Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Kill the President

So some swami comes on the the television and tells me he can kill a man with his mystical powers, and an Indian Rationalist says "kill me," so the swami tries and, after several hours (this is public broadcasting), the Indian Rationalist is still alive. So there. Question for lawyers: should the swami be charged with attempted murder?

Harvestbird told me this.










4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Evidently the swami was trying to make the guy die laughing.

Keri h said...

"Silly Beliefs" has more information.
The Rationalist Society of India sounds like it is doing a tiny-but growing- good job.
The 'hit attempt' was the face/voice of the Indian rationalist society-
(Youtube stuff available if you go for that kind of stuff)

Lisa said...

Likely not, actually, assuming the Indian penal code is still similar to ours.

Most crimes against the body require both a mental element (intention) and an act. These are called the mens rea and the actus reus.

It would be difficult to argue that the 'act' of sending brain waves or whatever was not simply mens rea. And, fortunately, we're not generally convicted for our thoughts.

Not the host Paul said...

and a nutter tried to bring down a QANTAS plane using only the power of his mind:

http://www.smh.com.au/travel/travel-news/qantas-passenger-threatens-to-bring-down-flight--with-power-of-his-mind-20100406-rng7.html