molecules in the brain cell are metabolized almost entirely in one or two days.

The human memory, however, is preserved to recall things many years ago.

If hypnotic methods are used, recalls can goes many years back and maybe recalling the ‘previous’ lives.

The question arises; how do the old cells transfer the memories to the new cells?

Some scientists have done so in passing their memory over to the newly born cell thru electric impulses.

If this is so that memory can be conserved thru electric energy, why should the consciousness which produces memory and imagination, not possible to be conserved in the space which is full of electricity?

If the principle of the conservation of consciousness is valid, it offers a theoretical explanation of people who experience recalling past lives or thought of being possess by spirit. In other words, the consciousness of a dead person is alive around us. Are we able to connect to them?

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Boy chosen by Dalai Lama turns back on Buddhist order

As a toddler, he was put on a throne and worshipped by monks who treated him like a god. But the boy chosen by the Dalai Lama as a reincarnation of a spiritual leader has caused consternation – and some embarrassment – for Tibetan Buddhists by turning his back on the order that had such high hopes for him.

Instead of leading a monastic life, Osel Hita Torres now sports baggy trousers and long hair, and is more likely to quote Jimi Hendrix than Buddha.

Yesterday he bemoaned the misery of a youth deprived of television, football and girls. Movies were also forbidden – except for a sanctioned screening of The Golden Child starring Eddie Murphy, about a kidnapped child lama with magical powers. "I never felt like that boy," he said.

He is now studying film in Madrid and has denounced the Buddhist order that elevated him to guru status. "They took me away from my family and stuck me in a medieval situation in which I suffered a great deal," said Torres, 24, describing how he was whisked from obscurity in Granada to a monastery in southern India. "It was like living a lie," he told the Spanish newspaper El Mundo.

Despite his rebelliousness, he is still known as Lama Tenzin Osel Rinpoche and revered by the Buddhist community. A prayer for his "long life" still adorns the website of the Foundation to Preserve the Mahayana Tradition, which has 130 centres around the world. The website features a biography of the renegade guru that gushes about his peaceful, meditative countenance as a baby.

In Tibetan Buddhism, a lama is one of a lineage of reincarnated spiritual leaders, the most famous of which is the Dalai Lama.

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